Free Hogs #1: Going Deep by Jim DeFelice

shoulder a shitload.
    The worst stuff, maybe. People applauding— applauding!— when a pilot was captured.
    Knowlington had argued with his two sisters only once about the war. He'd known it would be
useless before he even opened
his mouth. Something— booze probably, but maybe his love for them, too— made him try.
    No way. They knew the truth— they had seen it on TV and in the papers.
    Colonel Knowlington found the chaplain's tent. There
were a few people standing around a coffee machine at the back. He walked over silently, nodded
to an officer from one of the transport units he knew vaguely. Nice guy. Young. Most of the other people
who came to these meetings were enlisted.
There were no ranks here.
    Today was a busy day, and there wasn't likely to be a crowd. The colonel had barely filled
his cup when the informal
leader of the group, known as “Stores,” cleared his throat near the small wooden podium
at the front of the tent.
    “We ought to try and keep things quick today, since there's a lot going on,” said the
man, who was a logistics sergeant. The others began sifting among the chairs, everyone sitting near the front, but
not in the front row itself. No one was next to anyone else. “We'll just be ad hoc for the next few days; catch as
catch can, etcetera. Anyone
who has to leave, you know, ought to go when they have to. Okay— anyone have anything to
say?”
    Knowlington glanced around. When no one else spoke, he rose slowly to his feet.
    “My name is Michael and I'm an alcoholic. I've been
sober now thirteen days, going on fourteen. I thought it would be easier here, but it turns
out its probably a bit worse. Too much
Listerine.”
    Everybody laughed.
     

CHAPTER 15
    TAKING OFF FROM AL JOUF FOB
    1135
     
    In theory, every A-10A had been stamped from the same sheet metal. The parts
were completely interchangeable; weapons, performance, characteristics
precisely the same. The
bare-bones design and facilitated production lines were supposed to churn out the Air Force
equivalent of a model T, available
in any color, as long as it was muted green. Unlike most other military jets, there weren't even different versions or model numbers to
complicate matters. An OA-10A was just an A-10A on a target-spotting mission.
The only thing different was the mix of bullets in its gun.
    In reality, each Hog had its own quirks and characteristics. The one Doberman was
driving, for instance, seemed
to pull slightly to its left, a bit like a motor boat with a loose rudder. In fact, the
characteristic was so noticeable
on takeoff that the pilot triple-checked his flap setting and instruments. Eventually,
he decided the problem was with the engines, even though the gauges said the
two GEs were operating
in precise unison.
    His stomach said screw the gauges. One fan had just a
little more bite than the other, a little more aggressive spinning around its axle. No amount of
fine-tuning the throttle evened it out, either. The solution was all in the
stick and rudder, all in Doberman's attitude as he flew. He tensed his muscles
a different way to fly Dixon's plane; that's
what it came down to.
    Another thing— the ACES-2 ejector seat felt different. Totally impossible, but absolutely
true. Kid's fanny must've bent it special.
    Doberman noticed the rear end of A-Bomb's plane had risen a bit high in his windshield; he
tilted his nose up a tad more to correct. They were flying a loose trail formation north, climbing to twenty
thousand as they ran over the berm marking the border between Saudi Arabia and
its aggressive neighbor. A number of tanks were waiting to get their turrets blown off about a
hundred miles away.
    Luckiest dead man alive, huh? What the hell did Jimbo mean by that?
    A quarter inch one way or another.
    Yeah, right. A quarter of an inch one way or another and
the damn shell would have missed completely.
    Doberman snorted into his oxygen mask. He'd been unlucky as hell ever since he got
here, and not just at