Chapter Text
The Persian Gulf, 2009
“What the everloving fuck was that?” Murray shouts from the back.
The thundering boom from the right engine of Lieutenant John Watson’s F117 stealth fighter echoes across the water, startling both pilot and RIO. John leans hard left on the stick, trying desperately to correct the severe right spin caused by the loss of the right engine, which had sputtered to a halt when a passing F18-A had cut their flight path and the turbulence John couldn’t avoid destroyed the airflow into the engine, stalling it. The tail swings wildly as John shifts, trying to correct the imbalance.
“Shit, we’ve flamed out! We’re coupling up, Doc, we’ve got to stabilize—“
“Fuck, yes, I know, let me get the reins on—“John slams the stick hard right this time, tries to gain some measure of control over the spin, but the aircraft is fighting him, trying to force him back. He pulls again, feels the wings start to catch air, start to slow, but the ocean is rising fast and he knows he can’t save it in time.
“We’re low, Christ, we’re low!” The warning lights are flashing; alarms and sirens fill the cockpit with a cacophony that makes John’s head hurt. Panic is swelling in his chest, but years of training take over and direct him, his course of action desperately clear.
John can barely reach the panel, the centrifugal force holding him pinned to the side of the canopy, but his fingertips reach the radio button. “Mayday, mayday, Ghostrider Zero Six Five, we’re spun, ejecting immediately!” John tries to arch his head back, enough to move his shoulders to the point he can reach the ejector handle. “Murray, we’re out on my mark. Three. Two. One. Mark!” John pulls the ejector handle, hears the explosion that lifts the canopy from the body of the aircraft, and closes his eyes as the seat throws him into the air at 400 miles per hour, the wind screaming past his ears. The seat reaches the height of its trajectory and falls away, and as the parachute opens and John watches the ocean rush up to meet him, Murray is nowhere in sight. He lands hard, the waves as unforgiving as concrete. Before he can get his mind clear and his body oriented, the wind snags his chute and drags him across the water, the lines tangling in his legs and pulling him inexorably down no matter how hard he kicks against it. The last thing he thinks as he feels the water close over his head is that his CO is going to be really, really pissed off that John lost his airplane.
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Seychelles - Near Somalia, 2011
GHOST RIDER ONE ONE SEVEN. CONTACT ONE BOGEY, 090 AT 15 MILES, 900 KNOTS OF CLOSURE.
“Got him, Doc. Bogey on your six, Rex. Oooh. He’s an ugly one, too. Fully loaded. Watch it.”
“Roger, Copper, no radar lock. What the hell is he doing back there, checking the license plate?”
“He likes your arse, Rex,” John says, and peels off hard right, pulls back on the stick of the F/A-18 and feels the g-force push him back in the seat. “Don’t worry, dear. We’ll make sure he doesn’t disrespect you like that again.” The plane rolls, wings shuddering slightly with the pull, the sun flashing through the canopy until he tilts left, spots Rex just above the grey miasma of cloud that hides them from the swell of the ocean. The MIG-21 is a black streak behind, and if he times it just right, John can drop on his six without anyone the wiser.
“Fucking roll him,” crackles over the radio – Rex’s RIO, Archer – “he’s got a goddamn lock on! Rex!”
Rex’s plane swings wildly, cutting across the sky in ever larger gyrations, trying to shake off the lock-on. John doesn’t hesitate; he pushes hard, turns nose down into a dive that leaves him less than a thousand meters behind the MIG.
“We’re low on fuel, Doc, just so you’re aware. Not that stalling out over the ocean matters or anything,” Copper says, and John can practically hear Copper’s eyes roll.
John notes it in the back of his mind, but his chest is tight with adrenaline, with the need to fight, and still tries to lock on. “Goddammit, girl, steady,” he mutters, the green triangle of the targeting screen shifting wildly until, in an instant, there’s nothing left to target. The MIG peels off and straight up, right at the sun, hoping to lose them in the glare. “Oh no you don’t, you fucker,” John says, and pulls up after him.
“Whee! It’s like one of those car chases you see on the TV!” Copper cackles from behind him. “Get this asshole, Doc.”
