Beginning with You

by Lindsay McKenna

  Chappie had been smart: he’d let the station settle down after the whale incident and the funeral for Welsh’s wife before making his move. When Locke’s error came to light, he wanted the whole station to be focused on it, not detoured by some other crisis. The watch on his wrist read 11 p.m. By now, the SAR pilots were asleep. Locke was already in the duty quarters across the way, with the door shut and lights off.

  Moving to CG 1224, the helo that was prepped and ready for a SAR call, he stole through the open fuselage door. Making his way forward, he halted before going into the cockpit, looking right and then left. The hangar was buried in deep gloom; only a few necessary lights illuminated the area.

  Chappie settled into the right-hand seat. His hands trembled as he unscrewed the top of the channel monitor panel to the right of the pilot’s seat. Glancing around again, he pulled the wires that led to the hardover switches of the automatic stabilization equipment, or ASE. Scraping one wire carefully with his penknife he then put two drops of saltwater on it. Satisfied, sweat beading his wrinkled brow, he screwed the plate back into place.

  The nose of the ’60 had a tendency to turn in the direction of flight. That was due to a large, flat plate area aft of the main rotor shaft. The ASE improved the helicopter’s basic flying qualities, in conjunction with the cyclic stick trim system, and was capable of maintaining a desired attitude with minimal assistance from the pilot.

  Chappie slid out of the seat, making sure his presence in the cockpit would never be discovered. An electrical ASE hardover could occur now. The ASE could become a critical item—especially at night, or if the SAR was taking place during high winds or dangerous conditions. If any of those combinations occurred, the pilot could get vertigo and lose his sense of direction. Then the helo could crash. Or, if the SAR was at a critical phase when the hardover occurred, it could push the pilot over the edge, snapping his concentration and he might create an in-flight emergency.

  Jarvis didn’t anticipate anything as dangerous as that happening. The ASE had only ten percent control over the flight attitude of a helo. If the pilot was on top of things, and he didn’t doubt that Scanlon would be, the hardover would be overridden with a simple flight correction on his part, and then the channel could be disengaged—or, if that didn’t work, the ASE off switch could be punched on the cyclic stick and the system would be shut down.

  He checked the maintenance record on CG 1224 and saw Locke’s initials signing off a previous ASE discrepancy. Earlier that day, she had also done the normal inspection on the helo. When Scanlon got back from the SAR case, he’d have to down the aircraft. Then Chappie would have Locke’s ass right where he wanted it. He would put her on report for failing to do a complete and proper QA check on her helo and endangering the crew, as well as potentially losing an expensive helo. Letting the maintenance record fall back on the board, Chappie smiled. He’d get even with her for squealing on him. One way or another, she’d pay—in spades. Now, all he had to do was wait and hope for a SAR case tonight. With this kind of weather, there was bound to be some boat or yacht caught in the grips of high seas and the hammering wind. Someone would need assistance out there.

  “Hey, Rook, wake up.” Ty leaned over, giving her a good shake. Rook was in her rumpled flight suit, sleeping on the couch in the ready room. The television was on, but had gone off the air a long time ago. It was 2 a.m.

  “I’m up,” Rook mumbled, sitting up. Automatically, she slipped into her flight boots while Ty went back down to the SAR desk. She stumbled after him, sleepiness quickly replaced by alertness. Adrenaline was pumping through her now.

  A cup of hot coffee was waiting for her when she joined Ty at the desk, falling into her normal duties as copilot.

  “What have we got?”

  “An SOS from a disabled yacht with three people aboard. They’re going to need to be airlifted out.” Ty answered. “This is going to be a rough flight.”

  Rook turned and looked out the rain-glazed window. “Ugly might be a better word.”

  He nodded, his mouth thinning as he wrote down the necessary information. “Winds are thirty-five knots out there. We’ve got a report from a tanker twenty miles west of where the signal was picked up, and he’s reporting thirty- to forty-foot waves.”

  Her heart started to pound. All her previous cases had been fair-weather rescues. “You’re joking.”

  “Wish I was.”

