Usual disclaimers, no rights to any characters portrayed and this is neither the real world or a Disney Princess tale.
There will probably be changes in the first hour or so because I always see things that don't look quite right to me when it goes up in its final form.
They decided to have some fun, put on a show and make a statement when they left the reception, and they did that by Ellie and Rick jumping into the Loach and Chuck and Sarah jumping into one Lakota as they made touch and gos right outside the ballroom where the reception was held with the Little Birds and other Lakota as escorts, all in full stealth mode. After they watched the five black helicopters disappear quietly into the night, the top brass turned on the SOCOM Commander, demanding to know why they hadn't been made aware that they had such effective stealth technology at their disposal. At first he was angry as he said that they didn't, but his expression cleared and he laughed as he realised what had been done here. "We don't... but who has always been the ahead of the rest of us in tactical aircraft and equipment?"
At that, most of them turned to the diminutive general standing nearby in her full dress whites, because she was the one who commanded the group who always had the bleeding edge tactical technology, and the smile she gave them didn't bode well for someone. "No, you don't, because those stealth helicopters are in fact privately owned by the defense contractor that developed them, working with the Special Projects Group..."
Diane gave another evil smile as she waved to a side room and asked. "Would you like to hear why you don't have that technology at your disposal gentlemen?" Only about half of the men who wanted to be in on that discussion managed to get into the room to hear it.
Officially, the newlyweds had to leave as soon as the reception finished to fly back to LA because an urgent mission had come up, so Sarah demanded to know what was going on as soon as they were in the air because they headed east over the Atlantic, rather than west. Chuck stopped Ellie winding her up about it being a secret wedding present and came clean because he could see she was getting angry.
The Israelis had captured a Russian MiG-31B that Syria was trialling a few days before when it wandered into Israeli airspace after its radios failed, forcing it to land at Ramat David. Because the pilot had lost radio contact before they intercepted him, as far as the Syrians knew, the MiG had just crashed into the Mediterranean. The Israelis were worried about the potential backlash from Russia if someone found out that it was there though, so after debating the matter for a day or so they'd offered it to the United States Air Force, so long as they got it out of there ASAP.
The Air Force had jumped at the opportunity to get their hands on a MiG-31 and sent a crew straight over on a B-1B (using the 'running on fumes' line to explain the B-1B landing at Ramat David, but that wasn't too far from the truth, as they'd flown it non-stop from the States with a few drop tanks in the bomb bay), to strip as much weight as they could out of it, paint over any identifying markings and make it ready for an extended flight, fitting it with USAF compatible in-flight refuelling probes, oxygen systems, radios and transponders like they had with the MiG-25 so that it could be flown back to the States (and at Chuck's private request, disconnected the airspeed restrictions). When they ordered Chuck to fly it back because he was the only USAF pilot qualified to fly that type of MiG, Chuck demanded that Sarah be the second pilot and by then they were too desperate to get their hands on the MiG-31 to argue. (He'd turned them down flat and called the Chief of Staff of the Air Force to resign his commission the first time they tried to order him to cancel his wedding and leave immediately and the Chief of Staff had been on the phone and ripping into them a few minutes later, so they were willing to agree to any of his demands at that point.)
They would be flying the MiG-31 back to Palmdale for it to be dismantled and examined at Plant 42, and when they were close enough to Palmdale to get there safely, Chuck's plan was to give Sarah her shot at piloting a plane past Mach 3. Ellie couldn't decide whether it was a good thing or not that the closest thing to a bedroom on their Thirty Seven was the convertible sofas when Sarah jumped on Chuck for that, but she and Rick shared the jump seat in the cockpit with John and Anna until the noise died down.
Much of the flight over was spent in coaching Sarah on what she needed to know about flying a Russian jet of this type, but luckily her Cyrillic and Arabic comprehension was almost as good as Chuck's was so that wouldn't be a problem. By the time they landed at Ramat David, she had the theory down, so Chuck just had to coach her on the physical controls and quirks as they were going through the check lists.
This coaching and the 'JUST MARRIED' banners, ribbons and tin cans Ellie and Anna had added to the jet had some of the USAF personnel who'd readied the MiG for the flight worried, but the Crew Chief and over half of the team were there because the Air Force had grabbed everyone they could find from the original team who had come over in 2002 to ready the Libyan MiG-25PD for Chuck pretty much the same way, so they told the worriers that Mowgli knew what he was doing, and said that both Mowgli and Raksha were fully qualified Air Force Test Pilots.
The banners and ribbons were torn off by the air stream soon after the MiG took off, but they'd served their purpose because Ellie and Anna (and Casey) had gotten their photos. As soon as the MiG left and they'd finished loading the last of the MiG-31 parts and the ground crew and their equipment aboard their refuelled Thirty Seven (as they were also required to bring back all the equipment that had been stripped out of the MiG to improve its range and the USAF crew who had been flown to Israel to ready the MiG for the flight back), they thanked the Israelis and took off too, because the Israelis wanted everything to do with the MiG out of there ASAP.
The ones who hadn't known these people before this were wide eyed at some of the reminiscences they were hearing on the plane, about Raksha and Mowgli doing one of the last flights of the Blackbird at nearly Mach 3.5 back in Ninety Nine, of those record breaking flights from the States to the Middle East that Baloo had done with Mowgli in F-15Es in the early days of the War Against Terror... of Mowgli setting more records and taking that Foxbat past Mach 3.2 when he flew it back to the States to deliver it to the Air Force Museum back in Oh Two, and Mowgli and Baloo 'borrowing' ex-Soviet aircraft to get their teams out when missions went south. Most of them were beginning to see why the old hands hadn't been worried about the unconventional methods of these pilots.
