Chapter 8
Adventures in Driving
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The jellycars moved at a slow pace on city streets. They had an internal governor that limited their speed to something slightly above a fast walk, making them less exciting than the kiddie rides at an amusement park. Tom and Luke were going to try to change that.
The Whipples owned a jellycar in a bright magenta color. Tom had petitioned his father to get one when he'd learned that the Gracchians allowed any competent person to drive one, regardless of age. Even if they were slow, Tom still would like to drive a car. The idea didn't go over well with Dad. The city was compact and the Ellsworths lived within easy walking distance of school and the shopping districts; why would they need a car? Tom wanted to tell his friends back on Earth that he was driving; he knew they'd be impressed.
The poky, slow jellycars-- so called by the Humans because of their bright, semi-translucent colors, and their rounded shapes-- became different vehicles once on the rails. Each jellycar had an electromagnetic system in the slot beneath the carriage of the car. When it was placed on a maglev rail, the jellycar hovered above the rail, and the almost frictionless propulsion meant that the car could travel at great speeds. But the maglev rails ran between the cities; within the metropolis, a jellycar had to move slowly.
Like most people, the Whipples used the jellycar mostly for trips outside the city; Mr. Whipple needed one to travel to his lecture and conference sites.
"Nearly off," Luke said. He was prying the door off a control panel located near the back of the car where Luke and Tom were jammed shoulder to shoulder. They were pretty sure this was where they'd find the speed governor.
Luke and Tom were at the Whipple's parking platform in the area behind the house. School had let out early after the expedition to Ajincore Field, and the boys had decided that this was the perfect time to explore the hidden potential of a jellycar.
"Careful," warned Tom as Luke jimmied the panel. Neither of them wanted to scratch the car.
"Almost." Luke twisted the door sideways and it popped off. "That's it!" A small flake of magenta jellycar had came off with the door. Luke rubbed a thumb over the spot.
"Do you think they'll notice?" said Tom.
"No, and even if they do, it looks like normal wear," Luke said optimistically.
Now that the panel was off, they could see a panoply of different colored chips protruding from a board inside. Tom had been doing some research on these chips ever since Luke had told him about the speed governor system. The information had been so easy to find, Tom wondered why other people hadn't experimented with the controls.
Now Tom reached out a finger to touch the panel. "The blue chips are all part of the maglev system. Don't touch those, or the safety failsafes won't let it run on the rails. The green chips control stuff like the retractable windshield bubble and the locking mechanism.
"Here." Tom touched the bottom row. "One of the yellow chips controls the speed off the rails."
"But which one?" Luke asked. There were four yellow chips, and each one had a different number of dots on it.
"Um." Tom gazed at the chips as if they would eventually tell him their code, but the chips remained mute.
"Maybe this one," Tom touched the chip with two dots on the top.
Luke glanced toward the house. No sign of Mom; she was still out running errands and should be gone for another hour, at least.
Luke could drive the car with his parents' permission. He'd asked his Mom if he could take Tom out to the Scopos River and back sometime. She'd given permission, but the jellycars were so slow, it was faster to ride a bicycle, Mom had reminded him. "I know, Mom, but Tom really likes the jellycars. And he hasn't been in one since they arrived."
"Well, all right then. But it's not going to become a regular thing," she'd said.
And now they were trying to remove the speed governor before the ride to the river. They’d test the new and improved jellycar, replace the chip and return. No one would be the wiser.
"Okay. Go ahead and try that one," Luke said.
Tom pulled the chip out of the board. The jellycar, on a slightly uneven surface, began to roll.
"Put it back! Put it back! That's the parking brake!" Luke was frantic. He leaped over the side of the jellycar and tried to stop the moving car with his hands.
Tom attempted to put the chip back in its slot, missed. He tried again, and the chip slid home. The car stopped, brake reengaged.
"You know, maybe we should do this somewhere else," Tom said.
"If we do it somewhere else and get stranded, then I'll be in even more trouble than if we mess it up here," Luke said. "Plus, we'd have to walk home."
"All right, then. I'll try the chip with three dots."
"Just be ready to put it in right away if it's not the right one."
Tom pulled the chip. The car began to emit a series of beeps, and Tom hastily replaced the chip. The beeps stopped. "What was that?" Tom asked.
Luke shrugged. "I don't know. A warning system? Try one of the other ones."
Tom removed the chip with one dot. Nothing happened.
"That's it?"
"Only one way to find out," Luke said. "Let's start it and go."
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The car started fine; Luke could tell by the lights on the screen. The engine itself made almost no noise. He slowly pulled out into the street.
"Can you tell?" Tom said.
"Of course not. It's not like I can floor it here. We'll wait until we get out to the river." The Scopos River ran along the northwestern edge of the city, just a short distance beyond Ajincore Field where they'd been earlier today.
