"Sixty miles."
"He's got two Scorpion missiles, John," Elliott said. "Re-
peat-he's armed with two live Scorpions. You won't have a
chance. Disengage and leave the area-"
"I've got two Scorpions too, General. Plus I've got jammers
that can counter the Scorpion's active radar. He doesn't.
"He can fly circles around your Scorpions--
Ormack interrupted again. "I can engage him, maybe force
him to turn back, maybe knock the sonofabitch down. Or I can
let him fly our plane to Central America or wherever the hell
he's going. Which is it going to be?"
No immediate reply. Ormack nodded-he'd otten his answer.
9
"Radar, change to Scorpion-attack profile. Crew, prepare to en-
gage hostile air target."
Frost had his finger on the function key and hit it even before
Ormack finished giving the order. Immediately the Old Dog
heeled over into forty degrees of bank, then abruptly rolled out.
It was now aiming for a spot several miles along DrearnStar's
flight path, projecting out to intersect the fighter's path at the
AIM-12OC's optimum flight range. Ormack pushed his throttles
up to full power, then reached over to his left-side panel and
DAY OF THE CHEETAH 177
flipped a gang-barred four-way switch. "Guns, you have Scor-
pion missile launch consent."
"Confirmed," Angelina Pereira replied. "Left pylon on au-
tomatic launch, missile counting down ... twenty seconds to
launch.
On the UHF radio Ormack said, "CATTLECAR, this is Dog
Zero Two. Clear airspace for red fox engagement. Be advised,
red buzzer activity on all frequencies. Dog Zero Two out." On
interphone Ormack said, "Defense, clear for electronic coun-
termeasures. Crew, prepare for air combat engagement."
"Fifteen seconds . . ."
Suddenly a metallic, computer-modified voice cut in on the
frequency: "Dog Zero Two, disengage. I'm warning you."
Khan looked puzzled. "Who the hell was . . . ?"
"ANTARES. The master computer on DrearnStar. " Ormack
flipped to the channel. "This is Dog Zero Two. Who's this?"
"This is Colonel Andrei Ivanschichin Maraklov, General Or-
mack. " Maraklov thought before continuing: should he give his
American name? But he @was never going to return to America-
the KGB or the CIA would see to that-and they would find out
anyway. "You know me as Captain Kenneth Francis James, sir. "
Ormack swore through his oxygen mask. "Goddamn-Ken
James stole DreamStar." He switched his command radio to
channel eleven. "Alpha, monitor GUARD channel. Urgent." He
then quickly switched his radio to the universal emergency fre-
quency, GUARD.
"James-Ken-Mara . . . whatever the hell it is . . . land that
plane immediately. I have orders to attack." On interphone he
told Angelina Pereira to get ready to cancel the auto attack.
"Yes, sir . . . ten seconds."
"Turn off your attack radar immediately, General Ormack,"
the computerized voice of Maraklov on the emergency channel
said, "or I will have no choice but to defend myself."
"Damn it, James, you're about ten seconds from getting your
ass blown out of the sky. Decrease speed and lower your landing
gear or I'll engage."
No reply.
"Five seconds . . . four . . . three .
"Any change in his airspeed or heading?"
"Negative," from Frost. "Still goin' full blast .
"Launch commit," Angelina said.
178 DALE BROWN
There was a muffled screech of rocket exhaust from the left
wing, as the first Scorpion missile raced out of its streamlined
canister. It ran on course toward its quar . Unlike previous
ry
air-to-air missiles, the JC.-version of the Scorpion did not glide
or cruise to its target; even though it was still considered a
medium-range missile it stayed powered throughout its flight.
"Uplink tracking . . . missile now tracking . . . dead on
course .
The bands of yellow, signifying the B-52's tracking radar illu-
minating his aircraft, suddenly changed to red. Maraklov caught
a chill. This was real, Ormack wasn't bluffing. This Dog Zero
Two had live missiles on board, and he was under attack. By a
B-52 bomber . . .
He activated his attack radar. The radar imag o the B-5
still over fifty miles away, seemed the size of a flying mountain.
His radar wasn't picking it up but he knew the missile was only
seconds from impact. His reactions were executed at the speed
of thought . . .
He turned right toward the B-52, exposing only the minimum
radar cross-section of his aircraft possible. He then began a se-
ries of high-speed reversals using the canards in their high-
maneuverabilit mode, not rolling into each turn but side-
stepping, darting back and forth, keeping only DreamStar's front
cross-section aimed toward the B-52. The B-52 would be carry-
ing AIM-120C, same as DreamStar. The AIM-120 was a fabu-
lous weapon, with big fins to steer it toward its target. But its
developers ten years earlier had never envisaged an aircraft that
could move sideways like DreamStar.
