Ashes of Victory, page 23
“The American, Colonel! He has a lock on you!” Ren warned, his voice pitched with excitement.
“Let’s see if he has the balls,” she said, glancing at the húndàn—or bastard—locked on her and adding, “Bring it on.”
“DRAGON ONE HAS A shot,” Ricardo reported as he eased his jet behind the pair of Sukhois. “Liberty Bell, do I have permission to fire?”
“Negative! Negative!” Kowalski commanded instead of Barlow. “Fire only if fired upon.”
“I’m sucking air!” Amanda shouted. “If I don’t disengage, I’m going to have to drop my new shiny bird in the drink.”
“Negative, Dragon flight, hit the tanker! Now!” Kowalski ordered.
“But I’m still locked, Skipper,” Amanda replied.
A moment later, Ricardo responded, “Don’t make any aggressive moves, Deedle, and we’ll rendezvous with the tanker.”
“Roger that,” she replied, and stopped trying to evade the Sukhois. Instead, she slowed down to conserve fuel and entered a shallow climb to meet up with the tanker, noticing the Chinese calmly remaining behind her.
“Bastards are just trying to piss us off,” she reported.
“Just another day in paradise,” Ricardo said, staying behind the bandits in what was now a surreal formation. Her Super Hornet in front, two Flanker-Es in a tight combat spread behind her, and her flight leader bringing in the rear.
WHAT A BORE, LIAN thought, slowing the Sukhoi to remain a thousand feet behind the Super Hornet.
“What do we do now?” Ren asked.
“Now we let our colleagues play with the American radar turboprop,” she replied.
BARLOW HAD HIS EYES on the radar screen of the E-2D and didn’t like what he saw. “Dragons, the two additional bandits are coming in from my five o’clock now, makin’ some high Mach.”
“How far out?” Kowalski asked.
“Thirteen miles,” Barlow reported, amazed at how fast the two fighters were closing. “They’re superson— Wait a second. One of them is slowing at our six.”
“Okay,” Kowalski replied. “We’re heading your way to get behind them.”
Barlow studied the radarscope for a few moments, surprised by the speed of events. His RO and ACO were giving him wide-eyed stares.
He ignored them, concentrating on the screen and trying to suppress a gnawing sense of uneasiness. He keyed the radio. “The fast mover’s about to merge with us,” he said with his heart beating wildly. “Assholes are batshit crazy—and I hope they can hear that!”
Four seconds later, one of the Sukhois blasted past the Advanced Hawkeye’s starboard wing with twenty feet to spare. The supersonic shockwave rocked the E-2D and made it violently yaw from side to side. As the twin turboprop’s pilot fought to control the airplane, the second Sukhoi settled behind them.
Mother of God!
In the CIC, Barlow choked back the instant panic he felt, then reported, “Dragons, the other fighter’s on our tail!”
“OKAY, GANG, SETTLE DOWN,” Kowalski said in a soothing voice as he approached the single Flanker-E tailing the E-2D. “They’re just making a statement, so let’s also make one. Ricky, get a lock on your bandit.”
“Already have one. Winder. But the pilot doesn’t seem to give a shit. Very cool operator.”
Kowalski frowned as he came up behind the Sukhoi tailing the Advanced Hawkeye and slaved the infrared seeker in the head of one of his AIM-9 Sidewinders onto the hot twin exhaust of the Flanker-E.
“ALL RIGHT, BOYS,” LIAN said when hearing from the Sukhoi trailing the E-2D that a Super Hornet had missile lock on him. “That’s enough fun for one day. Return to base.”
Zaijian húndàns, she thought, bidding farewell to the Americans as she disarmed her R-73 and tilted the center stick to the right and down, breaking away from the Super Hornet as it approached a refueling tanker. Ren remained glued to her starboard wingtip as the Sukhois headed back to Fuzhou.
AS AMANDA APPROACHED THE tanker, the two Flanker-Es on her tail broke it off. “Bastards are bugging out.”
“Mine also just bailed,” Barlow reported from the E-2D.