Both Humans and Nawaks on bicycles passed the slowly moving jellycar. Tom and Luke did go slightly faster than the walkers. Luke drove through the Vannevar neighborhood and out past Ajincore Field. There were still a number of people at the park trying to clean up the damage. The great underwear sculpture itself had been hauled out of the water. Tom wondered if the disaster really had been due to sabotage, but he doubted it; blaming it on some intruder was just an excuse.
Eventually they reached the Scopos. Luke took the bridge across the river; now they were officially out of the city. There was a road paralleling the river on this side, paved, but rougher than the city roads. The road was lined with trees and bushes, but no other people could be seen, and there weren't any houses. It was practically a racetrack.
Tom and Luke grinned at each other, and Luke accelerated.
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The jellycars were supposed to be undentable. They weren't.
The road heading north along the Scopos grew progressively worse as Luke and Tom went from a walking pace to a fast bicycle pace to a wild downhill all-out sprint pace. And then they went faster.
The wheels on a jellycar weren't like the wheels on an automobile or even a bicycle. The wheels were spherical, about the diameter of a basketball, and they were set in wells in the chassis of the jellycar. Just as a maglev rail kept the car hovering above the contact point, the wheel wells and the spherical wheels themselves didn't touch each other. The jellycars thus could go quite fast without a great deal of engine power. The speed governor was installed to keep people from racing through the city.
Luke and Tom were enjoying the wind in their faces as they raced along. The windshield was down, and the air was streaming by. There were a lot of bugs in the cool, damp air by the river, and Tom was certain that most of them were caught on his face. Every few seconds, he had to reach up and wipe another one away.
"This is great!" Luke whooped.
Tom just grinned some more and caught a bug in his teeth.
The disaster began when Luke caught a bug in his right eye. Semi-blinded, Luke struggled to keep his eyes open enough to see the road. He took his foot off the accelerator, but the car had momentum.
Tom spotted a beas
t in the woods, standing on its hind quarters and peering out between two massive trees. With an incredible lack of self-preservation, the creature shambled out into the road. "Look out!" yelled Tom.
Luke was unable to look out. Both his eyes were streaming tears and his right eye was completely screwed shut by pain. “What?!” he screamed.
Luke couldn’t see to steer. Tom reached over and grabbed the steering column, sharply turning the car barely in time to miss the beast. Tom saw orange eyes flash and a hissing mouth of sharp teeth. The jellycar sloughed sideways and left the road, becoming briefly airborne before it reached zero velocity against a tree trunk. Both Tom and Luke were jolted forward, but the automatic stretchy harnesses kept them from bodily damage.
Luke held his fist above his right eyebrow, trying to consciously relax his right eyelid enough to be able to open the eye. “Oh no. Tell me we didn’t just wreck the car.”
Tom untangled his harness and scrambled out of the jellycar. He ran back to the road. There was nothing, no body in the road, no blood, no fur. Tom searched the side of the road and looked among the shrubs. Whatever that creature had been, they hadn’t hit it.
Tom walked back to the car where Luke had managed to get out the bug. His right eye was red like a cherry popsicle and still watering profusely.
“What happened?” Luke asked.
“I saw something, some kind of animal at the side of the road, then it crossed right in front of the car. I swear the stupid thing had never seen a car before,” Tom said.
“Did we hit it?” Luke said, getting out of the jellycar.
“No.”
“Good. Let’s see if the car is damaged,” said Luke as he walked around to where the car was resting against the tree trunk. Nothing seemed to be wrong; the engine was still gently purring. Luke got back in and slowly pulled away from the tree. The car disengaged with a squeak of protest.
Standing at the front of the car near the point of impact, Tom watched. “Oops,” he said.
“Oops?”
“There’s a dent.” ‘Dent’ was something of an understatement. It was more like a deep wedge shape in the jellycar’s front side. Tom felt the car material. It was neither hard nor soft; it was firm but with a yielding quality to it. He tried to squeeze the dent out of the car but couldn’t.
Luke got out to look. He sighed. “Come on, let’s go home.”
“Maybe we should put the governor chip back in.”
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Both Tom and Luke were grounded for a week. House arrest, excursions to and from school only. There was no appeal granted. Not that Luke didn't try.
"You told me you had an accident the first time you took out Grandpa's truck," he reminded his Father.
Mr. Whipple remained unmoved. "It was meant to be a cautionary tale, not a record that you're supposed to beat. And I was sixteen at the time. Not twelve." There was no support from Mom either. Luke's parents always presented a united front when it came to discipline. There was no right of appeal for twelve year olds, Luke reflected as he went to his room. He was at least lucky that Dad had been able to pull out the dent with a toilet plunger. Not that they needed a toilet plunger in this house, but Mom was a thorough packer. Nothing from their house back on Earth had been left behind.
