On Ilan's retina, there still lingered three blinding remnants of explosions.
The screams of his comrades in the channel abruptly ceased, replaced by suffocating static noise.
"Hamr 2, 3, 4, respond!"
Ilan's voice trembled, his fingers almost crushing the control stick.
No response.
On the radar screen, three friendly symbols simultaneously turned into flashing "X" symbols.
Three F-15Is.
Six of the best pilots.
All wiped out.
No ti for more thoughts.
The red light in the cockpit was still flashing madly.
Ilan suddenly realized—his own crisis had not yet been resolved, grieving for his teammates was purely superfluous...
"Damn it!"
He violently pushed the stick to the right while pressing the flares release button again, the fighter jet making a sharp turn at an angle that nearly tore the wings apart.
The sky was once again lit up by red flares.
At that instant, the fourth missile screeched past the left wing, the scorching exhaust burning the tal skin.
"Dodged it!"
Ilan had just breathed half a sigh of relief when he saw the missile draw an impossible sharp arc in the distance, turning back again!
"How is this possible?! An SA-6 shouldn't have this maneuverability!"
Ilan's pupils contracted to the size of needlepoints.
This completely defied the laws of physics—unless...
Unless the missile's guidance system had been enhanced by so unknown technology.
Missile distance: 2000 ters.
15 seconds.
Ilan's fingertips danced over the ECM (Electronic Counterasures) panel, releasing the last batch of decoys.
In the night sky, colorful fireworks of death blood once more.
The missile penetrated the jamming cloud without hesitation.
1500 ters.
10 seconds.
"Mayday! Mayday!"
Ilan howled into the radio, his voice distorted by overload.
"This is Hamr 1! Formation all wiped out! Repeat, Hamr formation wiped out! Enemy missile performance abnormal! Request—"
1000 ters.
7 seconds.
The missile's rocket engine emitted a demonic scream.
500 ters.
3 seconds.
Ilan made one last desperate maneuver.
He pushed the throttle to afterburner while pulling the speed brake.
The fighter shuddered violently as if struck by a giant hamr, its speed plumting.
The missile overshot due to inertia but imdiately began an incredible sharp turn.
200 ters.
1 second.
"Eject! Eject! Ej—"
Boom—
The world exploded in front of Ilan.
Fragnts from the proximity explosion hit the tail.
The blast wave sheared the aircraft in half.
The cockpit turned into a pressure cooker, Ilan's eardrums rupturing with searing pain, blood spurting from his nose.
The oxygen mask was torn away, icy wind rushing into the cockpit.
The aircraft began to spiral down.
The altiter spun wildly:
6000 ters...
5500 ters...
5000 ters...
"Ejection system damaged."
The cold electronic female voice pronounced the death sentence.
He looked back towards the rear seat.
The weapons officer, face covered in blood, hung his head like a goose suffocated to death.
His co-pilot, gone...
No ti for more thoughts, he hurriedly grabbed the ejection handle with his bloodied right hand, pulling with all his strength.
No response.
4000 ters.
He saw that disguised cargo ship on the sea, the eerie launch pad on its deck slowly retracting.
That was the culprit.
3500 ters.
Ilan pulled out his survival knife, stabbing it hard under the instrunt panel, cutting the safety cable of the backup ejection system.
The alarm sounded shrill, like the death knell of Hell.
3000 ters.
He gripped the handle with both hands, braced against the stick with his knees, and leaned back with his full weight.
Bang!!!
The rocket-assisted seat roared its final fury.
Ilan felt his spine nearly crushed by the G-force, the world went dark before his eyes.
When he regained vision, he found himself suspended beneath a parachute.
Below, the wreckage of his aircraft trailed smoke as it plunged into the sea, kicking up massive waves.
The icy sea breeze slapped his face.
Ilan trembled as he reached for the survival pack on his leg—pistol, flare gun, first-aid kit.
He was still alive.
The parachute carried this blood-covered man gradually towards the dark sea surface.
The brief and fierce fireworks of death over the eastern diterranean, its shockwave tore through the heavy air at the Tel Aviv Mossad Headquarters thousands of kiloters away in re minutes.
Encrypted lines slamd into Yager's office incredible real-ti communication segnts, along with preliminary satellite infrared detection data—those four suddenly brightening and swiftly dimming massive heat sources with ominous diffusion trajectories.
"Hamr... total wipeout... confird... Seagull... SAM-6..."
The intelligence officer's voice struggled to maintain a stern reporting tone, but the faint tremble in his words was like glass in a violent typhoon.
Yager stood before the giant electronic situation map, his back to the door.
On the screen, the four bright blue triangular points representing the "Hamr" squadron and the slightly larger point for the KC-707 "Sword" were, just a few seconds ago, automatically marked by the system as glaring red "X"s, then completely dimd and disappeared, as if crudely erased by an invisible hand.
Their final position information frozen on the cold sea chart roughly ninety nautical miles northwest of Alexandria Port.
He didn't move a muscle, only the muscles near his shoulder blades tensed and subtly pulsed beneath the fabric of his expensive suit.
The office was left with only the low hum of the server cabinet and his own heavy, nearly stagnant breathing. The air was as heavy as if filled with lead.
A few seconds, or a few minutes?
The passage of ti lost its gauge.
Until a solitary, unusually simple black encrypted communication terminal on the desk emitted a low, continuous hum, the screen lit up, displaying a complex authentication insignia. Yager turned rigidly, his fingers gliding over the touchpad with a near numbed precision, inputting a lengthy dynamic passcode.
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