68 DALE BROWN

"Those Cosmos peeping Toms start their first pass over the range in fifteen minutes," Briggs said. "They've got our test time scoped out almost to the minute. Those satellites will be overhead every fifteen minutes for the next two hours-exactly as long as this scheduled mission."

"Another damned security leak. And I scheduled this mission only two days, ago."

"But those spy birds weren't up there two days ago," Briggs said. "I checked. You mean-?" I

"I mean the Soviets took only two days-maybe less-to launch two brand-new satellites just for this test flight, 'I Elliott said. "Well, at least they won't catch our planes on the ground.

He picked up his microphone. "Storm Flight, this is Alpha.

Taxi to hold point and await takeoff clearance. Winds calm, altimeter . . . " Elliott checked the meteorological data readouts on an overhead console ". . . three-zero-zero-five. Taxi clearance void time is one-zero minutes. Over."

"Storm Flight copies ten minutes. On the move." Moments later both fighters emerged from the satellite bluff and -fell in behind a jeep with a large sign that read "FOLLOW ME." The caravan moved quickly across an expanse of hard-baked sand to another smaller satellite-bluff hangar that had been towed out to the end of one of the disguised runways that crisscrossed Groom Lake in the center of the Dreamland test range. Now Cheetah and DreamStar pulled alongside each other and set their parking brakes while technicians and specialists did a fast last-chance inspection of each.

"Pre-takeoff and line-up checks," Patrick said over interphone.

"Roger," replied. "In progress."

"Storm T\vo ready for release," James suddenly radioed in.

"Amazing," Patrick said to "He's already done with a pre-takeoff checklist twice as complicated as ours." He keyed I the UHF radio switch. "Standby, Storm Two."

"Roger.

"MAW switch set to V-sub-X, max performance takeoff."

read off the most critical switch positions for the mission- I adaptive-wing mode, and Patrick saw that the leading and trail- I ing edges of the wings had curved into a long, deep high-lift airfoil.

"Canard control and engine nozzle control switches set to T_

DAY OF THE CHEETAH 69

AUTO ALPHA,' continued. "This will be a constant-alpha takeoff." JC. Powell always briefed his back-seater on the takeoff, abort, and emergency procedures, even though he and Patrick had flown together for almost two years and Patrick knew the procedures as well as JC. "Power to military thrust, brakes off and power to max afterburner. We'll expect negative-Y push after five seconds, with a pitch to takeoff attitude. After that we monitor angle-of-attack throughout the climb and make sure we don't exceed twenty-eight alpha in the climb-out. I'm looking to break my previous record of a seventeen-hundred-foot takeoff roll on this one . . . In case we don't get the push-down I'll cancel auto-alpha and switch to normal takeoff procedures-accelerate to one-sixty, rotate, maintain eight alpha or less, accelerate to two-eight-zero knots indicated and come out of afterburner. Same procedures if we lose vectored thrust after takeoff . . . All right. " Powell slapped his gloved hands together, finished off the last few items of the checklist: "Circuit breakers checked. Caution panel clear. Canopy closed and locked. Seat belts and shoulder harnesses?"

"On and on," Patrick intoned.

"Checked up front. Lights set. Helmets, visors, oxygen mask, oxygen panel."

"On, down, on, set to normal."

"Same here. Parking brakes released." JC. touched a switch on his control stick. "Takeoff configuration check."

"Takeoff configuration check in progress, " responded a computer-synthesized voice. It was the final step in Cheetah's electronics array. A computer, which had monitored every step of the pre-takeoff checklists being performed, would make one last check of all systems on board and report any discrepancies.

"Takeoff configuration check complete. Status okay. "

"I already knew that, you moron," murmured to the voice. He never relied on the computerized system although he consulted it. It was, as he would frequently remind everyone within earshot, another computer out to get him. "We're ready to go, Colonel," he said.

Patrick keyed the radio switch. "Storm Control, this is Storm flight of two. Ready for departure."

Hal Briggs, on the narrow catwalk of the portable tower, spoke four words into a walkie-talkie. "Sand storm, one-seven."