First chapter of Raptor Rebel Rising.
She transcribed the memos with speed and accuracy until she started reading the memos.
Chapter 1
The rain on my face washed the sweat from my brow which was burning my eyes. I couldn't see, but not because of that. I was flying my WWII RAF model T-Six Texan in a cloud making my way under the radar to the beach below. North Korea. The only thing I have to explain is how does a WWII airplane with a 200 mile range get to North Korea and land on a beach?
Can you say Navy carrier?
Coming out of the clouds I see the beach as just a sliver of sand from 6000 feet and I was happy because it was cold at this altitude. Pushing the stick the nose dived down toward the sand. This was gonna be a short field landing as I was gonna get within 500 feet and crab it to the ground. A "crab" maneuver makes the plane fly at a 45 degree angle to lose lift and fall like a rock.
Actually crabbing the plane was my favorite way to land as it reminded me of walking down stairs without a banister carrying a load of laundry. You know where the next step is, but you could miss and drop the laundry or worst trip and fall. NOT.
I was used to this with 250 hours of flight under my belt in this flying WWII trainer. I borrowed the same model but a Canadian version from Mike Hunt who donated it to the Confederate Air Force (CAF) Wing in Anchorage, Alaska. The Confederate Air Force is a club started to restore and maintain WWII aircraft by a bunch of businessmen in Harlingen, Texas in 1959. There are 50 chapters with 11,000 members all over the USA. My grandpa was one of the men that were founders. In the 1970's my Aunt Shirley was the president and donated a lot of money to fund a tora tora tora reinactment.
I was at the first airshow in Mercedes, Texas as a three-year old kid. The Mercedes airport wasn't an airport at all. Instead it was a large 10 acre cotton field which was divided into half mile squares with crossroads. A gravel runway had been laid down on an angle on one of the squares.
And get this, "It was called Rebel Field."
It was here that I fell in love with flying. Sitting on my Dad's shoulders, seeing my mom leading the high school band on the gravel runway making a grand entrance was a thrill. She was a senior and a twirler. Twirlers are not as common anymore, they have flag wavers and cheerleaders, but in 1963 they had twirlers.
I didn't know it at the time, but my grandfather was not a pilot. Although in his office at Sort-rite he had model airplanes hanging from the ceiling. He seemed to have a passion for planes. So I assumed as a kid that he was a pilot.
Later in life, probably when I was 47 on March 20, 2007, I had solo'ed and gotten my pilot's license.
I called my mother and told her, "Heh, now I'm a pilot like Grandpa Wally."
She said, "Your grandpa was never a pilot, he was a businessman and didn't have time to go to school for that. No he sent your grandma to flight school. Your grandma was a pilot and she was a damn good one."
I thought wow, I was more proud than ever that Grandma Francis had been a commercial pilot in the 1950's. We called her grandma Francis, and she was by marriage. It was just that she was the secretary that Grandpa Wally had left Grandma Ruth for in 1956 just when my father was entering 11th grade. That was why my Dad had to quit going to school after 10th grade to take care of the harvest and the cotton farm that we lived on. He was now a full-time farmer but he was so much more to me.
As the first ghost squadron of planes flew overhead I arched my back to look up into the sky letting go of my father's neck. I started to fall and was caught by grandpa and put down on the ground. I could still see because Grandpa lead me to the front of the crowd. Holding my grandpa's hand, made me feel safe.
Overhead there was a loud sound. It sounded like 1000 bumble bees and was coming closer. It turned out to be a WWII flying fortress, and I didn't know it at the time but it dropped bombs.
See I wasn't in the military and I wasn't a high time pilot. No, I had always been a civilian computer programmer which allowed me to infiltrate companies overseas and provide intel. Although I had been preceded by military ancestors and why I had such great respect of all the branches. But it was the air force that held the magic for me. Flying. Flying like a bird was what the dream in me was about as a kid.
Here comes the turn, now on final at 500 feet stepping on the ball right so I can see out the window on my left. The plane crabs at a 45 degree angle and loses lift and starts to sink fast.
"Weeeeeeeeee Cow-a-bunga!", I exclaimed.
I couldn't avoid being seen by a northern scout in a tower. That was the idea to get caught.