She connected the probe and began to take fuel, relief sweeping through her at the sight of her gauges climbing back out of the red. She broke it off after three thousand pounds—enough to make it back to Vinson.
Shifting to the left, she waited while Ricardo refueled before he too retracted his probe and fell back.
“Had enough fun for one day, Deedle?” Ricardo asked.
“No shit,” she said. “Maybe the skipper will let us have a latte.”
“Deedle, today you may have a double,” Kowalski offered.
Before she could reply, Ricardo cut in and said, “Double for Deedle!”
“Isn’t that the same as Deedle-Deedle?” Malloy asked.
“No, dumbass,” Ricardo replied. “That would be Deedle SQUARED.”
Amanda shook her head as they bantered at her expense and followed her flight leader back to Vinson.
LIAN WALKED AWAY FROM her fighter jet and headed to operations to give a debrief of the flight to her superior officers. The room was unusually crowded today, and it included officers from the intelligence office—all interested in knowing the details of her engagement with the Americans. After spending the better part of an hour answering questions, she went to the officer’s club at the end of the flight line.
The colonel cruised through the double doors, ignored the dozen junior officers who snapped to attention, and entered the bathroom. The adrenaline from the encounter with the US Navy jets had long worn off, leaving her tired and thirsty.
Standing in front of the small sink, she splashed water on her face and rubbed at the sore spots left on her cheeks by the oxygen mask. Staring into her own dark eyes, the slim warrior contemplated her future. In two months, she would leave Fuzhou to start her astronaut training at the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center, the nation’s largest space vehicle launch facility in the Gobi Desert, covering 1,600 square miles and housing more than twenty thousand people. And that meant she would have to start training her replacement almost immediately.
Exiting the restroom, Lian made her way to the long bar and sat at one end, away from everyone. She signaled the bartender, Hai, to pour her a cup of hot tea. The old man, one of her jiujiu’s former pilots from back in the day, slowly made his way to her. When she had first arrived at the base, Lian had been shocked at the severity of the man’s facial burns. He had been lucky to survive his ejection from a burning MiG-17F during the legendary aerial battle that had launched General Xiangsui’s military career.
Regarding Lian with his one good eye, Hai poured her a cup and said in his almost guttural voice, “Good day, I hear.”
“Good day, indeed,” she replied.
“I also hear someone will be leaving us soon.”
Lian frowned. The old man seemed to know everything about everyone. “I need to identify a replacement.”
Slowly Hai tilted the curled whiskers on his scarred chin toward Major Ren, who had just entered the room and sat among his fellow pilots sharing a pitcher of beer.
Lian raised her brows and whispered, “Good stick . . . but needs combat experience.”
Nodding politely, Hai said, “A gem cannot be polished without friction, nor a man perfected without trials.” Then bowing respectfully, he returned to the other side of the bar.
Lian sipped her tea. The old Chinese proverb made her think of her own trials as an orphan girl in the slums of Hong Kong. For a moment, she grimaced at the things she’d had to do to survive after her mother was stabbed to death in the brothel where she had worked. Lian had been only twelve years old.
She could have ended up on the streets, nothing more than a beggar, but for the son of another prostitute. For years, she had looked up to him as almost an older brother. When her mother died, the boy, Lee Shui-bian, took her under his wing. He worked for a corrupt military warehouse manager, and the girl fell into a life of petty theft. Over the following year, they profited immensely from the black-market sale the Russian avionics and other spare parts they pilfered in the middle of the night from the vast depots at Shek Kong Airfield, the PLAAF’s Hong Kong air base.
Until they were caught.
The corrupt warehouse manager and Lee were taken somewhere to the back of an alley, where Lian had heard their pleading turn to whimpering and finally to silence. The base commander had then looked at Lian and asked, “Do you know why you’re still standing here and not bleeding out on the ground like your friends?”
Lian’s voice shook as she squeaked out a simple “No.”
“Because I know who you are. I know where you came from. You think you’ve remained hidden in your exploits? You have not!”
The frightened thirteen-year-old had broken down and cried.
“But more importantly,” he had added, his voice suddenly sympathetic, “because I knew your mother.”
His name was Lieutenant Colonel Deng Xiangsui.
