"Beyond The Call of Duty"
Author: Haruo Chikamori
E-mail: hhchikamori
Rating: M
Classification: K
Spoilers: N/A
Summary: You see Animal with the "blue button" (Medal of Honor). This is the incident that earned him the Medal. Over the skies of North Korea, a TARPS F-14 goes down necessitating a rescue that the Deputy Air Wing Commander objects to. The CAG thinks its dangerous but orders a rescue. An investigation into Animal's eligibility for the Medal of Honor ensues at Admiral Chegwidden's instruction.
DISCLAIMER: The characters Harm Rabb, Jr., Meg Austin, AJ Chegwidden, et al. belong (in concept if not name) to CBS/Bellisarius. No profit is being made from this story, nor is any infringement intended. Animal is the property of Heather and Hugo Chikamori.
USS Nimitz, CVN-68
Somewhere in the Sea of Japan
Sometime in 1995
Rear Admiral (upper half) James E. Pointer III gritted his teeth as he looked over at the captain responsible for the intelligence coming from the Korean peninsula. The admiral knew that the botched information could cause the deaths of his aviators and he wasn't pleased. As it stood there would have to be another TARPS mission over the disputed area for intelligence gathering and when he was through with the captain in question, the navintel geek would be lucky to have a job left.
"Our assets are not expendable, Captain. Especially when satellite information should be gathering this intel on its passes over the peninsula. North Korea has been especially volatile and they have been moving SAMs into coastal emplacements. Now you want to send in a TARPS 'cat to find out information that your satellites MISSED?!" RADM Pointer glared at the NAVINTEL captain. "You guys have been dropping the ball from A to Z, haven't you?" Pointer would have cheerfully throttled the captain for his response.
"Well, we need the information, Admiral, and your VF-41 guys are the only ones that can do it. VF-84 is not TARPS equipped or certified."
"Well, the Joint Chiefs haven't heard the last of this yet." Pointer snarled, nose to nose with the NAVINTEL four-striper geek. "You'd better hope I get all my planes back or your career in Naval Intelligence is going to go head-first down the crapper! You two-bit NAVINTEL weenie!" Even more infuriating to Admiral Pointer was that the 'NavIntel Weenie' didn't look fazed one iota. Not even at the fact that Admiral Pointer would make good on his threat. Either the NavIntel O-6 had balls of steel or he was just terminally stupid. You don't piss off an O-8 and expect good things to happen to your career.
VF-41 Black Aces Wardroom
"Hey, Animal. CAG and Mini-CAG want you in the flag plot. Evidently something big's going down." Lieutenant Commander Jimmy "Spike" Wilson grinned as he peered in the wardroom looking for Animal. "Orders?"
"Who knows." Toshio "Animal" Nakamura gave off the ensign-salute as if to say I don't know what the hell's going on. "It's above my paygrade." He got up out of the lounger and straightened up his zoomie bag patting it down so it looked passable. His VF-41 squadron patch was emblazoned over the right breast pocket of his flight suit which he was wearing which was UOD onboard a carrier for flight crews. The VF-243 Howlers (Harm's squadron) had copied the playing card right down to the clubs insignia on it. But Animal was a part of the original Black Aces squadron (the one with actual Su-22 kills after the Gulf of Sidra incident in 1981) after a stint with the Howlers over Iraq for Desert Storm. Animal was a Lieutenant Commander and as an O-4 he was well versed on military procedure. The 'want' was not a casual request, it was an order emanating from up above. Considering the pay grade requesting his presence was two grades above his and probably higher ranking officers would be present, it would be in his best interest for the sake of his career that he hoof it up to the flag plot and find out what was requested of him. Animal amscrayed out the wardroom door and headed up the stairs of the tower to the flag plot.
