Mackenzie's Mission (4 page)

 
"There's another test at 0800," Cal said as he sipped his coffee. "When Adrian and Yates get here, we'll all go to the control room so we can listen in on the flights. Colonel Mackenzie's going up today. He always comes back to the control room after a flight, and I'll introduce you to him."

 
"We've already met," she replied. "He came by last night before I quit for the day."

 
"What did you think of him?"

 
She thought for a moment, trying to come up with a concise answer, and finally settled on "Scary."

 
Cal laughed. "Yeah, I wouldn't want to cross him. I would have sworn that fighter pilots didn't respect anything, but they sure as hell respect him, in the air and on the ground. One of them said mat Mackenzie is the best pilot in the Air Force, period. That's saying a lot, considering none of this group are slouches."

 
The other two members of the team arrived. Yates
Korleski
, a short, sturdy, balding man, was the senior member and head of the team. Adrian
Pendley
was Caroline's fly in the ointment on this particular assignment He was tall and good-looking, divorced, and unrelentingly negative about having Caroline on the team.

 
When she had first gone to work for Boling-Wahl he had given her the rush, and he'd never forgiven her for the brush-off she had given him in return. He was good at his job, though, so she was determined to work with him, even if it meant ignoring his incessant little gibes.

 
He walked past her without speaking, but Yates paused beside her desk. "Did you get settled in okay?"

 
"Yes, thanks. Met the head honcho last night, too."

 
Yates grinned. "What did you think of him?"

 
"Like I told Cal, he's a bit scary."

 
"Just don't ever make a mistake, or you'll find
out
how
scary."

 
"No allowing for human error, huh?"

 
"Not with his birds or his men."

 
Yates wandered off in the direction of the coffeepot, and Caroline decided that maybe her panic of the night before had been justified. Yates had been working on defense contracts for twenty years, so if he was impressed, the colonel wasn't any ordinary
joe
. She grimaced at the inadvertent mental play on words.

 
At the appointed time they all trooped to the airfield, where the flights were being monitored. Their IDs were checked before they were allowed to enter the control room, reminding her of the tight security. The place swarmed with guards, and she knew that the Night Wing project was only one of several going on. There were a lot of civilians working at
Nellis
, people with both the highest credentials and the highest security rating. Just being here meant that her background had been checked so thoroughly that her file probably even contained the brand of breakfast cereal she'd liked best as a child.

 
The control room was a busy place, lined with monitors and people manning them. Practically every part of the Night Wing aircraft incorporated some radical change from how aircraft had been designed in the past, so there were a lot of different companies and defense contractors working to make certain everything was operational. A group of pilots had gathered, too, some in
flightsuits
and some in regular service uniforms. Several whistles filled the air when they caught sight of Caroline, and one grinning pilot clasped his hands over his heart

 
"I'm in love," he announced to the group at large.

 
"Don't pay any attention to him, ma'am," another of the pilots said. "That's the third time this week, and it's only Tuesday. He's fickle, very fickle."

 
"But good-looking," the first pilot said in defense of himself. "So what about it, beautiful? Want to get married, live in a rose-covered cottage and have beautiful children?"

 
"I'm allergic to roses," she said.

 
"And men," Adrian muttered behind her, just loud enough for her to hear. She ignored him.

 
"Forget the roses," the pilot said grandly. The tag on his shirt said his name was Major Austin Deale. "I'm adaptable. And fun. Did I mention that we'll have lots of fun?"

 
A deep voice came over the speaker, and as if a switch had been thrown, the pilots stopped their bantering and turned toward the monitor. It took Caroline a moment to realize that it was an in-cockpit camera, letting them see what the pilot was doing and seeing.

 
"There are four planes up today," Lieutenant Colonel Eric
Picollo
said, setting up the situation for them. "Two Night Wings and two F-22s. The F-22 is the only thing in production fast enough to give the prototypes a good test. The Night Wings are doing some stress maneuvers, and then they'll test the targeting system."

 
The deep voice came from the speakers again, laconic and matter-of-fact, as if the man weren't screaming along faster than the speed of sound high above the desert floor. Caroline shivered, and goose bumps rose on her arms.

 
"Go to MIL."

 
"Going to MIL," another voice answered.

 
"Military power throttle setting," Cal, who was standing just to her right, whispered. "All or more of an engine's rated thrust."

 
She nodded her understanding, her attention fixed on the monitor. All she could see of Colonel Mackenzie was his gloved hands and long legs, with the throttle between them, but she knew it was him she was watching rather than the other Night Wing pilot. There was just something about the way he moved.

 
The pilots took the aircraft through a series of maneuvers, and the sensors embedded in the aircraft's skin sent back readings of the stress levels on the airframe.

