Chapter 3
Deployment
White House
“Mr. President, they’re ready.” Jack Shepherd’s chief of staff said from
the doorway.
“Right.” Shepherd replied. He ran his hand through the silver hair,
wondering how the hell this had all happened. China, India, Pakistan, and
North Korea. They all had something in common. Now, so did this group of
Russian rebels.
Shit.
“Sir?”
“Coming, Dan.” the president lifted himself from behind the decorativly
carved desk and walked reluctantly across the blue carpet of the Oval
Office. He and his wife had just had lunch with Representative Mino Aino and
it was not quite sitting right with him. After all, they had been talking
about HB-803, which made Jack so angry it made his stomach turn.
“I’m fifty-three and yet I feel like I’m eighty.” he thought. “Note to
self: don’t get reelected.”
“This wouldn’t happen to be about those two Chinese Jainghu-class frigates
that put to sea this morning, is it?” he asked his Chief of Staff, Dan
Dorfeld, hoping i could only be that simple, that the rumor was just a
rumor. Maybe China had been acting up again. They weren’t happy about losing
two fighters to the Americans, even though it was obvious that they had
threatened a carrier group. But they had stopped saber-rattling Taiwan.
He could only hope.
“No, sir.” Dorfeld responded, “From what they tell me, this is much worse.
“Jesus.” Shepherd mumbled, his New Englander’s accent coming through. He
needed no leading to the Situation Room. He had spent more than his fair
share of time in that godawful room at the head of that godawful table
lately.
“Jumper has arrived.” the Secret Service agent at the door said into his
mike just as the President entered the wooden doors. Eight men, five in
uniform, were standing at attention.
“Take a seat, gentlemen.” Shepherd commanded impatiently as he sat at the
end of the table. “Now someone please tell me what the hell is going on?”
“Well, sir,” a young freshfaced man said, “It’s about the Kuril Islands.”
“I already know that!” Jack snapped, “Who is this crack addict, anyway?”
CIA Director Ethan Howly stood up, “Well, Mr. President, this is Greg
Masters. He made the discovery that we’re trying to tell you about.”
POTUS was silent for a moment, all the while thinking “oops.” Finally, he
gestured to Greg, “let’s have it.”
Obligingly, Greg clicked a button on a remote and an overhead picture of an
airbase came into view. “Mr. President, we’re just now learning the full
strength of the rebels’ power. This is a satelite shot of Malka Airbase.
These aircraft are from squadrons two fifty-, three-, five-, and seven
hundred Squadrons of the Russian 7th Red Banner Air Force. They contain
MiG-27s, MiG-29s, Su-27s, and Tu-95 aircraft respectively. The rebels also
control about two motor rifle divisions consisting of T-80 and -90 main
battle tanks, BMP-3 infantry fighting vehicles, BRDM-2 anti-tank vehicles,
M-1973 and Splav artillary support, a detatchment of six Ka-50 Hokum
helicopters, and various numbers of SA-13 and SA-19 SAMs. They also control
a Kiev-class CVA equiped with twelve V/STOL Yakolev 41s and the Akula-class
submarines Vepr and Pantera.
“The JSDF are fielding divisions of type 74 MBTs and squadrons of jF-15,
jF-4, and Mistubishi F-1 aircraft to counter these threats. They also have
the destroyers Haruna, Hiei, and Kikuzuki and a Yuushio-class hunter/killer
sub to counter the naval threats.”
“Nothing more powerful? That Kiev is a carrier.”
“They don’t have anything more powerful.” Greg answered.
“Why?”
“Well,” Howly reported, “the 1945 treaty does not allow it.”
“With them so close to Russia? That was stupid.” Shepherd shook his head,
“I can’t believe we were so blind as to ruin an ally’s defense right before
the Cold War began.” None of the other men in the room could think of a
rebuttle.
Greg continued. “This, sir, is what we’re most concerned about.” He clicked
to the picture that had sent him wild. “This is a group of silos for SS-18
ICBMs. So far, we’ve found just this one, but there could be more.”
“I thought SS-18s were banned by treaty.” Shepherd said.
“Well, the Russians have a problem with dismantling them because the fuel
is highly unstable, being both acidic and very flammable.” Greg told him,
“The, uh, facilities needed are expensive and with the recent economic
collapse...”
“I see, go on.”
