November 21, 2020
F-16C Fighting Falcon, Tail Number 004, Callsign "Misfile One"
Expeditionary NATO Airfield, Eastern Africa
1548 hours, local time
"Misfile One to Tower," Emily radioed as her flight approached the base. "Requesting permission to land."
"Misfile One, you're cleared to land," Kingmaster came back.
On radar and around her, the other three F-16s of her flight broke in a gentle arc to the left to wait in the queue for their turn to land. Emily continued on ahead, nosing down toward the runway as she deployed her landing gear and lowered the flaps on her wings to ensure that she maintained enough lift to remain in the air even as she slowed down for landing approach.
"Misfile One, gear down, full stop. Making final approach. Altitude two thousand, speed three-two-three."
"There are fighters on the runway," Missi reported.
Emily looked up from her instruments, spotting a group of MiG-29A Fulcrums moving into launch position at the far end of the runway. She frowned, tightening her grip on the stick, making ready to abort her landing run if necessary. It was sloppy and a clear safety violation—even one the Russians would be mindful of—to have fighters launching while another was trying to land.
"Tower, what's up with the planes coming to the runway?" she queried. Silence met her call as the MiGs began to cruise down the runway, clearly intent on launching without clearance, and coming right for her. "Tower, respond."
The first of the MiGs was airborne now, coming straight in her direction. Swearing, she slammed her stick to the right and pulled away, lifting her flaps and gear back to a closed state. The MiG-29 shot past behind her, close enough for its wake to rock her fighter. Eleven others followed after it, and as she arced around to put her nose to them, she watched as they formed up and departed to the southeast.
"Whoa, shit!" Missi exclaimed.
"What the hell is going on?" Three asked.
"Misfile One, this is Big Bear One," Stagleishov called, clearly piloting the lead MiG-29. "We had to scramble fast. Sorry for the mix-up."
"That was more than a mix-up, Stovie," Missi spat.
"Very sorry, very sorry."
"Why the hell didn't you clear your take-off with the tower?" Emily demanded. It was poor protocol to speak so confrontationally to a superior officer, even a foreign one, and she reminded herself she'd have to speak to Missi about it later—and ask what 'Stovie' meant—but she was angry at the moment, and didn't care for the time being. The damn bastard had nearly run her over.
It took her a moment to realize that she hadn't been answered. "Big Bear?"
Still, nothing.
"Colonel McArthur, we have an emergency here," the control tower reported. The voice was a little deeper than she was used to, but then again, they usually flew in the mornings, and a different shift was probably in the tower now.
"What's happening, Kingmaster?" she asked, arcing back toward the base.
"Carruth is under heavy assault. We are about to scramble all forces."
That must have been why Stagleishov was in such a hurry. She was willing to forgive him for nearly killing her, this time at least. Aborting her turn, she turned back to follow in the direction Stagleishov and his MiGs had gone in. "Misfile copies. Two, what's your fuel state?"
"Enough to get up to Carruth and back," Missi replied.
"Kingmaster, Misfile Flight is heading up to Carruth. Misfile One to all returning allied aircraft. Land if you're low on fuel. All others, follow me."
Glancing down at her fuel gauge, she ran the calculations in her head. She had enough to get to Carruth and dogfight for three or four minutes, but then she'd have to return to refuel and rearm. Missi was doubtless in the same boat, but the other squadrons would have made it by then, and could either finish the job themselves or hold until they returned. Rolling her throttle all the way forward, her airframe hummed around her as the afterburner kicked in.
"Misfile, this is Lion One. We have just launched and are en route."
"Bandits ahead," Emily reported, the contacts just popping up on her radar within missile range. "All forces, clear to engage."
"Christ, it's a rerun of MiG Alley," Missi swore.
Emily rolled onto her left wing and pulled hard into a turn to evade a missile rising up from below at her. These enemies must have gone ahead of the main force to ambush the responding NATO units, using terrain-following flying and the ravines down below to avoid radar detection until they were within missile range.
Her turn brought her into line with the rear of a MiG-21, the enemy either unaware of her or too focused on trying to lock onto Missi. Her computer locked on immediately and she fired a Sidewinder, the missile arcing over the back of the enemy plane and shredding its engine.
"More bandits are inbound," Lion One reported. "Kingmaster, we're going to need more help up here."