  “But—this is July. They said—”

  “This is typical Northern Pacific weather,” Ty muttered unhappily. “We’ve got heavy head winds, and it’s going to slow us down getting to the spot. They’re sending a Falcon jet from Astoria to assist us. They’ll locate the distressed boat and lead us to it.”

  Rook tried to ignore the chill that stalked her. Nightmare cases like this one made her uneasy. Undetected turbulence could test even the most experienced pilot’s abilities. Pursing her lips, she reached for the charts. “Okay, let’s get this show on the road.”

  Ty shook his head. “What a mother of a night for a case….”

  Annie Locke’s face was grim. And so was that of Beau Jones, their rescue swimmer. It made Rook even jumpier. She had less than three months of SAR training under her belt, and this rescue worried her. Ty knew she wasn’t fully trained to help if they got in trouble—at least, not in the rescue portion, if something happened to him.

  Getting the helo checked for flight and lifting off into the darkness helped settle Rook’s nerves. As they flew past the last Washington landmass and headed out over the Pacific Ocean, Rook strained to see the water five hundred feet below them. She could see nothing. The rain pounded furiously against the cockpit windows, severely limiting visibility. The soft red glow of the panel lights bathed their faces. Nothing but blackness lay outside the thin skin of the struggling, shuddering ’60. What little Rook could see was evidenced by the lights on the fuselage, blinking rapidly in the turgid darkness of the howling storm.

  Scanlon glanced over at Rook and saw the tension on her face. Christ, what was he going to do? He’d better be able to pull this case off on his own. It wasn’t her fault, he reminded himself. Both Logan and Welsh, who had flown with Rook on a couple of other rescues, had high praise for her touch with a helo. They said she was a pro and not to worry about her being behind a stick. That was good. This was the first chance he’d had to fly with her. The duty roster had been so screwed up lately that copilots flew frequently with the same pilots.

  Tonight, he’d need everything Rook had to give him. From his own years of experience, he knew a basket hoist would be the only way to rescue the people on board that yacht. Scanlon’s eyes narrowed as he concentrated on his instrument flying. The cyclic vibrated in his right hand, but the collective, which sat on the left side of his seat, felt good and solid. The ’60 was working well. He breathed another bit of relief: Annie was tops in flight maintenance. Not that the other flight mechs weren’t. He simply trusted her a bit more because she was such a stickler for details when she worked on a helo. And right now, Ty knew he was going to need all those infinitesimal extras to pull off this SAR case. With the present weather conditions, they would have to refuel at Neah Bay and La Push, in order to go out over the rescue site with a full load on board.

  Jarvis could hardly wait for the ’60 to land. He’d sat in his office, following the rescue on radio. The transmissions from CG 1224 had been sparse and terse. He was delighted when he heard Scanlon on the radio instead of the copilot. So, Caldwell had had to take over the rescue. The electrical hardover must have occurred or Scanlon wouldn’t have given the controls to such a green copilot. Two ambulances from Mercy Hospital were standing by near the hangar bay doors, waiting to transfer the three survivors once the helo landed. It was 0310. Chappie rubbed his hands together, congratulating himself.

  CG 1224 returned to the station at 0400. While Annie slid the fuselage door open, Rook sat limply in the left-hand seat, completely wrung out. Her flight suit was damp with sweat. Her hands ached
and so did her forearms, shoulders and neck. Midway through, the helo had had unexpected flight difficulties. Ty Scanlon had developed a case of vertigo and had handed the controls over to her. Thank God she had been able to complete the rescue and fly them back without further incident.

  Ty leaned back, closing his eyes for a moment, silence filtering into the cabin. They should go through their checks, but right now, they both needed a few minutes to collect themselves.

  “You did a good job, Rook.”

  She snorted softly. “Yeah, if you call five tries before I got the basket on the deck good.”

  “You got the men off safely and hoisted them. That’s all that counts.”

  “Did you see how much fuel we have left?”

  “Not much. It’s okay.”

  Gradually, some of the knots were beginning to work out of Rook’s fingers and lower arms. She turned her head and sat up. “How are you feeling?”

