crazy. You're unstable. I'm not going to work with
someone who completely disregards his own safety
and the reputation and quality of this company, the
company that I founded, not you. I'm going to trade
in and sell my stock options and start Sky Sciences
Inc. again, and this time I won't let you or anyone
else tell me how to run it, no matter how much of a
whiz kid they might be. Good-bye, Jon. I'll see you
in the funny papers--or in the obituaries. You're
sure to end up in either place." And she slammed
the receiver home.
The slam reverberated through the loudspeakers
around the old rocket test site like a 155-millimeter
howitzer shot. A sheepish Masters looked at the
faces of the stunned and amused technicians around
him.
"That crazy kid-she's still in love with me,"
he said, though his characteristic boyish grin was
strained. He took a swallow of Pepsi from his
squeeze bottle and tried to walk nonchalantly back
to his mobile control bunker. "She'll be back-she
still loves me," they could hear him muttering.
He was still in a daze when he entered the
bunker, so he didn't even notice the two strangers
in black battle-dress uniforms. He went to his little
cubicle, put his feet up on the desk, and punched up
a digitized video replay of the test, complete with
telemetry readouts. But he really wasn't watching
the replay-he was thinking about Helen. The two
men approached the cubicle, and the first one raised
two fingers out of his belt as if drawing a pistol from
a holster, aimed it at Masters, and mimicked pulling
the trigger. Still no reaction. "Shee-it, Doc," said,
Air Force Lieutenant Colonel Harold Briggs, "killin'
you wouldn't even be no fun."
Masters whirled around. Standing behind him
was a wiry, medium-tall black man wearing a wide
grin on his face and a big pearl-handled .45 Colt on
his hip. Beside him was a tall, powerfully built
white man as dour as Briggs was cheerful, as muscular
as, Briggs was lean. "Hal Briggs! Gunnery Sergeant
Wohl!" Masters exclaimed. "What are you
guys doing here?"
"Our two Pave Hammer aircraft are getting overhauled
up at McClellan Air Force Base north of Sacramento
," Briggs explained. The MV-22 Pave
Hammer was a tilt-rotor aircraft that could take off,
land, and-hover like a helicopter, but had the speed
-carrying capability of a cargo plane. The
and load
Pave Hammer variant of the V-22 Osprey was specially
designed for high-risk, low-level flight into
enemy territory. "McClellan is the only facility that
has the equipment to service them. They do all the
depot-level maintenance for the F- 117 Night Hawk
stealth fighter-bombers here too, so once the Air
Force gets done overhauling and test-flying the
stealth fighters, they work on our gear. it's all classified
, by the way. Not just ISA, but the F- 1 17's too.
"Anyway, we heard you were nearby doing some
kind of demonstration, and of course when we
found out what it was we hotfooted over here. Madcap
Magician is very interested in BERP. Of course,
everyone in ISA thinks BERP is a joke, so they sent
me and Gunny."
Masters realized why Hal Briggs was so chattythere
was no one else in the bunker to overhear
them. The ISA-the Intelligence Support Agencywas
a subdivision of the Central intelligence
Agency's Directorate of Operations. When a CIA
agent in the field gets in trouble, the directorate
calls on the ISA to help extract a friend, rescue an
agent; create diversions, find targets, neutralize enemy
defenses, or engage many other covert actions.
The ISA is broken down into action groups, or
cells, comprised of members from military, civilian,
and government specialties; the cells are so secret
that one ISA cell would not recognize another. Colonel
Hal Briggs was the commander of one such
cell, code-named Madcap Magician. Composed
mostly of former or active-duty Force Recon Marines
high-risk operations deep within enemy territory.
Jon Masters had worked with the group on many
projects. They liked using Sky Masters, Inc.'s gadgets
as much as Jon liked making them.
Masters rolled his eyes in exasperation. "C'mon,
Hal," Masters said. "I didn't present this project to
the military or to any national-security, agencies because
I know it will go 'black/ get buried in a topsecret
classification for twenty years. No one else
will be able to take advantage of this technology.
BERP can save thousands of lives, Hal."
"Looks to me like you barely got away with
keeping your own," Briggs pointed out wryly. He
studied the digital replay on the big computer momtor
on Masters's desk. "It works, Doc. Congratulations
. You might have a few kinks to iron out, but it
works. Very cool."
"Thanks, Aal," Masters said. "But I still don't
want-"
"Dr. Masters, you've already presented BERP to
the industry leaders," Briggs interrupted. "The cat's
out of the bag. You'll eventually put BERP on every
major airliner in the world, and that's cool. But you
know your technology can save the lives of ISA
agents who put their own lives on the line for our
country. All I'm asking is give us a chance to take
advantage of your breakthrough."