Pounding the pine, he paused until the answering voice called out "ENTER!" he made his appearance and announcement. "Lieutenant Commander Toshio Nakamura, reporting as ordered, sir." Looking over to see a fellow Lieutenant Commander also standing at the position of attention - Lieutenant Commander Bill "Friar" Tuck didn't even look over at him, Animal stood at attention too, his eyes gathering in the information and seeing stars – two sets of them totalling six stars counting collar devices to be exact. The battle group commander – a two-star and the vice-battle group commander, a commodore (at sea) ranked rear admiral lower half (on shore) – a one star. Combined with the gathered silver oak leaves and eagles in the flag plot, it was a scary experience to see all those high-ranking officers contained in one room with their attentions focused on his and Friar's O-4 carcasses.
"Lieutenant Commander Tuck, we would like you to fly the TARPS aircraft as you have the most experience in that bird." RADM Pointer said. "Lieutenant Commander Nakamura, you fly cover for the TARPS. We need a recon of the North Korean coastline from Kimchaek down to Hongwon, the area that the cameras on the Block III malfunctioned. It will be at least a month before they can get an emergency shuttle up to replace the cameras on the satellite and the operation cameras will have to be tweaked from the ground to re-image the area on the next pass. I presume, Captain, that your guys at Houston are already on that matter so this is the only flight we have to do." The captain nodded and Admiral Pointer looked over at Animal and Friar "So, are you two up to flying this mission? It's strictly voluntary as it's inordinately dangerous."
"Aye, aye, sir." Animal responded, trepidation coloring his voice. He knew this wasn't a milk-run and that they'd have to have their heads on a swivel. SAMS in the area had been rumored and it wasn't above a SAM missile site to lob one up if they thought an aircraft was in the area.
"Now this is a dangerous mission – namely because the NAVINTEL geeks fucked up." Rear Admiral Pointer said damningly shooting a glare at the NAVINTEL limited line duty officer, a captain, it seemed, who hadn't the self-awareness to be embarrassed.
The Operations Officer, Commander Jason "Rattler" Teague, disgust in his voice, muttered caustically that "Expect there to be SAMs in the area. The satellite that went over the peninsula malfunctioned due to some surface mistake at the operations level. Hence the reason why we're flying this mission so that there isn't a gap in the information sent out to battle groups in the area."
The briefing went on for a long time given the hours old information that hadn't been updated yet. Due to the lack of information about the air defences in the area, Animal and Friar were going in cold. It wasn't a good start to a day, Animal thought to himself as he looked over at Friar. When they were dismissed, Animal went over to the squadron ops officer to formulate out a plan for the mission that they had three hours prior to commencing. Telling the ops officer, he wanted every damned missile that he could possibly stack on his aircraft. Animal's load-out was the 4× AIM-9 + 4× AIM-7 configuration. For Friar's load-out, Animal requested "COMBAT TARPS" despite the fact that they weren't technically at war – It gave Friar 2x AIM-9 + 2x AIM-7 plus an ALQ-167 "Bullwinkle" jammer and the TARPS pod. The more missiles they had, the better just in case the North Korean People's Air Force came up to play. Better than leaving Friar's aircraft as a sitting target during air-to-air.
Lieutenant Commander Joe "Scooter" Willis grinned at Animal as they started gearing up for the mission. "Ah hell, who lives forever, eh?"
"I'd like to live just a little while longer." Lieutenant Mitchell "King" Richard muttered. He was Friar's RIO and made no bones about the fact that this mission was thanks to NAVINTEL. "If I get my ass shot down and make it back, I'm going to find that NAVINTEL puke and kick his nuts into his throat." He complained.
Animal kept silent, but agreed with King that the NavIntel puke needed a major league beating. Grabbing his HGU-55/P flight helmet and fastening it to his head, he and Scooter headed for their F-14A Tomcat. The piercing whine of the aircraft engines on the confined area of the flight deck was ear-splitting and hence flight-crews wore their helmets to block out the noise otherwise it was too easy to get their eardrums blown out. Pre-flight and checks were already done on the aircraft as they were set to replace the Alert 5 aircraft on Cat 3 (the waist cat) and were already stationed on the catapult. They just replaced the crew waiting in the Alert 5. The only new addition was the TARPS/ALQ-167 on the second designated TARPS aircraft that was to be going. All Animal and Scooter had to do was mount their aircraft and buckle in while Friar's and King's F-14A was towed to and attached to Cat 2 off the pointy end of the boat.