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No Human thought to look for traces of blood or fur on the underside of the jellycar.
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"Was it fun?" Abby asked Tom. She was in his room to commiserate. Tom also had been grounded for a week. He suspected collusion between Dad and Luke's parents.
"It was great. We would have been fine except for that animal crossing right in front of us,” Tom said. He’d described as much of the animal as he could, but no one recognized his description. There were simply no animals on Gracchia with large orange eyes, and Tom didn’t press the point very hard. It was too much like trying to put blame on ‘The Intruder’ like Valdemar had done at the art exhibit.
"Why did you want to take out the speed control?"
Tom shrugged. If Abby didn't know, he couldn't explain it to her. "To see if we could."
"At least you won't be grounded over vacation," Abby said, walking toward the door.
"But we'll miss the fireworks," said Tom with a long, lugubrious face. Tuesday on Gracchia marked the Fourth of July holiday. Since many of the Humans on Gracchia came from the United States, there was always a celebration. One anonymous benefactor had arranged to import a fireworks show from Earth.
Abby was sympathetic. "Maybe you'll be able to see them from the windows."
"Maybe."
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Dad and Abby left for dinner at the House of Fire. Dad had left a portion of vegetable, chicken and rice casserole for Tom along with heating instructions. Tom knew better than to ask if this healthy food was part of his punishment.
"Dad, why do boys like cars so much?" Abby asked as they walked along the streets of Aurelia.
Oliver reflected on his first love, an old jeep painted powder blue between the rust spots. "I don't know, hon. Maybe it's because we like to take things apart and see how they work. Curiosity, I guess. Some girls like cars, too, you know."
Abby nodded, face serious. "But boys are worse," she stated with certainty.
And there the discussion ended. They'd arrived at the restaurant.
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Alex and Marisol Vargas owned the Mexican restaurant House of Fire, located in the busy central district area of Aurelia. They were the parents of Luis and Sara.
Oliver knew who Alex Vargas was, of course. That is, Alex Vargas had been well-known on Earth before leaving for Gracchia. Born poor, he had built a chain of quick Mexican food restaurants across the United States and had been a millionaire before he was thirty-five. Then a fat woman had sued Taco Grande with the claim that the food made her overweight.
A jury of her peers awarded the woman ten million dollars. Alex Vargas didn't wait around for the award to be reduced by a more sane court. "I became rich by working a hundred hours a week for a decade," he was widely quoted as saying. "This woman becomes rich by eating too much. This is not justice." A judge refused to let Alex Vargas sell his chain of restaurants while the litigation was still ongoing.
Alex Vargas and his family left it all behind and disappeared from Earth.
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Running a restaurant on Gracchia had its challenges. The different species each had a unique eating pattern, and the Vargases wanted as many customers as possible. Humans ate out for lunch or dinner. The other major customer group was the Vannevars; they usually ate in large groups, and their meals came at unpredictable times and lasted for hours. Mr. Vargas requested that his Vannevar clientele call ahead: sometimes this worked, sometimes it didn't. The Gracchus liked their food plain and in large quantity but didn't eat according to any set timetable. Their mealtimes arrived when they were hungry, whenever that may be. There were a few Aeris and Nawak aficionados of Mexican food (the Aeris called it 'food of pain' for the chile peppers), and word of mouth seemed to be growing especially among the Nawak. Sadly, the Elihu were easiest to anticipate. They regarded public eating as unthinkable. It simply wasn't done.
Mrs. Vargas greeted Oliver and Abby at the door and led them to Macready's table. Throughout the restaurant were tables and chairs of varying heights, the better to accommodate a wide variety of patron sizes. The smell of onions and garlic and chiles drifted out of the kitchen and made Abby's mouth water. Poor Tom. Macready was sitting in the corner, in his hand a beer with a slice of lime. "But where is Tom?" Macready asked. He had a great fondness for the Ellsworth children.
Marisol Vargas listened as Oliver told Macready about Tom's and Luke's adventure with the jellycar. "I'm surprised that Luis was not involved," she said. "For once." She gave them their menus and left
Macready stifled a laugh. "I would
have liked to have seen one of those glorified golf carts flying down the road. Still, penance must be due. He's grounded, I take it?"
"For a week. At least the car seems to be undamaged, and thank goodness they didn’t kill an animal."
“Animal?” Macready asked.
Oliver took a sip of his water. “Tom said that they swerved to miss some sort of large animal crossing the road, something with big orange eyes. I don’t doubt that he saw something, but I think the adrenaline caused him to see more than was there. Perhaps some large kind of rodent or another.”
“Ah. And this took place where?” Macready’s voice was casual, but his eyes were sharp.
