'Have a nice flight,' he said in a grudging voice. 'I hope God doesn't do a Job on you.'
'Where are you going?' I asked loudly.
'Are you kidding?' He patted the Huey's controls. 'This baby and its weapons stores will fetch a high enough price that the Church of St. Judas will be riding high for years. Months, if I really enjoy myself.' He waved at me jauntily with a free hand, folding his second and third fingers down to form the Horns of Androcles-an ancient witches' symbol of good luck.
I tossed the headset inside and sealed the hatch. The copter rose swiftly from its pillar of dust to rotate about and race east toward the national forest-and the desert beyond.
'Impossible,' the launch director said. 'You can't launch tonight.' He was older than I was, balding and soft from too much desk work in bureaucratic surroundings. He leaned back in his console chair to stare at me.
All I needed that moment was a battle of wills. I stared back at him and leaned threateningly forward. I still carried the M-16.
'I don't pay you to say things are impossible.'
'That's a good line,' he said. 'Let me write that down.' He picked up a doughnut and bit a hunk out of it, washing it down with a swig of beer.
I leaned farther. The butt of the rifle thudded against the desktop.
'
is ready. Canfield told me so as I walked in. All you've been doing for the past two days has been flight simulations.'
He leaned forward, face-to-face with me. 'Listen, Mr. Del Taco, or whatever your name is. I don't think I like what I was hired to do here. There's an awful lot of rumors circulating that you have something to do with that crazy ad campaign. You may not understand this, but to get where you're going requires a specific launch window. I may be helping you accomplish some sort of twisted publicity stunt, but I'm not going to jeopardize my career by doing it clumsily!' He finished the doughnut and returned to his semirecline. 'We couldn't possibly consider a flight before calculating a new launch window. There might be one around five or six this morning.'
'That's fine for you,' I said, taking the beer from his hand and tossing it into the wastebasket. 'We, on the other hand, are being trailed by some annoyingly rude characters. The same ones who pureed Old Downtown a couple hours ago. Do you want to be around here running simulations when
show up?'
He frowned, looking for a moment at his empty fingers.
'I could probably work up a launch window a few hours sooner if I calculate a greater liftoff thrust. But with this jalopy, we might blow a fuel pump, and you'll wind up scattered over the Midwest.' He folded his arms, daring me to challenge his authority. He didn't know that I was ready to go up against the ultimate Authority.
'Give me odds.'
'One in ten.'
I carefully laid the M-16 across his desk blotter and grabbed him by his greying shirt's collar to pull him face-to- face again. He made a gulping sound but allowed me to speak.
'The odds of the people on our tail knowing about StratoDyne are fifty-fifty. They aren't interested in taking prisoners.'
'Then the sooner you let go of me, the sooner I can reprogram.'
I let go.
He straightened his collar and stood. 'I'll get the flight programmers working on it immediately. Head over to Flight Prep and find Gunther. Tell him I'll be over in a while.'
'Make it quick.' I glanced at the three women and nodded toward the door.
'I'll make it right, if you don't mind.' The launch director sat back again in his console chair and swiveled toward his terminal. The keyboard rattled like tapdancers on amphetamines.
People rushed past us as we wandered toward Flight Prep. No one wore any sort of uniform or identifying marks. Most of the people were young and energetic, though some very old people moved among them with easy determination. Almost nobody middle-aged was around. My generation had lived through the strangulation of space
