The Tin Man

right-shoulder-first onto the left side of the rotor, but the BERP suit protected him from being sliced into hamburger. His body skipped across the rotor disk, hitting again on the blade tips just forward of the cockpit canopy before being thrown a hundred feet into the air.

The helicopter’s blades bounced like palm fronds in a hurricane. One blade snapped and flew off into space; the others dipped so low that they struck the ground and then the tail, snapping off the tail rotor. Unbalanced, the entire main-rotor assembly cracked off the hub and shattered. The transmission screamed into high rpm’s, then it too shattered and disintegrated. The transmission burst into a globe of shrapnel, shelling out the turbine engine with a huge explosion.

Patrick landed up against the steel post of one of the facility’s ballpark lights. He knew he was alive because the ferocity of the electrical surges through the suit had set his entire body on fire. He writhed in pain and tried to relax his muscles, let the energy move through him and dissipate; but the more he tried to relax, the harder the waves of electricity came.

It felt like hours before they stopped. He didn’t dare move at first, thinking he was sawed into pieces. The vision of those rotor blades rushing up to his face was imprinted on his eyeballs. But when he opened his eyes, he saw hangars, lights, and gray cloudy skies. He was alive.

He got to his feet and looked over the R amp; D facility flight line. Soldiers were streaming out both crew doors of the disabled Huey, some holding injured comrades. The MV-22 Pave Hammer tilt-rotor was directly over the second one-it could fire straight down with its chin-mounted Chain Gun, but no one on board the Huey could shoot straight up because they’d be shooting through their own rotor disk. The second Huey’s tail rotor began to disintegrate as 20-millimeter rounds chewed it to pieces, and in seconds it was unflyable.

Soldiers began firing at the MV-22. “Hal! You’re taking ground fire!” Patrick shouted into his helmet radio. “Get out of there now!” As the MV-22 moved away, Patrick hit his thrusters, aiming straight at the soldiers firing on it. He plowed into them going full speed, knocking them over like an out-of-control truck.

Then he heard shouts of “Halt!” in German through his omnidirectional microphone-and cries of “Help!” in English. He hit his thrusters in the direction of the cries, jumping across the ramp behind the second hangar. He could see two soldiers chasing someone and recognized the running figure of Tom Chandler, carrying a woman down the fenceline behind the hangars. The soldiers had fired a warning shot in the air, but Chandler wasn’t stopping. One of them raced after him as the other knelt down and began to line up his shot.

Patrick hit his thrusters again but discovered they hadn’t recharged yet. He ran toward the kneeling soldier, shouting, “Chandler! Gun! Behind you!” with his electronically amplified voice. Chandler turned, pushed Kaddiri to the ground next to the fence, and raised a pistol. At last, a “Ready” indication. Patrick hit his thrusters and speared the kneeling soldier with his flying body just in time. The other soldier had thrown himself on the ground when he saw Chandler’s gun, trying to find cover.

Patrick got to his feet, made sure the one he had downed was out cold, and yelled “Stop!” at the second soldier. But he was too late. Chandler went down just as Patrick reached the guy and put him out of commission.

Patrick went over to Helen, lying where she had fallen when Chandler dropped. She looked semiconscious. “Helen! It’s Patrick! Are you all right?”

She opened her eyes. “Patrick?” she said groggily. “Patrick! I… I think I’m okay.” She turned her head toward Chandler. “He saved my life, the son of a bitch. How is he?”

Patrick checked him over. He had a bullet in his upper chest and left shoulder. “Not good,” he said. He tore off one of Chandler’s pant legs and stuffed the cloth into his chest wound to stop the bleeding. They heard the sirens of approaching police cars and fire trucks. “We’re going to have to get him out of here. And you need to be checked over too.”

The MV-22 had swooped over the R amp; D facility, firing at soldiers on the ground, but now it touched down on the ramp behind the second disabled Huey. Patrick carried Chandler out onto the ramp, with Helen hobbling beside him, just as the Sheriff’s Department and California Highway Patrol cars and county fire trucks roared up. The officers ran out, weapons drawn, and aimed at Patrick. “Put him down,” they ordered. “Hands in the air!”

