Starfire (22 page)

“I don't remember you, sir, but I sure recognize you: you're President Kevin Martindale,” Brad said, not trying to mask his surprise and confusion. Martindale smiled broadly and looked pleased that Brad recognized him, and he stuck out his hand as he approached. Brad shook it. “It's nice to meet you, sir, but now I'm even more confused.”

“I don't blame you one bit, son,” the former president said. “Things are happening fast, and folks are scrambling to keep up. Then this incident with you in San Luis Obispo popped up, and we had to react.” He squinted at the bruise on the side of Brad's head. “How's your head, son? You have a very nasty bruise there.”

“It's fine, sir.”

“Good. I, of course, asked the sergeant major what we should do when we detected the break-in, and he said extract you, I said yes, and so he did. He is extremely effective at things like that.”

“I didn't see what he did, but I'm here, so I guess he must be,” Brad said. “If the sergeant major works for you, sir, then can you tell me what's going on? He hasn't told me a thing.”

“He wouldn't tell you anything even if he had a car battery wired to his testicles, son,” Martindale said. “Neither would any of the men in this hangar. I guess I'm the head honcho of this outfit, but I really don't run it. He does.”

“He? He who?”

“Him,” Martindale said, and he motioned to the cargo ramp of the aircraft just as it emerged. It was a Cybernetic Infantry Device—a manned robot, developed for the U.S. Army as a battlefield replacement for a standard infantry platoon, including the latter's mobility, versatility, and all of its firepower—but it was unlike any CID Brad could remember. This one somehow seemed sleeker, lighter, taller, and more refined than the one Brad had piloted a few years back. The twelve-foot-plus-tall robot had a large torso that sloped from broad shoulders to a slightly thinner waist, more slender hips, and rather spindly-looking arms and legs attached to the torso. There were sensors mounted seemingly everywhere—on the shoulders, waist, and arms. The head was a six-sided box with sloped sides and no eyes but only sensor panels on every side. It seemed slightly taller than the one Brad had piloted.

The sensory experience of piloting a Cybernetic Infantry Device was nothing like Brad had ever felt before. First he got his nervous system digitally mapped and uploaded to the robot's computerized control interface. He then climbed into the robot through the back, lay spread-eagled onto a rather cold, gelatinous conducting mat, and stuck his head inside a helmet and oxygen mask. The hatch was sealed behind him, and everything went dark and quickly became a little claustrophobic. But within moments he could see again . . . along with mountains of data derived from the robot's sensors being presented to him visually and inserted into his body's sensory system, so he was not just reading information on screens, but images and data were appearing in his consciousness, like a memory or actual inputs from touch, vision, and hearing. When he started to move, he found he could run with amazing speed and agility, leap several dozen feet, kick down walls, and overturn armored vehicles. A dazzling array of weapons was interfaced with the robot, and he could control all of them with breathtaking speed and pinpoint accuracy.

“A CID,” Brad remarked. “It looks brand-new. New design too.”

“It's the first copy of a new model CID force we plan on deploying,” Martindale said.

“Cool,” Brad said. He waved at the robot. “Who's the pilot? Charlie Turlock? She taught me how to pilot one a couple years ago.” To the CID he said, “Hey, Charlie, how are you? Are you going to let me take it for a spin?”

The CID walked up to Martindale and Bradley, its movements frighteningly humanlike despite its size and robotic limbs, and in an electronic humanoid voice said, “Hello, son.”

It took a few moments for Brad to realize that what he had just heard was the real thing and for the realization to sink in, but finally Brad's eyes widened in surprise and shock and he shouted,
“Dad?”
He reached out to the CID, unsure of where to touch it. “My God, Dad, is it
you
? You're alive?
You're alive!
”

“Yes, son,” Patrick McLanahan said. Brad still couldn't figure out where to touch the robot, so he had to settle for clutching his own abdomen. He started to sob. “It's okay, Bradley,” Patrick said finally, reaching out and embracing his son. “My God, it's so good to see you again.”

