Lizard went fumbling beneath her seat. "Here-" she handed something across to me, a flashlight. "See what happened to Duke. And be careful. It's steep. I'm going to try to get the emergency power on."
I couldn't swivel my seat backward, not while the chopper was pointed so sharply downward. I guessed we were tilted at a thirty-degree angle. I unbuckled my safety harness and nearly pitched forward onto the controls.
"I told you, be careful."
"Yeah, I will." I angled myself around and swept the flashlight across the rear of the chopper. Duke was sprawled-no, caught-in the right side bubble. I couldn't see his face, his head was below the deck level, he was almost upside down in the seat. I started climbing toward him.
It was hard to find handholds. I had to use my seat and Lizard's to climb. Once I got past them, there were deck rings on either side for securing cargo. I grabbed for the ones on Duke's side of the ship. Halfway up, the chopper lurched-and shifted. The metal groaned. I thought I heard Duke gasp. I froze where I was
"It's your weight," said Lizard. "You're bringing the tail down. Keep going."
I started climbing again, this time even more carefully. The chopper creaked once and lurched once-then it was still.
"I think that's it," Lizard said. "That last one felt pretty solid." I'd reduced the angle of tilt to fifteen degrees.
Duke's eyes were closed. I lifted him out of the bubble and stretched him out on the floor of the ship. There was blood on his face, streaming from his nose and a bad cut on his forehead-but he was breathing.
"Duke-?"
"There's a red-bordered panel on the floor there," said Lizard. "Open it. That's the primary first aid."
I found the panel she was talking about and pulled it open. There were three plastic boxes stored inside. One was labeled WATER, one was labeled FOOD. The third simply had a red cross on it.
I took out an ampule of ammonia and broke it under Duke's nose. For a moment, there was no reaction-then he twisted his face away and started coughing. The spasms lasted for only a few seconds. He coughed and looked up at me. Then he lifted his head and looked around the darkened chopper. He glanced toward Colonel Tirelli, then looked back to me. He coughed and said, "I sure hope she can fuck better than she can fly."
I glanced foward to see if Lizard had heard that. She was holding her earphones close to her ears and concentrating on something she was listening to. She hadn't heard. Good.
I turned back to Duke. "I'll let you know when I find out," I whispered.
He grinned at me. "No. I'll let you know when I find out."
I sat back. "I was going to ask if you were all right," I said. "Obviously, you are."
Duke closed his eyes for a moment, as if he were mentally counting something. "Taking inventory," he said. He opened his eyes again. "All here."
"You sure? It looked like you took quite a beating."
He levered himself halfway up. "I hurt a lot, if that's what you mean; but everything is working like it's supposed to."
Lizard came back to join us then. She squatted next to Duke and touched her fingers to his carotid artery. "Pulse is good," she said. She plucked a pocket light from her shirt pocket and peered into Duke's eyes. "Reflexes look normal. Hand me the medi-kit, Lieutenant."
Duke frowned as she applied the sensors to his forehead. They looked like little poker chips. "Is this necessary?" he grumbled. Colonel Tirelli ignored the question-she just pushed him back down onto the deck and continued pasting the chips. She unbuttoned his shirt and applied three more to his chest.
I passed her over the console. "Shh," she said, as she thumbed it to life. She studied its screen thoughtfully. "Mm hm," she said. She looked at Duke as a person for the first time. "You took a few scratches, but otherwise you're fine."
Duke said dryly, "I could have told you that without the medi-kit. "
"Yes, but it's nice to have a second opinion, isn't it?" She stood up. "There're clean jumpsuits in the back. I'll get you one."
Duke looked at me and shook his head. "This is not my idea of a good time." He sat up, grimacing, and started peeling off the poker chip sensors.
Lizard returned with a sani-kit and a plastic-wrapped jumpsuit. Duke thanked her for it. She nodded and returned forward. "Do you need any help?" I said.
Duke gave me a look that made me sorry I asked.
"Right," I said, and followed Lizard forward. I climbed back into the copilot's seat. Even at this gentler angle, it wasn't comfortable. I still felt like I was about to be tilted out. I looked at Lizard. "How are you doing?" I asked. "Are you all right?"
"Only my pride is injured," she said. She was checking her controls with a sour expression. "I've never crashed a ship before."
"Really?" The word fell out before I could catch it.
She raised an eyebrow at me. "Is that a comment on my flying?"
"Um-uh, sorry," I flustered. I pointed to the controls. "How bad is it?"
"We broke the keel of the ship. That took out most of the cables. We have lights forward, nothing aft. There's no power for anything aft. I can run a bypass for the door, or we can pop it manually if we have to. Anything else, I don't know." She rubbed her eyes. For a moment, she looked tired. I felt sorry for her. I remembered what it felt like when I cracked up my first new car two weeks after I bought it. I'd wanted to die then. She probably felt the same way about this chopper.
I looked away politely. There really wasn't anything I could say that would help. Probably I should just keep out of her way for a while. I stared out the front window.
Now that the ship was canted at a gentler angle, we could see out the front windshield. We were staring at a frosty pink landscape. Frosty pink trees and frosty pink bushes-everything was covered by frosty pink snowdrifts. The world looked like the top of some gaudy baroque dessert-one of those Valentine's Day surprises my mother used to make; we never knew what was hiding under the thick pink whipped cream. We'd hated them. We thought they were tacky. That's what the frosty snowdrifts reminded me of. I felt there should be maraschino cherries on top of each delicious-looking mound. That made me think of breasts.
I looked at Lizard, speculatively. She was studying a radar scan on her screen. She had nice breasts. I wouldn't mind a better look at them.
She looked up and caught me studying her. "What's on your mind?" she asked.
"Um-uh, how long do you think we'll have to wait?"
"Depends on the size of the clouds and where they're coming from. We came down right at the leading edge, so we'll have to wait for the whole mass to pass over. I tapped into the weather net for satellite photos, but it didn't show anything we didn't already know. I expect we'll have to be lifted out, and probably not before tomorrow. "
"Will we be okay until then?"
"Oh, sure. This ship will never fly again-but most of her equipment's still good. She'll sustain us." Lizard patted her console affectionately. "You done good, baby. " Then she added, "A salvage chopper can pick her up and take her back to Oakland where they can strip her for parts. Then we can melt down the rest and try again." She slapped a wall with her hand. "Most of this is foamed Kevlar. The frame is the easiest part of the chopper to fabricate. During the Pakistan conflict, the Lockheed plant was putting out two hundred and forty frames a day. That's almost two thousand machines a week. Incredible. There'd never been a fleet like that before. You should have seen the dogfights. These birds are light, cheap and powerful-and quick to build. Most of the parts are modular, designed to be assembled by robots. That's good, because we're probably going to need a lot more of them-and very soon."