The Disciple

In United States’ flag portion of the Combat Direction Center, Jake Grafton saw and heard the news of the ejection, and heard the communications that diverted a flight of Hornets from their scheduled mission to the site of the ejection to search for the survivor. Air Ops also ordered the angel helo on deck scrambled and talked to the CDC aboard the frigate on one of the ship-to-ship voice circuits.

All this took less than a minute, almost a reflex action.

Harry Lampert’s parachute opened with an audible bang and his ejection seat fell away toward the cloud deck, which was right under his boots. He inspected the chute, which looked blessedly full of air and intact.

Then he fell into the clouds.

Chicago O’Hare’s nudge of the pilotless Hornet seemed to work. The wings stayed level as it closed with the Iranian coast. The Black Eagle controller came back on the radio, informing her that her transponder was malfunctioning and asking for a location. O’Hare turned the volume on the radio down as low as it would go and ignored it.

She watched the coastline march down her radar display toward the apex. Fifteen miles, ten, five… She could hear the deep beep of an Iranian search radar as it swept her plane periodically.

At two miles her ECM warnings lit up. A fire control radar was looking. Chicago turned on her ALQ-199. This black box should fool the Iranian radars and protect both planes until War Ace 305 ran out of gas.

The fire control radar failed to achieve a lock. After a moment it went off the air. The search radar continued to sweep. The two Hornets crossed the coast and continued northwest into Iran.

When he came out of the clouds, Harry Lampert was unsure of his height above the water. He took off his oxygen mask and threw it away, then deployed his seat pan, which fell on a lanyard until it dangled about twenty feet below his feet. His life raft fell out of the seat pan, inflated and hung below it. He got a firm grip on the parachute riser release fittings on his harness and watched the life raft. It would hit the water first, signaling him he had twenty feet to go until he went in.

He realized he could see whitecaps, then swells, then the life raft splashed, and he had time to draw exactly one breath before he went under.

He was still underwater when he toggled the riser releases. The emergency life vest on his harness inflated, squeezing him like an anaconda. In seconds he felt himself bobbing to the surface.

The chute was still in the air, within a foot or two of the water, safely downwind. Lampert spit water and gagged and tried to draw a breath. He didn’t see the parachute go into the ocean.

He was floating with his head well out of the water, still wearing his helmet. He began looking for the seat pan and life raft. Not finding either due to the height of the swells, he felt around for the lanyard and started pulling. Eventually the seat pan, then the life raft, appeared in front of him.

Now to get in the damned thing. He tried pushing it under him and working himself over it. Fell off twice. This was always so easy in the pool during refresher survival training, he thought.

The third time was the charm.

He was sitting in the thing, wet and cold and happy, when he heard the first jet. Now he needed his flares. He fumbled in his survival vest until he found one, lit it and shouted as orange smoke began pouring out. The jets were ru

Two minutes later they were back, working on a different track, when one of them peeled away from the formation and came diving toward him. He waved the flare, which was spewing a tremendous amount of smoke.

The two jets set up an orbit over Harry, and it was only then that he remembered his survival radio, which was in his vest. He tossed the flare into the water, got out the radio, turned it on and squeezed the transmit button.

“Hey, this is War Ace Three Oh Five,” he shouted into the thing.

“Hey yourself, shipmate. We saw your smoke and decided to drop in. A helo is on the way. You okay?”

“Yeah yeah yeah. I’m okay.” Actually he was shivering uncontrollably and felt his first twinge of nausea, but he wasn’t going to say that. He was so very happy.

“You sit right there and behave yourself while we get on the horn to the guys on the big boat. Okay?”

“Yeah yeah yeah.” Harry Lampert sat in his tiny life raft, with his ass partially submerged, shivering and smiling. Life was good, he decided. And he wasn’t parting with his anytime soon. Yeah! He vowed then and there to buy a bottle of the best whiskey he could find for the guys and gals in the parachute shop. Yeah!

He raised his helmet visor so he could see better and waved at the circling jets.

The Iranian search radar was still beeping in Chicago’s ears when War Ace 305 ran out of gas. It was 110 miles deep into Iran. Chicago realized the fire had gone out when the plane began to decelerate and its nose came down.

It seemed to find a new equilibrium as it descended, something like eight degrees nose down. The wings stayed level.

She was in a level turn by then, watching the descending jet fall away.

Chicago O’Hare leveled out heading back the way she had come and got on the radio. She sent a prearranged code over the two-way, secure Link 16 to Black Eagle and the carrier, where it would reach Jake Grafton.

War Ace 305 came out of the clouds several thousand feet above the desert floor. The autopilot had disengaged, and the plane was in a shallow left turn, its nose about eight degrees down. It was still in that attitude when it met the earth and began sliding along. The plane shed a cloud of pieces as the wreck decelerated. Finally the largest piece, the engines and the remainder of the airframe, came to rest and the remainder settled to the ground. The dust cloud drifted away on the wind and dissipated.

Chicago O’Hare was twenty miles from the coast when she saw the two MiG-29s at least five thousand feet above her and to her right. They were crossing from right to left, heading generally east.

Uh-oh!

She advanced her throttles from cruise to full military power. Her airspeed began to build. The jets crossed in front of her, and then the nearest one began a left turn. He’s looking me over, she thought. The second one turned behind the first.

Chicago O’Hare didn’t want to engage either of them, but trying to run away was probably begging to get shot down, and that had no appeal whatsoever.

In for a pe