Not all though, one of the young whiz kids questioned just what they were trying to do with those 'JUST MARRIED' signs, condescendingly saying. "Surely you didn't expect something as simple as that to actually mask what type of plane it was?"
And the Crew Chief just about pissed himself laughing when Raksha turned to him to say. "Please tell me that you didn't let this idiot handle anything critical on the MiG Crew Chief!" before turning on the man.
"You're obviously some sort of equal opportunity hire so I'll try to put this in small words! Just Married means Just Married! We all had to cut our own wedding receptions… damn, too big a word!… parties short to come on this mission! Mowgli and Shanti have to deliver the MiG and we have to deliver those parts and you lot to Plant Forty Two before we can start our honeymoons, such as they are, so shut up! And by the way? I saw the way you were ogling my sister-in-law's butt and you better believe that my brother would have too! So if I were you I'd be praying that they're long gone by the time we get to Palmdale, because in case you didn't recognise them, those IDF officers who came up to greet him at Ramat David? They were Shayetet Thirteen, the Israeli version of our SEALs! and the reason they know him is that he's trained and operated with them!"
The Crew Chief gave up on that idiot when he just scoffed at what she said, he'd been waiting for him to wake up and realise that he was just digging himself deeper into a hole, but no, he just kept diggin'! He'd been preparing and maintaining all manner of aircraft for this group for special missions for over fourteen years now, and he'd seen enough in that time to be quite sure what Raksha said was true, not that he'd question her word anyway… but she'd just let slip something else, something that he regarded as more important here and now. He was a little upset that he hadn't been told about this before, but he expected that he would have found out at the wedding like most folk if he hadn't been pulled away and thrown onto a B-1B for this assignment a couple of days before. With that he stood up and crossed to where Ellie was sitting with Rick, offering Rick his hand. "Sir, may I offer my congratulations? You've got yourself one in a million here!"
Rick broke into a grin as he shook his hand. "Thank you Crew Chief, and believe me, I know!"
The Crew Chief turned to Ellie then, a little unsure how to address her... She was a senior officer, he had no doubt that her Colonel's rank was genuine and that it wasn't the only senior rank she held either... But for all the fact that they were exceptional pilots and absorbed more about and understood the aircraft they were flying better than any other pilots he'd ever known, she and her brother had just been teenagers when the then Colonel Beckman had first got him assigned to her team to look after them and their aircraft, so he'd taken the two of them under his wing.
Ellie could read his hesitation and what he was trying to say, and surged to her feet to hug him and kiss him on the cheek, whispering. "Thank you Hank!" and asking "Do you want to see the pictures?" excitedly.
He hardly got out "Of course!" before he was dragged down to sit beside her, Rick handing her her laptop with a smile. As she was showing him the wedding pictures, Ellie explained that, as he'd surmised, only a few people had known beforehand that it was to be a double wedding, so it had been a shock to most people at the wedding.
Hank froze when he saw the wedding party picture where Ellie, Sarah, Anna and Emma were wearing their faux uniform jackets, because he noted their ranks and medals instantly, and finding out that the 'kids' were both one star Admirals and one of them had the Medal of Honor? Shit! He hadn't expected that! And he didn't miss the SEAL tridents they were both wearing either.
Ellie read his reaction again and swatted him on the arm. "Stop that! Yes, as well as being Navy Admirals we're both Colonels in the Air Force, Marines and Army, but we're still the same snot nosed kids who you drilled the rules of the aircraft into when you first took over making sure our planes and helicopters wouldn't fail us, and the highest rank either of us had back then was Captain or Navy Lieutenant... I expect Chuck will probably get two or three more grades before he's done, but we'll always think of you as Uncle Hank!"
He glanced quickly at the others. "That's not appropriate Ma'am!"
"Oh shut up Uncle Hank, John's in the middle of putting the fear of god into them, so I'm sure they're too busy trying not to wet themselves to listen to anything we're saying..."
He glanced over again and chuckled, because she was right, then Ellie suddenly grabbed his arm.
"Did you hear what the General did to her protective detail?"
He was almost pissing himself laughing by the time she finished the 'back seat driver' story, but shook his head. "I better get over there and check the Twenty Eight out then, the General has never had your or Chuck's... or even John's... light hand on the controls."
Ellie just shook her head at him. "What do you mean 'get over there'? We're heading to Plant Forty Two right now, remember? We'll just get the General to cut you orders to say that you're spending a week or so going over the Twenty Eight, Thirty Seven, Tiger, Loach, Lakota, One Oh Nine and Bertha and Andre, because I know Chuck wants to talk to you about some new test platform Gulfstream has. I think he's planning another major upgrade on this, aside from those new fly by wire systems he wants to put in, but Sarah will kill him if he tries to cut the pitiful excuse for a honeymoon we wrangled out of Auntie Di short to talk to you... I expect that you'll be needed at Plant Forty Two for meetings with the brass about your stealth project in the next week or two anyway, because we used the Loach, Lakotas and Little Birds in full stealth mode for our exit from the wedding reception."
