“Didn’t we blow up a pocket battleship?” he argued sourly.
“After Jerry serves us up a welcome reception we’ll talk,” Allison said. “I’m expecting it to be hot.”
At that moment the intersquadron speaker began to rattle off clipped orders. Every man was on his feet instantly. The moment had come for them to take off. Number 30 swarmed out on the field. Allison was in command again, Stan had insisted upon that arrangement. Allison was cold and calculating, Stan Wilson was a fighter and wanted action. Anyway, Allison had earned that right to lead. He was the original flight lieutenant of Red Flight.
Stan grinned eagerly as he swung himself into the cockpit and glanced back to see that his gunner got set. He called back over his shoulder. “Tight straps, Sergeant, we likely will be in a few tight spots.”
“Yes, sir,” the gunner answered. He settled back against his shock pad and adjusted his belt.
Strange how a fellow can always take up another notch in his belt, Stan thought. Then he jerked the throttle open and the Hawk roared and strained on the cab rank. He pinched one brake and swung around, heading down the field with a finger of light guiding them.
“Red Flight, check your temperatures. Red Flight, are you set?” Allison’s voice was crisp and metallic.
Stan and O’Malley cleared and the Hawks swung around. The recording officer and the coveralled mechanics had slipped back into the darkness. A mobile floodlight thumped over the black field ahead, took position, and a yellow shaft of light slapped down the field. The adjustment was made on the shadow bar and the three Hawks nosed into the band of black and waited, trembling, ready.
The signal came from the recording officer’s Aldis light and they were off. Screeching into the night, twisting up the glory trail with the hydrogen gorged balloons tugging at their cables, waiting like gloating monsters for their victims, out of the notch and up they went.
“Tight formation,” Allison droned. And Stan in the right-hand slot shoved in closer to the roaring monster in the lead.