Ace

The tank kept turning. The driver must have been looking for us. It was then that I discovered something important about tanks — no rearview mirrors. Or at least no way for the driver to see something that was right behind him. I reached up and grabbed hold of a huge metal bracket that looked like it might be used for towing something extremely heavy behind the tank. I used it to climb up onto the deck and then walked up the slope of the turret to the top. When I reached the highest point, Neeka took off and got out of range so she wouldn't have to keep dodging to avoid being run over. She drove back to where the flattened patrol cars were and sat behind them, to try to get the tank to backtrack instead of going on down the road toward the schools and the houses. It seemed to work. Once the driver turned far enough to see her, the tank headed right in her direction.

The view from up there was impressive. It was a real charge to stand on top of such a big machine while it was moving. It felt like the world was moving and I was standing still. When the tank changed gears and began to pick up speed, I decided it was time to get to work.

The first thing I did was to pull the machine gun off its mount next to the hatch. I didn't see any bullets, so it may not have been loaded. I pitched it off the back of the tank anyway, just to be safe. When it hit the concrete roadway I could barely hear the crash it made over the roar of the tank's engine.

I bent down and tried to open the hatch, but the darn thing was made just to prevent what I was trying to do, and I had no luck getting a good enough hold of it to pull it open. Frustrated, I slapped the top of the hatch with the palm of my gloved hand. It smarted a bit, but more importantly it made a bonging sound, like you get when you hit things that are metal... and hollow.

I stamped my foot on the top of the tank, then I jumped up and landed on it with both feet. My custom-made sneakers cushioned the impact very effectively and the sound was muffled compared with when I had smacked it with my hand. Slapping the tank seemed silly anyway, but it did give me hope for my hazy plan to stop it. I skipped down the front of the turret, bracing myself with one hand on the cannon barrel. Then I jumped off in a low arc to land about thirty feet in front of the tank.

I had a strong urge to bend over and wag my butt at the tank, but I resisted. It wouldn't have been professional and that helicopter was still overhead with its big camera lens underneath looking right at me. Seeing me in front of him did seem to piss off the maniac in the tank anyway. He revved the diesel engine and the tank lurched as he changed gears and tried to run me over.

I ran away before he could reach me and joined Neeka at the pile of debris that used to be two county patrol cars.

"Way to go," Neeka congratulated me. "Now he's just trying to kill us."

"Sarcasm duly noted. At least we've got him turned around," I said, and began picking through the low pile of metal looking for something I could use. He had really made a mess of the cars. They were just pieces now, and none of them too big.

"Look quicker," Neeka warned. "Here he comes."

"Got it!" I pulled out a cylinder of metal a few feet long with a ball of gears on one end. It was pretty heavy, and just what I needed. I picked it up and waved it back and forth like a baseball bat, to get a feel for its balance.

"Drive shaft," Neeka identified it for me. "And what's left of the differential. If you hit him with it, mind the shrapnel." She turned the bike and moved back down the road some more, to get out of range and to taunt the driver of the tank into backtracking further.

I stood my ground, holding the drive shaft in both hands. I thought about what he could do to some unfortunate family's house with that machine. I pictured it smashing through the walls and crushing all their stuff. I imagined it bulldozing through the walls of a classroom full of little kids, mashing them to a bloody pulp. I tried to work myself into a state of fury. I tried to dump every bit of adrenalin I could into my bloodstream. I planned to use it all, to pull out all the stops and give this every bit of strength I had.

The tank came on, roaring its challenge and clanking toward me. I waited for it to come to me and when it was about ten feet away, I swung the drive shaft around and brought it down on the front of the tank, giving it a good smack. The weight of the steel shaft and the force of the blow lifted me off the ground just before my club came down on the thick armor.

The sound was incredible. The whole tank rang like a huge bell. As Neeka predicted, the differential shattered instantly into a million pieces, but the shaft held together. Even though the metal bits flew everywhere, none of them hit me very hard, and the suit kept those that did from tearing through. The bruises would be healed before I got back home again, if I managed to avoid being ground into Dragonburger or blown into Dragon nuggets.

I danced backward from the moving tank and raised my club again, this time in a batter's stance so I could get more force into the swing. I could see a big dent on the front of the tank where I had hit it the first time, and I aimed for the same spot once more.