“The missiles have a range of about 9100 miles and each one has seven
multistage individually targetable reentry vehicles, or MIRVs. Each of the
warheads on these MIRVs has a yield of about 5 megatons.”
“Citybusters.” someone commented.
“With these capabilities, they could come across the globe and strike our
west coast or go over the poles and hit Washington, New York, etc.”
“But this little piss party is with Japan.” Shepherd pointed out, “Wouldn’t
the rebels strike there first?”
Greg thought it over a second. “My guess is they’d send two missiles for
Japan, one for a strike against the various cities important to defense and
one for a high-altitude burst to take out communications and electronics
with an electro-magnetic pulse. The other six would head our way. Four for
city strikes and two for EMP would probably be enough to take us out of the
loop for a while.”
“How acurate are these MIRVs?”
“Acurate.” Greg answered, “On tests, the reentry vehicles landed warheads
within two miles of the target.”
“Close enough to vaporize.” Shepherd nodded. He then asked the most
predictable question in a crisis. “Where’s the nearest carrier?”
“The Ronald Reagan is in the Sea of Okhotsk monitoring the situation and
making sure it stays inside the Kurils.” Admiral Jeremy Boort answered.
“What about others?”
“The George Washington is in the Taiwan straight, having releaved the
Stennis two months ago. Those are all that’s at sea.”
“How many carriers do we have in the Pacific arena?” Shepherd asked,
somewhat irate.
“Four, sir: the Washington, Eisenhower, Stennis, and Reagan. Well... three.
The Ike is currently having her reactors refueled.”
“Three carriers?” Shepherd’s eyes went wide, “Of the eleven carriers we
have, only three are in the world’s largest ocean?”
“Two, sir.” Boort corrected, “The Stennis is...”
“Shut up! I don’t feel like knowing how bad off we are.” the president
snapped, “Now, what do you gentlemen figure we do?”
Howly was the first to come up with an answer. “Well, sir, the rebels have
made no overtly agressive moves. I don’t think we shouldn’t really get
involved until we absolutely need to.”
Shepherd put his head in his hands. He weighed the possibility, but decided
this was the best course of action. “Alright, but put the Stennis on in-port
alert. And do we have any bombers based in Alaska?”
“I can have the 39th Strategic up there by tomorrow.”
“Good, then. Go to it.”
Sea of Okhotsk
Two weeks later...
The waters were cold and black off the Kamatchka Pennensula, seeming to be
a liquid void. The cold alone could kill in minutes. If that failed, the
rough seas might do the trick. An if not that... the crew of the USS
Indianapolis knew what fate awaited.
There was a pod of them swimming southward just beneath the black waves.
Ravenous, the tiger sharks searched for schools of fish on which to feed.
They torpedoed through the water, attempting to sense vibrations that might
lead them to a source of food.
Suddenly, the leader felt something. There was a tremor in the water. It
was unfamiliar. The source was moving too fast for a school of fish. On
instinct, the lead shark broke and dove just as three Saracha hydrofoils
knifed through the water.
As the pod of sharks went deeper, there was less light. In spite fo their
ability to sense electrical impulses, they were not aware that yet another
predator lurked in these waters. At least not until they slammed into the
titanium hull.
This too was a shark. In fact, that is what the Russian word NATO so
designated it means. The Soviets called it Bars, but it is better known by
the NATO designation: Akula.
The Akula-class is a podvodaya lodka atomnaya, or nulear powered submarine,
built as a hunter/killer. Driven by a mercury-cooled reactor, he (unlike
most countries, the Russians refer to ships as males) is the most silent and
arguably the most deadly vessel afloat. Indeed, sunken wrecks are known to
make more noise. In the world of the silent service, he is an invisible
enemy.
His six forward torpedo tubes had already been flooded. This would aid in
catching his prey off guard. Even now, the enemy was probably too
preoccupied with the three hydrofoils that had passed noisily overhead,
their surface radars active and searching. These were simply a distraction.
The first wind the Americans would get of the Vepr was when his first
torpedos hit. By then, it would be too late.
Torpedo tubes one, two, five, and six were opened to the void of sea. From
port to starboard, four type 65 torpedoes gurgled into existance. Traveling
far beneath the surface, there was no wake trail indicating their movement.
They would only turn surfaceward when they were beneath the target, so as to
avoid the anti-torpedo defenses the Nimitz-class aircraft carrier had.
