Hair Power

by Piers Anthony

  The boys laughed good-naturedly. “It’s just practice,” Speedo said as he recovered the ball.

  He pitched again, this time lower and faster. She swung again, connected, and again the ball sailed well out into the field. This time the fielder was out there, and chased it, but it was still beyond him.

  Quiti shook her head. “I can’t explain it. Usually I’m lucky just to hit the ball, and it goes about ten feet. Something’s making me feel strong. Maybe it is the meds.” Though she was not on any meds at the moment.

  Speedo considered. “Wanna arm wrestle?”

  And he had real muscles in his arms. But it might be a valid test. “Go easy on me,” she said. “I’m really no good at this.”

  They went to a park bench and set up for a contest, hands linked, elbows on the table. “Starting,” Speedo said, and applied slow pressure.

  Quiti returned it. He pushed harder. She pushed back harder. He applied real force. She resisted, but was slowly being overwhelmed. So there were limits to this mysterious power. “You got me,” she said.

  He stopped immediately. “But you’re pretty strong.”

  She laughed. “For a sick girl.”

  “For anyone.”

  “I’ll have to go ask what’s in those meds.”

  “Can you get some for us?”

  She shook her head. “It’s probably illegal, outside the lab.”

  “You wanna join our team?”

  “No way. When this stuff wears off, I’ll be nothing again. But thanks for humoring me.”

  “You’re more of a woman than I took you for, Quiti. If I were your age, I’d ask you for a date.”

  “Fortunately you aren’t. You won’t need to embarrass yourself with a bald girl.”

  “You got a wig, don’t you?”

  She produced her wig. “Yes. But all it does is make me a nothing in a wig.”

  “I’m not sure of that.” This was a more thoughtful boy than she had supposed. She had evidently won his respect by showing some physical prowess, and he wasn’t concerned about her dull appearance. “I think you’re pretty good to handle your condition the way you do. I’d have freaked out.”

  Was this getting serious? Would she consider going out with a sixteen year old boy? “Thanks, no thanks. You are kind to offer, but I have to get home.”

  “If you change your mind—”

  “I’ll let you know.” She walked away.

  Now she had at least two things to ponder. It seemed that her new-found strength was real, and she might actually get a date, at least for a day. Would she care to make out with an underage boy? That could be legal trouble. But he would never tell where it counted.

  That evening she went for her college math class. She was abysmal in math, but she liked the people in it, so she normally suffered though. She had donned her wig, as the professor felt that it was less distracting to others than her bald head. This time her scalp did not tingle, maybe because there was no sunlight to be had.

  She was early. So was her friend Kate, who had been treated for skin cancer and survived, so she understood about chemo and nausea. “I couldn’t make head or tail of the assignment,” Kate confided. “This calculus—it makes no sense to me.”

  “It does make sense,” Quiti said. “Ordinary math can’t properly handle things like trajectories or gravitational attraction, which have changing ratios, but calculus can. So if you want to be an astronaut, it’s better to know it.”

  “Quiti! You actually sound as if you understand it!”

  “Well, it’s not that complicated when you get into it. You just have to understand its basis, starting with derivatives. They’re not Greek even if some Greek symbols are used.”

  “But this example in the book—that sure is Greek to me!”

  “No, no. That’s just the rationale for calculating a graph or chart that is logarithmic in nature. It’s simple, really.” She went on to clarify it for her friend.

  “I’ll be damned,” Kate said. “It does make sense! Thank you, thank you!”

  “Max the exam,” Quiti said.

  “And why didn’t you max it?” a voice behind her asked.

  Quiti jumped. It was Professor Taylor, the math teacher! He had come in while she was distracted clarifying the example for Kate. “I’m sorry,” Quiti said. “I didn’t mean to interrupt the class.”

  “You flunked that example yourself,” Taylor said. “But obviously you understand it very well. What happened?”

