Trampship Wars 2 Read online

Page 5


  The Exec walked up behind Captain Cook. “My God Captain, Commander Collins has a full fucking Squadron of bombers. Do we keep the fighters as well or not?” Watching the fighters climb up out of the pit with a half shocked frown. “Hell, he was a fucking civilian a little o ver a week ago even if he was a Cadet since he was 8. Well, at least the Admiral is not responsible this time.”

  Turning to glare at her Executive Officer. “No! The Collins kid may be responsible for us getting them but he is damn well not going to Command weapons that can take out a ship.”

  The English Captain catching Captain Cooks remarks as he picked up his helmet and turned back to Mark still standing beside the huge torpedo bomber he had just climbed out of. “Now get out of that damn flight suit and I will see what I can teach you about maintaining your bo n mbers and training your crews and pray that you do a better job flying during your next training session later this evening tomorrow . I have brought some of your other bombers down so we can pick and start training your crews while I am busy with you. That is if we can find any one that are qualified and can get their heads out of their ass’s. I am going to need you to tell me who can be relied upon to fly million credit ships after we weed the list down.”

  Captain Cook stepped forward. “That won’t be necessary Captain. You have made it perfectly clear that Lieutenant Junior Grade Collins, is not fighter pilot material and I need him in the engine rooms getting our engine upgrade kits installed. The Boat Chief is here, you can start familiarizing him with the equipment. I don’t think we need you to waste your time training our pilots. I am sure they will do just fine. They all have thousands of hours of shuttle cockpit time that includes a few planetary landings.” Captain Cook patted the Chief on the shoulder smiling then headed for Mark. “Lieutenant Collins, your flying days are over. You can get the hell out of that damn flight suit and report to Engine Room 4. They need…”

  “Just hold up there Captain Cook.” The English Captain shook his head as he turned to Captain Cook and then smiled. “Don’t need training do they? Even made a couple of reentries from orbit hey? Good. Put your two best pilots in this bomber and have them take it up and fly it around the ship even once.” He said patting the side of the bomber Mark had just climbed out of. “Compared to a fighter these are easy to fly. Any kid with a few hours of Simm time can fly one around the ship. Rated ground crewmen do it all the time , (not mentioning that they still had to be trained for hundreds of hours and then only with the ships auto pilots on very restrictive settings) . You pilots with thousands of hours of cockpit time and a couple of reentries should have no problem. ” The Captain said sarcastically.

  Captain Cook smiled as she stopped half way to Mark. After all how hard could that be? Motioning for the Boat Chief to comply. “It will take a few minutes to go up and get into the boat flight suits.” (Boat flight suits were little better than light weight vacuum suits made to fit a little tighter so for the pilots could fit into the cockpits .)

  “Don’t bother Captain. They don’t need boat flight suits for a short joy ride and they can use our helmets. We will supply regular combat flying suits if they pass or when training starts.”

  The Boat Chief pointed to a couple of the older pilots standing around and they stepped forward smiling. It only took a few minutes to get them into the cockpit with the borrowed helmets plugged in.

  The English Captain stepped up next to Captain Cook gently grabbing her arm and started dragging her away from the big bomber giving it plenty of room as they walked toward the only remaining fighter. “I am going to have my pilot climb into this fighter acting as backup pilot to keep them from crashing a million credit ship not to mention what ever they hit . Even then we had better give them plenty of room and have the area cleared.” Smiling as they turned around next to the fighter to watch as the bombers that had just landed decided to jump back into the air and put some distance between them and the Star Queen. “You will be able to hear the conversations between your pilots and my safety pilot from the external speaker in the fighter behind us. It will also sound a horn each time my pilot has to take control and continue a low beeping while the safety pilot has control of the bomber. My safety pilot will be running the demonstration.”

  Captain Cook watched most of the ground crews and pilots take up positions behind the line of trucks full of bombs, torpedoes and maintenance equipment . Getting as close to the steep sides of the berm as they could get.

  The Star Queen pilot was told to take off and hoover by the safety pilot.