"Try and stay with me," Missi muttered to a jet pursuing her. Emily glanced over just in time to see the younger woman counter-maneuver onto the MiG's tail, eliminating it with a close-range guns attack.
Without wasting time, Emily nosed to the right and locked onto the wingman of the MiG she had just shot down, the speed of her attack denying the enemy the time he needed to react, another missile sending him spiraling out of the sky. "Bandit destroyed," she reported, looking down at her radar and then scanning the skies nearby for her next target.
"Do not let the rebs fly by you in the weeds," Lion One ordered his men, discreetly warning them about the enemy's tactic of using terrain-following. "Make them come up."
Emily closed on her next target, and just as she was lining up for a missile strike, the MiG exploded, courtesy of a long-range strike from one of Lion's Mirages. Chuckling, she tightened her turn, spotting another MiG by its lonesome off to her right. One of the allied pilots warned, "Misfile One, target is cutting toward you."
"Roger."
"Don't worry about your stalker, Boss, I'm on him," Missi said.
She glanced at the rear mirror in her cockpit, then focused on the MiG she was lining up on. This one, for whatever reason, didn't even seem to be trying to evade. Even after she launched her missile, she continued to remain nose-on to him, watching for any sudden tricks or evasive actions. But this enemy just continued straight and level flight, not even attempting to use countermeasures against her missile. Odd. Was that a novice pilot?
She didn't have time to contemplate that further, her computer alerting her of an enemy attempting to seek a lock on her. She looked down at her radar, seeing the enemy in question coming from her right, and so cut hard in that direction, causing him to overshoot and throwing off his sensors. Reversing her direction, she came around behind the offending fighter, stitching his engine with cannon fire. The engine flamed out, and she watched a moment as the enemy began a nose-dive to the desert floor.
"Misfile Three, bandit closing with you."
"Roger."
Another MiG was passing behind her, not aggressive to her, so she pulled her stick back and sent her F-16 into a climb to pursue it. A long chain of explosions nearby drew her attention for a moment to see a lot of enemy fighters on their final descent; between her flight and Lion's Mirages, these amateur pilots didn't stand a chance. Focusing on the target once more as she drew even with it, she fired a Sidewinder once she had achieved lock. This one at least attempted to break away from the incoming missile, but his moves were too slow. The blast of the missile tore off its wing and sent it flipping sideways through the air.
"Kingmaster to Misfile One. Say your status."
"We're engaging the rebels," Emily remarked, turning on instinct as an enemy fighter exploded just ahead of her. "No sign of Big Bear."
"Contact him. They engaged an element further east and should be coming back in your direction."
"Big Bear One, what's your situation?" she queried. The radar warning receiver indicated an incoming missile from her left. She punched flares and turned into its arc, not looking back as it overshoot and detonated amongst the flares.
"We are heading in your direction," was all Stagleishov said.
"Are you engaged with enemy units?"
The silence lasted long enough for her to complete a loop and come from above and ahead at an enemy fighter, sending a missile into its path. As the wreck fell to the ground, Missi reported, "No answer. What the hell is with them?"
Looking down at her radar, she could find no more enemy contacts, but the group of MiG-29s from Big Bear were now on her screen. She turned in their direction as they began to spread outward. Missi pulled up behind her right, and a wingpair of Mirage 2000s from Lion were ahead on that same side. The French pilots seemed to be just as concerned with what was going on.
"Big Bear, give me your status," she demanded.
Her answer came from her radar warning receiver, warning of a missile from directly ahead, within the Russian formation. Grimacing, she turned her nose to the ground and dove, leaving flares in her wake. "Missiles, evade!" she ordered the allied pilots. "Mercenary flight, state your intentions!"
As she pulled out of her dive, she watched a MiG-29 coast in on the tail of a Mirage 2000, launching a missile at the allied plane and following it up with cannon fire. The missile impacted with the left rear of the French plane, sending it spinning out of control.
"What the fuck!" Missi spat. "Two of these bastards have me locked."
The radio waves overloaded with allied pilots shouting, "Friendly fire!" in an attempt to get the MiGs to stop their attack. "Bear Flight, break off!" Emily ordered.
"Blue on blue," came Missi's utterly-calm report as she shook the missiles coming after her with flares. "Blue on blue."
"General, what the hell is the deal?" Emily growled as she brought her fighter around to locate Stagleishov's MiG-29.
"He doesn't have the balls to answer," Missi sarcastically responded.
