true comptroller.
'Who?'
'The ones who cut you up.'
She turned away from Ann's penetrating gaze to stare furiously out the window, chin propped on hand. Down below, the cops had rounded up a few Auberge guards and were enjoying a workout on them with fists and clubs for the benefit of the TV crews. Suddenly, a startlingly bright beam of green light flashed from a slit cut into a concrete slab. Three cops fell down twitching, their abdomens exploding from the unfortunate effects of a high- wattage pulsed laser.
Isadora frowned and turned back to me. 'How do you plan to get back at them? Spike their Geritol?'
I smiled and tucked my pistol away to take her by the hand.
'Ever take a ride in a space shuttle?'
Ann, the kid, Corbin, and I climbed through an access shaft that might have been built for a pygmy. Fifteen claustrophobic feet later, we emerged into a shack on the roof of the Bonaventure's central cylinder.
Corbin and I quietly peered through the doorway to see the aircraft sitting motionless on the helipad. The pilot and gunner paced nervously about.
'They're debating what to do next.' Corbin raised his rifle to sight in on the gunner. 'They don't want to encounter a wire-guided missile or gamble on a run-in with police choppers. What they don't realize is that the missiles are probably keeping the police away, too. Cops know how much their equipment costs.' He squeezed the trigger.
The gunner collapsed. The pilot panicked and rushed for the cockpit. Corbin gunned him down.
'Nice,' I said. 'How do we fly it out of here?'
Corbin grinned and kicked the door open. 'The Beast has wings,' he said. 'Unless, of course, you don't want my help.'
I sighed and followed him through onto the helipad. A cold winter breeze blew the smell of the fire up to us. Coolers, vents, and nameless clutter tangled below the landing platform. An orange circle and cross of cracked and curling paint marked the center of the pad.
'Let me guess,' I said. 'You learned to fly in `Nam.'
His fleshy face grimaced as if he'd smelled rotten eggs. 'Hardly. I was a merc in Afghanistan, fighting the real Commie menace. I didn't waste my time with orchestrated `police actions.''
I nodded impatiently. Ann was having trouble with an intoxicated adolescent. I trotted back to render assistance.
'I'm afraid of flying!' Isadora hollered.
'We'll be getting a lot higher than this!' I shouted back. 'You should be more afraid of what's down below.'
She took a drunken swing at me, missed, and collapsed in my arms. That simplified things. Ann strapped her in.
'Can this crate carry five?' I asked.
Corbin stripped the dead pilot of his radio headset. 'Probably. Who've you got in mind?' He strapped into the pilot's seat and fired up the engine.
I grabbed the gunner's helmet and squeezed into his vacant seat. Corbin showed me where to plug into the intercom.
The copter rose a few inches and dropped down the west side of the hotel. Gunning it, he lurched us away from Old Downtown at a stomach-convoluting speed.
'Can you sneak us over to Hollywood?' I asked.
'Hollywood? Sure.'
'Great. And watch out for low-flying broomsticks.'
Corbin flew nerve-jarringly low, more to avoid radar than brooms. Not that every cop between Old Downtown and Hollywood didn't notice us. If they'd been informed, though, to let the attackers on Auberge get away, then we were relatively safe. Unless they had to do something for the TV crews.