  What had happened, indeed! Quiti suddenly realized that she had not just gained physical strength today, she had become far more intelligent. She understood things she had never grasped before. How could that be? This was distinctly weird. But she needed an answer for the moment, so she tried to make a joke of it. “Today I have my thinking cap on.” She touched her wig.

  The professor laughed. “That must be it. Keep it on.” He moved on to start the class. But she knew he would not be forgetting this incident.

  Quiti was increasingly certain that her encounter with the hairball had not been a hallucination. Hair Brain had given her something that was changing her life. How and why were things she would still have to figure out.

  When she got home that evening and gazed at herself in the mirror, she discovered that her head was no longer quite bald. It was covered with a mat of very short hair, like five o’clock shadow on a man.

  She was actually growing a new head of hair. But she strongly suspected that that was the least of it.

  Chapter 3:

  Date

  In the next ten days her hair grew to an inch in length. She went out daily to walk in the sun, because the hair was hungry for energy. It was translucent to the point of invisibility, but when she focused, it could change color, becoming brown, blond, red, black, gray, or actually any color at all, including blue, green, or even striped or polka dotted. Yet she had the feeling that this was only the beginning of its properties.

  She ate voraciously, everything her mother provided and more. She also went quietly out back and scooped up handfuls of dirt, swallowing them. She knew this was for the hair: it needed more than a standard diet provided. She obliged it without telling her folks, knowing that they would think her crazy. The hairball had certainly come through for her in that respect: she now had hair like no other. Yet despite her huge intake, she was losing weight. Her face and body were becoming lean. She had to eat even more. How could she do it without attracting unwanted attention?

  Maybe there was a way. She walked to Speedo’s house. “I need a favor,” she told him. “I need to eat a lot without other folk knowing. Could you take me to an all you can eat place and pretend you’re eating most of it? I’ll pay for it. I just need privacy.”

  “Sure,” he said eagerly. “Anything you want, Quiti.”

  “What can I do for you in return?”

  He gazed at her, and she knew he was seeing what she couldn’t conceal: she was no longer chubby or pimply. She was a lean mean machine. Some of it was improved posture, but more was robustly improving fitness. Her legs were muscling out, her waist was thinning, and her perky breasts now rested upon a nicely contoured chest. Only her still seemingly bald head marred the effect. She had become sexy.

  “Not that favor,” she said before he spoke. “It’s not that you are unworthy or unattractive, Speedo. It’s that I am twenty and you are sixteen. It would be statutory rape on my part. I have problems enough without getting mired in that sort of hassle. Otherwise I would do it.”

  “I wouldn’t tell.”

  “You’re a virile young man. You’d have to tell. Otherwise it wouldn’t count.”

  He did not argue the case. “Damn. And I’ll bet you could beat me now at arm wrestling.”

  “Speedo, I’m not here to embarrass you.”

  “But you could. You’re just bursting with vigor. It’s not just sex appeal.”

  She nodded. “Ask for something else.”

  “Well, there’s a dance tomorrow, and
I don’t have a date,” he said hesitantly. “You—you weren’t much, before, but now you’re a bombshell.”

  “Thank you. That I can do. I will be your girl for the dance. I will dress pretty, I will kiss you, I will put on the show. Everyone will know you have a viable companion.”

  “Great! It’s a date.”

  “It’s a date,” she agreed. “I’ll even put on a more attractive wig.”

  “Yeah.” He was understandably at a loss to say more about that.

  Then she thought of something else. Not only was he believing her, he was pretty sharp. She could use his active support. “Speedo, can I trust you?”

  “Quiti, I can’t help looking!”

  He had misunderstood. “You may look,” she agreed, opening her blouse so that he could see down into her vibrant bosom. “This is something else.”

  He licked his lips. “Anything!”

  “It’s that I have hair now, but I don’t want others to know. Will you help me keep that secret?”

  “Sure!”

  “Like this.” She focused, and turned her hair brown.

  “Wow!”

  Then she turned it blue.

  “Don’t do that in public!” he said, alarmed.

