*
“What do you mean, Mach 4?” asked Major Jack Greenham, peering over the shoulder of the Operations Specialist, who was operating the tracking system. The top secret tracking centre had been built in the heart of Mount Union in Arizona to track all air traffic moving through United States airspace. The state-of-the-art equipment could pinpoint a child flying a radio-controlled plane, from Maine to San Diego.
“That’s five thousand kilometres per hour, Corporal. Nothing moves at that speed inside the atmosphere. You must be mistaken. Run a diagnostic.”
He waited, cupping his chin in his hand and tapping the side of his cheek whilst changing the acoustics of his mouth in a way that always irritated the hell out of everyone around him. The Operations Specialist, desperately trying to block out the infuriating sound behind him, ran another diagnostic, his eyes transfixed on the screen.
“The signal is confirmed sir. There is no system error. We have an unidentified bogey on a heading of one-eight-zero moving at Mach 4 at a height of four hundred metres.”
“Where is it exactly?” asked the Major.
“It’s just left Utah and… Hold on a minute. It’s slowed to Mach 2 and has entered the Grand Canyon sir.”
The major reached over to the next desk and pulled a red telephone receiver from the front of the panel. He pushed one button and waited.
“This is Major Greenham. We have an unidentified bogey travelling at Mach 2, in…I repeat in the Grand Canyon.” He held his hand over the mouthpiece. “Where is it now, Corporal?”
“It’s just left the Canyon, increased to Mach 4 and changed course to two-seven-zero. ETA, Pacific coast, three minutes.”
The major relayed the information to the National Defence Centre in Washington and was ordered to continue tracking the object. There was very little else they could do, after all. They had nothing fast enough to intercept it and they certainly had nothing fast enough to shoot it down. Two hundred kilometres off the coast of Mexico however, the USS Port Royal, a Ticonderoga class cruiser was taking part in an exercise, the object of which was to detect and engage the USS Santa Fe, a Los Angeles class fast attack submarine.
“Priority one message coming through Captain,” said the Communications Officer.
Commander Willis took the printed text and read it silently; ‘Unidentified bogey…position 35 degrees 42 minutes north...114 degrees 02 minutes west...course 270 degrees…speed Mach 4…engage and destroy’.
“Battle stations,” he calmly stated. “This is not a drill.”
The ship was armed with Sea Sparrow missiles that could reach Mach 4 plus. So they had a fair chance of hitting the object. A giant plume of smoke and fire burst from the rear of the ship, and out of it emerged the missile. Oli was flying so close to the sea that a trail of spray forty metres high was shooting up behind the ship. Robbie put a rear view on the screen to show Oli the effect they were having.
“Cool,” he said, edging the ship even closer to the ocean. “You will let me know if there’re any boats coming up, won’t you Robbie? I don’t think they’d appreciate being carved in two.”
“The closest vessel is a United States Cruiser about forty kilometres from us but we will not…Hold on a minute, they’ve just launched a missile at us. Cheeky buggers!”
“The weapon has locked onto the target, sir,” said the Weapons Officer in the Operations Room on board the USS Port Royal. “Impact in twenty five seconds…Twenty…Fifteen…Ten…Five, four, three, two, one…Impact sir. The weapon has detonated and the target is dest…”
“Correction, target still approaching sir. It will pass over us in ten seconds.”
The Captain ran out of the Operations Room and onto the small round lookout protruding from the bridge of the ship, just in time to see a forty metre high wall of water cut across the bow of the ship. The cruiser was travelling at thirty knots and it pushed straight through the curtain of water as it hung at its zenith in the air. The front half of the ship all the way up to the windows on the bridge was hit by a wall of seawater.
The Captain reappeared from his observation point, dripping wet from head to toe, confused and to some extent, livid. The bridge crew, eyes remaining fixed to their screens, fought with all their might, the urge to laugh. Several shoulders began to wobble.
Oli pulled back on the right stick, grinning so widely that he thought he might split his face open and in a couple of seconds they were back in space. He let go of the controls and they slid back into the front of the control panel. Robbie had remote-detonated the missile when it was just twenty metres from the ship. Any normal aircraft would have been ripped apart by the blast, but they would have felt more of a jolt, travelling in a car that ran over a pebble in the road.
“You see what I mean Robbie,” he said, unable to hide the disappointment on his face. “Imagine what they’d be like if they had all of these toys to play with.” Not wanting to let the trigger-happy Yanks put the mockers on it all, he continued. “Anyway, that was superb Robbie. Do I get my driving licence?”
“Yes Oli, you performed adequately. I only had to prevent us from being smashed into tiny atoms and the earth being knocked off its axis by a graviton particle explosion on four occasions. Bravo.”
Oli looked at Pardy and pulled his snooty face.
“Right,” pronounced Oli. “It's Saturday night and I don't know about anyone else, but I would kind of like to let my hair down a step or two.”
“Meaning?” inquired Robbie.
“I'm going clubbing!”