 
"Twenty degrees alpha," the deep voice said, confirming what the digital readout on the computer screen was telling them. "Thirty… forty… fifty… sixty."

 
One of the pilots standing behind her muttered, "Damn," in a nervous tone.

 
"Alpha is angle of attack," Major Deale whispered, noticing Caroline's puzzled look. His own expression was tense. "Most high-performance aircraft can only do about twenty degrees before they stall out. We've taken Baby to fifty degrees, because her vectored thrust gives better control, but even the X-29 wasn't controllable above seventy degrees."

 
"Seventy," said the calm voice. "Seventy-five."

 
The major had turned pale. He was staring at the changing numbers on the computer screen as if he could control them by willpower alone.

 
"Seventy-seven… seventy-nine… eighty… controls feel a little spongy. That's enough for now, leveling out."

 
"How'd Mad Cat do?" someone asked.

 
"Sixty-five," another someone replied, and the group chuckled.

 
"Was that his alpha, or his pucker factor?"

 
"I was sweating at fifty."

 
"We'll have to haul Mad Cat out of the cockpit. He won't have any starch left in his legs at all."

 
"Bet Breed's heart rate didn't even go up. He bleeds ice water, man, pure ice water."

 
Next, the aircraft pulled both negative and positive Gs, provoking more comments as the speakers carried the sounds of the grunts the pilots made to force more oxygen into their brains and keep from blacking out A trained pilot could normally withstand up to six positive Gs before gray-out began, but with specialized breathing techniques tolerance could be raised to about nine Gs for short periods of time.

 
The colonel was pulling ten Gs.

 
"Level out, level out," a captain said under his breath.

 
Major Deale was sweating. "Don't do this to me," he muttered. "Come on, Breed. Don't push it any further."

 
"
Levelling
out," a calm voice said over the radio, and she heard the quiet release of air from several pairs of lungs.

 
"That son of a bitch is a genetic freak," the captain said, shaking his
head.
"Nobody
is supposed to be able to tolerate that. How long?"

 
"Not long," the second lieutenant at the monitor replied. "He actually hit ten for about four-tenths of a second. He's done it before."

 
"I can only tolerate nine for that long. And he was making sense when he talked! I'm telling you, he's a genetic freak."

 
"
Gawdamighty
, think what he must've been like ten years ago."

 
"About the same as now," Major Deale said.

 
The next series of tests involved the laser targeting, and Caroline edged her way closer to the monitors. She felt oddly shaky inside, and she tried to gather her thoughts. When she had been chosen to replace Walton on the test site, she had done some quick research on jet aircraft, and that, coupled with her general technical knowledge, told her exactly how dangerous those maneuvers had been. He could have lost control of the aircraft at such extreme angles of attack, or he could have blacked out pulling so many Gs and not regained consciousness in tune to keep from drilling the aircraft nose-first into the desert floor. The reactions of the other pilots told their own tale.

 
Adrian slipped in front of her, effectively blocking her view, since he was so much taller. Caroline brought her mind back to the current situation. She had no doubt he had done it deliberately, and if she let him get away with it he would only do something worse the next time. "Excuse me, Adrian," she said politely. "Since you're so tall, let me stand in front of you so we both can see."

 
Yates looked up and smiled, either not seeing or choosing to ignore the sour expression on Adrian's face. "Good idea. Step up in front, Caroline."

 
The targeting test went well. They were currently sighting in on stationary targets, and all of the components performed within the acceptable range. The data streamed across the screen, each item swiftly checked and noted against the hard-copy lists they all carried.

 
The four aircraft landed safely, and the atmosphere in the control room suddenly lightened to an almost giddy buzz. The laser team stood around Lieutenant Colonel
Picollo
and went over the rest results with him. Caroline was initially surprised at his knowledge of the subject, then realized that she shouldn't be. After all, he and the other pilots had been working on this project for some time; they would have had to be brain-dead not to absorb some of the information. "The colonel may have more questions," he finally said, "but it looks like we can start testing how well it targets and tracks a moving object now."

 
An arm slipped around her waist, and Caroline went rigid. Her head whipped around. Major Deale grinned at her as his arm tightened. Behind him, she could see the other pilots watching and grinning, too. They all looked like posters for a dental convention. Dismay filled her. Damn, it was starting already.

 
"So, beautiful, where do you want to go for dinner tonight?" the major asked.

 
"Hands off, Daffy," came a deceptively mild voice behind them. "Dr. Evans will be with me tonight."

 
There was no mistaking the speaker's identity. Even if she hadn't recognized those smooth, deep tones, she would have known by the way her heart began pulsing wildly and her lungs suddenly constricted, making it difficult to breathe.