“Hold on, hold on!” It was the commander of the Highway Patrol’s SWAT team, Thomas Conrad, who ran up, followed by Masters and Briggs. “Let him go, boys. He’s one of us.” Then he pointed to Chandler, still in Patrick’s arms. “But not that man. He’s under arrest. Get him to the hospital but keep an officer with him at all times. And this lady needs medical help too. But hold it just a sec…” Conrad went over to where Chandler was lying, withdrew something from his pocket, and put it in Patrick’s right hand. “Here,” he said. “You deserve this a hell of a lot more than he does.”

Patrick looked at it. It was Chandler’s gold captain’s badge.

Jon Masters was focused only on Helen. He took off his jacket and gently wrapped it around her. “Oh God, Helen,” he kept saying. “Are you all right? Oh Helen, I’m so sorry…”

“I’m okay, Jon, I really am,” she reassured him, smiling at him weakly. “I… I must look like hell, but I’m not really hurt.”

“You look beautiful to me,” he said. “But you’ve been through hell, and we need to get you to the hospital right away.” The paramedics moved him out of the way and helped Helen onto a gurney. As they began to wheel her to the ambulance, she reached out a hand and grabbed at his sleeve. “Don’t leave me, Jon,” she said.

He took her hand and walked beside her. “I won’t, Helen,” he said. “Never again.” He realized he was deliriously happy. “You crazy kid, you’re still in love with me.”

“Yes, you crazy kid,” she replied happily, “I’m in love with you.”

Research and Development Facility,

Sacramento-Mather Jetport

several hours later

Hal Briggs thought it was the weirdest sight he had ever seen. There sat Patrick McLanahan in the chair in his office at the R amp; D facility, taking sips of coffee and working on the computer-with a cord running from him to a wall outlet. Of course, he still had the BERP suit on. But weird was the word, like Patrick was some kind of futuristic half-man, half-machine, both parts getting refreshed at the same time.

It had been a very long day. After the shootout with Townsend’s men, the R amp; D facility had been overrun with sheriff’s deputies, then Highway Patrol investigators, then FBI and ATF officers. Since Townsend was so fond of using booby traps, the whole facility had to be evacuated while the place was searched. Then the interviews began, one agency after another gathering statements from all of them. Additional security units were on the way from Sky Masters, Inc.’s facilities in Las Vegas, San Diego, and Arkansas to secure the Sacramento facility, but until they arrived the place was being guarded by Sacramento County Sheriff’s Department deputies, augmented with National Guard troops.

“Out of the twelve soldiers that Chandler said were here,” Briggs said to Patrick, “we got seven, Sacramento County Sheriff’s got one, and Folsom police got another one. That leaves three unaccounted for. Not a bad day’s work.”

“It’s not them I’m worried about-it’s Townsend and Reingruber I’m after,” Patrick said, seated at his terminal. He was fingering Chandler’s seven-pointed gold star thoughtfully.

“Unfortunately, I think the only way we’re going to learn what he’s going to do next is to wait,” Briggs said. “He’s probably got a dozen more hideouts in the area that we don’t know about. He could be anywhere. If he were smart, he’d be long gone.”

“No,” Patrick said. “He’s after something here. This whole caper of his never made any sense. First he’s into armed robbery, but he only hit one place. Next he’s into drugs, but then he blows it all up. He raids this place, but it looks like this was just a target of opportunity. He’s an arms smuggler and dealer, not a drug dealer. What’s he doing here?”

“Nothing against your hometown, partner,” Briggs said, “but there ain’t a helluva lot here. You’ve got Intel, HP, Packard Bell, Aerojet, and a couple of other high-tech companies, and you’ve got the state capital. Except for a couple of bases outside of town, all of the military bases here are closed or will be closed soon. There’s nothing here.”

“Henri Cazaux was involved in some pretty elaborate schemes to cover his real objectives,” Patrick pointed