Maraklov continued to shoot back and forth for another two
seconds, completing two full horizontal S-slides, making each
dodge wider than the other, using his high-maneuverability ca-
nards to keep DrearnStar's nose pointed at where he thought the
missile would be. It was a gamble. With each turn, he hoped,
the Scorpion missile would have to make bigger and bigger turns
to maintain lock-on. As DrearnStar's side-steps got bigger, the
missile's turn rates had to increase even faster to keep up-not
fast enough, he hoped, for the missile to track its target at close
range.
He was at the top of a right ninety-degree bank and about to
execute another hard left break when he heard and felt a sharp
DAY OF THE CHEETAH 179
bang to his left. He had been very lucky this time. Forced farther
and farther out of phase, the missile was opposite his canop '
when its proximity warhead detected it was within lethal range.
Maraklov waited for the concussion and flak to hit, but nothing
happened and all systems reported with a good status check
when queried by an instantaneous mental command. Then Mar-
aklov realized the Megafortress must have been on a test flight
and so would not have live warheads in its missiles. Which di-
minished but hardly eliminated their threat.
He had never paid much attention to the Megafortress Plus
project, thinking of it as just another one of Elliott's eccentric
boondoggles. Another underestimation . . .
A quick flash of his all-aspect-attack radar showed the B-52
maneuvering hard right, moving back into attack position, its
huge wings pulling it easily around and behind him. The enor-
mous plane had to be pulling at least four or five Gs, Maraklov
thought. It was enough force to rip the wings off any conven-
tional bomber and many fighters as well. Orma
ck obviously
meant business, and he had the hardware to back him up. This
was no place for a fight, even with a supposedly decrepit B-52.
ANTARES, however, always favoring the offensive, was beg-
ging for a fight and had recommended a high yo-yo maneuver-
a hard vertical pull, zoom over the top, then an inverted dive to
lock-on-to pull behind and above the B-52 to get into missile-
firing position. Maraklov queried about fuel: now he was two
thousand pounds below the fuel curve instead of two thousand
pounds above it. He had no time to waste with a missile pass.
Every time ANTARES activated its attack radar, even in small,
frequency-agile bursts, the B-52 would jam it. ANTARES was
being forced to use older and older data to process an attack.
Besides, if the B-52 could jam DrearnStar's phased-array radar,
it could easily jam the AIM-120's conventional pulse-Doppler
active radar. It was definitely time to bug out. Maraklov can-
celed the right high-G yo-yo and pulled into a sharp left turn,
using radar to clear terrain until he could get established on
course again.
ANTARES tried to tell him, but Maraklov wasn't listening-
tried to tell him that a left turn was precisely the wrong thing to
do.
He barely had time to roll wings-level when the missile-launch
warning hammered into his consciousness. This time it wasn't
180 DALE BROWN
a head-to-head engagement-the B-52 was in missile-launch po-
sition, behind and slightly to the left, the cutoff angle estab-
lished, the missile already aiming ahead of its target's flight path.
Radar, infrared, laser-whatever he had, DreamStar was wide
open. The Scorpion missile was even close enough to be picked
up on radar . . .
But ANTARES, literally, did not comprehend the meaning of
surrender-it would compute escape and attack options until it
ran out of power to energize its circuitry. And Maraklov, feeling
he had no hope of survival, had surrendered control of DreamStar
to ANTARES.
The computer took over. Using its high-lift wings and full
canard deflection, DreamStar executed a sharp ninety-degree
pitch-up at max afterburner. The Scorpion missile overshot but t
turned precisely with DreamStar, arcing nearly up to twenty-
thousand feet before following the guidance signals from the Old
Dog and pitching over hard for the kill. The missile was now
aimed straight down, passing Mach four, locked on, closing in
again on DrearnStar's tail.
With its canards again in high-lift configuration, DreamStar
continued its inverted roll, screaming below, then back up
through the horizon. It was now clawing for altitude, skimming
across the high desert floor by only a few feet. The Scorpion
missile tracked every move, following DreamStar's high-G loop.
The missile broke Mach five as it closed in on its target . . .
Which suddenly stopped in mid-air, then climbed five hun-
dred feet straight up. The missile could make a fourteen-G turn
far greater than any fighter yet designed, but not even this high-
tech missile could discontinue a Mach-five diving loop and then
turned a ninety-degree corner. The Scorpion missile tracked per-
fectly, but at such close range, and moving at almost a mile per
second, its turn radius was several hundred feet greater than its
altitude above ground. The missile exploded into the Amargosa
Desert, just a few yards from a truck stop northwest of Jackass
Airport off highway 95.
The threat gone, the maneuver accomplished, ANTARES
switched to offense in less time than it took for the last of the
Old Dog's missiles to disintegrate into the hard desert floor.
