The captain's additional problem was that his battlegroup commander, an Admiral, had taken the chance to fly into Naples for a conference with the Commander of the United States Sixth Fleet. Richards was on his own.

"Where's our friend?" Roosevelt's CO asked.

"About two hundred fifty miles back," the operations officer said. "Close."

"Let's get the plus-fives right up, skipper," Jackson said. "I'll take two and orbit right about here to watch the back door." He tapped the chart.

"Play it cool, Rob."

"No sweat, Ernie." Jackson walked to a phone. "Who's up?" he asked the VF-1 ready room. "Good." Jackson went off to get his flight suit and helmet.

"Gentlemen," Richards said, as Jackson left, "since we are now east of Malta, we are now part of the SIOP, therefore a strategic and not a conventional asset, and DEFCON-TWO applies to us. If anyone here needs a refresher on the DEFCON-TWO Rules of Engagement, you'd better do it fast. Anything that might be construed as a threat to us may be engaged and destroyed on my authority as battlegroup commander. Questions?"

"Sir, we don't know what is happening," the ops officer pointed out.

"Yeah. We'll try to think first, but, people, let's get our collective act together. Something bad is happening, and we're at DEFCON-TWO."

It was a fine, clear night on the flight deck. Jackson briefed Commander Sanchez and their respective RIOs, then the plane captains for the two Tomcats sitting on the waist cats walked the flight crews out to them. Jackson and Walters got aboard. The plane captain helped strap both in, then disappeared downward and removed the ladder. Captain Jackson ran through the start-up sequence, watching his engine instruments come into normal idle. The F-14 was currently armed with four radar-homing Phoenix missiles and four infrared Sidewinders.

"Ready back there, Shredder?" Jackson asked.

"Let's do it, Spade," Walter replied.

Robby pushed his throttles to the stops, then jerked them around the detente and into afterburner, and signaled his readiness to the catapult officer, who looked down the deck to make sure it was clear. The officer fired off a salute to the aircraft.

Jackson blinked his flying lights in reply, dropping his hand to the stick and pulling his head back against the rest. A second later, the cat officer's lighted wand touched the deck. A petty officer hit the firing button, and steam jetted into the catapult machinery.

For all his years at this business, his senses never quite seemed to be fast enough. The acceleration of the catapult nearly jerked his eyeballs around inside their sockets. The dim glow lights of the deck vanished behind him. The back of the aircraft settled, and they were off. Jackson made sure he was actually flying before taking the aircraft out of burner, then he retracted his gear and flaps, and started a slow climb to altitude. He was just through a thousand feet when 'Bud' Sanchez and 'Lobo' Alexander pulled alongside.

"There go the radars," Shredder said, taking note of his instruments. The entire TR battlegroup shut down every emission in a matter of seconds. Now, noone would be able to track them from their own electronic noise.