Cuba by Stephen Coonts

himea”…Jake
    said. “Bet he can fly the hell out of that thing,
    too.”
    In the Cuban fighter, Major Carlos
    Corrado took his time looking over the American
    plane. This was the first time he had ever seen an
    F-14. Amazing how big they were, with the two men
    and the missiles under the wings.
    Carlos was lucky he had this hunk of hot
    Russian iron to fly, technical generations ahead
    of the MiGo-19’s and 21’s that equipped the bulk
    of Cuba’s tactical squadrons, and he damn
    well knew it. Cuba owned three dozen
    MiGo-29’s and had precisely one operationalthis
    onewhich Corrado kept flying by the simple
    expedient of cannibalizing parts from the others.
    He checked his fuel. He had enough, just enough,
    to get home. Sure, he had no business being out
    here over the ocean, but he wanted to fly today and the
    Cuban ground control intercept (Gci)
    controller said the American was here. One thing
    led to another and here he was.
    Now Carlos Corrado was on course to return
    to his base near the city of Cienfuegos, on
    Cuba’s southern coast. He checked the compass, the
    engine instruments, then turned back to studying the
    American plane, which hung there on the end of his wing
    as if it were painted on the sky.
    A minute went by, then the man in the front seat
    of the American plane raised his hand and waved.
    Carlos returned the gesture as the big American
    fighter turned away to the right and immediately began
    falling behind. Carlos twisted his body in his seat
    to keep the F-14 in sight for as long as possible.
    Big as it was, the F-14 disappeared into the
    eastern sky with startling rapidity.
    Carlos Corrado turned in his seat and eased the
    position of his butt.
    The Americans were two or three technical
    generations beyond the Cubans, so far ahead that most
    Cuban military men regarded American
    capabilities as almost superhuman. They had read
    of the Gulf War, of the satellites and com-
    puters and smart weapons. Unlike his
    colleagues, Corrado was not frightened by the
    Americans. Impressed by their military
    capability, but not frightened.
    If I were smarter,
    he thought now, still
    would be frightened.
    But the Americans and Cubans would never fight.
    They had not fought since the Bay of Pigs and
    doubtless never would. Castro would soon be gone and a
    new government would take over and Cuba would become
    a new American suburb, another little beach island
    baking in the sun south of Miami, Key Cuba.
    When that happy day came, Carlos Corrado
    told himself, he was going to America and get a
    decent flying job that paid real money.
    Dona Maria Vieuda de Sedano’s daughters
    arrived first, in the early afternoon, tocom tidy up and do
    the cooking for the guests. They had married local men
    who worked the sugarcane and saw her every day. In
    truth, they looked after her, helped her dress,
    prepared her meals, cleaned and washed the clothes.
    It was infuriating to be disabled, to be unable to
    do backslash
    The arthritis that crippled her hands and feet made
    even simple tasks difficult and complex tasks
    out of the question.
    Dona Maria managed to shuffle to her favorite
    chair on the tiny porch without help. Her small
    house sat on the western edge of the village. From the
    porch she could see several of her neighbors”
    houses and a wide sweep of the road. Across the road
    was a huge field of cane. A canecooking
    factory stood about a half mile farther west.
    When the harvest began, the stacks belched smoke and the
    fumes of cooking sugar drifted for miles on the
    wind.-
    Beyond all this, almost lost in the’distance, was the blue
    of the ocean, a thin line just below the horizon, bluer
    than the distant sky. The wind coming in off the sea
    kept the temperature down and prevented insects from
    becoming a major nuisance.
    The porch was the only thing Dona Maria really
    liked about the house, though after fifty-two years in
    residence
    God knows she had some memories. Small, just
    four rooms, with a