"I don't know, Hal," Masters said. "I really
wanted to make BERP the first thing I built that can
preserve lives, not help destroy them."
"Believe me, I can think of a bunch of ways BERP
can help save my narrow black ass," Briggs chuckled
. Wohl shook his head in exasperation. He was
quite accustomed to his commander's tone and attitude
but irked by it too. "But we're not trying to
stop you from deploying your system-we just want
you to give us first dibs on it." When Masters still
hesitated, Briggs added slyly, "Remember, Doc, it's
a new. fiscal year. ISA has got plenty of bucks to
spend. I know the money's not as important to you
as public safety, but I'll bet you all the memory
chips in Silicon Valley that you could use a h
ttle
k seed money. And you'll be doing my and Gunny's
boys a world of good. What d'ya say, Doc?"
Masters had truly not thought about making a
profit by deploying BERP; he had actually been
thinking of ways to require the world's airlines to
support placing BERP systems mi poorer countries'
aircraft, in exchange for his granting free licenses to
the technology. But he had no such compunctions
when it came to the military or to goverriment
agencies like the CIA. They had bucks to spend on
whatever sneaky black covert ops they were involved
in, and Jon saw it as his duty to his companyls
shareholders to get as much of that money as
possible.
"Well, since I've scared off all the major airplane
manufacturers and the FAA," he said with a shrug,
"I might as well help you out. Exactly how much
money are we talking about here, Hal?"
Briggs and Wohl W ere still watching the replay on
the screen. When they saw the aftermath of the explosions
and then looked at the man who had sat
atop 150 pounds of TNT and survived, they were
astounded. "Name it, Doc," Briggs said, his voice
hoarse with excitement. "Show us a way BERP can
help my guys in the field, and you can name your
price./I
Jon Masters was smiling broadly now. "Patrick
and Wendy have been working on a few interesting
items," he said. "Patrick calls it his Ultimate Soldier
program. All based around this." He withdrew
the piece of BERP material from his pocket and held
it out for Briggs and Wohl.
"This is it?" Chris Wohl asked. "This is BERP?"
"That's it," Masters acknowledged. He felt
Wohl's black battle-dress uniform and Wohl
scowled in irritation. Masters withdrew his hand
quickly, as if he had touched a hot stove. "About
the same thickness as your fatigues there, Gunnery
Sergeant."
"It's too shiny, too slick," Wohl said. "It'll make
noise when you move. Doesn't breathe like , cotton
either. It'll be hot as hell in a desert environment
and cold as hell in cold weather."
Masters hit the keyboard on his computer, freezing
the digital video playback. He pointed to the
intact first-class section of the airliner. "Gunny, we
can dull it, and we can build in an environmental
unit to keep the wearer comfortable. But can your
cotton BDUs,save your ass like this?"
Briggs and Wohl looked at each other, their
minds racing. Then Briggs turned to Masters and
said, "Doc, show us what else you got, and we'll go
Christmas shopping. When can we see everything?"
"Patrick runs the program, and he's here in Sacramento
," Masters explained. "In fact, Wendy's having
her baby today."
"No shit!" Briggs exclaimed. "I thought she
wasn't due to pop for another couple of weeks.'
"It's happening fight now, Hal-in fact, it
should've already happened," Masters said. "We've
set up an office here in Sacramento, out at the secure
development center at Sacramento-Mather jetport
, and Patrick can demo his stuff for you there.
He's got some cosmic stuff that I'm sure he had you
guys specifically in mind for."
MERCY SAN JUAN HOSPITAL,
CITRUS HEIGHTS, CALIFORNIA
SEVERAL HOURS LATER
P
aul McLanahan breezed into the hospital room
carrying bouquets of flowers and balloons and almost
ran smack into the departing doctor. He found
Patrick sitting beside the bed, holding Wendy's
hand and brushing back her hair from her sweaty
forehead. The room was furnished to look more like
a regular bedroom than a sterile hospital room-the
hospital bed like a bed at home, a comfortable
couch and chairs, nice wall decorations, a pleasing
dresser.
But the image was spoiled by a cart stacked high
with monitoring equipment, plus an IV stand with
two large bags of clear fluid on the other side of the
bed, the lines leading to Wendy's right arm. The
sight made Paul's heart sink. "Patrick?"
"Paul!" Patrick exclaimed. "What are you doing
here? I thought this was your first night of duty?"
"I'm on my way to the South Station to report in,
but I wasn't going to show until I stopped in to see
the new baby-except I see he hasn't arrived yet."