As Lian savored her tea, she thumbed a quick text to her jiujiu in Beijing, the man who had turned that small-time thief into one of the PLAAF’s finest.
Mission accomplished ;-)
— 21 —
USS GERALD R. FORD (CVN 78), SEVENTEEN MILES NORTHWEST OF VIRGINIA BEACH, VIRGINIA
SEAMAN DWIGHT HAGAN, ALONG with a dozen sailors from the EMALS team, had been sitting in the Air Department lobby for nearly two hours. Hagan was part of the technical group testing the brand-new Electromagnetic Aircraft Launch System in the Ford-class carrier that had replaced traditional steam catapults.
A man wearing faded jeans and a tight blue T-shirt stepped through the bulkhead leading to the office area.
The twenty-one-year-old navy technician noticed two things about him. First, the large white letters spelling NCIS stenciled across his blue T-shirt. And second, the black firearm holstered on his right hip. Word around the ship was that an army of NCIS agents had arrived earlier in the day aboard two Sea King helicopters. No one quite knew what they were doing there, but nearly everyone on the ship had been given a time to be interviewed.
“Seaman Hagan . . . Dwight Hagan?” he said, reading from a clipboard.
“That’ll be me,” he replied, standing.
“Good afternoon,” the man said in a pleasant voice. “I’m Senior Field Agent Bob Vanmeter, NCIS. Please come this way.”
They walked to one of the small staterooms in officers’ country.
“Have a seat and relax,” Vanmeter advised as he shut the joiner door. “This is an informal interview in regard to security measures aboard the Ford.”
Hagan folded his hands in his lap as he sat across a small table from the agent, who began with a few pleasantries, asking about Hagan’s family and where he had been born and raised. Then, after a few minutes, Vanmeter paused, looked at his folder, and then found Hagan’s gaze. “So, how you like the navy so far?”
Hagan felt more comfortable with the agent. “I like it fine, sir. I’ve always been mechanically inclined, so working in EMALS is awesome. Plus, I like to travel. Looking forward to our first deployment after we wrap up the trials.”
“How are we looking so far?”
He gave him a thumbs-up. “Great ship, sir. First-class.”
“It sounds like you know where you’re going,” Vanmeter said in a friendly voice. “And I see you have a security clearance. Secret, right?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Does anyone ever try to get you to divulge information you shouldn’t?” Vanmeter asked, the tone of his voice almost conspiratorial, before he leaned closer and lowered his voice. “You know, we’ve all been there. Mom wants to know if we’ll be home for Thanksgiving. High-school buddy wants to know if we’re going to the reunion. Or a guy at a bar asks about something he saw on TV and wants the inside scoop. That sort of thing.”
Drawing a blank, Hagan slowly shook his head. “Not that I recall.”
The agent paused a moment, glancing at Hagan’s enlisted service record. “I see from your files that you’re single.”
“Yes, sir,” Hagan said flatly, his eyes shifting to his service folder.
“Has anyone ever asked you about the ship’s movement?” Vanmeter suddenly asked in a different, emotionless tone of voice.
“Sir?” Hagan replied, blinking.
“Has anyone asked questions about the carrier’s schedule, when it’s departing or returning to port? Where it’s going?”
Hagan shook his head . . . and then he thought of his girlfriend.
“Carol,” he finally said. “She’s asked me a number of times, but just because she wants to make plans.”
Vanmeter paused, leafing through a few sheets of paper, then back at Hagan. “Who’s Carol?”
“My girlfriend. She just wanted to know if I was going to be home for the weekend. Again, so she could make plans.”
“What did you say?”
Hagan shrugged. “Everyone aboard knows we’re wrapping the trials today and will be back at port tomorrow night, sir.”
“So, you told her yes? You would be back in time for the weekend?”
Suddenly feeling a touch of guilt, he said, “Yes, sir. Three days ago. She’s picking me up at the pier.”
Vanmeter’s gaze narrowed. “I see. What’s her last name?”
“Carol, ah Carol Cline,” Hagan answered.
The agent’s friendly smile vanished. “Does she have email?”
