“Go get them, Scottie!” Her words came short and quick.
“You asked for it.” His motor roared. “So did they.”
The four Zeros, sure that one of them would finish Scottie off, came right at them. As if by thundering straight on he hoped to avoid them, Scottie did not change his course until he was almost beneath them.
Then, with a “Hang on, Mary!” he tilted his plane straight up to climb toward the stars.
Caught off guard, the attackers attempted to scatter. One narrowly escaped crashing into the other and, in the confusion, found Scottie beneath him, with every gun blazing. With its fuselage sawed half in two, the Zero doubled up to go rolling and tumbling toward the jungle far below.
Just in time Scottie dropped the nose of his plane, tilted, and went into a spiral to escape an enemy on his tail.
When he came out of the spiral, he stood for a second on his wing, then rising like a comet, flashed past the would-be attacker to catch a second Zero unawares and send him down in a pillar of smoke.
Just then a stream of slugs cut across their cabin, so close to their backs that Mary felt the heat of their passing.
“The dirty—” Scottie did not finish. As the other plane flashed past him, he had seen something. Mary had seen it, too.
“Get him, Scottie,” she screamed. “Get him if it’s the last thing you ever do.”