I smashed my metal club into the front of the tank and again there was a sound like the biggest bell in the world being hit with the biggest hammer. It was really impressive. It must have been very unpleasant for anyone inside the machine. My hands smarted and my ears rung, but the driver had to be in a world of hurt, hearing that godawful sound from inside there.

Once more I hit the tank in the same spot. This time the front split open and I could see inside a little bit. I had raised the club to hit it again, when I realized that the tank had stopped moving and was just sitting still.

"He's going for the cannon!" I thought. Fear jolted down my spine and I swung my club at the tank so hard that I actually knocked it back a few inches. That startled me. I didn't know how hard I had to hit a 70 ton object to get it to move, but it must have been really, really hard. Encouraged, I started to hit it again, but I checked my swing when I saw the hatch on the front deck of the tank open and a hand stick out, palm out and fingers spread. That hand was joined by another, then a head appeared. The man lurched out of the hatch and fell onto the sloping front. He slid down and fell to the ground like a rag doll, landing on his back at my feet. It was then that I saw that blood was streaming from his ears, nose and eyes.

It was a horrible sight, and I couldn't stand to look at it. I dropped the badly bent and dented drive shaft and walked away. Beating on the tank had been a lot of fun, but seeing what had happened to the man inside made me sick to my stomach. I couldn't remember any stories about superheroes that barfed at the sight of blood and I didn't want my first public appearance to be remembered for something like that, so I turned my head away and tried to calm my stomach.

Neeka brought the bike to a stop right in front of me and I hopped on. I'd done my job and it was time to leave. Sticking around would just mean more TV footage and a better chance for someone to get a good enough look at me and figure out who I was. There was already an opportunity for anyone who saw Neeka and I leaving school early and could put 2 and 2 together to identify us.

"Can you lose the helicopter?" I asked, doubtfully.

"I can try."

She raced back up the road the way we had come. When we flew past Major Carson and the Sergeant Major, I blew them a kiss, just to be nice and to apologize for breaking their tank.

Going the other way, Neeka shot the gap in the roadblock faster than she had before. This time, the waves the two deputies gave us included more fingers and one of them even looked like he was trying to salute.

On the way back, Neeka took us down every tree-lined street and through every narrow alley she knew about. We got some funny looks from the people we passed and some of them seemed strangely happy to see us roar past their houses, destroying the tranquility of their neighborhood. There even was a good bit of pointing, smiling, and waving, and we both smiled and waved back politely in reply.

After about a half-hour of playing tag with the helicopter, we finally lost sight of it when we took a shortcut through the downtown park and Neeka slowed to a normal speed — normal for her — and went back to the main roads to get us home again. Once out of range of the eye in the sky, I dropped my disguise and pushed my hood back.

When we drove through the double doors of the workshop, there was a small crowd of people waiting for us: Mom, Mrs. Morgan, Jim and Bud, Sara Henderson, and Steve Wojeski. The first four weren't a surprise. The Henderson sisters knew enough to be able to recognize Neeka and me on TV, and Sara had even elected herself President of my fan club, so she wasn't too much of a surprise either; but seeing Steve standing there with everyone else was something of a shock. I had done my best to keep him as far away from my secret life as I could, and even though I'd confessed my secret to him after almost destroying the weight room, I thought he hadn't really believed me.

When Neeka shut off the bike, everyone started applauding. I had never been applauded before, and I blushed so hard I could feel my face get hot.

"We saw it all on TV!" Sara burbled. She was so excited that she was bouncing up and down. "It was AWESOME!"

"It was pretty impressive, sis," Bud said. "You took out a freakin' tank!"

Neeka took off her sunglasses and her cap. She pulled the clips out of her hair and let it fall around her shoulders just as her mother grabbed her and hugged her.

"Darling, that was the bravest thing I've ever seen," she told her. "Your father will either be so proud he will burst, or he will be so mad he will explode!"

"Either way," Neeka said, "that sounds very messy. Let's not tell him, OK?"

"What?"

"Yeah," I said to everyone in the room, "please let's keep this in the room. The fewer people who know — the better."

"Of course, honey," Mom said, "Everyone here understands the importance of keeping your secret." She said it in a reassuring way, but loud enough for everyone to hear. Since Steve was the only person she hadn't met before this, she must have intended it for him.

