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Good Boy, Dex
"Please don't tell me you junked her," Joseph Sullivan announced as he walked into the hanger of The Flying Legion with an eager gait. Never a heavy man to begin with - a heavy pilot was just so much more dead weight in an airplane - Captain Sullivan was much thinner than before his six month stay in a Manchurian slave camp; it was the first thing Dexter Dearborn noticed as he turned from his work bench. Mechanical savant and friend of the hero that had become known as "Sky Captain", he barely had time to notice before being enveloped in a bear hug by the new arrival and owner of that familiar voice. The two men broke the embrace and Dex managed to get out a "Good to see you again, Cap. They told me you just got released, but I figured I had at least another day to get things ready."
"Well, it probably would have been another two days of processing at least, but someone left a backdoor open at the transition center and I liberated myself from more incessant debriefing." He started looking around the hanger, but didn't see what he was looking for. "You DID get her back, didn't you?"
Dex knew what Joe was looking for. His highly modified Curtiss P-36 Hawk had seen extensive action over China during the war against Japan - the only time it didn't see action was on the final pullout from Nanjing. When Joe had jumped into the cockpit to take off and fly cover for the retreating forces, he had found himself immobilized by a cut fuel line. In an act of desperation, he had taken on an advancing group of soldiers while Dex temporarily mended the plane enough to get it off the ground. Finding himself trapped with enemy between him and the plane, he had waved Dex away and been taken as a prisoner.
"Sorry, Cap. I lost her on the flight out. I took a few critical hits heading south and barely managed to land it in a forest of soft trees."
"Soft trees?"
"Well, softer than the mountain face that was to my right or the ocean on my left."
Joe sighed. That plane had been so much a part of him; flying was his life, but the Hawk was the heart that kept it going. "It's alright, Dex. You did your best. And we both made it out, right?" he said, trying to sound upbeat but failing completely.
"Yeah. I owe my life to you, Cap."
"You've saved me enough times as it is. Let's not start keeping score, or I'll owe you as much as I do from our Pinochle games. I wish I knew who cut my fuel line, though. Probably Polly - but she'll never admit it."
Dex knew for a fact it was Polly; although Joe thought it was to spite for him having a relationship with a mystery woman that she had been unable to identify, the mechanic knew differently. Polly had a premonition that Joe would be killed going up against the overwhelming enemy, and had sought Dex's help to keep him on the ground, swearing him to secrecy. He showed her exactly where to cut the line, and even had given her the sidecutters to do it, although he couldn't bring himself to watch as she performed the act. He counted Joe and Polly both as friends; for that matter, the other woman Francesca "Franky" Cook too. Joe didn't two-time her - he just didn't take long to move on after Polly had rejected his advances for the last time. "No, I doubt that she would," he agreed. "So, are you back with the Legion?"
"As if I belonged anywhere else," Joe said as the smile returned to his face. "I'm feeling pretty naked right now, though - what does a man have to do around here to get armed?"
"Right this way Cap," Dex said and led his boss towards a door within the hanger. On the wall above, the Legion's insignia was painted on a large sign - Ille Caelum Fremitus - "Yon roaring of the skies". They continued into the office and Dex opened a locked safe. "Revolver or automatic?"
"Do you really have to ask?" Dex shrugged and handed him both an Enfield Mk I .38 AND a Colt 1911 .45 which were checked expertly and stashed into his coat pockets. "That feels better. Say, Dex, you wouldn't happen to know if Polly went back to New York, do you?"
"Yeah, I saw her name on a byline somewhere. Still at the New York Chronicle for that Morris Paley editor. Gonna go see her?"
"Not on your life. I've got too much to do right now to get tangled up with her again on some wild goose chase. Her and I just aren't made to be together. Let's see, it's 1936...ask me again in ten years. First things first, though, is that I've got to get myself another set of wings. Are one of those Hawks out there available?"
"If you really want one," Dex said with a twinkle in his eye. "I've also got a brand-new bottle of Milk of Magnesia in your locker already, and the one can of Vienna sausages that Kaji left when he took off for Tibet. But I've been working on something that you might be more interested in."
"Lead on, Macduff." Joe knew that Dex had a gift for understatement and tended to play his cards close to his chest. He followed the mechanic out of the room, after which they made a right and exited the hanger before entering a much smaller one.
Dex entered first, then had Joe enter before he shut the door when they were both inside. It was pitch black, but he reached out and clicked a switch on the wall. Lights blazed on, illuminating a single aircraft in the middle of the floor. Dex watched Joe, who was now rooted on the spot as he took in the lines of an aircraft he had never seen before. "What is it?" he asked in a near whisper.
"Cap, you are looking at a prototype of the successor to the Hawk. Meet the P-40 Warhawk. It's an update of the old plane, and they're starting to roll them out now. We managed to get this early model. Go ahead, you can touch it - it's yours."
Like a kid just given keys to a candy shop, Joe ran his hand along the leading edge of the wing as he walked toward the fuselage. His eyes took in the improved contours, the exhaust manifolds and the gun barrels as he continued walking around the aircraft. Dex watched his feet make their way around the far side until Joe appeared again around the tail and came back to the mechanic. "It's beautiful. Does it...fly?"
Dex laughed out loud. "I wouldn't give it to you if it didn't, Cap."
"What's with the designation?" Joe asked, pointing. The side of the plane was painted with "h1-1-od".
Dex almost coughed. He had a makeshift explanation just in case Joe asked, and he spit it out as if it was of no consequence. "High performance First Model First Modification Offense/Defense." He looked to see if Joe somehow made out what it spelled upside-down, but there was no glimmer of recognition. "But unofficially you can call it what you want. I've got some more ideas worked out for her after you get comfortable, but to start with I've already added another supercharger for better high-altitude performance."
"When do I get to try her out?" Joe asked, cracking his neck in anticipation.
The speakers in all four corners of the room kicked in. "Emergency Protocol 90201. Repeat, Emergency Protocol 90201. All pilots report to your planes and tune to Band Four for launch and formation instructions. Good to have you along, Captain Sullivan."
"How about now?" Dex asked, straight-faced.
"How about open the hanger door and let's get this bird in the air!" Joe said as he climbed onto the wing and looked into the cockpit, finding a pair of goggles that he put over his head. Emergency Protocol 90201 was just a drill, but it had been arranged for when Joe showed up - the fact that it was a little earlier than expected was just better training for everyone else. Dex turned and pushed the large button to activate the door, which started to roll up. He turned around and Joe was already in the cockpit, strapping in and firing the engine. The Allison belched fire and roared to life, creating a deafening echo in the small hanger. Joe gave a thumbs up, and Dex returned it.
Ready to roll.
Dex removed the wheel blocks and Joe mouthed something and turned forward as he taxied the plane out of the building. Dex couldn't hear it, but he knew what it was.
Good boy, Dex.
He would have loved to have taken a picture, but they no longer had Joe's camera. Joe thought it was lost in Dex's crash flying out of Nanjing, but it was about the only thing he had managed to save from the wreck. He had given it to Polly the last time he saw her, and told her it was from Joe - it even had a picture of him on the undeveloped film roll inside. Joe probably would have given it to her, he told himself, if he had taken the time to think about it - as much as they clashed, those two just seemed to fit each other. She probably still had camera, safe back in New York.
Or about as safe as the world ever got.
The End