The first hit just as the Ronald Reagan was preparing to launch an A-6 from
her deck to deal with the Saranchas. The Intruder was jolted from the
catapult truck and sent rolling off the side of the deck without enough
speed to keep her aloft. As the pilot desperately tried to rotate, the
attack jet stalled out and crashed into the black ocean.
The second rammed into the hull below a corner of the deck overhang. More
aircraft were loosed from their deck chains as sent into the sea.
The third missed, but the last stuck the number two propellar. The shock
tore three of the blades from the five-pedal screw. This unbalanced a
propellar that was already turning at full speed, 130 RPM. The forces caused
by the imbalance were awesome. The shaft fittings were torn open and the
skegs holding the propulsion system in place were twisted away. Moments
later, the aft portion of the shaft alley began to flood.
Though nuclear powered, the Reagan was steam driven. The two nuclear
reactors boiled the water to provide the steam needed to drive her. That
steam went into a sort of heat exchange system, used to boil other water,
and then piped sternward into a high-pressure turbine. The steam turned the
turbine much like a water-wheel was turned by the flow of a stream. What was
left over would be spewed into a low-pressure turbine so as not to waste
energy. The turbines had very rapid RPM. This was much to fast to be used
effectively by a turning prop. To solve this problem, a set of gears used in
much the same way as a car transmission was placed between the turbines.
These were comparatively brittle to other systems. The shock from the
torpedo hit stressed these gears beyond their design limits. The umbalanced
shaft now had enough energy to demolish the entire number two drivetrain.
The gears and other various parts of the drive system were now projectiles
with enough force to slice through the steel deck and bulkheads of the
engine rooms. The drive shaft twisted, rotating entirely off the supports
and slamming through the nearby bulkead, jamming into the transmission of
the number one drive. This shaft rose up, throwing off its skegs before
jumping sideways, ripping a gash in the hull.
Water flooded in and moments later, the Reagan was listing sideways with
her stern sinking.
The number three and four drivetrains were pushing dead weight off center.
At this angle, the shafts snapped and jammed forward before sliding limply
out the stern.
In this way, the USS Ronald Reagan (CVN-76) was seriously crippled. Within
hours, she was twenty-seven degrees off her keel and sliding under. It would
take until just after dawn for her to finally disappear beneath the cold
black waters. Five hundred fourty nine sailors would go with her. The others
would be picked up by the cruisers and destroyers of the task force, but not
before the sharks picked off a few.
By the time the beleaguered remains of the carrier task force hit port in
Bolsheretsko, Russia, the news of the sinking was in the papers. There were
photos of the Reagan with towers of water shooting up from her stern and
even a video of her sinking. This video was taken by a seaman on the
guided-missile destroyer USS Arleigh Burke (DDG-51). A clip of which was
shown on the afternoon news.
The front page of the Los Angeles Times was plastered with a photo of the
task force under protective escort by three Russian frigates. It was a
picture that would later be shown in history books as one of the great signs
of post-Cold War friendship.
At her aparment in San Diego, Navy Lieutenant Amy Anderson had recieved the
alert call within an hour of the attack. She ordered a taxi to take her to
Miramar, where Carrier Air Wing number Seven was being prepped for emergency
deployment. The Johnny Reb was already at sea with her task force, awaiting
her air wing before setting sail for the Kurils.
Most of the crew were not fond of the idea of going into combat. With a
sister ship now making a nice nest for fish, what was to prevent their boat
from going under?
“I’m not so sure I like this” Wax comlained as several of the pilots
awaited their aircraft to be rolled out and readied.
“We’re the only carrier that’s conviniently available.” Mercury argued.
“I know.” Wax said, “That’s the part that scares me. We’re the only ones
for them to shoot at.”
“Don’t tell me you’re scared.”
“Hell, yes, Merc.” Wax threw his hands up, “You should be, too. Else you’re
pretty fuckin’ crazy.” Before she could rebuke, his RIO called him over.
Their Tomcat was ready to go.
Los Angeles
“...the first American aircraft carrier to be sunk since World War II.”
Peter Jennings was saying on the news, “The loss of this ship alone puts the
US Navy back three point five billion dollars. That does not include the
some eighty-two aircraft she took down with her. The loss of the Ronald
Reagan will also set back the schedule for retireing its older carriers. The
John F. Kennedy was scheduled for decommissioning two years from now, in
2007 after the USS Thomas Jefferson, carrier number 77, is launched. Now,
the already elderly Kennedy will have to continue service until 2011, when
the as yet unnamed CVN-78 will be launched. And the Enterprise, which is
nearing the end of her career, will be decomissioned in 2020, five years
after her scheduled retirement...”