Hooking his oxygen mask to the O2 mask fittings located to either side of his flight helmet, Animal made sure that his oxygen mask fit was nice and snug; the hose being attached to the oxygen tank on board the F-14 Tomcat. The flow and mixture was right, but until the cat was ready for launch, the oxygen mask stayed to one side dangling. Animal went over the pre-flight cockpit checks checking the flight controls to make sure the rudders and flaps worked as well as the tailerons.
"This hop's gonna keep us awake, ain't it?" Scooter said sardonically.
"You betcha." Animal replied. "If they lob a SAM in our direction, we're going to be more than awake. Probably end up ejecting brown organic matter."
The plane captain and the crew had Friar's aircraft all set up. Friar evidently was launching first due to being stationed on Cat 2. Animal would be up next on the waist cat. Animal saw the plane captain salute Friar and clipped his own oxygen mask on as did Scooter. Both took a second to bring down their visors on the HGU-55/P and lock them in place. The plane captain on the number 3 cat brought his thumb up, Animal acknowledging that with a return of the same and then the plane captain saluted Animal. Animal returned the salute returning his right hand to the handles to either side of the canopy rails. Cat launch was a hands off affair because there was the danger of over-rotation of the aircraft into a stall if one kept their hands on the flight controls. The only hand on the control was the left hand pushing the throttles in to full Zone 5 afterburner, holding the throttles steady against the force pushing it back applied by the sudden acceleration from zero to 260 mph. The plane captain dropped his salute, then dropped into a crouch with his hand extended towards the end of the flight deck amidships.
The catshot was sudden, a tremendous force pushing him back against the ejection seat, nearly caging his eyeballs back in their sockets.
"Control, Fast Eagle 105, Good Cat!" Animal radioed back as he eyeballed the area for Friar. Finding Friar floating up ahead, Animal joined up on his wing. They would be photographing 75 miles of coastline. Iwon Airport was home to 44 MiG 21s and that was a concern. Also Simpo Nuclear Power Plant – they had been clearing a site for the prospective nuclear power-plant amid declarations that they intended to become a nuclear power in the next two decades. Animal was sure that there was the possibility of SAMs around the area to deter errant visitors.
All things considered though they had to tank first prior to ingress. And that was going to be fun - in the same way that getting a tooth extraction without benefit of anesthetic could be termed as fun.
25 minutes later
After tanking, the two F-14s headed towards Kimchaek, their first waypoint. Friar's position was to be fifteen miles off the coast over water with the TARPS pod camera turned inwards towards the coast. The Radar Warning Receiver went absolutely ape-shit when the F-14s were about 25 miles from the coast.
"KimChi Army's awake." Animal said to Scooter.
Friar had his hands full, King set the TARPS to start recording as they made their turn to run parallel with the coastline. Iwon Airport was going bananas from the look of activity down at the airport as they went past at over 600 knots. Pilots looked as if they were running for the MiG 21s.
"Holy shit…" Friar muttered to Animal over the UHF. "Iwon's going batshit. So how we gonna get out of this one?"
"Just press the 'I Believe' button for now and we'll see what happens." Animal muttered as they kept on course.
"That's comforting." Friar report sardonically. "We gotta make it to Hongwon intact…and hopefully back to our boat as well."
King muttered a "Hail Mary full of grace" barely audible over the UHF.
