"Glad to be of help, Hawk One."
Peretz clicked off the radio and turned around. "I think they bought it."
"So far so good," Ramirez nodded.
He descended the three steps down into the lower cockpit, the weapons station, and stood behind Peretz, looking it over again. The Hind's offensive capability included a four-barrel Gatling-type 12.7mm machine gun in a turret under the nose, as well as 32-round packs of 57mm rockets secured on hardpoints on each stubby auxiliary wing. Finally, the wingtips carried four Swatter homing antitank missiles, two on each side. Plenty of firepower for what he intended.
"Remember," he said to Salim as he moved back up, "no hint of hostile action until after they make the ID." Would the stubborn Iranian hold steady? Stick to the procedure?
He checked his watch. Four and a half minutes should take them inside the VIS range. The altimeter showed that they were now at eleven hundred meters, and so far the Iranian was bringing her in perfectly. Of course, after the frigate confirmed they were flying a Hind . . . but by then it would be too late. . . .
"I was doubling Cape Maleas when the swell, the current, and the North Wind combined to drive me sidelong off my course and send me drifting past Kythera. The force of the gusts tore my sails to tatters, and for nine days I was chased by those accursed winds across the fish-infested seas. But on the tenth I made the country of the Lotus-Eaters."
From The Odyssey: Book Nine