“Serena, it’s for you.” Darien shouted after answering the phone.
“Thanks, muffin!” Serena said, snatching the cordless from the wall.
“Hello?” With much interest, Luna and Darien gathered to watch the
conversation. “Oh, my God, that’s terrible!..Oh, God!..Yes. Yes, of
course...Yeah...hold on.” She looked up at Darien. “They want me to go on a
carrier cruise as a war correspondant. Is that okay?”
“Sure, why not?” her husband shrugged.
“Yeah, that’s fine...how long...yeah, okay... when am I leaving?.. The
Stennis?..she put to sea this morning? They are expecting me?.. Good, I can
be at Miramar in about an hour...Okay...bye.” She hung up and looked at
Darien. “I’m going on Amy’s boat!”
Serena already regretted this decision. She had grabbed her emergency bag
that she kept packed and ran out the door, forgeting the arm bands that
helped her with her seasickness. Even so, she was not yet on the carrier and
she was already feeling bad. She was on a C-2 Greyhound, a small
carrier-based cargo plane. It was prop-driven, and the design was somewhat
old. And very uncomfortable.
Right now, she was seated on one of the fold-down metal chairs, her body
tucked tight against the cold. There was a helmet on her head that seemed to
do nothing but exacerbate her headache. To make matters worse, some wise-ass
chief petty officer was telling her enough airsickness stories that punching
him was very inviting.
“You think the turbulence is bad?” the Navy man shouted over the engine
roar, “Lemme tell ya about one time when a friend o’ mine went out. It was
during stormy weather and they were going to the Independence, which is a
really small carrier. It’s retired now, by the way. But man, we’d just taken
him to Ryan’s Steak House not an hour before hand. It was his birthday, you
know. Anyway, we were maybe fifty or sixty miles from the Indy when we hit
turbulence and man it was like a brick wall. We were rocking and shit like a
roller coaster. And I look at Paul, and I says ‘you okay,’ an he says ‘yeah,
I’m alright,’ and I swear his face was the same color green as those Army
pukes wear on them BDUs. Anyway, not five minutes later his cheeks puff out
and he just blows chunks all over everything. I mean he was really chucking
up...”
“Incoming aircraft. Unauthorized Personel, clear deck!” came the order over
the loudspeaker from pri-fly. The yellow shirt led Amy from her plane over
to the superstructure just in time for the announcement to be repeated.
However, most of the pilots just returned to safety didn’t go inside.
Instead, they milled around to watch the trap. They liked to keep up with
how well others could land their planes. The less cocky among them might
actually use it as a learning experience.
“There it is!” someone pointed. It was still too far for Amy to see, even
with her vision at twice perfect. The one who saw it must have really good
eyesight. “It’s a C-2.”
“Why are we landing another?” Dutch asked, “We done got all our stuff.”
They were silent for a moment, all of them wondering. Was it having
problems? Was it some special team or something? It wasn’t any more of those
damn whale biologists, was it?
“Christ!” Amy deduced it faster, “Press.”
“Aw, Jesus!”
“Shyt!”
“Can’t they leave the damn press outta this.”
“Last thing I need is a fucking microphone shoved in my face.”
“There goes our privacy!” Dutch whined.
“Snafoo!”
“Son of a bitch!”
“Damn First Amendment!”
“Situation normal,”Amy began, and the entire group concluded “all fuck up!”
At about that time, the pilot of the cargo plane called the ball, rolled in,
and trapped the three wire clean. The prop was jolted to a stop. The tail
hook was retracted and the number three wire allowed to reel back to its
normal position. The carrier was yet to begin normal flight operations and
wouldn’t start until later that day. Even so, after having just recieved its
entire air wing, the deck was crammed with aircraft. The C-2 stayed put,
lowering its cargo door.
Out stepped the only passenger. She wore a press pass around her neck and a
helmet on her head. Amy was about to turn away with the others until the
“reporter” removed the helmet and two absurdly long blonde pigtails cascaded
down from underneath it.
“Oh, my God!” Amy gaped, not knowing if she should be pleased or pissed.
“Don’t you know her?” Robinson looked at his blue-haired squadron mate.
“Uh-huh.”
“Serena...Hendrix isn’t it?”