"Contacts on our five o'clock." Scooter said craning his head around to view. Evidently there were two MiG 21s on their tail. They were maneuvering to the outside of their line of direction, herding the two F-14s closer to the coast within range of their missile defenses. Until the F-14s got in range of the SA-6 Grail and SA-17 Gadfly missiles, the MiGs would try to hem the F-14s in. Animal on the other hand was having none of that. Rolling his Tomcat, he went high as Friar maintained course. Rolling the aircraft through a large rolling arc to drop airspeed as the two MiG 21s shot past below, he dropped in on the six of those two MiG 21s, activating AIM-7 missile lock on active seeker. That prompted a loud missile warning buzz in the helmet headsets of the MiG pilots who promptly decided that discretion was better than getting their asses shot off over home territory and broke off. The next missile warning was much more dangerous. The SAM missile warning light went on in the F-14 cockpit, prompting Friar and Animal to start dropping chaff while trying to keep as straight a course as they could to get the photos that Ops and NavIntel wanted.
The SA-11/17 Gadfly/Grizzly was known as the four fingers of death – brutally efficient and radar-guided, the SA-17 Grizzly was mounted four to a launcher on a tracked mobile launching mechanism. Virtually undetectable by satellites due to its mobility, it was able to be trucked in and planted anywhere then moved again to avoid detection.
As they passed what would be the future site of the Simpo Nuclear Reactor Facility, the calm exploded into sheer hell. Missile launch warnings went off in both Animal and Friar's cockpits. Animal started dropping chaff and flares to try to spoof the incoming SA-17s.
"Friar, missile launch. Evasive!" Animal shouted out as he jinked his F-14 dropping flares and chaff into a series of hard turns.
"I can't shake it." Friar said panicked, a smoke trail appeared and a proximity fuse exploded 100 meters from Friar's F-14, throwing burning fragments of metal into the F-14's fuselage severing fuel lines and hydraulics. A puff of smoke and a burning sheet of flame started trailing from Friar's F-14A Tomcat. "I'm hit…I'm hit!" Friar shouted.
"Punch out! Friar!" Animal said. The canopy came off the aircraft and King's ejection seat came out of the aircraft barely seconds before the F-14 turned into a rolling ball of flame as burning fuel met an electrical line. Friar didn't have time to get out and went up with the aircraft. The horror on the face of Scooter was disguised by the oxygen mask.
The remains of the F-14 wreckage along with the surveillance film went into the waters off the coast of North Korea as the parachute floated inland – Animal circled the chute as it went down in the mountains just south west of Simpo. King would have to evade capture by North Korean forces until such time as the Nimitz could mount a rescue operation to recover him.
"Fast Eagle 105 to Homeplate. Fast Eagle 112 is down. Need CAP and helo for rescue. King punched out, Friar didn't survive. Orbiting to make sure he lands safely on the ground."
"Negative, Fast Eagle 105 return to Homeplate." The voice of the mini-CAG sounded in his helmet radio receivers.
"Roger…" Animal's voice was tight with barely controlled rage as he turned the aircraft around. He could disobey an order and end up being exonerated if it went to court but he knew the Mini-CAG was a vindictive son-of-a bitch and could make rising the ranks hell if he went ahead and did that. Animal's only option was to return to the Nimitz and hope to hell that he could convince the admiral to sanction a rescue mission. With that in mind, he shut off the radio, let loose a vicious "FUCK!" on the inter-cockpit radio system and turned his F-14 back to home, with the niggling feeling in the back of his mind saying that he was wrong in doing so. Courage of conviction…sucked if there was a vindictive senior officer on board. No wonder they called the DCAG the Mini-CAG. He had an attitude like the Emperor though of diminutive stature. Like a 5'2" Chihuahua, the Mini-CAG had an attitude that was more vicious bark than bite and never failed to try to use every possible advantage to screw his junior officers out of promotions.
"When we get back." Animal warned Scooter. "Mini-CAG better not be anywhere within my sight." Leaving a fellow crewmember behind was breaking a cardinal rule and Animal was absolutely certain that he was going back to get King out. It was a toss-up as to how many arms he would have to twist or break to get that done.