"To hell with him, then. Misfile One to all aircraft. Big Bear Flight is hostile. I say again, MiG-29s are hostile. Burn the bastards out of the sky."
Responding to that command with an enthusiastic shout, Missi immediately dropped her throttle and tucked into an aileron roll, forcing the MiG chasing her to overshoot. Her aircraft still inverted, she hammered its backside with 20mm fire, flaming out the engines. The MiG fell out of the sky, only to explode moments later. "Dosvedanya, svoloch!" she taunted the downed pilot.
"Where the hell did you learn to say that?" Three asked her.
"Call of Duty," she answered tersely.
"Misfile One, do you know what's going on?" Lion One asked, panic creeping into his voice. "The mercenaries are attacking us."
"The bastards turned on us, Lion," Emily answered, cutting into a high-g turn to get behind a MiG chasing after Missi, the acceleration forces crushing her into the right side of her cockpit. "Defend yourselves and take out as many as you can."
"Uh, roger that, Misfile." The confusion was clear in his voice, but the presence of a known threat and target were rapidly making that disappear. "Missiles in the air. Lion Four, break right."
The MiG she was chasing was more experienced and had better equipment than the rebels they'd been fighting thus far. Detecting her missile lock, the betrayer pilot rolled onto his left wing and pushed his throttle forward, accelerating into a turn that Emily had some trouble matching. As she struggled to catch up, she glanced at her radar and saw additional contacts, more rebel MiG-21s. One was coming straight at her, attempting to catch her unawares while she was busy trying to keep up with the MiG-29. She swiftly shifted her target lock onto it and fed a missile into its conical intake, rolling right to get clear of the debris cloud.
"They are not our usual thugs," Lion One remarked. "Their Fulcrums are a hell of a lot better than the rebel crates."
That certainly went without saying. A glance into one of her rear mirrors showed another rebel trying to sneak up behind her, but she preempted him by snapping her stick back and feathering the throttle, performing a tight loop that left her on his tail. Wasting no time, she burned his engine out with cannons, then banked to the left to find another target.
"Lion Four is hit. He is going out."
Turning back toward the bulk of the engagement, she picked out a MiG-29 and locked on at long range. She fired a Sidewinder at it and accelerated, prepared to dive on it when it evaded her missile. To her pleasure, however, the infrared missile shot straight through the enemy's countermeasures, ignoring them completely, and blasted both engines out of the fire. Smiling in grim satisfaction, she attempted to repeat the process on his wingman, but the enemy plane's orientation to her allowed it to outmaneuver her missile without dumping flares.
"The damn Stovies have our playbook," Missi grumbled.
"Tear a new page," Emily responded.
She arced after the MiG in her sights, closing in and snapping off a missile. The explosion peppered its left wing and vertical stabilizer with shrapnel, and sparked fire from the left engine. Demonstrating a great amount of experience, the enemy pilot simply shut down that engine and continued on, its maneuverability and speed greatly hampered. Just as Emily moved in for the killshot, her computer toned, "Missile. Missile."
Glancing down at her radar, then into a mirror, she broke away from the crippled enemy fighter and throttled up, deploying flares to ward off the missile. As she'd expected, the originating MiG jumped onto her tail, intent on finishing her off at close range. She slowed some, drawing him in closer, and then mimicked Missi's earlier barrel roll maneuver, tightening her finger on the trigger for her cannons as she accelerated again. Before she could fire, tracers from another enemy curved above her canopy.
These pilots were definitely better than the rebels, coordinating into a two-on-one offensive against her. Rather than pull a fancy maneuver, she simply decelerated hard and pulled her stick to the right. The enemy plane, having been coming in toward her at a gentle leftward curve, had to completely alter its attack angle so as not to lose her, and wound up overshooting. Bringing her nose up, she spitted him with a target lock and launched a missile, the Sidewinder's explosion all but cutting the plane in half at the center.
"Lion Two, you have one on your tail. Break right."
"Breaking!"
"Misfile, Lion Two is in trouble. I cannot assist from this position."
"Lion One, Misfile Three. I'm on Lion Two's pursuer. I'll have him out of trouble in no time."
"Thank you. Misfile Three."
She looked down at her radar screen. The combined fight had downed about half of the traitorous planes and nearly all of the interfering rebels. About five enemy MiG-29s remained, at the cost of four planes from Lion and damage to Misfile Four. "Let's mop this up. Missi?"
