A Private Little War(116)
“Understood, Ted. Roger and out.”
Carter switches channels, drops his nose, lets two rounds go, curses as the ejected shells spang off his knee and he hits the switch. “Fenn? Carter. You talked to Ted?”
“I did. Lovely man.”
“So you’re staying.”
“Eyes in the sky.”
Carter hears a long rip from Fenn’s guns, muffled but still audible.
“Save those rounds, pal. You’re gonna be all alone up here for a bit.”
“One of them gave me the finger. Had to teach him some manners.”
Carter laughs. “All right then. Porter and Lefty are inbound, but a few minutes off. Call in whoever’s left of your flight and put ’em on my tail. I’m headed for home.”
Fenn does that. They all shoot their guns dry on the way, waggle their wings at the outgoing fighters when they pass, then again at the bombers just making their way to the strip, confusing things, causing delays. Carter calls his mutt flight off approach and puts them into a long, lazy circle. He tries to catch his breath. He hunches down tight in the seat and hides from the wind slipping past the cockpit coamings. His lips are chapped and numb. His nose is running, and when he reaches up with his gloved hand to try and wipe it, he can’t feel his own hand on his face.
The bombers lumber into the air. Carter brings the fighters down. On the field, every hand is turned to loading death into the idling machines. There is very little talking. This is something they are good at. Carter is scooping spent cannon shells off the floor of Roadrunner’s cockpit with his hands like bailing water. He is bouncing in his seat and slapping at his frozen face—the lower half of it, the part not covered by the helmet. He is straining his muscles as Max hands him up belts of .303 ammo to be stowed and, all the while, he is listening to Fenn’s flight channel.
This is how he hears Lefty Berthold die.
Key
TWR: Transmission from lead controller Diane Willis
RAM: Radio area microphone, voice or sound source
RDO: Transmission from ground control
-1: Identified as Cmndr. Theodore “Ted” Prinzi
-2: Identified as Controller James McCudden
-3: Identified as Controller Shun Le Harper
OPS: Transmission from Iaxo operations control, Theodore Prinzi
HOT: Cockpit or pilot microphone, voice or sound source
-1: Identified as Cpt. Fennimore “Fenn” Teague, call sign “Jackrabbit”
-2: Identified as Sqd. Ldr. Porter Vaughn
-3: Identified as Louis “Lefty” Berthold, call sign “Bad Dog”
-4: Identified as Sqd. Ldr. Jack Hawker, A flight
-?: Voice unidentified
( ): Questionable insertion
[ ]: Editorial insertion
13:22:04
START OF RECORDING
HOT-1: Return flight one-two, I have you inbound.
HOT-2: This is one-two return. Where are you?
HOT-1: Not something a fighter pilot ought to be asking, flight leader. I’m just saying.
HOT-2: Ah, go fuck yourself, Captain. [Laughter] You in the soup?
HOT-1: Roger that. Five degrees your left. Eleven o’clock high at… ten thousand.
HOT-2: ’Kay. We’re incoming.
HOT-1: I’m winking at you. Can you tell?
HOT-1: Descending now.
HOT-1: Passing six thousand. Split out and form on me for formation.
For what time he had remaining, Carter would hear the voices in his head. Ghosts that, once embedded in the soft meat of his brain, could not be dislodged. In bed, in flight, at peace and at war, they would be there, taunting him, joking, dying. There would come nights when he would wake with his ears sore and his scalp bloody from trying to claw off imaginary headphones. To make the voices stop.
HOT-2: One-two inbound to control. We’re on-target. Spotter on capture.
TWR: Copy one-two.
TWR: Ground capture, one-two inbound approach to target.
RDO-3: Thank you, control. I have both targets.
HOT-2: Fenn? One-two inbound. I have you on capture.
HOT-1: Roger. I’ve got visual. I’m maintaining at five thousand. Pass below and come around.
HOT-2: Yeah, I…
HOT-1: Porter?
HOT-2: Yeah.
HOT-1: Cut out there for a minute, flight leader.
HOT-3: Over there. Uh… Your two o’clock-ish. Low. Way low.
On the field, Carter only dimly acknowledged the sound of Lefty Berthold’s voice. He was busy. No idle hands. The ammunition belts passing through his fingers were heavy and cold as if knowing their own freight and destiny. He liked the sound of them sliding over the cockpit coaming, a clatter like an abacus rattling. He smelled the snow on the air and the heat radiating off his engine and the sweet, thick stink of aviation fuel from the pumps near him and the pour-cans being run across the field. When he caught himself speaking aloud, under his breath, saying, “Come on, come on, come on,” he willed himself into calm, unclenched his fists, closed his eyes. He barely made note of Lefty’s voice in his ear. Not yet, anyway.