Exiled Omnibus by James Hunt Read Free Book Online Page B

the pilots that had flown with him began to make their own landings. When he climbed out of the cockpit, Eric was greeted on the runway by a dirty-faced colonel.
     
    “Lieutenant Stephenson,” Colonel Brack said. “It’s great to have you here.”
     
    “Do we know how close they are?” Eric asked.
     
    “The last satellite images we received had Gallo setting up a forward operating base in the border town of Nogales just south of Arizona. We sent a scout team in last night to survey the area. We should receive a report by this afternoon.”
     
    “What's our personnel situation?”
     
    “Could be better. We have five hundred boots on the ground, and with the addition of your airmen, we have forty planes.”
     
    “Everybody loves a good David-versus-Goliath story. Where are we at with the city?”
     
    “Phoenix?”
     
    “Yeah.”
     
    “It's a shit show.”
     
    “We need to send a unit into the city to help stabilize it.”
     
    Eric pulled the glass door to the main office building open and stepped inside. What was normally a bustling area with uniformed men and women going about their daily tasks was now a ghost town. Five hundred airmen sounded like a lot, but spreading that over a base that was meant to hold five thousand made it look practically empty.
     
    “It's not much, but we're trying to make it work,” Brack said.
     
    “Where's your communication post? I need to make a call,” Eric said.

 
    ***
    Eric paced back and forth on the floor. He was alone in the room, as requested. He held the radio firmly to his ear. He wanted to make sure he could hear everything for this conversation.

“I understand that, Captain, but we barely have enough men to keep this base running. We can't risk sending more men into Phoenix to stabilize the city,” Eric said.
     
    “Lieutenant, it's not your call. I understand you’re spread thin, but so is everyone. Now's not the time for excuses. We just need to buckle down and get it done. I don't care how you do it.”
     
    “Sir, if Gallo's men attack when we're in the city, we'll have our defenses divided. Timing is everything right now.”
     
    “I agree, Lieutenant. That's why you're going to ensure the people left in Phoenix have something to hold onto. They're in the same boat we are.”
     
    “Yes, sir.”
     
    Eric set the satellite phone on the desk. The rumbling engine of a truck rolled past the window outside, and Eric fell backward into a chair. He buried his face in his palms and tried to rub the impossible task given to him from his mind.
     
    He wanted to help the people in Phoenix as much as the captain did, but they didn't have the time right now to scramble a scout party to head into the city. Gallo could attack at any minute. Right now, he was stuck between a rock and a hard place.
     
    If Phoenix was anything like what he had seen in San Diego, then it was going to be bad. Phoenix had already been dying before the president's orders, and now that they were cut off from the rest of the country, with no resource shipments coming in, the likelihood he would be able to get everyone to stand together and sing Kumbaya would err on the side of difficult.
     
    The roar of the base sirens snapped Eric out of his stupor, and he burst out of the office. He sprinted across the tarmac to his jet. His dog tags flung out behind his neck, holding on for the ride. He didn't need to ask what the alarm was for. Gallo's men were heading their way.
     
    The honed efficiency of the dozens of scramble drills that each pilot had endured was on full display as everyone rushed to get the fighters into the air as fast as possible. The crew chief was running around finishing his prep on fuel, hydraulic fluid, and liquid oxygen. Normally each jet had its own crew, but right now there was only a handful of crews for forty planes.
     
    Eric climbed inside the cockpit, and the crew chief climbed the ladder after him.
     
    “Your fuel tanks aren't completely refilled