The tires touched down in the soft sand and bounced once, twice and then dug in and brought my oil burner to a stop. I cleaned up the flaps and turned the plane facing the ocean. After getting out I pushed the tail of the plane back into the jungle. Pulling it backwards with the help of a hand winch tied to a tree. Palm leaves covered the bright yellow and black plane which looked like a giant bumble bee hence the name "Buzzy". I had covered it with a large green camo colored net and then palm leaves.
I also took the landing raft with motor and pontoons and hid them in another part of the jungle. This would be my escape. I couldn't fly the plane out as the beach was too short for take-off even though it had been fine for landing. Plan A would have to be the raft to take me and my cargo back to a rendezvous out at sea with a submarine. Plan B was to rely on diplomatic means to secure my release. Although diplomatic relations were not strong, this was the least of my worries or concern now.
It was getting dark and while I could easily make a fire, I didn't want to appear like I was trying to be found. There had to be some effort on my part to hide, in order to support the ruse. Actually, I was hiding because I didn't want to be taken at night when the guards may shoot first and ask questions later. No, I wanted to be taken after 4:20 PM in two days, but perhaps closer to 5:20PM.
This way I could medicate myself inorder to ease the effects of the beating I was surely gonna receive. I just thought that would be par for the course given the situation of not being able to explain my presence and of course I would have to stonewall my captors for a valiant effort before I spilled the beans. Beans. There are no beans in Texas Chili. My mantra.
I wasn't sure how long I would be deprived of food. So I decided I would have a big meal. I opened the soft-sided handy dandy cooler I had purchased at REI. In it was all the things that I wouldn't be eating in a North Korean prison.
A bottle of Jim Beam.
MaryJane flower (Purple Trainwreck)
MaryJane Brownies (Grandma's recipe, but my Magic Butter Machine)
Bacon (About 5 pounds, uncooked)
Beans And Chili (no way they would suspect I was from Texas, I was from Alaska now)
Bread and Butter with Sugar
Mayo
Lettuce
Glacier Water
My body was used to skipping breakfast and lunch, but dinner was another story and it was dinner-time.
I could hear the jeep coming up the beach. I then took out the bottle of Jim Beam Black and guzzled it down in one 45 second shot. OK, not all the way but 1/4 of the bottle anyways. Now, I poured the bourbon on my shirt and took a piss in my pants as a sign of my fear in landing on North Korean soil. I wasn't afraid in the least but I was acting the part of a drunk ass fool that ended up making an emergency landing on what was the only patch of land that I could see. This was my story and I was sticking to it.
I wasn't sure if I had been seen, or the plane, or the raft or the sterno can I had set afire inorder to warm my beans and fry the bacon. If they stopped and got out of the jeep they surely would smell the bacon.
The lights of the jeep came closer but the lookouts were on a regular patrol and scanning the ocean for boats or vessels. They didn't even look my way and never slowed down. Relief.
Now that I knew there was a patrol things would be a little easier. For one, I didn't have to go looking for them. And two, the bacon would get me caught as long as I burned the bacon on the beach.
I laid down in a jungle clearing and drifted off to a booze and maryjane brownie induced sleep.
The next morning I decided to hike up the hill which was about 300 yards from the beach but at least it was covered by jungle. I had only the chance of walking into a mine field or a patrol.
At the top I saw the lookout tower which had spotted me in the air. I leaned the fuel and pulled on a cable that had been rigged to release oil on the manefold and start a fire with smoke. This undoubtably alerted the look-out as I landed on the beach.
Hence the beach patrol.
This was enough so that I knew the direction that the patrol would be coming down the beach. It was wednesday I think. Maybe Thursday. In any case I had eaten the food and thought no time like the present.
At about 5:20 am I doused my clothes as before and waited for the 7am patrol. I heated up the sterno can, made a fire and the foil I made into a make-shift skillet. I loved cooking in a black skillet and I loved bacon. But the foil would have to do. I even thought to lick the bacon grease for calories.
I heard the sound of the jeep, but it was followed up with a transport vehicle which would be full of soldiers. Ok, I fan the fire and put some wet seaweed near the fire and pour some bacon grease on it. I then put it on the fire and sure enough a bacon grease smoke plume rose from the jungle clearing.
The soldiers piled out of the transport along with the jeep sentries. Five soldiers made a bee line to the smoke plume while the rest fanned out along the beach presumably to search.
Then like the song, "That's the night when the lights went out in Georgia"
BAM rifle butt to the back of the head.
Lights out.