Return From the Inferno by Mack Maloney Read Free Book Online

of the Aerodrome's three-mile-long main runway, lifting off a little shakily after a 12,000 foot roll and slowly banking toward the north.
    Bone and Itchy went next, their antique Thunderchiefs ripping through the midmorning hot air and lifting off in a particularly ragged, one-two fashion.
    Once airborne, they quickly kicked in their afterburners and caught up with the jumbo, taking defensive positions slightly above and behind the flying behemoth.
    It promised to be a short flight from Bundeswehr Four to New Chicago, an hour at the most.
    The skies were clear, the weather perfect for flying. Although both Thunderchiefs were equipped with AIM-9 Sidewinder air-to-air missiles, neither pilot expected to fire any. For them, the skies above Fourth Reich America were virtually enemy free.
    The jumbo reached 25,000 feet, and would stay there only a few minutes before starting its descent toward New Chicago's main airport. Itchy actually found his mind wandering back to the night before; the tidal wave of booze, drugs, broads and debauchery. He imagined similar scenes happening all over the eastern part of the country as the Fourth Reich tightened its vise grip over the population. Why, he wondered, had people bothered all those years with things like morals? Ethics? Laws? Decency was a drag, man. A dead-end street.
    Whether you live your life good or bad, you still die. So what's the point?
    He felt a pleasant chill go through him. There was definitely a new order settling down across the continent, one which held promise for people like him. But it would be survival of the fittest and he would have to reach out and grab whatever he could. That was okay-he'd been doing that for most of his life anyway.
    He made a routine flight check call over to Bone, who was barely paying attention himself.
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    "This is a fucking milk run," Bone called back over. "Don't bug me with this flight status crap."
    Deflated, Itchy knew his pain in the ass wingman was right. Kick back, he told himself. Just fly the fucking mission, land, eat some steak, score some myx and then find something young and cute to deflower. Enjoy this new life in Second Axis America.
    An instant later, they got the Mayday call from the jumbo.
    Thirty-two men in an NS convoy witnessed the incident.
    The seven-vehicle column had just unloaded a supply of barbed wire and electrical shock equipment to a civilian concentration camp forty miles south of New Chicago and was heading north again when they spotted the jumbo jet and its two escort fighters passing overhead.
    As many would later testify, the big 747 appeared to be smoking from its left-side wing. One of the F-105s-later identified as Bone-pulled up close to the stricken airliner, almost as an attempt to get a closer look at the cause of the smoke. Meanwhile the second F-105, the one piloted by Itchy, began firing its weapons wildly in the general direction of the two other airplanes, almost as if he thought they were being attacked.
    As the convoy of Atlantic soldiers watched in horror, the 747's left wing suddenly burst into flame. The big airliner began to veer over, clipping the close-in fighter in the process, causing it to explode almost immediately.
    The convoy had drawn to a halt by this time and all of its members saw the jumbo slowly flip over on its back and plummet, slamming into a field about four miles away. The shock wave created by the frightening crash was enough to perforate the eardrums of some of the transport troops, causing them to bleed profusely. Those that were able, rushed to the crash site, but realized quickly there were no survivors.
    The last anyone saw of Itchy's F-105, it was streaking off to the east; its weapons firing, as if chasing some phantom aircraft.
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    Chapter Eight
    The small shack shuddered as the pair of Tornadoes streaked overhead, their engines screaming as they turned on final landing approach.
    Inside the shack, Fitz was drunk again. He was sitting on the floor, two