  “But if I forget, and it shows a color, you’ll help cover for me.”

  “Oh, yes! How do you do it?”

  “That’s a story. I’ll tell you, if.”

  “I don’t have to talk about that. I won’t tell.”

  “Thank you. Now let’s go and gorge.” She handed him a twenty dollar bill. “You’ll pay.”

  “Quiti, you don’t need to—”

  “Humor me. And cover for me. Here and at the dance.”

  “Okay!”

  They walked to Joe’s All You Can Eatery, where a single cover charge per person sufficed. They loaded their plates high and went to a booth, where Speedo nibbled and Quiti ate ninety percent of both plates. Then they refilled them and continued.

  “Wow,” Speedo murmured. “You weren’t kidding about eating a lot.”

  “We can go slower for dessert. Then I’ll talk.”

  The proprietor, Joe, had kept on eye on them, to make sure the food wasn’t being wasted. “I’ve got half a left over wedding cake in back I need to use up. You want it?”

  “Oh, yes,” Quiti agreed.

  They took the huge portion and she dug in. Between mouthfuls she spoke. “You can believe me or not. Just don’t tell.”

  “Got it.”

  “I was going to kill myself, since I’ll soon be dying in pain anyway. You know, cut to the chase.”

  “Don’t do it, Quiti!”

  “Instead I met this alien telepathic hairball trapped in a warehouse. I helped him get into the sunlight, and he floated up and sat on my head to give me a nice head of hair. Now I’m spending a lot of time in the sun, and eating a lot, to give the hair energy and substance. It’s some hair.”

  “It sure is! But it doesn’t make sense.”

  She shrugged. “I said you don’t have to believe.”

  “I believe! I have a feel for aliens. I love ET type movies. But why didn’t the hairball float up out of there on his own? He didn’t need you to let him out.”

  “Well, the door was latched.”

  “He could have pushed the latch himself. Quiti, that wasn’t chance. He was waiting for you.”

  She stared at him. “Why?”

  “Because maybe the kind of help he needed wasn’t getting out of a warehouse. Maybe it was a good person with nothing to lose. For something bigger than just hair.”

  It was a revelation. Of course it was true! “He did say we would meet again. I didn’t credit it because I didn’t figure to be alive that long.”

  “He read your mind. He knew you were a good person. Quiti, I think he gave you more than hair.”

  “Hair like this isn’t enough?”

  “What good would a dead girl be to him? That hair is giving you health.”

  “It certainly is. It’s making me strong and smart, and I think it’s starting to make me telepathic.” She was saying too much, but she was tuning in to his mind and knew she could trust him. It was a relief to have such a dialogue at last.

  “And I’ll bet it’s curing your cancer.”

  She stared again. “My cancer!”

  He nodded. “I think you owe that alien.”

  “Oh my god,” she breathed. Then she leaned forward and kissed him on the mouth.

  “I want to be your friend,” he said, pleased. “Even if it’s without benefits. I think you have much more of a future than you expected.”

  Her head was spinning, and not from illness. “Yes to both, I think.”

  It was time to move on. Her belly was so full it almost looked as if she were pregnant, but she felt comfortable and exhilarated.

  “About the dance,” she said. “I really don’t want to advertise how I’ve changed, especially if I’m going to be around for the long haul. Is it okay with you if I’m anonymous? Like a masked visitor?”

  “Great!”

  Next evening they went to the dance. Her belly was already flat; her digestion had improved significantly along with the rest of her. She wore a flaring skirt and tight blouse, and her new wig was glorious. The mask covered only her eyes, really concealing nothing, but her face had changed enough so that it was unlikely that anyone would recognize her. Certainly her body was from another realm. She took Speedo’s arm as they entered the chamber, and she knew that all eyes were upon them. She smiled and inhaled, knowing that she threatened to burst out of the blouse. She was giving them the show, making the boys envy Speedo.

  They registered at the desk. “Speedo,” he said. “And my date, the visiting Lady Excelsior.” He paid the fee and filled out the name tags.