"I got enough left for two or three more."
"Good enough. Let's take 'em down."
She turned to reunite with Missi and then engage another target, but before she could, a MiG-29 descended onto her tail and filled the sky around her with tracers. Her stick shuddered in her hand; some of the rounds had hit, but her diagnostics showed minimal damage. Watching its movements for a moment, she repeated her 'slow down and turn against its forward motion' trick, firing her cannon up into its underside. The hull of the MiG-29 split like a ripe melon, the flaming aircraft nosing down into an uncontrolled descent.
Looking around her, she watched as Missi chased a MiG-21 down into the ravine to the southwest of the base. A betrayer MiG-29 saw and dove to pursue. Whether or not Missi was aware of her own pursuer didn't matter. Rolling until she was inverted, Emily dove after that fighter, announcing her presence with a missile lock to take its attention off her wingman.
Ahead, Missi nosed her fighter to the right, firing a burst of 20mm into the path the MiG-21 had to take to curve around a bend in the ravine. The rebel fighter was shredded by the cannon fire, and Missi abruptly pulled out of the ravine. Emily fired a burst over the MiG's top to discourage it from pursuing, then repeated the nose-leading maneuver and fired an optimum-lock Sidewinder. The explosion punched the aircraft's nose down and to the right, and the pilot had no time to recover before his jet pancaked into the side of the canyon.
"Bandit terminated," Missi emphatically reported, cruising up alongside Emily for a moment before splitting off to assist Lion with mopping up the MiG-21s. "Only a few of them left. You feel that pressure, Stagleishov? That's the clock counting down on your sorry ass. Tick tock, tick tock, Stovie."
As to be expected, Stagleishov did not respond to Missi's taunts. Returning to the flight altitude of the main combat, Emily spotted two MiG-29s in hot pursuit of Lion One's Mirage, working in tandem to hem the experienced pilot into a killbox. She turned into their wake and locked up the closest enemy, noting with a sadistic smile that he didn't even respond to her lock-on. The red haze had overtaken him; he was too focused, too hungry in his desire to kill Lion One to notice the Grim Reaper coming down on his own neck.
That combat exclusion was a mistake that only his wingman was in a position to learn, watching as the flaming fragments of his comrade's aircraft flew past him, looking back to see the F-16C closing in with a vengeance. In a panic, he cut hard to the right, an instinctive response that Emily saw coming a mile away. She'd already turned the nose of her plane into his flight path, the optimum trajectory locking into place as the 'SHOOT' box appeared in her HUD. With a press of her thumb, the Sidewinder rode out on its contrail, on course for its date with the MiG-29. To the enemy pilot's credit, once he detected the missile launch, he immediately attempted to evade by rolling onto his left wing and turning in the opposite direction, but this was a simple course correction before the missile reached its target, the blast and acceleration forces shearing both wings and the cockpit section free of the fuselage.
"Nice kills," Three praised.
"Colonel, I owe you one," Lion One called in.
The last of Big Bear's MiG-29s made a desperate dive into the ravine again, hoping to shake off their vengeful pursuers in the twists and turns. It was a fool's gambit; the smaller and more nimble F-16s would have a much easier time navigating the canyon than the larger MiGs. Misfile Three and Four went about demonstrating this advantage, sticking close to their targets' tails and feeding them a steady diet of high-explosive incendiary. It didn't take long for the two pilots to put the final nail in Big Bear's coffins.
As her pilots continued through the ravine, chasing down the last of the rebel MiG-21s, Emily's radio crackled. "This is Stagleishov. Can you hear me, Misfile One?"
Looking down at her consoles, she tracked the source of the signal to find the Russian general, now flying at an altitude where her radar could pick him up. As expected, he was rapidly departing the combat zone. "What the hell is your problem, General?" she demanded.
"A shame that you are still alive," he responded, ignoring her question. "A grave mistake on my part."
"Damn right it is," she snapped back, turning to pursue and putting everything she could into speed. It was hopeless, though; she knew that his fighter just barely edged hers out in maximum speed, and he was too far away to catch up to. "Why have you changed sides, Stagleishov?"
"How much did they pay you to turn traitor, you son of a bitch?" Missi added for good measure.
"No one paid me, Captain," the general answered, his calm demeanor only serving to rile the excitable Chinese American up that much more. "This is my doing."
"Is Major Reynolds with you?"