  The bomber shot up into the air and headed for the Star Queen accelerating.

  A horn sounded and the bomber came to a stop short of the Queen. Turning around it glided back down to the deck halfway between the Queen and the group watching , . A a good hundred yards from where it had taken to the air from and as far away as it could get from anything it could hit. The Safety pilot told them to try it again and again the big bomber shot into the air headed in the opposite direction as the horn sounded again blaring for a half second before the noise was reduced enough to hear the Queen’s pilot cursing and the bomber came to a stop in midair and the blaring horn stopped as the Queen’s pilot continued to curse for several seconds.

  The Safety pilot started giving directions on how to fly the bomber as he brought it back down to land. Then turned control back over to the Queen’s pilot. The bomber started rapidly sliding across the pit. Its landing gear scraping the plasticrete sending sparks out each time one of the landing pads hanging down from the slightly upturned wing hit the surface as it raced back and forth with the horn sounding every few seconds to stop it from hitting the fighter , packed trucks or the Star Queen . , ( Captain Cook thinking seriously about ducking under the belly to put the fighter between them for protection but with the English Captain staying put she did as well but started taking short puffs on her cigar pumping it up into a bright cheery red ) or trucks or someone or something in the pit .

  The large group of correspondents suddenly taking an interest in what looked like a disaster about to happen as they came running across the pit under the ship, trying not to miss the imminent crash. The death lock forgotten.

  Finally the fighter shot up off the deck toward the ship north of the Queen barely missing the 200 foot tall blast proof wall of the berm around the pit as the horn sounded briefly several times to make the bomber miss the berm and ship and other things as it turned and careened suddenly in different directions before diving toward the ground and the ear splitting horn sounded again in a steady wail before the horn stopped and was replaced by a low beeping. T he horn ’ s volume was reduced to hear the Queen’s pilot started cursing again as the bomber settled back to the tarmac again , far from anything.

  For a half hour the Safety pilot tried to help the Queen’s pilot fly the bomber without much success before the English Captain had the bomber brought back remotely to land in front of them.

  The English Captain smiled at Captain Cook. “At least Commander Collins can pilot the bomber and I bet he can even pilot the fighter which takes one hell of a lot of cockpit time in trainers before we even let a new pilot near one.”

  Captain Cook shook her head and growled. “So my pilots need training, all I saw was Mr. Collins climbing out of a grounded bomber a few minutes ago and what I saw last night of his flying did not look much better. What makes you think he can fly a fighter any better?”

  The English Captain smiled at Captain Cook. “Last night he managed to land a fighter I could not even have flown let alone land.” Turning to face Mark still in the flight suit given him hours before his flight suit , with his helmet cradled under his arm against the side of the chest. “Mr. Collins, take this fighter up and show your Captain what you can do. Have some fun with it.”

  Mark’s mouth dropped open. “Aaa. Sir. After last night I don’t think I can do much better than what I was just watching.”

  “Nonsense Commander. You will do just fine. Now get in.” He slapped th
e side of the fighter as the English pilot acting as a safety controller climbed out the other side jumped down .

  Hesitating until the English Captain slapped the side of the fighter again, ordering him t o get his butt in the cockpit. Mark climbed up the ladder and dropped down into the cockpit as the same ground crewman that helped the Star Queen pilots into the bomber, helped Mark get fastened in. The pilot that had just climbed out stood on the other s ide away from the Captains and out of sight , taking a few minutes to familiarize Mark with the differences between the old tri fighter he had flown yesterday and the newer upgraded fighter.

  As Mark sat in the cockpit do ing what looked like no thing, Captain Cook looked around as the Star Queen’s pilots climbed out of the bomber visibly shaking. Sweat still running down their faces. The Pilot that had ridden with him as Weapon’s Officer had barf down the front of his chest while walking funny with a lump in his butt hanging down onto his legs and water running down his leaving foot prints leg as he headed towards the ship.