“Uh-huh.”
“Oh, I see.” the older pilot patted her on the shoulder. “Good luck.”
“Good luck? Hey, wait just a damn minute! What do you mean?”
“Well,” Dutch smiled, “I know of about five thousand or so guys who are
gonna hate you before the cruise is over.”
Captain Douglas Raulstone looked out over the flight deck of what he
believed to be the best ship in the fleet. Various crewmen ran around the
entirely empty flight deck, looking like little sprites in their different
color shirts, red, green, and yellow. The Foreign Object Damage walk had
just been completed. In this excercise, a line of yellow shirts walked down
the deck from fore to aft, looking for any small particle that might cause
terrible damage to an expensive jet engine.
The ones in green, the catapult crews, had just finished calibrating the
steam-driven catapult trucks for the cruise. He had just recieved word that
all four were ready.
With that thought, Raulstone glanced up at the windsock waving aside the
bridge. “Come right twelve degrees to two-nine-five, increase speed to
thirty knots.”
The helmsman immediately complied, “Coming right twelve degrees to
two-nine-five, increasing to thirty knots, aye sir!” It was an interesting
sensation feeling an aircraft carrier roll beneath you. It is similar to
having an entire building twist on its axis and move foreward. It can be a
gut-wrenching feeling and many people are known to be sensative to it.
Raulstone checked the windsock again. Not quite. “Come right five degrees
to three-zero-zero.”
“Coming right to three-zero-zero, aye sir!”
Raulstone noticed he’d moved right a little too far. This was okay, but he
wanted dead on. “Come left three degrees to two-nine-seven.”
“Coming left to two-nine-seven, aye sir!”
He checked again. Perfect. “Increase speed to thirty-five knots.”
“Increasing speed to thirty-five knots, aye sir!”
Beautiful. Absolutely beautiful. Raulstone then picked up a radio.
“Pri-fly, this is bridge. Air Boss, you may begin flight operations.”
“Yes sir!” can the enthusiastic reply. Alarms sounded all around the deck,
and the announcement of the official initiation of flight ops echoed across
the Stennis. Just ahead of the superstructure, the number one elevator rose
swifty to the deck. A pair of F-14s with a picture of Felix the Cat on the
tails rode her up. The brownshirts quickly loaded her with ordinance. Four
AIM-54 Pheonix, two AIM-120C AMRAAM, and two AIM-9X Sidewinders were fitted
to the appropriate belly and wing pylons. The crews were led to their
aircraft and after a short visual check, climbed into the cockpits. The
engines were started, the various start-up umbilicals were disconnected, and
the maintenace crews backed off. A yellow shirt led the first to the
catapult line. As it approached a green-shirted catapult crewman got down
next to the launch bar on the nose gear and, signaling the yellow shirt what
to tell the pilot, aided the Tom into launch position. He checked that the
bar was secure before giving the appropriate signal and backing
off. “Tomcatter 201, ready on the cat.” At this report, the blast shield
rose up behind the F-14s engines.
“Throttle up and stand by.”
“Roger, standing by.” As the pilot reported this, the second F-14 was being
locked into cat two.
“Cat one!” and the steam rushed forward, billowing in the wake of the
fighter. Not two seconds later, the first jet of the cruise was airborne.
Soon enough, the second followed.
Amy had been right, it was intriguing. Serena watched from a window in the
island superstructure as the first pair of Toms took ot the air. It was
almost an adrenaline rush just watching the pair of twenty-eight ton jets
thrown aloft by the power of steam. No wonder Amy had become what she was.
Serena had found Amy down in a section known as “pilot country.” It was
where all the aviators and air crews lived, worked, and played when not
aloft. Amy wasn’t due up on the flight line till evening and had obligingly
showed Serena around. She had seen the large hanger where the some
eighty-two aircraft were stored. Amy had pointed out each type and its
function. Serena, being a journalist, scribbled notes down furiously, asked
questions, and noted a dozen other things she’d need to write.
Her articles would be wired to the LA Times and then syndecated in nearly
every newspaper in the country. It would not be the first time this had
happened, but it would be the first time it had occured on such a large
scale.
“So,” Serena asked, “What is your real opinion of naval aviation?”
Amy answered with a quote from Admiral Jeremy Boort. “It’s claustrophobia,
shit for food, and some of the best damn flying in the world.”
