“Carson’s hit!” someone yelled. Christ, Phips thought. One of the waist gunners was down. “Oh, Jesus, he’s bleeding all over the place.” The wounded man’s screams carried up to Phips, who felt nauseated as the bomber continued its stately turn.

Suddenly, the German fighter pilot found himself facing an array of. 50 caliber machine guns from the side, top, and belly that spewed torrents of bullets in his direction. Now it was the German’s turn to panic and he tried to escape. As he did so, he exposed the belly of his plane for just an instant. A handful of bullets ripped through his engine. It started to smoke and the ME began to fall back.

“Christ almighty,” yelled Stover. “We got us a kill.”

The German pilot fell from the plane and a parachute opened. The ME was gone, but the pilot would live to fight another day. Now the Mother’s Milk had to do the same damn thing-live to fight another day.

“How’s Carson?” Phips asked.

“Dead, sir.”

Phips sagged over the controls. His first mission and not only had he disobeyed orders to keep formation, but he’d gotten lost, and a crewman, one of the guys he’d been with for six months, had been killed. Now he had to make sure this miserable situation didn’t get any worse.

“Navigator,” said Phips. “Where are we?”

“Over Germany, Skipper.”

Damn smart aleck, Phips thought. “Can you possible narrow that down, Kent?”

“Seriously Skipper, I’m trying, but we were all over the sky for a little while and I need a frame of reference. I think we’re over East Prussia and now we are heading towards Russia. I suggest we turn north and west and hope to God we find something that makes sense, like the Baltic Sea. I also suggest we lighten our load. We’ve got a few tons of bombs doing nothing but weighing us down and using up our fuel.”