“But I don't get it, Dad,” Brad said after several long moments in his father's embrace. “They . . . they told me you had . . . had died of the injuries . . .”

“I did die, son,” Patrick said in the electronically synthesized voice. “When they pulled me from the B-1 bomber back on Guam after you landed the B-1, I
was
clinically dead, and everyone knew it, and that's the word that was passed around. But after you and the other crewmembers were evacuated to Hawaii, they loaded me onto an ambulance and started resuscitation, and I made it back.”

“They . . . they wouldn't let me stay with you, Dad,” Brad said between sobs. “I tried to stay with you, but they wouldn't let me. I'm sorry, Dad, I'm so sorry, I should have demanded—”

“It's okay, son,” Patrick said. “All casualties had to wait for assessment and triage, and I was just one more casualty out of hundreds that day. Local medics and volunteers took over the casualties, and the military guys and contractors were taken away. They kept me alive in a small clinic off base for a day and a half, parked far away from everything. The first responders to arrive were locals, and they didn't know who I was. They took me to another little clinic in Agana and kept me alive.”

“But how . . . ?”

“President Martindale found me, a couple days after the attack,” Patrick said. “Sky Masters could still track me through the subcutaneous datalink. Martindale was monitoring all of Sky Masters Inc.'s activities in the South China Sea region and had a plane sent to Andersen Air Force Base to collect intelligence and data on the attack. They eventually found me and secretly spirited me off to the States.”

“But why the CID, Dad?”

“That was Jason Richter's idea,” Martindale said. “You met Colonel Richter in Battle Mountain, I believe?”

“Yes, sir. He helped me do the programming so I could get checked out in piloting a CID. He's the head of operations for Sky Masters Aerospace now.”

“Your dad was in critical condition and not expected to survive the flight back to Hawaii,” Martindale said. “My aircraft that evacuated him had very few medical staff and no surgical or trauma-care equipment . . . but it did have a Cybernetic Infantry Device on board to help with rescue and recovery on Guam. Jason said the CID could help a victim breathe and control his other bodily functions until he made it to a hospital. Richter didn't know that victim was your father.”

“Then . . . then you're okay, Dad?” Brad asked, at first happy. But he quickly realized that his father was far, far from okay, or else he would not still be aboard the CID with his only son standing in front of him. “Dad . . . ?”

“I'm afraid not, son,” Patrick said. “I can't survive outside the CID.”

“What?”

“I could possibly survive, Brad, but I'd definitely be on assisted breathing and heartbeat and probably in a vegetative state,” Patrick said. Brad's eyes welled with tears, and his mouth dropped open in shock. Both the robot's hands reached out and rested on Brad's shoulders—its touch was light, even soft, despite its size. “I didn't want that, Brad. I didn't want to be a burden to my family for years, maybe decades, until they had the technology to heal me, or until I died. Inside the CID I was awake, functioning, and up and moving. Outside, I'd be in a coma, on life support. When I was inside the CID and awake, I had the choice: stay on life support, pull the plug, or stay in the CID. I decided I'd rather stay inside, where I could be of some service.”

“You're . . . you're going to
stay
inside . . . forever . . .
?”

“I'm afraid so, son,” Patrick said, “until we have the ability to heal all of the injuries I sustained.” The tears rolled down Brad's face even harder now. “Brad, it's okay,” Patrick said, and his softer, reassuring tone was evident even in the robot's electronic voice. “I should be dead, son—I
was
dead. I was given an extraordinary gift. It may not seem like life, but it is. I want you to be happy for me.”

“But I can't . . . can't see you?” Brad reached up and touched the robot's face. “I can't touch you for . . . for real?”

“Believe me, son, I can feel your touch,” Patrick said. “I'm sorry you can't feel mine, other than the cold composites. But the alternatives for me were unacceptable. I'm not ready to die yet, Brad. This may seem unnatural and unholy, but I'm still alive, and I think I can make a difference.”

“What about the memorial service . . . the urn . . . the death certificate . . . ?”

