Read Online End Game by Dale Brown - Free Book Online Page B

could have made it,” insisted Stewart, powering down at the signal from the crewman outside.
    Breanna sighed, and pretended to busy herself with the postflight checklist. She’d had Stewart fly as pilot to give her more experience behind the stick, not to show her up. Stewart had the qualifications to be a lead pilot, but so far she just wasn’t hacking it. Hopefully it would come in time.
    If her personality let it.
    â€œHey, Bree, Dog’s looking for you,” said Danny Freah, sticking his head up at the rear of the cockpit area.
    â€œWhat’s up?”
    â€œWe’re moving out. You’ll never guess where.”
    â€œMars.”
    â€œI wish. Going back to the Gulf of Aden. We’re going to work with Xray Pop and the infamous Captain Storm. Hey, Stewart, you’re invited too. Looks like your first Whiplash deployment is about to begin.”
    â€œGreat,” said Stewart, her tone suggesting the opposite.
    â€œNewbies buy.”
    â€œScrew yourself, Captain.”
    â€œWhat’s buggin’ her?” said Danny after the pilot left the plane.
    â€œDoesn’t like to buy,” said Breanna.
    Â 
    B Y THE TIME B REANNA AND D ANNY GOT TO C ONFERENCE Room 2 in the Taj Mahal, Colonel Bastian had started the briefing. A large map at the front of the room showed northeastern Africa, the Gulf of Aden, and part of the nearby Indian Ocean. Somalia sat like a large, misshapen 7 wrapped around the northern and eastern shores of the continent. During its last deployment, the Dreamland Whiplash team and the Megafortresses supporting it had seen action on land and above the sea at the north, where the Gulf of Aden separated Africa from the Saudi peninsula. Today, the eastern shore of the war-torn country was highlighted, with a large X near the town of Hando on the Indian Ocean.
    â€œI’m going to start by giving you all some background on political situation here,” said the colonel. “As many of you already know, pirates have been roaming the Gulf of Aden for nearly a year. They’ve been taking advantage of trouble elsewhere—specifically in the Balkans, in the Philippines, Japan, and Taiwan—to prey on oil tankers and other merchant ships traveling through the gulf.”
    â€œWhile the cat’s away, the mice do play,” said Major Mack Smith down in front. He turned around, smiling for everyone behind him, as if he were in junior high and had just made the most clever statement in the world.
    â€œThe Navy sent a small warship called the Abner Read into the gulf a few months ago,” continued Dog, ignoring Smith. “Some of us supported them. We won a major victory against the strongest group of pirates two months ago. Things have been relatively calm since, with some sporadic attacks but nothing on the order of what we’d seen before.Yesterday, however, there was a major attack on Port Somalia, an oil terminal that has just been opened by the Indians. The Indians are blaming Pakistan and are threatening to retaliate. That’s not sitting too well with the Pakistanis, who say they had nothing to do with this attack. Both countries have nuclear weapons. Our satellites have detected preparations at the major Indian ballistic missile launching area and at its Pakistani counterpart.”
    â€œSaber rattling,” said Mack.
    â€œOur immediate mission is to beef up Xray Pop, the task force that the Abner Read heads. We’re going to help it figure out who’s behind the attack. We’re also going there to show both sides just how serious a matter this is.”
    â€œBlessed are the peacemakers—” said Mack.
    â€œThank you, Major, but I can do without the running commentary,” said Dog. “We will be under the operational command of Xray Pop’s commander, Captain ‘Storm’ Gale. A lovely fellow.”
    Everyone who had been on the last deployment snickered.
    Dog turned to the projection