  “I didn’t have vertigo again after we discovered it was the ASE hardover.”

  “Good.” A pilot with severe or continuing vertigo would have to go to the medical officer and be examined. A pilot could be grounded until a doctor was convinced that he wouldn’t experience the dangerous condition again. “I’m sure it was caused by the hardover.”

  “It had to be. I’ve never had vertigo before—ever.”

  Rook stirred and unstrapped, beginning to feel shaky now as the adrenaline left her bloodstream. Annie had gotten the survivors into the ambulance. Rook watched as the flight mech climbed back into the helo.

  “Ms. Caldwell, what happened up here?” she asked worriedly, crouching between the two seats.

  Rook’s heart went out to Annie. Her freckled face was waxen looking, her eyes dark with concern. The flight mech who rode in the helo was also responsible for servicing it properly. She knew what Annie was thinking: that she was responsible for the malfunction.

  “We experienced an ASE electrical hardover.”

  Annie reached out, touching the lower radio console with her trembling fingers. “I can’t figure it out. I did my periodic check on this bird only two hours before the call. The ASE was working fine then.” She turned to Ty, apology in her strained voice. “I’m really sorry, Mr. Scanlon.”

  “Annie, it’s a fluke. I know how well you maintain the helos. You’ve got a clean record. Don’t worry about it.” He managed a weary but genuine smile for Annie, giving her a well-deserved pat on the shoulder. “You did a hell of a job out there. We couldn’t have done it without you, Annie.”

  Rook nodded. “You were the greatest, Annie. Now, I see why all the pilots pray for you to be on the duty roster when a case comes in.”

  Annie lowered her lashes, a blush bringing color back to her features. “Gosh…thanks….”

  Rook saw anxiety in her drawn features. “We’ll have to down the bird,” she told her.

  Annie nodded, understanding. “As soon as I can get a dry set of clothes on, we’ll bring the helo in, take off that plate and see what went wrong.”

  “Fine,” Ty agreed, beginning to unstrap. “Go get cleaned up.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Annie ran through the rain, visor down on her helmet to shield her eyes from the deluge. She halted just inside the now-quiet hangar and shoved the visor back up into her helmet. With shaking hands, she unsnapped the chin strap and pulled the helmet off. When she straightened up, Chief Jarvis was standing no more than ten feet away from her. She saw a savage gleam in his eyes.

  “Looks like you fucked up real good, Locke,” he began softly. “An ASE electrical hardover? What’s the matter, you cheating on your QA checks and just signing them off, instead?”

  Anger roared through her as she stood there with the helmet in the crook of her right arm. Physically, mentally and emotionally drained, Annie struggled to hold on to her temper. “The day I sign off a discrepancy on a helo without checking it first will be the day I die, Chief.”

  Chappie smiled wolfishly. “You damn near just killed two fine pilots, not to mention the three men you picked up.” He walked slowly toward her, his face mirroring his pleasure. Jabbing a finger into her shoulder he snarled, “You didn’t do your job, Locke. You got lazy because those QA checks are boring, and you damn near cost a lot of lives, not to mention a helo.”

  “Now, look here, Chief, I checked that helo out two hours before we flew!”

  “Doesn’t appear to be that way, Locke.” He gloated as Annie started coming loose, like an unraveling ball of yarn. “One thing I learned about you, Locke, a long time ago, was your false pride in your work. Of course, with your looks, maybe work is all you have to take pride in.”

  Annie gripped her helmet hard, wanting to throw a punch into the chief’s smiling face. “You bastard,” she hissed. “You’ve been waiting for this, haven’t you? You’ve been wanting me to make a mistake for so long that—”

  Jarvis stepped up to her, his face inches from hers. “You’re on report, Locke, for insubordination.”

  Shaken, Annie took a step back, realizing what she had done. After taking a year of Jarvis riding her almost daily, she’d done the one thing she swore she wouldn’t do: talk back to the mealy-mouthed bastard. “But, I—”

  “You’re on report, Locke. I’m also pulling you off duty as ready crew for the rest of the night.”