It took the Thirty Seven nearly three times as long to get to Plant 42 as Chuck and Sarah had in the MiG, so they knew before they got there that Chuck had gotten himself another distance record, shared with Sarah this time, for doing a flight of over 8300 miles from Ramat David in Israel to Palmdale California in a bit over five and a half hours with seven aerial refuellings. They also knew that Sarah had officially taken the MiG-31B up to Mach 3.13 (with the restrictors removed, it had the thrust to get up there OK) and Chuck had taken it to Mach 3.15 too (while it was tempting to find out what it would do, taking it past Mach 3.2 like he did with the Foxbat probably would have burnt out the 31's engines too, and they wanted to examine this one). He wished he could have given Sarah the full experience of flying the MiG rather than being stuck in the rear cockpit hardly able to see anything like that, but he was the only one who knew really how to fly it so he had to be in the front cockpit. He'd officially handed control of the 31 over to her while she made her run though (they wrote it up as evaluating the plane's behaviour with different pilots), so Sarah was in control of the plane when she took it past Mach 3, and the squeals he was hearing over the intercom at the time said that she loved it.
By the time the Thirty Seven arrived at Plant 42 over ten hours later, the MiG was half dismantled.
The one with the mouth almost fainted from the relief of hearing Raksha being told that Mowgli and Shanti had gone on ahead, and that they'd be in the Dungeon when they arrived. Hank was confused though, asking why they would be in the Dungeon?
Ellie explained. "They're staying in the apartment that we have down there at the moment Hank. You see Chuck's apartment is being renovated..." she stopped and frowned "Though it better be finished by now or Uncle Roan's going to be in big trouble, because he promised that it'd be done by the time Chuck was married."
Hank grinned at that, as he wouldn't want to be Roan if Chuck's apartment wasn't ready. He liked Roan, he really did, for all that he was the smooth, slippery type who's teeth he generally just wanted to kick in. He'd talked both Pilatus and Gulfstream into including all of the latest developments that he'd heard about from his buddies into the builds for the kids' planes... He'd also managed to talk the General into going along with their plan to get Ellie the brand new MD600N (instead of the MD500 she was planning because he knew that it would make a much better machine for the kids with a few changes) in Ninety Seven because she was getting upset that she wasn't getting to fly any more and he saved them millions on plant and equipment and got the Fenestron tails and other parts they needed out of Eurocopter for their Stealth Project….. but if Roan had promised to deliver that apartment for Chuck and he hadn't…. well he'd be cheering Ellie on as she kicked his arse!
As soon as they'd off-loaded the parts and the rest of the crew, and Hank had passed on anything he regarded relevant to the people there, the refuelled Thirty Seven took off again, for the last short leg down to Bob Hope. They set Hank up with a hotel room close by and left him there to start going over the planes and copters, because he was there often enough to keep all his airport accesses current.
When they got back to El Castillo, Chuck and Sarah were looking more rested and mellow. Sarah was shaking her head about the fact Chuck said the Thirty One was a lot smoother ride than the Twenty Five, because it almost shook her fillings out when they opened it up, but Ellie wasn't about to ask her whether she was this excited because she'd actually flown the MiG past Mach 3 herself, or it was something else, because she really didn't want to know the details if it was something else!
Roan was there, so he took them up for a tour of their new home. They used one of the new 'public' lifts because their offices weren't finished yet, with Roan stopping the lift on the ground floor to show them one of the new foyer areas that had been created, saying that these would obviously be staffed by Thebes people as he waved at the reception desk in the alcove beside the lift. The foyers on the ground floor had mainly been created out of Chuck and Anna's old offices, and they now opened into the Carmichael Industries and Noble House Consulting offices. He pointed out that this was why they'd had been moved out of their offices and apartments, to allow the foyers to be built on each level, and also to allow the elevators to be enlarged enough to serve as public lifts, adding that those apartments would be recreated, they'd just be a little smaller than they were before. When Chuck asked where Anna and Lou would be he explained that Anna, Lou and the girls would be in the apartment above his offices so that they could use the private lift that came up to his side of the Keep. Chuck smiled when Sarah nodded, indicating that she was fine with that.
Roan demonstrated the concealable multi-factor authentication mechanisms for the lifts, saying that of course everyone's access to each level would be controlled individually, and took them up to the Keep (as the penthouse had been designated, being at the top of El Castillo, the Castle), and they saw it for the first time. Looking around, they were stunned and Chuck apologised to Uncle Roan for ever doubting him, because this was magical.
They started the tour with the formal lounge, because that was where they'd come up, this was a quite large, elegant room with flat screens on the walls, and they noted that all of the furniture sat on lockable rollers to allow it to be rearranged or moved out of the way quickly and easily for functions. Next came the formal kitchen, which was set up like a restaurant kitchen and clearly capable of catering for large functions, with the formal dining area which could easily handle forty or fifty people in front of it. Beyond the dining area and kitchens, there were ladies and gentlemen's toilets along one side (to serve the guests at functions), while a rather large games room/cinema room filled the space from the dining area to the corner, and there was another, quieter lounge area at the other end between the cinema room and the partition that closed off the private wing on that side. The other public elevator came up in this lounge area. Looking back through the entertainment wing they all agreed that yes…. this would be quite enough to handle any functions they may want to have here.
