“Two-four, two-three. I see some minor damage, and you’ve got fuel streaming from your belly. We need to get you on the ground now.”
“Two-four copies.”
A return to theFordwas completely off the table. Lava had already determined that the closest usable airfield was Port Said, slightly west of the canal entrance. The unannounced arrival of four U.S. Navy fighter jets might wake up some sleepy Egyptians, but the DoD could sort out the repercussions.
“Two-three, two-one. Make for Port Said. Id and I will hunt down the last two.”
Everyone acknowledged the plan.
Lava set out with Id on his wing, the last two drones ahead. They were low on fuel and ammo, but if they played everything perfectly there was enough to finish the job. At a range of five miles, Lava got a visual on their targets.
And that was when the plan went to shit.
“Two-one, two-two,” Id said from the right. “You seeing what I’m seeing?”
“Two-one, yeah. They’ve gone feet dry.”
Both the Shaheds were skimming over light brown desert, the converging entrances of the canal on either side.
“We’re too late unless somebody can find a way to turn them back out to sea.”
Lava slammed a gloved fist on his canopy. They were so damned close!
His eyes scanned farther ahead. Sparky had forwarded the expected target, a confluence of the two northern entrance canals ten miles inland. Lava could see it dead ahead. In a minute, maybe two, the drones would begin dispersing their radiological hell.
Then Id’s last words played back in his head.
…unless somebody can find a way to turn them back out to sea.
Lava closed in on the nearest drone, which was less than a hundred yards off his nose, and an idea percolated into his head. It probably wasn’t even possible. It was certifiably insane. The potential outcomes? Anywhere from a smashing success to Chernobyl.
But it was the only damned escape hatch he could think of.
“Two-two, two-one. Here’s what we’re gonna do…”
68
Glock 21
Suez Canal, Egypt
0559 Local Time
Lava’s focus was absolute. His hands gripped the Hornet’s controls lightly, mere fingertip pressure. The Shahed looked far larger from his new perspective: it was less than ten feet from his wingtip.
He saw the pusher propeller churning, the ailerons on the drone’s wing adjusting deftly to maintain course. It had descended to an even lower altitude; they were skimming along in formation a mere four hundred feet above the ground. The good news was that the drone had leveled off. The bad news: this was likely the altitude from which it would disperse its payload.
The Shahed was on its final attack run.
Being so low, even at a mere one hundred and sixty knots, the ground swept past in a rush. The Hornet felt mushy in Lava’s hands, the flight controls less responsive at the low speed. He eased closer, approaching from slightly below, until his jet’s left wingtip underlapped the Shahad’s right. From that vantage point, he saw an ominous new sight. A spray bar ran the length of thewing. Any moment now, radioactive liquid would begin spewing into the air not far from his canopy.
Lava couldn’t venture a look back, but he knew that Id was joining up with the last remaining Shahed. They were roughly two miles behind him. The whole dubious plan was Lava’s idea, so he would be the guinea pig.
He was thankful that he wasn’t carrying AIM-9 Sidewinders. The FA-18 had a wingtip weapon station, a six-foot steel rail that was integral to the wing structure. The rail was sturdy, designed to support hundreds of pounds of munitions during high-G maneuvering. Right now, however, it was conveniently empty.
The Shahed’s wingtip was very different. It looked thin and was no more than two feet from front to back, perhaps four inches thick. Its metal skin would be thin to save weight. Altogether, a dollar-store toy compared to his eighty-million-dollar military-grade machine.
“As they say, when push comes to shove…” he whispered, not bothering to key his mic.