  As Mark was getting c C heck ed out in the fighter ’ s ing the bomber ’ s cockpit , as the other bombers rapidly returned to settle down along the berm wall back in their original line . N around them n ot the least bit worried about a boy at the controls of a damn fighter. As the pilots climbed out of their cockpits all up and down the line, Captain Cook looked at the bomber next to him a second time as the maintenance crewman climbed up and took one look into the bombers cockpit and started gagging as he slid back down . His fee t missing the rungs as he grabbed the side rails to slide down and looked at Captain Cook disgusted . , “I am not cleaning that mess up. Its your bomber now . Get your men to clean it up before it damages the systems.”

  Captain Cook face turned grim as she turned back to the English Captain. “Captain, why aren’t you putting a pilot in one of the fighters bombers as a safety pilot? Do you have a link to the base with a safety pilot there?” She He asked the English Captain as s he took a few steps away from the fighter .

  The English Captain smirked at Captain Cook as he stopped only a few yards away from the fighter as Captain Cook continued to walk several more steps before stopping and turning around to look up at Mark in the cockpit and then back down at the English Captain standing with his arms crossed with his back to the fighter only a few feet away from it .

  The English Captain smiled at Captain Cook. “Th ose are at was a bomber s Captain and no, I don’t need a safety pilot for the Commander. He will do fine. Besides that Bombers Cockpit needs a good cleaning before anyone gets back in it.” He pointed up at the bomber behind Captain Cook , she was inching toward to use as a shield.

  Captain Cook kept slowly backing up away from the fighter and the English Captain. “Are you crazy? I am having second thoughts about even letting them on my ship. Get away from it before the kid you get kill s you ed .”

  The English Captain still only a few 12 feet away from the fighter did not move . Just smiled back as Captain Cook continued to back up with the rest of the ship’s officers until she was near enough to the closest bomber to dive under if she needed protection. Trying to keep her dignity but very apprehensive of what destruction Mr. Collins was going to inflict on the nearby ships he was about to destroy as the rest of the Star Queen’s officers took cover. The English pilots and weapons officers standing out around the front of their bombers not the least worried as the y talked amongst each other.

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  Mark had spent the last half hour listening to the Star Queen’s Captain and half the Star Queen’s officers around him talk about getting him kicked out of the ships new fighter and bomber squadron let alone commanding it as the horn kept sounding every few seconds while the bomber made the Star Queen pilots look like fools. His only condolence seemed to be that Number 4 engine was a mess and they needed him to figure out why it was refusing to run though he thought he already knew why just by what he had heard while waiting in line to get his breakfast that morning.

  Mark’s stomach growling making him regret leaving the mess deck as soon as Mickey had told him he received the word that the English Captain had landed with more fighters just as he reached the serving table. And now that he was faced with losing his fighter squadron as well, he felt like his world was collapsing around him. For some reason he just could not get even a little excited at the prospect of going back down to the engine room. No one had said squat about him getting Command of his engine room back. In fact, the Captain had been calling him Lieutenant JG ever since she arrived in the pit. Most likely he would be put right back to having to put up with the Chief and every other officer and probably most of the engine room ratings treating him like shit again. No, he loved the engine rooms but after commanding one and successfully upgrading one engine, he was not looking forward to being treated like bilge slime again. Glasses or no glasses.

  While his world continued to fall around him as the officers spoke about him as if he was not even there, Mark realized that the one thing he wanted most was to climb back into one of the new bombers, strap into it and feel the million horses he could release, to loose himself in the sky. After the last few hours flying was one thing he knew he could do. The bombers were landing sitting down with their its wings partially folded for landing before folding up to their storage positions but fully exten ded and ready for flight as their pilots climbed out. They kept beckoning to him. Calling his name. But the more he listened to the officers around him, the more certain he was that he would never fly a fighter again let alone one of the bombers he had dreaded even climbing into a few hour before.

  And then the English Captain had told him to climb in and fly the fighter everyone was standing beside. His heart skipped a whole bunch of beats as he tried to swallow. Suddenly not even sure anymore that he could even fly one after watching the embarrassing debacle the other pilot s had done. How could lowly engine room grease monkey old him do any better. Especially without Mickey plugged in anywhere to help.