With its attack-radar activated, it quickly searched for the en-
emy. At such close range even the Stealth fibersteel skin and
radar energy-absorbing honeycomb arrays couldn't diminish the
DAY OF THE CHEETAH 181
huge radar cross-section of the Megafortress Plus. Lock-on, data
transfer, active seeker lock-on, missile stabilization test, unlock,
motor firing, launch.
The thing was done before Maraklov really knew it-missile
flight time was barely four seconds . . .
"Missile launch, " Wendy called over interphone. "Break right.
Ormack yanked the control stick hard right, all the way to the
stops. Roll-control jets pushed the right wing down and pulled
the left wing up, and nose and tail thrusters counteracted the
adverse left yaw, which increased the roll rate even more. At
fifty degrees of bank the B-52's right wingtip was no more than
two hundred feet above ground. Ormack pulled back on the stick,
letting the Old Dog's twin-tails pull the nose around even faster.
At the same time, Wendy released five rocket-powered decoys
from the left ejector racks under the tail. The rockets spewed a
huge globe of radar-reflecting tinsel a hundred yards from the
B-52, followed by the blinding hot glare of phosphorous flares.
Simultaneously Wendy activated her electronic jammers, present
to the frequency of both DreamStar's track-while-scan phased-
array radars and the Scorpion missile's seeker-radar, and pumped
band.
The B-52s decoys flew past the missile's active radar seeker
undetected-it had a solid lock on the B-52 itself. The seeker
radar was blinded by the intense jamming, but in a millisecond
it switched to the most accurate and reliable of its four backup
modes: track on jam. The missile homed in on the center lobe
of the jamming energy from the B-52, following the energy beam
the way a hungry bat follows the echo of its hunting screech,
straight to its prey. The missile flew under the B-52's tail, past
the ECM emitter and under the fuselage to the right wing, im-
pacting on the number-three engine pod.
The right wing, made of composite materials far stronger than
any metal, held fast, but the number five and six engines disin-
tegrated in a cloud of flying metal and a huge fireball. The fire-
ball lifted the right wing fifty feet into the air, then dropped it,
stalling it out. The left four engines pulled the Old Dog around
in a clockwise spin. None of its huge wings was generating lift
now; the plane was being held aloft only by its forward momen-
tum, like a chewed-up Frisbee tossed awkwardly into the air.
182 DALE BROWN
Engine-compressor blades from the number-five engine acted
like huge, powerful swords, chopping through the crew com-
partment. Jeffrey Khan and Linda Evanston, sitting on the right
side of the plane, were pierced by hundreds of shards of white-
hot metal. Wendy Tork, thrown sideways in the blast, was hit by
several pieces of metal.
Ormack pulled the control stick to the left and stomped hard
on the left rudder pedal. Fibersteel screamed in protest. The flat
spin slowed almost to a stop, but so did the Megafortress' air-
speed. Ormack knew he had pulled the plane out of its spin, but
the sudden negative Gs told him that the Old Dog was never
going to fly. Wendelstat was screaming, clawing at his lap belt,
face distorted. Blood was coming from places all over his body,
his helmeted head tattered from the impact of flying metal.
Ormack reached over to the center console, finding that the
centrifugal forces were gone-it felt as if he was riding a gentle
elevator down to the first floor. Lowering his head caused the
cockpit to tilt violently, but he fought off the sudden vertigo and
flipped the EJECT WARNING switch to EJECT.
Downward ejection for the two navigators in a B-52 bomber
was a crap shoot in the best of circumstances, and Major Edward
Frost knew it. Driven by years of experience, it took him only
a few seconds to get his hands on the ejection ring, get his back
straight, chin down, knees and legs braced, elbows tucked in.
He pulled his ejection handle the instant he saw the red EJECT
warning light illuminate. But even then it was too late. The zero-
point-two-second drogue-parachute ripped Frost's ejection seat
free, automatically pulling the zero-second ripcord, but his main
parachute barely had time to deploy fully from its backpack be-
fore Frost hit the earth.
Angelina Pereira had pushed Wendy back upright in her seat
when she saw the bright red EJECT light. Still holding Wendy in
her seat with her left hand, she carefully rotated Wendy's right
ejection lever up and pulled the trigger. The fingers of her left
hand broke as Wendy's armrest smashed into them, but she didn't
notice the pain as she watched the seat blast skyward. Then she
slammed herself back into her own seat, raised her arming lev-
ers, and pulled both triggers.
Her seat malfunctioned. Nothing happened. She reseated her
triggers and activated the backup ballistic acutators, but by then
it was too late . . .
t
DAY OF THE CHEETAH 183
Ormack heard the loud pops and surges of air as ejection seats
left the plane-at least someone might make it out alive, he
thought. Wendelstat had finally collapsed. There was nothing to
do for him-no time to haul him downstairs for manual bailout.