Paul was wearing a civilian blue-and-brown GoreTex
foul-weather jacket, but when he removed it,
Patrick saw that he had his uniform on underneath.
"I had a class this afternoon that I had to be at in
uniform," he added, "but I'm not officially on duty,
so I had to cover up." He wore matching police department
patches on both sleeves, a simple brass
nametag, and a dark blue turtleneck shirt under his
uniform blouse with the letters SPD embroidered
on the neck. His shoes were polished to a high gloss.
He wasn't wearing a utility belt, but he did have a
small semiautomatic pistol in a clip-on holster on
his belt. All standard gear, except for a small
American-flag pin over his nametag.
Man oh man, Patrick thought, the kid looks good
in a uniform! Sacramento Police Department uniforms
, especially for rookies, are as plain as can be,
but on his little brother it looked as sharp as a tuxedo
. Or was that just because his little brother was
wearing it?
Of course, Patrick's eyes were drawn to the
badge, a large silver seven-pointed star with "Sacra-
mento Police" and a badge number, 109, in black,
probably not much different from the original Gold
Rush-era badges of the Sacramento Police Department
. Patrick knew the history of badge number
109-it had been their dad's patrolman badge, and
their grandfather's badge, and their greatgrandfather's
badge, made from silver instead of
chrome, as they were now. The first McLanahan
cop, Shane, had not worn a badge number, but he
was known to be the ninth patrolman recruited in
the newly incorporated city. So when they issued
badge numbers years later, future McLanahans first
inherited number 9, then 109 when the department
grew and badge numbers had three digits. it was a
source of intense pride for Paul to wear it. Legacy
was very important for police officers. In a profession
where death can be a moment away, it was
reassuring and fight for cops to feel a sense of history
and continuity, as if the badge made its wearer
invincible.
"C'mon in, bro," Wendy said. Her voice was
strained from fatigue and pain, but she wore a welcoming
smile and held out her hand. Paul found a
place for the flowers and balloons, gave her a kiss,
and pulled a chair over to her bedside. "You look
great, Paul," she said. "Ready for duty? Your first
night on patrol-how exciting!"
"I thought -you guys got dressed in the locker
room," said Patrick.
"We do, but I sat in on an MDT class-that's Mobile
Data Terminal, the communications terminal ,
in the cars-downtown, and I had to be in uniform
for that," Paul explained. "The academy doesn t "A"
teach the MDT because the various departments
use different systems, but I wanted to be up to speed
before I hit the streets.
"But forget about me, you guys, what about you?
When I got the message this morning that you guys
were headed to Mercy, I thought the baby was going
to be born in the back of the
car. Sheesh, Patrick,
maybe you'd better Wait outside-he's obviously
afraid to come out and face you." His smile dimmed
as he noticed that his brother and sister-in-law
weren't sharing his joke. "Any complications?"
"Wendy's in labor and she's one hundred percent
effaced, but not dilated over three centimeters,"
Patrick said, reciting the obstetrical lingo he had
been hearing for hours now. "She's been in labor
since three A.m. and her water broke at five, but it
had blood in it so we came right in. The doc found
blood and meconium-baby shit-in the amniotic
fluid, so he was worried about infection. They
hooked the baby up to a. monitor with a probe attached
to his scalp, and of course they got Wendy
wired for sound and put an IV in at the same time.
So no walking around, no relaxing showers--our delivery
plan pretty much went out the window flfteen
minutes after we arrived here."
Patrick offered Wendy some crushed ice to keep
her hydrated-she initially refused, but relented after
a mock stern demand from her husband. He
pointed to one of the monitors. "Here's the baby's
vitals, and here's Wendy's uterine monitor . . . /
he watched as the graphing needle started a rapid
climb-". . . and here's another contraction. Deep
cleansing breath, sweetie." Wendy took a deep
breath and expelled it all the way out, her eyebrows
knotting in concentration as she tried to separate
her mind from her pain, as they had taught
in Lamaze class. "Good. About thirty seconds to
the peak. Don't hold your breath, hon. Let it
out through your teeth if you need to, but don't
hold it . . . good. Five seconds . . . that's the
peak, hon, you're doing good . . . on the way
down, about thirty seconds and it'll be over . . .
real good, babe, you did good. Give me another deep
cleansing breath. Relax your hands, sweetie, and relax
those toes too, you're staying tense when you
should be relaxing. You need another calf massage?"
He reached over to knead her left calf.
Paul looked at the strip of paper unreeling beneath
the monitor-Wendy had obviously been undergoing
this shme ordeal for a real long time now.
FES sister-in-law looked as if she had been beaten
UP
and left in a sauna. The sheets were wet with sweat,