  “But, Chief, I want to pull the ASE apart and check it out—”

  “I’ll do it. I’m the chief here. I’m going to find out what really happened.”

  Annie stood open-mouthed, at a loss for words. Jarvis check her work? If she couldn’t check it out first, herself, he could rig it so that something would be wrong to get her into a hell of a lot more trouble. “I want Mr. Welsh to look at it. He’s the engineer.”

  Rook stepped into the hangar, realizing belatedly that there was a confrontation going down. She frowned and walked over. “What’s going on here, Chief?”

  Jarvis nodded deferentially in the officer’s direction. “I just placed Locke on report for insubordination to a superior, ma’am.”

  “What?” Rook glanced over at Annie’s stricken face and then back to Jarvis, who was barely able to keep a somber look on his grizzled features.

  Jarvis explained the incident, omitting his part in the conversation with Locke. “Further, I’m going to pull that ASE apart and look at it myself.”

  Rook nailed him with a glare. “No, you won’t, Chief. I’ll notify Lieutenant Welsh, and he’ll come out and investigate this.”

  Jarvis stared up at her. The bitch. “I’m line chief here,” he reminded her angrily.

  “Not anymore,” Rook parried. “Not according to Captain Stuart’s orders. You push paper, Chief—you don’t have anything to do with a helo on the line.”

  Heat soared up through Jarvis. He wanted to take a swing at Rook. He hated her confidence and authority. No woman had any business being a pilot!

  “What’s going on here?” Ty came up, standing at Rook’s side.

  Rook explained.

  Jarvis smiled slightly, turning to Scanlon for help. “Look, Mr. Scanlon, I know these helos like they were my own children. All I wanted to do was check out the ASE, that’s all. How about it?”

  Automatically, Rook tensed. Would Ty become a “good ol’ boy” and stick with what another man wanted instead of following the orders Stuart had issued? He was senior duty officer for the night, and what he decided became law. She could see the feral pleasure in Jarvis’s eyes as he looked at Annie. He’d already put her on report for insubordination. Dammit! Rook wished she’d gotten to the hangar sooner. Maybe she could have prevented this. The case had been particularly hard on Annie. She had had five other lives in her hands as she orchestrated the rescue. It was one hell of a load on anyone’s shoulders.

  “Sorry, Chief. That’s not your job any longer,” Scanlon said.

  Rook relaxed. Thank God Ty wasn’t going to side with the wheedling chief. “I already told the chief that Lieutenant Welsh would come out a
nd do it.”

  Ty nodded. “That’s correct procedure in a case like this. Chief, do you understand?”

  Jarvis quelled his fury. “Yes, sir.” That was all right; he had Locke right where he wanted her, anyway. When Welsh saw the bare wire and dried saltwater on the cable and below it, Locke would be implicated immediately. Besides, to add to it, she was now on report. He silently celebrated.

  “Come on,” Ty told Rook. “We’ve got paperwork ahead of us.”

  Rook gave Annie a silent look that said, Rrelax, we’ll help you as much as we can. “Okay.” She wondered why the chief was here at this time in the morning. He didn’t have duty tonight. Dismissing it because of encroaching exhaustion, Rook followed Ty to the line shack.

  “Look at this,” Tag said, pointing down at the wiring in the opened channel monitor panel. One of the hardover switch wires was bare, and there was dried saltwater on it, plus a small pool of dried crystals beneath it.

  Rook, who was sitting in the left-hand seat, stared over at it. Tag had come on duty at 0800 and gone straight over to the hangar to inspect CG 1224. Annie was up, moving around in the hangar, going about her normal duties for the day, but Rook could see the strain in every feature of her vulnerable, pale face. Flicking a look over at Tag, sitting in the pilot’s seat, she said, “You know what this implies.”

  “Yeah, that Annie didn’t do her required inspection,” he answered heavily. Writing down his findings on his memo pad, the scowl increased across Tag’s brow. “This isn’t like Annie. She’s a stickler for detail. I’ve seen her tear into a wiring panel when something was within normal range and she wasn’t satisfied with it.”