“My doing, Brad,” President Martindale said. “As your father said, he was dead for a short time, in critical condition, and not expected to live. No one except Richter thought putting an injured man in the CID would work for more than a few days at most. Once we got back to the States, we tried several times to remove him from the CID so we could get him into surgery. Every time we tried, he arrested. It was . . . like his body didn't want to leave it.”

“I was pretty messed up too, Brad,” Patrick said. “I saw the pictures. There wasn't much left of me.”

“So what are you saying? You're being
healed
by the CID? How can that work?”

“Not healed, but more like . . . sustained, Brad,” Patrick said. “The CID can monitor my body and brain, deliver oxygen, water, and nutrients, handle waste, and control the interior environment. It can't fix me. I might get better over time, but no one knows. But I don't need a healthy body to pilot the CID or employ its weapons.”

Brad realized what his father was saying, and it made his skin crawl and his face contort in disbelief despite the joy he felt at talking to his father again. “You mean . . . you mean you're just a
brain . . .
a brain operating a
machine . . .
?”

“I'm alive, Brad,” Patrick said. “It's not just a brain operating a machine.” He tapped on his armored chest with a composite finger. “It's
me
in here. It's your father. The body is messed up, but it's still
me
. I control this machine, just like you did back in Battle Mountain. The only difference is that I can't just dismount when I want to. I can't get out and be a regular dad. That part of my life was destroyed by that Chinese fighter's cannon shells. But I'm still me. I don't want to die. I want to keep on working to defend our country. If I have to do it from inside this thing, I will. If my son can't touch me, can't see my face anymore, then that's the penalty I get for accepting life. It's a gift and a penalty I happily accept.”

Brad's mind was racing, but slowly he began to understand. “I think I get it, Dad,” he said after a long silence. “I'm happy you're alive.” He whirled to face Martindale. “It's
you
I don't get, Martindale. How could you not tell me he was alive, even if he was inside the CID?”

“I run a private organization that performs high-tech intelligence, counterintelligence, surveillance, and other high-risk operations, Brad,” Martindale said. He noticed Chris Wohl starting to make a move toward Brad and shook his head, warning him away. “I'm always looking for personnel, equipment, and weapons to perform our job better.”

“That's my father you're talking about, not some fucking piece of hardware, sir,” Brad snapped. Martindale's mouth dropped open in surprise at Brad's retort, and Wohl looked angry enough to chew off a piece of the cargo plane's propeller. Brad noticed something he hadn't noticed before: two locks of gray hair had curled over Martindale's forehead above each eye, resembling inverted devil's horns. “You're starting to sound like some kind of Dr. Frankenstein mad scientist.”

“I apologize, Brad,” Martindale said. “As I said, all the doctors we spoke with didn't expect your father to make it. I really didn't know what to tell the White House, you, your aunts . . . hell, what to tell the whole
world
. So I made a suggestion to President Phoenix: we don't tell anyone that your father was still alive inside the CID. We had the memorial service in Sacramento. When your father passed, which we truly believed was imminent, we'd inurn his remains for real, and the legend of Patrick McLanahan would finally be put to rest.” Martindale looked up at the Cybernetic Infantry Device beside him. “But as you can now see, he didn't die. He's managed to shock and surprise the hell out of us once again. But what could we do? We already buried him. We had the choice of telling the world he's alive but living inside the CID, or not telling anyone anything. We chose the latter.”

“So why tell me now?” Brad asked, his head still reeling. “I believed my father was dead. You could have kept him dead, and I could have remembered him as he was before the attack.”

“Several reasons,” Martindale said. “First, the Russians stole your father's cremation urn, and we have to assume they opened it and found it empty—we never dreamed anyone would ever steal it, and we thought it was going to be a short time before it was needed, so unfortunately we didn't put anyone else's remains in it. We thought the Russians could use that fact to pressure President Phoenix or even make the fact public, and then he'd be forced to respond.”

“You know what they say about assuming,” Brad said acidly.