As Roan led then into the private wing, which had similar access controls to the lift, he explained that this was the Carmichael residential wing, but the Noble wing was a mirror image of it, except for a few details which were specific to each of them. The private wing started with a couple of light and airy guest rooms, which had spacious en-suites and built in wardrobes, then came a cosy informal kitchen/dining room, followed by an unusual guest bedroom with two beds, an ensuite that included a bath and a large walk in wardrobe that opened into the master bedroom. The rest of the private wing was made up of the master bedroom with a large bathroom and walk in wardrobe/dressing room, the large armour glass walled gym/work room looking out over the roof garden which had its own ensuite and kitchenette, and a spacious private lounge area between the rooms and the internal armour glass walls.
Oh, and the private elevator that came up outside the kitchen that went down through Anna and Lou's apartment and the bathroom of their executive offices to the Dungeon. Looking around their private wing, Chuck and Sarah decided that they'd be spending most of their time in here and it would be just right for them, though that massive 8' by 10' ultrabed and the jacuzzi bath and shower which could easily hold four people in their bathroom raised a few questions that they weren't sure that they wanted to ask, for fear of what the answers may be. Ellie and Rick were thinking the same thing.
Overall though, it was incredible, as was what they could see of the luscious roof garden and the pool that went across the other end of it, but this was of course part of the tour, so Roan led the way out into the roof garden… They stopped to look around and agreed that roof park would be a better description, because while the first hundred feet or so between the residential wings was only around seventy five feet wide, the four hundred or so feet from there to the pool structure was about a hundred and fifty feet wide.
Now they were outside, they had a better look at the spa pool built against the wall behind the toilets and kitchen that would take well over a dozen people comfortably, with change rooms (made of mirrored armour glass to blend in with the walls) with showers and toilets on either side and a bar and comfortable outdoor entertainment area in front. After deciding that they'd probably spend some time in that later, they turned around and began strolling towards the other end of El Castillo Jardines, noting as they went that the potted gardenia and rhododendron bushes and trees around the walls and dotted about the area were all hooked into automatic irrigation systems to keep them healthy, and that what had looked like grass from inside was actually a soft, lush green version of astro turf. Chuck remembered that his father had come up with something like this (or more to the point, he'd come up with this) a few of years ago and realised that the family must have either sold the rights or more likely started manufacturing it, but he'd been bouncing around the world on missions at the time and hadn't paid much attention to it. The two lifts and stairwells along the centreline that came up from the garage/storage area were still there, but they had been disguised as quaint little cabins with gardenias and rhododendrons around them to make them blend into the setting. There were also a few similar styled lightweight 11 x 13M shells on fat swivelling tyres that were big enough to cover the Loach, 109 or Lakotas but light enough to roll about easily, with doors at both ends and on one side to make it quick and easy to push them over the helicopters.
When they got down to the pool, they waited for Uncle Roan's explanation, they didn't have to wait long because he was quite proud of this. "Ah yes, this is my pièce de résistance, the Crystal Palace! I was inspired by your innovative use of the armour glass your father created actually Charles because as you can see, it's all made out of armour glass. The pool itself is a hundred and fifteen feet long, thirty three feet wide and seven feet deep with clear armour glass walls and it's surrounded by a sixteen and a half foot wide mirrored armour glass deck on three sides. We decided that a deck along the outside would be superfluous, and this way those using the pool have a clear view out though the outside armour glass wall, as well as through the other sides…."
"The pool itself is floored with mirrored armour glass for added effect and it's sitting on a solid sixteen inch high base faced with mirrored armour glass, so there's nearly eight feet of clearance underneath the deck. The floor of the area underneath the deck is also made from mirrored armour glass. We have foot wide clear armour glass panels coming out from the pool walls every sixteen and a half feet around the pool to help support both the deck and the walls, with more of them mounted parallel to the edge every sixteen and a half feet along the outside edge of the deck on this side, overkill I know, but we wanted to make it as strong as possible.… There's also a three and a half foot high clear armour glass panel across this side of the deck to serve as a railing…. this is extended down the inside of each staircase and the mirror glass stair treads are supported by this and the outside glass. The cabins over there against the outside glass are change rooms with toilets and showers and we've also added three and a half foot high mirror glass fronted and topped bars under the stairs on both sides to make best use of the possibilities for entertaining, with tables and chairs down here and up on the deck. All of the change rooms have convertible sofas by the way so they could also be used as guest cabins too if you have the need."
They stood there with their arms around each other and apologised to Uncle Roan again for ever doubting him, and thanked him for creating this for them. With that, Uncle Roan said his goodbyes and each couple headed back to the residences to try out those deliciously decadent beds in their master bedrooms.
It was no great surprise that they couldn't avoid working on their so called honeymoon, Chuck and Ellie tried to get as much as possible of it done while Sarah and Rick were sleeping, but they still had to have video-conferences at least with the others during the day as well, so when Ellie told Sarah that she knew that Chuck wanted to talk to Hank while he was there about some plane related project that he wanted his input on (then she clarified that Hank had been their aircraft crew chief for over fourteen years now, ever since Auntie Di had tracked down the best one in the Air Force and got him assigned to her group to look after them), Sarah went to Chuck and told to get Hank down for that talk.
Hank flew the Loach in that night, because he'd flown their helicopters into El Castillo with night vision goggles more than a few times since they fitted the first stealth rotor to the Loach about a year and a half ago, but when they brought the lights up once he'd shut the Loach down and taken the night vision goggles off, he just stared about, not believing what he was seeing. The rooftop had always been huge, but it was about a hundred and fifty foot longer now, so even with that mirror glass mansion taking up one end and that structure…. was it a pool? going right across the other end, there was almost as much free space as there'd been before, more if you included the big area between the side wings of the mansion. And the rooftop was a beautiful park now!
