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I nodded. "The monk may have hit the nail right on!" I said cautiously. "I also think we have helped Jack in the same manner to cross one of those thresholds to a higher level of thinking."
The sky before us had become brilliant while we talked. Soon the sun stood high above the waterline radiantly blinding. We were flying directly towards it. It filled the flight deck with a brilliance that finally woke everybody out of their somber mood that had prevailed ever since we had left Hawaii.
"OK, it's light now. It has to be breakfast time," I announced a second time. At this very moment, as by command, like an angel out of the blue, Jennie appeared. She stood in the doorway behind us, with a pot of coffee, some plastic cups. "There are plenty of goodies cooking outside," she said. "Breakfast will be ready and served in ten minutes."
I got unto the intercom and called Jack back.
"How do you like that," said Orlando to Jack as he came through the door. He sat down, behind the controls again. "Just imagine, breakfast at a quarter to four! Now that's service! I'd bet you, in all your years flying for SAC it's never been like that!"
Jack grinned. He seemed to have fully recovered.
"Jennie's a good kid," I said to Orlando.
Jack agreed.
"She's from Vancouver," I said, "they're all pretty good kids there. Besides, we'll have the whole plane packed full of them soon."
"...Provided we can get this thing in one piece onto the ground," Jack said. He stopped grinning. "How do you intend to land this thing on an itzy bitzy highway? What tricks have you in mind that you like to share?"
"Tricks!" I started to laugh. "No tricks are needed. We'll swoop in," I gestured with my hands, "and when we see the highway, spoilers on! Plonk! We'll set the thing down, easy like a feather, you'll see."
Jack just shook his head.
"Hey, seriously, Jack! After years of flying these jumbos, one acquires a feeling as to how far one can push one's luck."
"Luck!" Jack scratched his head; "that's what I was afraid of. Another barnstormer, eh?"
I raised my hand in protest, then started to laugh.
Jack began to laugh, too. "No, Paul, don't take me wrong. I am behind you one hundred percent. We've got to get the job done. If you were to ask me, I wouldn't know a better solution. I was just curious!"
To judge by the way he spoke, Jack seemed transformed. Was it the breakfast? Or was it his time alone? I didn't want to find out. "A Barnstormer!" I repeated, cautiously. "I thought you guys flying for the Strategic Air Command were all expert barnstormers. You spoke about flying for SAC. You're trained to sneak across the Russian border, just below their radar, taking your super stealth bombers at treetop level into enemy territory, following every hump of the terrain. It's like riding a roller coaster isn't it? Barnstorming must be tame compared to that."
"No luck, Paul," he grinned. "I left SAC before the stealth babies came on line. In fact, the B58 and me went out at about the same time. The B1Bs were just coming in when I left."
"All right then, if you're not one of those, I'll have to do all the hard stuff myself," I said. I grinned back at him and patted him on the shoulder.
"Chief, that's the only way you can be sure it's done right," he grinned back at me, then laughed out loud. "That's like it was in the Air Force. They never really trusted anyone, either. As God is my witness, they had good cause not to trust me. I would never have dropped their atomic bombs on a city. I think I would have sooner crashed our kite along the way, than causing millions of deaths. Why should I have to kill millions of people, simply because our politicians are too stupid to accommodate the needs and hopes of other nations? There are no natural enemies among mankind. Stupid people created them. Insane politicians create wars out of them, and a foolish society elects the stupid politicians. Killing people by the millions doesn't get us out of this mess. It never did and never will. I would never become a murderer at the call of idiots."
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Stories about
War
from novels by Rolf A. F. Witzsche
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