Читать книгу End Game - Dale Brown - Страница 39

‘This looks a lot like those contacts we had the other night,’ Starship told Eyes as he scrambled to follow the aircraft he’d just spotted. The slow-moving plane, about five miles north of Starship’s Werewolf, was so low the sensors showed it on the surface of the water.

‘Good, copy, we concur here. Track him.’

‘Yeah, I’m on that.’ Starship swung the Werewolf westward as the bandit continued to pick up speed. The image in the forward-looking infrared showed that the airplane had two engines set high behind the wing; it was small, almost surely a civilian aircraft. The threat file in the Werewolf’s combat computer couldn’t identify it.

Starship followed at about two miles, ratcheting his speed up as the strange aircraft continued to accelerate. Starship tucked his Werewolf downward, trying to get a better look at the underside of the craft. But the other plane was so low to the waves that he had a hard time; he kept jerking his hand involuntarily as the shadows changed on the screen. Finally he backed off his speed, dipping so close to the water that he nearly ditched.

‘Definitely no weapons,’ he told Tac. ‘Looks like a civilian craft. Are you going to contact them?’

‘Stand by,’ said Eyes, his voice tense.

The distance between the two aircraft had widened to four miles. Starship began to climb and accelerate. As he did, the bandit veered to the east.

‘He’s climbing,’ Starship told Tac.

‘Werewolf, Indian destroyer Calcutta is reporting it’s under fire. They’ve been torpedoed. Stand by to render assistance.’

‘What do you want me to do with this aircraft?’

‘He has no weapons?’

‘Negative. Look, maybe he launched the torpedo.’

‘Way too small for that. We’ll hand him off to Dreamland Wisconsin. Get back over to the Calcutta. They need assistance.’

‘Roger that,’ said Starship, changing course.