He was still looking around in stunned amazement when they walked down to greet him and Chuck said "Welcome to El Castillo Jardines!" with a laugh.
Hank shook his head and looked at Ellie. "This is what you were talking about?"
Ellie nodded with a smile. "Well I guess you weren't too upset with Roan when you got home after all then?"
She shook her head with a laugh. "Not in the least! And you haven't seen inside yet!"
Turning to point at the Carmichael Wing, she went on. "That's Chuck and Sarah's home, but that..." turning to point at the Noble Wing "Is Rick and mine! What our spouses didn't tell us was that Uncle Roan asked them if they'd be happy with us all sharing the Keep just after when Rick and I decided to get married, and he's been building this ever since!"
Hank pointed to the Noble Wing. "If that's your home, and that's Chuck's home…." (pointing to the Carmichael Wing) "What's all the rest?"
Ellie laughed again. "Oh that's just the shared entertainment wing!"
Hank shook his head as he decided that his head was going to explode if they kept talking about this, so he turned to Chuck. "Chuck, Ellie told me that you want to talk to me about something Gulfstream has?"
Chuck nodded. "Yeah, let's just get the Loach covered up and we can go in." He looked at Rick and they walked to the nearest 'shed', each grabbing the handle on one of the corners and pushing. When they were about twenty foot away they stopped to open the doors and then pushed it over the 600, closing the doors again so that it was completely out of sight. It looked like they'd broken Hank again so Ellie laughed and took him by the arm to lead him towards the Keep, but he stopped and pointed back at the pool. "What is that?"
Ellie laughed again. "Uncle Roan calls it the Crystal Palace because it's all made out of glass, it's a pool and outside entertainment area. I have to admit, it is pretty incredible, you have to see it in the daylight, and have a swim in it as well while you're at it."
Hank just shook his head and let himself be led towards the mansion, not noticing that Rick had picked up his bag.
Chuck led the way to his and Sarah's workroom, and brought up the designs, specs and pictures of what he wanted to talk about on the screens of the workstation he'd been using, but Hank had been distracted by all the certificates, medals, pictures and flags on display above the screens which they had left visible when it was just them there, so he had to spend a while answering questions about them first.
Sarah had come in with them, because she wanted to hear what this was about too, and she was both amused and touched when the Crew Chief wandered from looking at Chuck's achievements onto her's and suddenly checked himself with an apology when he realised. "Oh I'm sorry Ma'am, I shouldn't have looked at your display without asking!"
She shook her head. "Feel free Crew Chief, I know you'll keep whatever you see to yourself, and it's Sarah to family, which from what Ellie tells me, you are!"
"Thank you Sarah, and it's Hank to the family!"
Now that he'd been given leave to look, he did so with interest, and his eyes widened as he realised that Chuck, or rather Mowgli in this context, had found himself a good match in his little lady. He didn't hold to the notion that the Distinguished Intelligence Cross was at the same level as the Medal of Honor, but he was quite prepared to accept it as the equivalent of the Distinguished Service Cross or Navy Cross, and he was willing to bet just about everything he had that she was just about the only woman to get one, and she had an Intelligence Star as well, so she'd certainly seen serious action and distinguished herself there. He knew some of the men who'd certified her on aircraft and signed off on her special operations training as well, and you had to be damned good to get them to sign you off, especially a woman! Considering that she couldn't have seen as much action as Mowgli (he was damned sure that no-one had seen as much action as him in the last ten years, with all the missions the General sent him on), what Sarah, no, Shanti here, had earned was damned impressive.
Sarah was surprised to find that the approval of this man who Ellie and Chuck obviously cared about and held in high regard actually meant quite a bit to her, and he read her thanks in the smile she gave him. He gave her a 'you'll do!' nod, and then went back to what Chuck had wanted to talk to him about.
It wasn't long before he was as tied up in it as Chuck was, because what Chuck had found was a G Five SP that Gulfstream had modified to use as a flying testbed for the wings for the next generation planes they were developing now, the G Six. The figures they were showing for these new wings were damned impressive, and they could obviously carry a lot more fuel than the G Five's wings too, but in the end he shook his head.
"It looks like they've made major changes to the airframe to fit those wings Chuck. I dare say it'd take a hell of a lot more work than converting the G Five airframe to the G Five SP like we did and the Thirty Seven's too good a plane to risk hacking it up like that, especially without the technical information we'd need to get it right…. But if you could get that airframe off Gulfstream and have it built up with the new wings, I'd say that it'd probably be worth selling your existing Thirty Seven, because this should make a better plane, faster and with longer range."
Chuck nodded musingly. "If we could get that airframe once all the testing is done, that's certainly an option I'd be interested in... but I don't think I'd sell our Thirty Seven if we did Hank, like you said it's a good plane and our group keeps getting bigger and more active, so if we can get this airframe and have it built up, we'll keep that one here and the existing Thirty Seven can be based in Austin so that they have faster and more comfortable transport on hand. I've heard that Gulfstream are working with Rolls Royce to get a new engine created for the G Six that's more powerful and more efficient as well, so hopefully by the time they finish using the airframe as a flying test bed, we'll be able to get both of our C Thirty Sevens updated to the new engines and the new fly by wire systems they're working on for the G Six... Oh yeah, can you see if you can find a few airframes that are suitable to make into Wagons and get three more built up for us please? Auntie Di wasn't too happy with the last Air Force transport she had to take, but from what Anna said she did like flying the Propfan, and she and our other people in DC will be better off with transport of their own. One of the Wagons will be for the Dallas crowd because they need more transport down there, and so do we so if we upgrade to a couple of Wagons here, our Twenty Eight can go to DC for them."