  They danced. She whirled, making her skirt spread out in a full circle, showing off her legs. After the first dance, the men started cutting in. She accommodated them; she now had coordination beyond her fondest prior ambitions, and was mistress of all the intricate steps. Speedo plainly didn’t mind; a date like this added significantly to his teen credits. Between dances she was with him, smiling and giving him her full rapt attention. She was really enjoying the script, which was totally alien (no pun) to her prior existence.

  “Who are you?” one man asked. “I know all the gals around here, but I don’t know you.”

  Because he had paid no attention to the sick chubby girl no one wanted to date. But she knew him: a handsome rake. But, true to her identity as a visitor, she merely smiled. “You would not believe my origin, stranger.”

  “Come have a drink with me.”

  She glanced around and saw that Speedo was dancing with a pretty girl. He was evidently more in demand now that he had proven his mettle by snagging a beauteous visitor. “One,” she agreed. “Then I must return to my date.”

  They went to the bar where he ordered mellow vodka. Vodka was notorious for its deceptive mildness that masked a hundred proof alcohol or more; it was possible to get drunk before one realized. But she could handle alcohol; she had tried it privately, making sure. She could not get drunk; the energy went straight to feed the hair.

  She knew with the first sip that the drink was spiked. Probably the date rape drug. But she also felt her system marshaling to counter it. That was a new talent of the hair, somehow protecting her internally as well as externally, and not just from alcohol. She continued drinking, tuning in on the man’s mood: he was hot for sex. As if she needed even token telepathy to pick up on that.

  “Thank you,” she said as she finished. “It’s a very nice drink.” Then she returned to Speedo, who of course was not drinking, being underage. That was just as well.

  Immediately another man came to their table. “I hear you’re good with cars,” he said to Speedo. “I got engine trouble, and I have to make a rendezvous. Can you help?”

  Speedo glanced at Quiti. “Go ahead,” she said. “I’ll keep.”

  He got up and acco
mpanied the man outside. Whereupon the rake moved in. So it was a setup to get her alone. This was interesting.

  “How you feeling, Lady E?” the man asked.

  Oh yes, the spiked drink. Quiti feigned dizziness. “Unsteady,” she confessed. As she recalled, the drug did not render a girl unconscious, merely without much volition, so that she became amenable to whatever the man wanted, and had no memory of it the next day. An ideal one-two punch, for the man: no resistance, no recriminations.

  “Oh, that’s too bad. You need to lie down for a while.”

  “Yes,” she agreed faintly. She accepted his firm hand on her elbow as he guided her to a private chamber and locked the door. Now he had her alone, drugged.

  “Just relax,” he said as he helped her lie down on the oh-so-convenient bed. “Let me loosen your clothes so you can breathe more easily.” He got to work on her blouse, then her bra, baring her breasts. They were full and fine, with no sag.

  “Oh, thank you,” she said. “That’s much better.”

  “Much better,” he agreed, bending down to kiss them.

  Then he worked on her skirt, carefully drawing it down and off. This presented her with a problem: she knew she could overcome him at any time, because he had no inkling of her physical strength. But she didn’t want to make a nasty scene that might give someone a hint of her real identity and powers, and might also hurt Speedo’s reputation, since he had brought her here. He could be accused of being in on the date rape conspiracy. She also didn’t want to reveal her ability to resist.

  But neither was she about to let him rape her. She had no fear of sex, but wanted it to be with a man she chose to give it to, not this impostor. Actually, a nice young man like Speedo, ironically. What was a person to make of a culture that forbade compatible sex between friends, and promoted it between enemies? But that was a question for another day. What could she do?

  Now he was drawing off her panties. Whatever she was going to do, she needed to do soon, or it would be too late. Knock him out with a knee to the face? Tie him naked to the bed? Such actions would serve him right, but there would be repercussions.

  The man didn’t bother to remove her token mask. That was not the part of her that interested him.