"Reynolds is a fool. He is lucky is he still in that bed. It will be a pleasure to shoot you down. Especially you, Fuller."
"Yeah? Quit running like a bitch and come say it to my face."
It was then that a new contact rose from near the surface, drawing Emily's attention to her radar screen. Her sensors identified it as a Su-35 Flanker-E, and she paled instantly. The Su-35 was one of Russia's best fighters, said to be a match for even the F-22. She'd never seen them in combat before, not in real combat. The F-16C she was flying would be hopelessly outmatched.
Judging by the return signal on her radar, the enemy aircraft would be within visual range off to her left. She turned to get a glimpse of the enemy. The Su-35 was heading in the opposite direction she was, clearly flying cover for the retreating Stagleishov. Its left side was toward her, allowing her to make out specific identifying marks, and as her brain recognized the pattern her eyes were seeing, her blood froze in her veins.
On the left horizontal stabilizer of the enemy plane, prominently displayed for all to see, was a stylized crown.
"The King..." she muttered, feeling her heart begin to pound in her chest. "You're real... But is it...?"
"Colonel Manderly," a new voice broke into the channel. It was a male voice, strong, and the radio distortion didn't quite manage to obscure an accent that only another native of Massachusetts would recognize. "A pleasure to speak directly to you. Even if it is only to say goodbye."
"Who the hell is he talking to?" Missi wondered. "Hey, asshole! Get the hell off our channel!"
"Ah, Captain Fuller," the man remarked with mirth. "Your eloquence is still legendary. You sound a bit under the weather, though. Perhaps you should not be flying with laryngitis?"
As though to underscore that statement, the Su-35 broke and turned in Missi's direction, clearly intent on shooting her out of the sky. Fear paralyzed Emily, coiling in her guts, that nightmare playing before her vision again. Temporarily out of control by its pilot, her F-16 began to drift to the left, its nose dipping slightly. Even if this pilot wasn't who she thought it was—and the male voice was a bit of an indicator there—if it was anything like her dream, she'd be horribly outclassed by him, and she had even been flying a comparable fighter in her dream.
"Shit, he's on my tail. Fuck off, you bastard!"
"Not used to being ahead of me, eh, Captain Fuller?" the King taunted with a malicious chuckle.
"Jesus, what the hell are you on about, you crazy son of a bitch?" There was an explosion in the background of Missi's transmission. "Ah, fuck! I'm hit!"
"Don't tell me that's all you have."
The sound of her closest remaining friend in trouble snapped Emily out of her paralysis. Tightly seizing control of her stick, she angled into a strong and fast turn to catch up to Missi and the King. If she engaged him in this plane, she would probably die, but at least Missi would be able to escape. That was her job as the older sister figure; she had to protect Missi from harm.
"Get your eyes over here," she snarled into the radio, locking onto his Su-35 and sending a Sidewinder his way. "I'm the one you want."
Demonstrating his superb piloting skill, the King dumped flares and evaded the missile without even breaking his pursuit of Missi, but to both pilots' surprise, he willingly broke away from the damaged F-16 a moment later, turning to head in the complete opposite direction. Something in the motion of his fighter told Emily that he had been spooked by her transmission or something about it. She didn't know what it meant, but she did know that it was her opening.
Slamming her throttle forward, she closed the distance with the King and set up another target lock. She fired her cannons to hem him toward her right side, then depressed the missile trigger as her computer reported a successful lock.
He was a long distance away from her, giving him ample time to react. With flares spreading from both sides of the Su-35 like a grim parody of an angel's wings, the King's nose came up, for a moment presenting Emily with a perfect shot at his exposed top surface, but before she could trigger her cannons, the moment had already passed.
Just as in her dream, time slowed to a crawl as the Su-35's tail snapped up into the sky, its nose pointed down directly at her. From here, the King had a perfect angle to hose her with cannon fire, but she knew without knowing that his finger was frozen on the trigger as the two pilots stared at one another, separated by nothing but glass and open air.
And there, despite all evidence to the contrary, despite the voice on the radio that told her she would find a man sitting in that cockpit, those shocked green eyes staring down at her were the eyes that haunted her dreams, the eyes of her long-lost racer, the only difference being the passage of sixteen years of time.
"Em..." came the King's voice across the radio, barely a whisper, as the Su-35 fell into line behind her. She could only make it out because she had been specifically listening for it.