Hank chuckled, as it was always fun to see Chuck getting excited like this, and he agreed that a U-28 for their people in DC and extra planes in Dallas and here would be a good idea. It would be easier to just build more Propfan PC Twelves but the Wagon was a better plane and he could see how having the greater capacity of the Wagons would be useful. He glanced at Sarah and she was smiling fondly at Chuck's enthusiasm too. He held up a finger to quieten Chuck as he pulled out his phone to call a friend who was an engineer at Gulfstream.
Twenty minutes he signed off the call and looked at Chuck with a smile. "Okay, they're talking about scrapping that airframe once the wing testing is finished, so if you want it…." he held up a hand to forestall the response he knew was coming "which I know you do, I'd say that the best approach would be to send Old Silver Tongue to talk to them now, while they're still using it as a test bed and planning to scrap it, and do a deal for us to buy it from them now, with the agreement that they will build it up for us with the new wings, engines and fly by wire systems once the testing's done, and include upgrading the engines and fly by wire systems on our existing Thirty Seven in that deal. That should stop them abusing it too much in further testing and they'll probably use it to accelerate the engine and fly by wire systems testing and development too then, because they'll see it as an opportunity to use it for all their early testing then clean it up and give it to us, so we're offsetting the cost of their development. I doubt that Roan would have any trouble convincing them that it will be a good marketing ploy to have something that's identified as the functional equivalent of their new plane flying around showing what it can do to build up interest for a couple of years before it's released, especially seeing that we already did that for them with the G Five Fifty."
He'd hardly finished speaking before Chuck grabbed his phone and asked Uncle Roan to come up.
Hank saw Sarah shaking her head at Chuck with a fond smile and leant over to whisper. "Just be glad that he understands that it'll probably take Gulfstream years to get this new design finished, otherwise he'd be wanting to get his hands on the new jet straight away..."
Sarah flashed a smile at him, thinking that he obviously knew Chuck pretty well, that smile widening when Chuck turned around indignantly, saying. "Hey! Right here you know!"
She leant over to kiss him. "Are you trying to tell me that Hank's wrong about that Chuck?"
"Nooooo, okay, I'll admit that I can't wait to get my hands on this…. but I still don't think that Uncle Hank was being fair, putting it like that!"
She laughed and kissed him again, wrapping her arms around him.
She kept her arm around him as she asked Hank. "Just how are our helicopters so quiet Hank? They're much quieter than any other copters I've heard."
Hank smiled, because he loved to talk technical details as much as Chuck did, and he appreciated the way she'd accepted him as part of the family. "I presume that Chuck's filled you in on the background, but I've been working with our people in Raccoon City up at Plant Forty Two on and off for about ten years now on a project to reduce the acoustic signature of military helicopters, focussing on the Little Birds as they're most often in the situations where it matters. Part of the noise reduction comes from using an asymmetric Fenestron tail rotor…. That's the shrouded fan in the tail…. to replace the exposed tail rotor, because that gets rid of most of the tail rotor noise, but even more work has been done on reducing the acoustic signature of the main rotor. Well the Six Hundred didn't have a tail rotor to start with, it was originally using something called a NOTAR system, it's basically a big arse fan pushing a lot of air out one side of the tail boom. It works, and it's quieter than a normal tail rotor, but it's big and heavy and not very efficient, so we pulled it all off and built an improved titanium versions of the Little Bird's transmissions with better bearings to reduce drag that was more than strong enough to handle the full power of the Six Hundred's bigger turbine to drive the main rotor and tail rotor shaft. We used the Fenestron tail rotor to cut down the tail rotor noise, and built a skinnier, lightweight carbon fibre tail boom for it, but we shaped the boom like a vertical airfoil to make use of the base principle of the NOTAR boom and save a bit more power, we replaced a number of panels with carbon fibre at the same time to drop more weight. It did a better job and all up it saved four or five hundred pounds and over fifty horsepower so the Six Hundred was a little faster and a lot more nimble with better range. It worked so well that we converted our One Oh Nine to a Fenestron tail rotor too, it didn't give quite as much of an improvement there but it still it quieter and more nimble, improved its looks too in my opinion, so we did the same with the EuroMil when we got it. Our Six Hundred already had the Fenestron tail rotor and was close to the Little Bird's size and weight, so we used it for the testing when our engineers came up with a shorter seven blade rotor with thinner composite rotor blades and asymmetric spacing early last year. The stealth rotor reduced the acoustic signature quite a lot, but we found that it also impacted the performance quite a bit, so the engineers modified the Six hundred's FADEC to allow its full power to be used. The tail rotor drive and transmission we created for it had also freed up more power to go to the main rotor and with those changes the Six Hundred could more than match its own or the Little Bird's original performance in full stealth mode, but you lost range due to having to use extra power to counter the reduced lift of the rotor blades."
