the wind clapped them against one another.
After opening the door and relieving myself, I brought the van back down and tried to decide-
-as I ate some Munchies—how to get back to the road without being seen. There was no easy way to do that. I carefully drove over the rough terrain and waited at the gully edge until no traffic was within sight, then flew across the chasm and nearly scraped the far rim in my haste to get across. Settling the van down, I drove on over the sand, up the grade, and pulled onto the interstate as a road train went thundering by. I followed it into New Denver to meet Nikki.
Chapter 7
When I’d finished my story, Nikki just said, “Anti-grav rods? Phil, are you feeling all right?”
“Yes… No!”
We both laughed.
“Well,” Nikki said, “crazy or not, it looks like you’re my best bet, even though you seem to be a real lightning rod for trouble.”
“What? No. You need to get as far away from me as you can. I’m trouble and—”
“I was already leaving. I’m packed. No doubt whoever’s after you will figure you’ve told me your story—which you have, you dummy.”
“Sorry.”
“So, now I’m a marked woman. And you’re my fastest ticket out of here. I’ve nothing to lose at this point by going with you.”
“But—” I argued with all the intellect I could muster.
“Let me get dressed.” She got up.
“But—” I expounded.
“No ‘buts.’ You’re the only chance I’ve got. And quit looking at me like that. This towel is anchored on very securely.”
I blushed. It was hard not to stare at a body like Nikki’s. I knew better than to try to talk her out of coming with me. She had a mind of her own. And, quite frankly, I was glad to have a partner in my lunacy. I just regretted the danger that I’d managed to get Nikki sucked into.
In a few moments, Nikki returned fully dressed in a tight in all the right places, green jump suit, “Come here.”
She handed me a men’s shirt and unlatched the shirt I had on, “Take off your shirt and see if this fits. It’s one of Craig’s. He has dozens squirreled away here.”
It fit.
“OK,” Nikki said, “We’ll pack up a bag for you. Bet you haven’t any other clothes judging from your outfit.”
“That bad?”
She nodded. “One more thing. Come in here.” She led me into the dressing room. “Since your van’s been changed and you were careful coming here, I have a feeling you got spotted by your sorry face. Maybe they’ve stationed an agent at each area where they thought you might show up.
Whatever happened, you need a change of face.”
“What?” Then I saw what she had in mind. “Oh, come on, Nikki—”
Before I could do anything she had the instaface kit slapped on me. “Any preference?” she asked.
“Just make me look handsome,” I muttered through the machine.
She snickered. “Don’t ask the impossible.” I felt the synthaskin growing into my face. It felt foreign for a moment then became a part of me. “Now open your eyes,” she said.
“Nikki—”
Too late, I didn’t blink in time and felt the lens pop onto the surface of my eyes.
“What color of hair?”
“Green.”
“OK—”
“No, wait—”
She just laughed. Fortunately it only became blond. She removed the machine from my face.
“Now not even your own mother would recognize you.”
I studied my face in the mirrored wall, “My own mother wouldn’t want to recognize me.”
Nikki changed her own face as well. In reality neither of us looked a lot different. Just different. And plain. Both of us were blond which caused—I hoped—a person’s eye to notice our hair rather than our plain faces. Nikki had done a good job. And it would stay that way for at least a couple of weeks until our bodies rejected the synthaskin and it sloughed off our faces.
Fifteen minutes later we sneaked out the rear service door of the building with three bags—
one filled with Craig’s clothes that had been appropriated for my use—and two of clothing and odds and ends for Nikki. We also had two bundles: one a slightly used needle rifle and the other an industrial laser. Each “tool” was wrapped in a pillow case. If nothing else, I was picking up quite an arsenal.
No one was on the street. That looked good but I figured someone might be hiding, waiting to nab us when we got into the open. We waited a moment. “Stay here,” I finally ordered Nikki. ”
I’ll pick you up in a minute.”
“No way,” she said and stepped out onto the street with me. I stood there a moment with two bags and the needle gun and decided it was useless to argue. A bag lady came around the corner a block away and looked at us.
“Come on,” I whispered and tugged Nikki in a brisk walk toward the van, somehow managing to resist the urge to run like a scared rabbit.
After enough lifetimes to make a cat feel lucky, we reached the van. We looked back. Now one was on the street. We eased away from the curb and drove down the street.
We hadn’t gone many blocks when the next problem appeared.
“I want to see you fly this thing,” Nikki announced.
I had seen it in Nikki’s face the first time I’d mentioned flying the van. It was that we’re-going-to-do-that- first-thing look. I new I might just as well have been trying to talk a Seeker out of using his joy circuit. Nikki wanted to fly. So Nikki was going to fly.
I tried to explain to her again about my experience with the two fighters that had tried to down my flying turkey.
But she refused to take “no” for an answer.
She had even figured out a safe way to fly without being detected by radar.
And what red-blooded man is going to not give in to anyone as beautiful as Nikki?
“Look, Phil,” she said. “This would be safe to do. The new rockets—which I was flying on as navigator before I got sacked—use powdered aluminum in their fuel to pep up their lift-off. The metal in the rocket’s exhaust messes up the radar.”
“Say no more,” I said. It didn’t take an Einstein to figure out the possibilities there. “Just because it is possible doesn’t mean we’ll do it. That’s final,” I added, as forcefully as I could.
After stopping near the ruins of what must have once been a large home, we repainted the van (a nice pink —yes, Nikki picked it), changed the van’s license imprint, had a picnic, and tried to stay cool during the hot afternoon that’s so common in the thin air of the Denver area.
By the time night fell, Nikki knew the vehicle inside and out and had even done some reprogramming of the computers to make the van fly a bit more faster. And a bit more safely.
I hoped.
She was a navigator and knew what she was doing with the computers; but flying in a vehicle designed to hug the ground is not without its more terrifying—if challenging—aspects. My limited experience had suggested that white-knuckle flights are the norm in a flying van.