She choked, unable to speak or respond, tears blurring her vision. Her horrible nightmare had become a reality right before her eyes.
"Shit! Evade!" barked the masculine voice of the King.
Emily wasn't aware of her danger until an explosion at her rear slammed her forward in her harness. Alarms wailed in her ear, diagnostics warning her of an engine fire and failing hydraulic pressure.
Ash had shot her!
Panic rising in her chest, she fought her stick for control of the plane as she looked back in her mirror. Through the smoke coming from her engine, she could see that the Su-35 was still behind her, still following her closely, but it wasn't firing anymore. Instead, it had moved in even closer, and the head movement of the pilot she could see seemed to be inspecting her aircraft for the full extent of the damages.
Biting her lip from inside her oxygen mask, Emily choked back a sob and reduced speed. Automated damage repair systems in the plane were working to mitigate the damages, and she hoped to god her engine didn't give out; F-16s were disparagingly called 'piloted lawn darts' for a reason. Another glance back showed Ash matching her reduced speed, moving in the same manner she had been trained to do when shadowing a crippled friendly plane. It seemed that Ash had launched that missile in automatic response to a computer lock-on, and given that the explosion was less than what a direct impact from an AA-11 Archer should have produced, it also seemed she had destroyed the missile prematurely when she realized what she had done.
"Korol, what are you waiting for?" Stagleishov demanded. "Finish her off."
Emily tensed, waiting for the killshot, but it never came. Instead, she watched in amazement as, one by one, the remaining missiles on the Su-35 fell away, ditched by their pilot. "I'm unable to comply," the infuriatingly-wrong male voice replied. A very-notable current of anger ran under the pilot's voice. "I'm running low on fuel and all of my missiles are expended. I'm breaking off."
Cutting its speed back even further, the Su-35's nose rose relative to Emily before the pilot punched the throttle, completing an Immelmann turn and retreating from the battle. As it departed, Emily's communication console beeped, and she looked down to see a text communication scrolling across her screen:
EM – DID NOT KNOW IT WAS YOU. PLEASE FORGIVE – A
Those simple words broke her shell. Hastily reaching down to switch off her transmitter, she unclipped her oxygen mask and let it dangle from the left side of her helmet, pressing her gloved hand to her mouth only to reduce the volume of her sobs. Her tears flowed hot and freely, soaking into the material of her gloves and between her fingers. For several long seconds, her mind shut down and could not form a coherent thought, jumping tangentially from Ash returning after all these years, to Ash being an enemy, to Ash not having any hard feelings for her; though they were in every direction, they all involved Ash, and she knew that she was incoherently blubbering at the sudden rush of powerful emotions threatening to overwhelm her.
"Colonel, you have heavy damage," Missi reported, moving in close to her flight leader's stricken aircraft. From their relative positioning, Emily knew that Missi could see her absolutely coming apart at the seams. The younger woman observed for several moments, then turned her attention down to her displays.
Emily's communications panel beeped again, a new message coming in, from Missi this time:
WAS IT HER? YOUR DREAM?
Barely managing to read the five words through her tears, she leaned back and took a deep, shuddering breath before looking out the right side of her canopy, where she could see Missi flying alongside her with concern evident on her face even over the distance. Her lip trembling, she nodded in an exaggerated fashion, guilt stabbing her in the chest when she saw the pain on Missi's face.
"Boss, are you okay?" Three queried, pulling up on her left. "Are you bailing out?"
Breathing in deeply again, she reconnected her oxygen mask and forced herself to get back in control. She was still in the air in a crippled plane, still responsible for getting her people down safely. She could disintegrate later. She cleared her throat, flipped her transmitter back on, then answered, "I'm alright. I have control of the plane."
With Four pulling in behind them, the quartet of F-16s banked slowly toward the air field, mindful of any potential catastrophic damage that could yet occur to Emily or Four's plane. As the runway came into sight, Emily slid up her visor and rubbed her hand over her eyes, wiping away the tear tracts. Then she lowered the visor again and started the landing dance once again, hoping that there wouldn't be any more surprises.
"Misfile One to Tower," she called.
There was a brief delay, during which she noticed her stick vibrating in her hand. She glanced back toward her tail; the rudder looked too damaged to function properly. That could be a problem.
"This is La Pointe," the second-to-last voice she expected to hear answered. "Our men in the tower were killed, so you've got me. Please state your status."