"As a work around for that problem, they redesigned the stealth rotor and Fenestron hubs so that the rotor blade spacing could be quickly changed between symmetrical and asymmetrical in the field. That way that it could be in symmetric mode for better performance on the transport leg, and then be switched to asymmetric mode to quieten it for the final approach, but it still lost range and performance because of the reduced lift from the thinner main rotor blades. With thicker rotor blades, we found that the stealth rotor can actually improve the performance and range in symmetric mode, but they make the acoustic signature bigger in asymmetric mode so the stealth aspect suffers."
"When they added the ability to change between symmetrical to asymmetrical in the field, they also worked in the capability to fold the blades right back for storage. The Navy consultant on the team brought that up first in regard to shipboard storage, but one of the other guys pointed out that it could be even more useful for allowing the helicopters to be airlifted into forward support positions and then rapidly deployed, as one C Seventeen could fly in an entire strike team, complete with up to half a dozen Little Birds, and they could be on their way within half an hour or so of the plane touching down. Being able to fit it all into one load would also mean that they could get the C Seventeen in and out of a forward airstrip without having to rebuild it. Unfortunately we couldn't let others know that we had something far better than the C Seventeens for that because we need to keep our AN Seventies a secret, but the idea was a stroke of genius and the rest of us were wondering why the hell we'd never thought of it before, so we made damned sure that we had it working by the time the revisions to the stealth rotor hub were done."
"Once we'd proven the concept with our Six Hundred, we confirmed it by repeating the exercise with our two Little Birds, using the higher rated turbines from the Five Thirty Fs to get the extra power we needed for them to perform in stealth mode. The Army panel overseeing helicopter development projects of this nature questioned the sanity of most of our core ideas... reconfiguring the rotor blades in the field, modifying the FADEC to use the turbine's full power, using an unproven transmission in a Little Bird and fitting a higher rated turbine into the Little Bird, even though we just bolted in compatible higher rated Two Fifty turbines from another Five Hundred variant, so our proposal to use all of them together just about gave them apoplexy. They were determined to stick with the normal Little Bird variants anyway, so they rejected the improved transmission, Fenestron boom and tail, reconfigurable rotor and bigger turbine proposals out of hand. The only piece of the project that they approved to continue was the original fixed seven blade asymmetric rotor, but with the thicker rotor blades. While they officially rejected most of our proposals though, we left our helicopters configured with the stealth components, so we had three fully functional stealth helicopters that performed quite well!"
"The reason we have the Lakotas is that the Army selected the EC One Forty Five for its new Light Utility Helicopter soon after that. We knew that Eurocopter were already using a Fenestron tail rotor on their slightly smaller but similar One Thirty Five, and they were working on an updated Fenestron tail rotor variant of the One Forty Five as well. Chuck and Roan went to France and talked Eurocopter into selling them a couple of the new One Forty Five Fenestron tails and the uprated turbines and FADEC and glass cockpits they were using, picking up a couple of beaten up early One Forty Fives cheap while they were over there because they got them for less than a quarter of what they would have cost us here. We compared the existing open tail rotor parts to the Fenestron tail rotor parts, confirming that they were a straight swap, as were the turbines and FADEC."
"We thought that having the uprated turbines and FADEC and Fenestron tail rotor being manufacturer parts would have been enough to get past their arguments against using unproven parts, so we fitted the uprated turbines and FADEC and glass cockpit and built stealth rotors for the the One Forty Fives they picked up, along with a shorter and lighter Fenestron tail with less aerodynamic and mechanical drag to go with it, and they exceeded all the targets they'd set for stealth helicopters. We were confident that stealth One Forty Fives using mostly factory parts would be enough to prove to them that we could turn their new Light Utility Helicopters into fully functional stealth helicopters that could carry almost as much inside as a Black Hawk…. But the old fools on the panel just refused to look at them, so we just use the Lakotas as extra helicopters, luckily they're quite useful little helicopters... Though from what Ellie told me on the plane, the stealth Lakotas and Little Birds should get looked at by SOCOM now, after the show you lot put on at your wedding."
"Our Lakotas are a lot lighter now because we've built much stronger improved titanium transmissions and carbon fibre tail booms like the Loach and Little Birds' for them and replaced a lot more parts with titanium and carbon fibre since then. We did the same with the One Oh Nine and EuroMil, just to prove that we could, and replaced a few more on the Loach and Little Birds as well, to improve their performance and range. We have all the equipment at Raccoon City to build whatever we need, all we need is time and materials and when the Army rejected our proposals we had plenty of time to improve them, and the EuroMil. We've also built new components, wings, tails and fuselage panels for our Twenty Eights and Wagons, new tails, panels and components for the Seventies and One Twenty Two and that full sized cargo door we added to our Thirty Seven. I don't know why Gulfstream doesn't offer them on the Five Fifty airframe, they're damned useful for groups like us."
"We normally keep the Loach configured in full stealth mode because it's mostly used to fly in and out of here so the reduced performance and range isn't an issue, but we have the thicker rotor blades back at the hangar and they can be swapped in for other uses. We also came up with a way to carry one set of rotor blades attached to the skid supports, so you can have increased performance in transport mode and full stealth in approach mode, it just takes another hour or so to swap the rotor blades. The Little Birds are normally in transport mode because they're used around Dallas and the Lakotas are normally left in transport mode because even though they'll carry almost as much inside as a Black Hawk, they're only about half the size and weight, which makes them fun to fly because with the thicker rotor blades and lighter weight, just over half the power is quite enough to make them faster than the Black Hawks, and a lot more nimble too. So are the One Oh Nine and EuroMil, and even though the EuroMil is the size and weight of the Black Hawk on the outside, and it'll carry over twice as much inside. Actually with the extra power they have the One Oh Nine and EuroMil are faster than just about any other helicopters, any production ones anyway, because the EuroMil can use fifty percent more power than any other MI Thirty Eight with our transmissions and FADEC modifications, and the One Oh Nine is almost twice as powerful now because we uprated its turbines to the same ones we put in the Lakotas."