GHOSTRIDER ONE ONE SEVEN, YOU ARE ORDERED TO DISENGAGE AND LAND IMMEDIATELY
“He’s bugged out, Doc,” Rex says, and his voice sounds shaky. “I’m headed in.”
“Roger,” John returns, and pauses for a split second. “Hey, Copper, you feel like a little bit of wildlife photography?”
Copper’s wheezy laugh crackles through the radio. “I thought you’d never ask.”
John pushes hard on the stick, sending the F/A-18 straight at the sun.
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“Oh holy shit, Doc, did you see the look on his face”? Copper doubles over with laughter on the bench next to his bunk, towel nearly slipping off his waist and water dripping from his dark hair. “Oh wait, you did!” Copper holds out his phone to John, who takes one look at the canopy-to-canopy picture of the MIG pilot, one hand raised in a half-hearted wave, and loses it all over again.
“Well, when he broke off, he should have known we’d get between him and the sun and he’d never see us from there. Moron.” John, still chuckling, pulls his tee shirt on, runs a towel over his hair. “Besides, we’d not pushed this plane into an inverted dive yet, I say it’s only good for it. Test it out a little. Make it work.” And oh, did it work. Handled beautifully; a sleek, nimble change from the clumsy, subsonic F-117 stealth fighters he’d been flying before.
“Yeah, well, you were just fucking arou—“
“Doc! Copper!” a voice bellows from the hall. Shit. John hurries to pull his trousers on and cracks open the door. Lieutenant Donovan, their deputy CAG, stands in the hall with her hands on her hips. “Dimmock says straight to his office, now.”
John tries hard not to roll his eyes. They take a MIG off Anderson’s tail and they still get dressed down. “Yes, Ma’am,” he says instead, and finishes getting dressed. Copper playfully kicks him in the calves a couple of times as they make their way up to Dimmock’s office, but as they reach it, they see Rex—Lieutenant Anderson—leaving with a sober look on his face.
“Thanks, Doc,” he says to John’s surprise, and walks slowly down the corridor without looking back. Before John can turn to Copper and ask what the hell that was all about, Dimmock yells.
“Get your asses in here. You’re on my time, not yours.”
John and Copper step in and stand at full attention, trying hard not to glance at each other. Their little stunt probably didn’t go unnoticed by radar, and he’s sure at least two of the LSOs are snitches, the little shits.
Dimmock stands, all six-foot-three, reedy height of him barely contained by the low ceiling of his deck side office. “Doc, Copper, you both, for reasons that pass my understanding, managed to fuck up even something good.” Dimmock puts his hands on his hips. “You want to explain why you disobeyed a direct order?”
John swallows. “I had the MIG in my sights, sir, and as they were fully loaded and had locked on Rex, I thought—“
“You don’t get to think! You did an incredibly brave thing, but what you should have done was land that plane, not chase off after MIGs that had already bugged out! Do you have a death wish, Lieutenant?”
“No sir.”
“And you,” he turns to Copper “are not helping. I know you’re along for the ride, but Jesus H. Christ do you have to participate in every single stupid thing he comes up with?” Dimmock punctuates his statement with a finger jabbed in John’s face. He breathes through clenched teeth, then closes his eyes and drops heavily into his chair. “You’re a hell of a pilot, Watson. Better even now than you were before the Gulf, but so damn reckless. You’ve lost your section leader quals twice, put in hack three times just by me for high-speed passes over two air control towers and one Admiral’s wife—“
“Chelsy Brennan, right?” Copper mutters
“You’re lucky you’re even here, Copper, so I’d advise you shut up.” He turns back to John. “The Navy, your squadron, hell, the reputation of yourself and your RIO should be your concern. Orders are given because we know things you don’t, and our responsibility is for you, the safety of your fellow seamen, and the millions of taxpayer dollars you’ve been entrusted with. Got that?”
John nods. He knew it was stupid, but damn it, he’d won, and it still felt good.
Dimmock continues. “I can’t believe I’m doing this, but I’m giving you two your shot. I’ve got to send someone to Fallon.”
Copper sucks in a breath. “I thought it was Rex, sir,” he says. John feels butterflies start up in his stomach. Dimmock can’t mean, he can’t…
“Rex lost it. That bogey getting a lock on him cost him, and he turned in his wings. I’m sending you two idiots to Top Gun.”