"We killed most of the traitors," she answered. "Stagleishov got away. I'm losing oil pressure and have damage to control surfaces. Requesting permission to land."
A flickering light out of the corner of her eye caught her attention, and she looked back to see a small guttering flame on the top surface of her right wing. Excellent. Now her fuel tank was on fire.
"You are cleared to land."
As she accelerated to lessen the time remaining in the air, Missi queried, "General, we had transmissions from the tower earlier that-"
"Yes, I know. Our people were killed. Those transmissions must have come from the mercenary planes. Only half the pilots were involved. None of the ground people."
By then, she had reached the optimum glide path. Saying a quick prayer, she dropped her landing gear and lowered the flaps to lower her airspeed, grimacing at the shudder that worked its way through her plane when the flaps deployed. Gently easing back her throttle, her eyes flickered from the altitude indicator to the looming runway that grew as she descended.
"Major Reynolds has come out of the hospital and has taken control of the loyalists," La Pointe finshed.
Well, that was at least good to know, that James hadn't turned on them the way Stagleishov had. She put that thought out of her mind for the moment, focusing as the tarmac came up at her. She rocked in her seat as the rear landing gear touched ground, the familiar screech sounding behind her, and she quickly nosed down to get her front gear down as well. With that done, she breathed a slow sigh of relief and pulled her throttle back to zero. The hard part was over.
But then she realized that the screech had not stopped on her right side, meaning that the wheel on that side was not turning and therefore putting excess stress on the airframe. The ominous creaking sound that came from her right wing underscored this assessment.
"Oh, that shouldn't be making that sound..." she murmured.
Without warning, her stomach clenched as the right rear landing gear snapped off, dumping her aircraft onto its nose and wing. An ungodly shriek of metal assaulted her ears as it spun on the tarmac, slowly bleeding out its forward momentum. Holding her stick and throttle in a death grip, she counted as the nose came around in three full rotations before finally coming to a rest pointed in the direction she had originally been going.
As the horrible noise faded out, a shiver ran up her spine in that same way as when someone runs their fingernails down a chalkboard, but she couldn't rest now. There was a strong risk of fire, and the remaining fuel and munitions on her jet exploding. She unhooked her oxygen mask from the cockpit supply and quickly unbuckled her restraints. As she was doing so, the voice of Stagleishov broadcast from her radio and over the air field's Big Voice loudspeakers:
"Attention, NATO forces. Witness the destruction of Carruth at the hands of our newest weapon. This is not just a boast. Blatnoi cannot be stopped. We will communicate our demands shortly. Let us see how far your arrogance gets you now."
Ignoring the transmission except to store it in her memory and think about it later, she pulled the canopy release lever and pushed it up and away with her hands, then crawled from beneath the canopy and slid down the side of the jet onto the tarmac. The sudden smell of jet fuel assaulting her nose, she glanced at the broken right wing of the plane before limping away as fast as she could, her legs feeling like jelly from hours in the cockpit, the chance near-death at the hands of Ash, and the crash landing.
She had only made it to the edge of the runway before a blinding flash from her right stole her attention. Automatically, she turned to look at it, and immediately regretted it as the sharp pain of the illumination stabbed into her eyes. Lifting both hands to ward it off, she stared through the gap between her fingers, horror once again seizing her as she recognized the distinctive mushroom-shape of a massive explosion cloud.
The eerie silence of the scene, due to the distance from the blast, allowed her to hear her pulse pounding in her ears, and then the pressure wave and sound caught up with her, the wall of displaced air knocking her from her feet as the noise of the explosion rumbled like a crack of thunder through the hot desert air.
The first thought through her mind was an angry indignation at the unfairness of it all, of finally finding Ash after so many years only to be killed by a nuclear weapon before she could even speak to her. Then her rational mind caught up, knowing that it was unlikely to be a nuclear weapon, given that the sheer candlepower of even the lowest-yield nuclear device would have instantly struck her blind from the illumination. Further, this was the same sort of weapon that had been encountered twice by Doug and Shooter Squadron, and both times the weapon had been nonnuclear.
It was that simple, hard fact that allowed her to remain standing at the edge of the tarmac, against all her instincts screaming for her to run for cover, and watch as the explosive cloud billowed slowly higher into the sky.
"Ash..." she whispered, the very name feeling so unusual, almost hard to pronounce, and yet, so wonderfully familiar, so right, on her lips.