  Mark’s mouth dropped open. “Aaa. Sir. After last night I don’t think I can do much better than what I was just watching.”

  The Captain’s response did little to mollify him but it was a chance he would definitely never get again if Captain Cook and the other officers he had been listening to, got their way.

  Mickey spoke in his ears. “Mark you will do fine. You really don’t need me to fly. Just think of this as your speeder. I have watched the files of you flying your Airspeeder and you are one hell of a pilot and with what I was able to teach you last night about this fighter which is just a newer copy of the one you flew last night, you will do just fine. Just relax and lose yourself and have some fun rubbing Captain Cook’s and the ship’s officer’s noses in the dirt.”

  The Captain slapping the side of the Fighter again got Mark moving. Walking past the Captains , he tried not to trip while walking a stiff legged straight line. He climbed up the ladder to the cockpit concentrating on not missing a rung and took a look inside. This wasn’t the Fighter/torpedo bomber he had been flying or even the old fighter he had flown the day before. This was one of the new single seat fighter conversions for the Tri-wings they had come out with toward the end of the war until production of the new X-winged fighters could match demand. He didn’t even have a weapons officer for advice which he now thanked Godstar he had in the bomber.

  “Mark, you know this cockpit. I spent part of the night teaching you its layout and what you need to know since this is what I believed you were getting a squadron of. I did not have time to teach you much beyond the basics of flying it but that is all you need now so relax and just fly the damn thing like I have seen you fly before.”

  Relaxing as the warmth of the now familiar cockpit soothed his mind as he realized that he did know all he needed to know about what should have been a very strange cockpit. Settling back as the Sargent strapped him in and checked the connections, he let the tub wrap around him, calming his feelings, carrying him away to familiar confid ence
confidence as the pilot started going over the controls and what to watch or as he flew as well as the fighters few quir ks . Next thing he knew the pilot was gone , the canopy was sealed and the big machine came to life under his touch with a hum. Knowing were everything was when he needed to.

  Raising ever so softly over the deck he raised the gear, closed the weapons bays letting the wing tip coils feel for the deck to stabilize the tipsy craft. Figuring that this would be the last time he ever got a chance to fly anything again he decided without thinking to take Mickey’s advice to have some fun. After all the Captain had said to show them what he could do and have some fun as well. After spending a few minutes over or under controlling the fighter through several simple acrobatic stunts with Mickey giving a constant stream of advice and warning s of what was needed next, he finally got the hang and feel for the fighter’s controls. And his years flying maneuvers with his speeder across a half a hundred planets and his space cycle pod acro ss asteroid fields came flowing back.

  Mark then spent the next half hour doing stunts without repeating a single maneuver one . Stunts he had perfected in his speeder over thousands of hours of practice far from the ship to avoid the bullies while doing the thing he loved. Half way through his routine, he noticed Chet’s families’ big Maxi-box shipping container with a big red X across the sides, sitting angled across the top of the pile of junk shoved out the old junk deck some 600 feet above. Though someone had taken the time to lift it down and set it gently on top of the pile instead of dropping it off the hatch’s platform. “Damn shame it was in one piece.” Mark thought to himself.

  Damn! He wanted the monster container to look like junk with its back broken and all the equipment he knew had been left inside it strewn all across the towering pile of junk . W (w ith most of Chet’s family and relatives dead from Chet’s and his father’s the poison attack on Dian and Jack in the water tank deck , there was no place to put all the junk or anyone to care if they had ) . W hile everyone was afraid to touch it lest they take a flying leap off a cargo hatch platform like most people suspected most of the enemies of Chet’s family had done . , strewn all across the towering pile of junk . Chet had terrorized Mark for years and now that Mark was not putting up with Chet beating him up and terr orizing him any longer, had even tried to kill him three times over the last week that he knew about. One of t he attempts resulting in one of Mark’s friend s being killed with a concussive shot to the boys head meant for Mark sitting next to him at the time . The last attempt killed most of Chet’s own family.