Chapter 3: Nightmares

The Station Commander's office was quite full, with General Chennault, Major Dupree, who as commanding officer of the Squadron was also Station Commander, Cynthia and Joni, two privates from the RCAF Regiment guarding the girls, Harry Arsenault, the chief of squadron maintenance Master Warrant Officer Balfour, and William Whitefeather. Only the general was seated, behind Dupree's double-pedestal desk. Cynthia and Joni were struggling to hold back tears.

"All right, having heard the testimony before me, I judge that Cadet Sergeant Dunlop was the less guilty of the two of you. However, she did not object to the plan and therefore entered onto a top-secret base without authorization. She is confined to station for two weeks, and is to work her sentence off with 468 Squadron's ground maintenance. Warrant Balfour, you have responsibility for her."

MWO Balfour came to attention crisply. "Yes, Sir!"

"See to it that she's kept busy. Understand?"

"Sir!"

"I've had a word with your school, and your parents," Chennault advised Joni. "Your course work is being sent here, as is that of your partner in crime. It should be here first thing in the morning. You are NOT getting out of school."

Joni winced at the mention of her parents. When she got home, she'd be in for yet more punishment.

"You're going to work on the Lancasters during the day, and your high school courses during the night."

Work on the Lancasters? For the next two weeks? Suddenly life was looking up, she decided.

MWO Balfour marched the teen out of the office, shutting the door behind them. Through the closed door, the occupants could hear an excited "Yes!" of triumph.

The general turned to Cynthia. "You, young lady, are in far more serious trouble. You had control of that aircraft, you could have turned back at any time. You didn't. You were the one convincing Sergeant Dunlop to go along with you.

"However," the General sighed, "you demonstrated superb flying skills. That was one of the best landings I've seen from anyone with only a general aviation license. I understand you wish to be an RCAF pilot when you graduate from college?"

"Sir, yes, Sir," Cynthia confirmed, finding her voice a little rusty.

"Very well. By rights I should have you drummed out of the Air Cadet program, but I'm going to accept Captain Whitefeather's recommendation. Captain Buckler will put you through the simulators for the rest of the afternoon, and then Captain Whitefeather has your ass for the rest of the day. Gentlemen, don't take it easy on her. Dismissed. Captain Arsenault, Major Dupree, a word before you go, if I may."

The rest left the room, Captain Whitefeather taking it upon himself to double-time Cynthia out of there. Both Dupree and Arsenault remained, staring at the general inquisitively.

General Chennault turned to the pair. "This incident will not go on either of their personal records, if they behave themselves while they're here. It will be as if the incident never happened."

The moon was at its maximum that night – a thin sliver, casting little light. Two figures wandered in the shadows of the still-uncleared brush between the outer marker and the end of Runway 63. As the searchlights from the guard towers played over the perimeter, the two figures remained unseen and undetectable.

Both wore black Armoured Corps berets without cap badges and dark maintenance overalls. Their feet were shod by matte black boots, and their faces were painted in face camouflage called "Black is Beautiful". Their eyes were the only chance of reflecting light, which is why they covered them in protective goggles whose lenses were coated in a dark, one-way filter.

As the searchlights moved on, both figures took the opportunity to race to the fence. The guards in the towers, night blinded by proximity to the searchlights, didn't see a thing.

Two snips and the wire had parted enough for the two figures to tiptoe into the station. They paused long enough to tidy up the breached fence. The repair gave any wandering patrol nary a hint that any unauthorized bodies were actually wandering around inside the perimeter.

Quickly, silently, both forms attacked one particular barracks and then retreated unseen into the shadows.

In the Officer's Quarters, Harry Arsenault stirred in his bunk. Unable to sleep, he was reduced to reviewing the afternoon's actions after his sister's arrival. As promised, Captain Buckler had thrown Cynthia into a simulator. Harry had to concede that Little Sister was a good, no, a great pilot. She had handled the faux version of the Lanc with precision and discipline, sticking to her wingman even when the general had added complications that nobody had faced in the morning's sessions: fog, rain, icing conditions, crosswinds on landing, engine failure, battle damage and so on. The general had tried to punish her with the toughest time in the simulator yet given to anyone, and she'd passed with flying colours.

At Whitefeather's demented request, the last mission was intercepted by several heavily-armed Concorde supersonic transports bearing the German airline Lufthansa's livery. The facts that the Concorde had never been armed in reality, had never been flown by Lufthansa and hadn't flown in decades just added to the insanity. Cynthia's outrage at a civilian jetliner armed with a GAU-8A Avenger Gatling gun was heartwarming to Harry.

Joni Dunlop, Cynthia's potentially innocent partner in crime, had been sentenced to assist the ground crew do maintenance on the general's electric-engined, fusion reactor powered DC-4. It was yet another case of non-punishment, for the young lady had happily bent to the task with a will that endeared her to the airmen she was assisting.

Suddenly the station was plunged into darkness, the dim light coming through the curtain-free window being abruptly cut off. Harry glanced at the glowing hands of the analogue watch he was wearing and realized it was just after three. Even the searchlights had ceased to function, he realized.

The night was just as suddenly rent with a blare of horns – musical horns, and the other instruments of a full military brass band. His roommate Razor Sharpe sat up in his bunk, disoriented from being abruptly awoken from a sound sleep. Harry hopped out of bed, slipping his feet into slippers and grabbing his robe from the back of the door.

"BE KIND TO YOUR WEB-FOOTED FRIENDS!" a chorus of male voices loudly advised him as he flung his bedroom door open and stumbled into the hall, which was rapidly filling up with similarly-clad pilots.