As it happened, Serena was quartered with Amy and two other female
crewmembers. These two girls (they were only nineteen and twenty) took
quickly to Serena. The youngest, Karen Claborne, was a trap worker with the
rank of seaman. She worked a slaving twelve hour day working near the
dangerous recovery wires. The other, Anjali Krist, was a yellow-shirted
handler who led the pilots around deck.
“What made you go into the Navy, anyway?” Serena asked Karen as she prepped
for duty.
Karen was a startlingly beautiful girl when her face wasn’t smeared with
black smudges. She had clear blue eyes and a healthy figure. She kept her
waist-length sandy hair pulled back in a bun which was covered by the tan
helmet she wore. She looked so bubblegum/candy cane, but was more like
olives. “Well, I’m not going to give you the whole ‘wanted to see the world’
bullshit. I enlisted for the Montgomery G.I. bill to get money for school. I
went through one cruise on the Truman and absolutely loved it. I don’t know,
I just love working I guess. Anyway, I got about a dozen commendations from
Cheif Borden, my CO, and he asked if I’d stay on. I said okay, so when I’m
not cruisin’, I go to school.”
“You got someone back home?”
“A guy? Hell no. I ain’t got time for guys what with school and the Navy
and shit. And a lot of men say they’re intimidated by a woman who’s in the
fuckin’ Navy, anyhow. You know how many times I get pinned a goddamn lesbo?
Shit!”
“You have an accent. Where are you from?”
“Muscle Shoals, Alabama.” she said, clipping her chinstrap down. “I’ll tell
you about funny accents, Anderson has about the wierdest voice I’ve ever
heard. It’s something between British, German, and I don’t know where the
hell else. Christ, she must be half-blooded of everything.”
“I have no clue where she gets it.” Serena shrugged, “I know her mom’s a
Brit, but that’s all.”
“Well, I gotta go. See ya.” Karen said, promptly leaving. As she exited the
small quarters, she passed Amy.
“Annoying my roomies?” she chided playfully in that singular silvery voice.
She went over to the small mirror to remove an eyelash from her eye.
Serena shook her head and put down her note pad. “Amy, where is your accent
from?”
The pilot stopped picking at the eyelash and thought a moment. “You know, I
have no idea. It’s just the way I talk.” She plucked the lash just as it was
about to enter the white of her eye. “Hey, they’re starting flight ops soon.
You might want to go up and watch.”
“Where will you be?”
“I’ve got some work to do with my squadron before jumping off tonight.
It’ll take a while.”
“Okay.”
So there she was, watching the begining of flight opperations. Her
Dramamine was just starting to kick in, and so she was feeling drowsy. It
might be a good idea if she took a nap.
Mist rolled eerily over the deck, reflecting the setting sun’s orange and
yellow. There was a roar to the left as catapult one hurled an F/A-18E into
the air. The fog gave way, billowing and curling tight in the jet’s wake.
The empty space was immediately filled again by the vapor.
On catapult two, another Hornet was powering up, awaiting its turn. The
afterburners sent an eerie blue glow refracting along the mist.
The catapult officer, cued by the pilot, waved his left hand to the control
station, pointed forward, and then quickly knealt out of the way of the
oncoming wings.
“Cat two!”
“Gunslinger 106, airborne.” Mercury reported as she cleared the deck.
“Good luck.”
“Gunslinger 106 passing two-point-five. Switching diamond two-point-one.”
Amy said as her altitude indicator scrolled past the twenty-five hundred
foot safety altitude. She switched over to air combat control. “I am
arching, outbound, and up for checks.”
“Gunslinger 106, sweet and sweet, continue outbound.” A few minutes later,
she pulled up alongside Dutch.
“You seem happy to be off the deck.” he commented.
“God yes.” Amy replied, “They put Serena with me and my bunkmates. And I’ll
tell you, we got some wierd girls on this ship.”
“That so?”
“You know it. One of the kids they put me with has more country in her than
a busy night at the Grand Ole Opry. The other’s always giggly about this
cute crewman and that cute crewman. I hate being the only female pilot on
this whole damn boat.”
“Well, there just aren’t that many.” Dutch shrugged, though Mercury
couldn’t see him.
“Aw, bullshit. On Ike, there were six of us. Two in Toms, three in Hornets,
and one in an Intruder.”
“So how does Serena like being on a CVN?”
“Shit, she’s already asking questions.”
“Aw, hell.”
“Oh, yeah.”