“Out on the road alongside the river, on the far side of the Sun Bridge,” Oliver said. Oliver recognized that look in his friend’s eyes. In the past, it had usually meant that Macready was contemplating some unorthodox plan of action or unapproved sortie.
“Why do you ask?” Oliver added.
“No reason.” Macready’s gaze was now innocent and open, completely relaxed.
Apropos of nothing, Macready asked, “Have you given any consideration to becoming a permanent resident, applying for full citizenship?”
Oliver laughed. “Have a heart! We’re still figuring out how the plumbing works.”
Abby and Macready joined in the laughter.
They were quiet for a moment as they surveyed their choices. The House of Fire had menus in a variety of languages; these were printed in English on one side, Gracchian on the other. The offerings were a mixture of the familiar and the exotic: enchiladas made with a choice of chicken or verdinger meat, tacos came with a side of beans and berkin fruit. Berkin fruit was funny; it wasn't sweet at all but had a smoky, savory taste more like ham than anything else. The descriptions of the different dishes were long and flowery. A burrito was 'a tantalizing mix of tenderly cooked legumes with sweetly browned onion (sulfuric root vegetable). Includes a choice of fire-roasted verdinger from the grassy plains of Rubico or chicken (similar to wackenbird) from exotic Earth. Topped with melted cheese (lactose product) and fabulous burning green chiles to thrill and challenge your culinary horizons.' And that was one of the plainer descriptions.
When she came back to take their orders, Abby asked Mrs. Vargas if she could have half a chicken burrito, half verdinger enchiladas. "Of course," Mrs. Vargas said.
Macready ordered the enchiladas with a side of green chile made with roasted verdinger. Oliver got the combination plate with a chile relleno, an enchilada and a side of verdinger mole. Abby knew that a mole sauce was made with chocolate. And people thought her cooking was weird. When she first heard of it, she had thought it was a mole sauce as in made out of rodents, but Sara had told her what it was and that it was pronounced mole-ay. She'd also said that the Gracchus who came to the House of Fire almost always ordered the mole dishes because they were so crazy about chocolate.
While Macready, Oliver and Abby were waiting for their food, they discussed the Ellsworths' first month on Gracchia. Macready asked Abby how she liked her school.
"It's okay. It's harder than back on Earth, and Ms. Tavish makes us work a lot more while we're in school, but she doesn't give us much homework."
Macready nodded. "I know she wants her students to get out into Aurelia as much as possible, see the place, learn things firsthand."
"She's nice, too."
"I agree." Macready cast a significant look at Oliver who ignored it.
"I might have a Gracchus as a student within a couple of months," Macready then mentioned, taking a swig of his beer.
Abby was excited. She hadn't seen any children of the other species yet. "Really? A Gracchus kid?"
Macready shook his head. "Actually an adult. They go to school on and off their whole lives. The Gracchus say it keeps their minds awake. I think perhaps it might be a survival instinct as well; they live so long that they have to exercise their minds more than we do."
Oliver had heard that the Gracchus were long-lived, but this was news to Abby. "How long?" she asked.
"About two hundred twenty, two hundred fifty, something like that. About twice what we do, or what we have the potential for," Macready said. "That's why you don't see many Gracchus young-- very low birthrate.
"I've heard that one of the Gracchus children attends Vic Davis' school," Macready continued. Like Macready, Vic Davis was another unconventional teacher, a farmer who now ran a boarding school on Gracchia for the children of traveling traders. In the beauty of the peaceful Gracchian countryside, he ran a productive winery and vegetable farm while also teaching the roots of Human western civilization with special attention to the Greeks, a juxtaposition of philosophy and practicality that seemed very logical to the Gracchus.
"What do the Gracchus children look like?" Abby wanted to know.
Macready shrugged. "Like the adults, only much cuter. All young are cute so their parents want to keep them," he added.
Abby smiled. She was pretty sure Macready was joking, but it wasn't always easy to tell.
The food arrived. Oliver noticed that Abby ate her half burrito but didn't touch the verdinger enchiladas. He thought he knew why.
"Not very hungry?" Oliver asked his daughter with a casual air.
Abby made a show of finishing her mouthful and swallowing before she answered. Dad was big on manners, especially in public. "Umm. I thought I would take some of it home."
Verdinger enchiladas were Tom's favorite; he had ordered them on both previous visits to the House of Fire.
Abby quickly changed the subject. "Are you going to the fireworks on Tuesday?" she asked Macready. Mrs. Vargas arrived at the table to box the leftovers and deliver the tab.
"Wouldn't miss it for the world," Macready answered, grabbing the bill from Oliver’s fingers quicker than his friend could blink.
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Far Travels, The Gracchian Adventures, Book One Page 8