“Um,” Hagan started, then realized they only communicated via text, so he told Vanmeter that.
“Okay. Got your phone?”
Hagan handed over his phone, which Vanmeter set aside.
“Where does Carol live?” Vanmeter asked with casual curiosity. “Does she have an apartment, or a home?”
“Home.”
The agent stared at Hagan for a long moment. “Do you spend a lot of time there?”
“Actually . . . no,” he replied, suddenly feeling concerned. “I’ve never been to her home.”
“How long have you known her?”
“About five months.”
Vanmeter raised an eyebrow. “And you’ve never seen her place?”
Hagan shrugged, embarrassed. He then explained, in torturous fashion, about the husband, the separation, and the ban on Carol having men in their home.
“You live in navy housing, yes? Barracks?”
Hagan nodded.
“And you’ve never seen her place? So, what did you do when you wanted some alone time?” Vanmeter smiled. “I mean, I’m assuming a red-blooded American guy like you closed the deal, right? You haven’t been saving yourself for marriage, have you?”
Hagan laughed also. “No, sir. Not saving myself. We just got a motel room for date nights.”
“Dwight, did you use different motels or hotels?”
“No, sir. We always used the Newport News Inn on Jefferson Avenue. They have free HBO and Starz.”
The agent nodded, wrote down the name of the motel, and asked a number of follow-up questions. In short order, Hagan gave him the description of Carol’s yellow Mustang convertible and the number for her cell phone.
“Do you have any recent photographs of her?” Vanmeter asked without looking up. “Any selfies of the two of you?”
“Well, I know this sounds weird, but she’s hated having her picture taken since she was a child.”
“Okay,” Vanmeter continued, as though he heard that sort of thing every day. “So, what does she look like? Pretty?”
“Oh, yes, sir,” Hagan replied enthusiastically. “Very pretty. She’s on the shorter side, maybe five-four, with long, dark hair, brown eyes. In great shape. She likes to run.”
“Nice ass?” Vanmeter asked, grinning.
“Hell, yes. Bounce a quarter off that, I tell you,” Hagan answered enthusiastically. Suddenly they were buddies, talking about women.
“So, where’s she from? Do you know how old she is?”
“Um, I think she’s from Saint Louis. She said her family moved a lot when she was a kid. She’s twenty-eight,” Hagan said, relieved he knew some of the answers.
“So, seven years older than you,” the agent pointed out. “What about family? Does she have any children?”
“The only thing I know is that she was born in Louisiana. She never mentioned anything about her family, other than her husband. She didn’t want to talk about him.”
Vanmeter rose from his chair, placed a reassuring hand on Hagan’s shoulder, and looked him in the eye. “Dwight, you stay here. Be back in a few.”
“Yes, sir,” Hagan said with growing concern.
Vanmeter picked up Hagan’s cell phone and stopped himself as he was headed out. “Dwight, what’s the access code?”
HAGAN COULD FEEL HIS heart beating. The minutes passed slowly as he waited. His hands trembled before he clamped his left hand over his right.
Maybe it’s all a misunderstanding and we can laugh about it later this evening.
It took almost a half hour before Vanmeter returned to the stateroom, his jaw set.
“Dwight, I want you to tell me everything you know about Carol, every single detail.”
Hagan shook his head. “I don’t understand. I’ve told you everything. Can I have my phone back? I can call her.”
The agent didn’t hesitate. “No, Dwight, you cannot have your phone back. Right now, a couple of technical guys we borrowed from the FBI are downloading everything that’s on your phone and giving the thing a thorough strip search.”
Hagan was stunned. “I—I don’t understand. The FBI?”
“Dwight, I checked with the FBI and there isn’t a Carol Cline with a C or a K in the Newport News area. In fact, there isn’t one in Virginia. You said she has a home, but the assessor’s office has no record of a Carol Cline, C or K, owning a home. We also checked the DMV records for the Mustang you mentioned. There is none registered under her name.”
Hagan froze.
“Our people checked the Inn on Jefferson,” Vanmeter continued in a staid voice. “There are video cameras around that place. They found the yellow Mustang on one.”