Sarah smiled at him, she could see why Chuck liked and respected Hank, because he was down to earth and smart, and almost as fanatical about their toys as Chuck was.
Roan had arrived soon after Hank started and was listening with interest, because he'd never heard the subject discussed in this much detail before. When Hank finished, he and Chuck explained what they wanted him to do. Thinking about what he'd just heard about their helicopters' stealth systems (contrary to popular opinion, he wasn't a buffoon, and he was quite interested in this technical information), he asked what the benefits of getting this airframe would be, so Hank explained how the new wing was designed to be more efficient at higher speeds so the plane would have a faster cruising speed and more range, and that it would also hold at least ten percent more fuel for even greater range. Chuck also told him about the new engines they were working on that were more powerful and efficient as well, so combined with the new wings they could have a faster, much longer range plane to get around in. He also repeated what he'd said to Hank about wanting to keep the current Thirty Seven if they did build a new plane on this airframe, so that more of their people would have transport available, but that he'd like to upgrade their Thirty Seven to the new engines and systems too.
Roan nodded thoughtfully, he could see why Chuck (and Hank) wanted this airframe, and Hank's arguments about pitching it to Gulfstream as it being a good teaser for their new jet and a way to offset their development costs were certainly valid, but Chuck's plan to keep their current Thirty Seven and upgrade it as well would help cinch the deal, because he could point out to Gulfstream that not only would there be one less second hand G-550 out there to cost them the sale of a new plane, they'd also be getting paid to upgrade their existing G-550's engines and systems too. What Hank was saying about having everything they need to fabricate things at Raccoon City also offered another angle that could work for them. He didn't see himself having much trouble getting this locked in on good terms for them (especially if they paid up front and he played on the fear of this brewing financial crisis to push the price down!) while having Gulfstream seeing this as them doing Gulfstream a favour, yes, this should work out quite well!
He nodded again and said that he'd set up a meeting with Gulfstream, but he was confident that he'd be able to get them to agree to what they were after. Then he asked Chuck what was the absolute limit he was prepared to go to for this and whether he could offer the services of Raccoon City to sweeten the deal.
Chuck looked at Hank and at his thoughtful nod said. "Yes, so long as it doesn't interfere with our other operations we can fabricate components for the test beds at Raccoon City, but we won't do anything for their production aircraft, and you can go up to Forty Million to get the new engines, avionics, fly by wire systems and controls, preferably the side sticks they're working on in parallel with the yokes, and interiors, for both planes. Talk them down as much as you can but let them think they've won so they're motivated to give us what we want."
Roan beamed as Chuck showed how well he had taken on board what he'd been taught about working people, but he was sure that even with that caveat he could beat that figure down by quite a bit, but Hank blinked at the way Chuck threw that figure out. He knew that they had access to serious money from what they'd spent on aircraft and Raccoon City over the last ten years or so (and this place, he thought as he looked around), but dropping a figure like that so casually? He just shook his head.
Just then, Ellie came over to get them for dinner, adding Roan when she saw him, as there was enough for one more. They had a pleasant dinner, then Ellie trumped Chuck by saying that they'd already made up a room for Hank, and telling Hank that his bag was already in there when he started to say that he had to go get it, so he was their guest for the night.
When he got up in the morning, Hank went down to have a look at this Crystal Palace. It certainly was impressive, a hundred and fifty foot long glass structure that was mainly using mirror glass for the horizontal and clear glass for the vertical surfaces. He sat down at one of the (glass) tables underneath the deck to enjoy the peaceful atmosphere, and Ellie and Rick came to say good morning before they went up to dive into the pool. Watching them doing laps and playing about in the pool, and Ellie stopping to wave with a grin when she passed him, he could certainly see the appeal of this design, and what a stunning sight Ellie was in a bikini too.
Yes, he'd have to say that Roan's Crystal Palace was certainly a success, in fact everything he'd done up here was amazing… he turned back to look across the garden to the Keep… that had seemed strange at first until they reminded him that it was on top of El Castillo, the castle…. and the effect looking that way was similar because all the walls at that end were mirrored glass too. The Keep didn't go much higher than the perimeter glass walls, so aside from it being about a third longer, El Castillo wouldn't look that different from the outside. On the inside though… he shook his head, on the inside it was an estate fit for the fabulously wealthy, while remaining comfortable for the people who lived here, it was an incredible job. He also thought that those mobile hangars were a great touch, anyone flying over would think they were quaint little cabins that had been put there for atmosphere, but Chuck and Rick had shown how quick and easy it was to get the Loach or Lakota completely out of sight with them, ingenious!
While it was nice, being there with them, he knew that they were trying to enjoy what little honeymoon the General was prepared to let them have, and he had other jobs that he'd been pulled away from when he was thrown on that B-1B as well, so when Ellie and Rick got out of the pool he went back up to the Keep with them, to say goodbye to them all and head down to get a lift back to the airport.