Steve had crowded around like everyone else, but he hadn't said anything yet. I took one step and launched myself into his arms, trusting him to catch me. He did, of course. He cradled me in his arms and I put one of mine around his neck.

"Welcome to the family, big guy," I said. "You knew it was me?"

"As soon as I got home, I saw it on TV," he said. "They'll be replaying that clip all day and all night. Of course, as soon as I saw you standing on top of that tank, I knew it was you. Even with that stuff on your face, I knew. No other girl would have the balls to stop and check out the view at a time like that."

I wanted to ask how many girls he knew who got into hand-to-hand battles with heavily armored vehicles, but I kept that comment to myself. He was taking this marvelously well and I didn't want to spoil things.

"Oops! Busted for sightseeing," I said. "It's always the small things that get you. So, you just came on over?"

"I called Jim and told him that I knew. He said I may as well join the group, that we would be going out to eat later and that he knew you would want me along."

Steve swung me around so I could see Jim, who was standing at the back of the pack. He grinned at me like the cat who swallowed the canary and I wondered just how much matchmaking he had been doing on my behalf. Both Reynolds boys had changed a lot from the spoiled brats they used to be. I realized that I didn't know how much that had been, or how little. Maybe I had underestimated them from the start.

"He was right about that. Now that you know, I guess things will be different between us, hunh?"

"You mean, you're going to quit hiding stuff from me, and I might get to see more of you?"

"Not much left to hide. I guess I'll have to try to work you into my busy schedule somewhere."

"Your busy crimefighting schedule? I wondered why it was you kept running off and disappearing on me. I thought you might have another guy you were seeing, but Jim said no, that you just had some important stuff you were doing. Now I know what kind of stuff he wouldn't tell me about."

I wanted to ask about how long he and Jim had been such big buddies, but I held my tongue. There would be time to turn over those rocks later, if I even decided to pursue it.

Steve put me down so Mom could give me a hug. After that, a line formed and I hugged everyone who had come to meet us. After promising to tell the whole story to everyone before we left for dinner, Neeka and I stayed behind in the Lair (she keeps calling it that, and I gave up trying to make her quit; now she's got me doing it, too) while everyone else went back upstairs.

We got the doors shut, and turned the bike around, and then we sat down on the mats to talk.

"This is going to change things," she said. "More things, anyway."

"Yeah. They've got pictures now. Everyone will know The Dragon is real."

"No turning back now."

"We could. We could just quit. Let it all go. Wait for it all to blow over."

"You won't."

"No, I won't. I knew this could happen. It was inevitable, from the first time I put on this suit. I can't stop. I have to go on. You know why."

"Because you can. Or, more importantly, because others can't — or won't. Because you can't stand to see people hurt, not even if they deserve it. Not even if you have to hurt them yourself to get them to stop hurting others. 'All that is needed for evil to thrive is for those who could stop it to deny that it is their responsibility to do so.' I'm paraphrasing somebody. I don't remember the exact quote."

"It was Burke, and that's close enough. I did a Web search on Evil and that kept popping up. The problem with explaining that is I can't tell someone who is trying to thank me that I do this because they're shirking their duty. Now there is something else, too."

"What?"

"I enjoy it too much to quit," I confessed shamelessly. I was feeling less guilty about enjoying it than I had been.

"I know. I knew the same way Steve knew it was you. When you were standing on top of that tank, looking around like some kind of tourist, you were happy. In a situation where any sane person would have been terrified, you were calm enough to stand there and enjoy the moment — even check out the scenery. You were so happy, you had to work to get mad enough to be able to clobber the tank. It's not just pain you have a high threshold for, it's action."

"Guilty as charged. You going to stay?"

"Are you kidding? I wouldn't miss it for the world. I even thought of my own nom de guerre."

"Your what?"

"That's right, you took Spanish for your foreign language requirement. It's French. It means, 'war name', like a Resistance fighter, or a member of the Foreign Legion. I'm going to be 'Ace'. I think I'll have an ace of diamonds silk-screened on the back of my jacket."

"'Ace of Diamonds'. I like it. Very strong, yet feminine. And a red card, too. 'Ace of Clubs' wouldn't work as well."

"And 'Ace of Hearts' is too romantic. As for 'Ace of Spades'..."

"Let's not go there."

"Let's just stick to 'Ace'."