3rd World Products, Inc., Book 5

by Ed Howdershelt

Gesturing around the cabin, I said, "Yeah. Check out this plane. This isn't some save-a-lot budget charter. I'll bet half these guys are lawyers of some sort, and one of 'em's bound to sue somebody about being hijacked."

  Toni snickered as Sue said, "Most of them are politicians."

  "Heh. Same thing. Maybe worse. Something like eighty-five percent of the elected officials in America are -- or have been -- lawyers, and that hasn't really helped matters one damned bit, as far as I can tell. Why did this batch of legal eagles happen to cluster aboard this jet?"

  "They were scheduled to attend a seminar in Washington concerning anti-terrorism security measures."

  Snorting a short laugh, I said, "And here they are on a hijacked plane. Maybe now they'll see it as more than a way to milk the treasury. That'd be something new, wouldn't it?"

  The attendant seemed to make up her mind. She used my arm to pull herself to her feet and stood glaring at me for a moment, then asked, "What do you want me to do?"

  "Just work with these ladies to make sure everybody has their carry-on stuff and get them across to the flitters."

  "That's all?"

  "That's all. We aren't hijackers, ma'am. This is supposed to be a rescue mission." Indicating Sue, I said, "This lady will let the people you're moving wake up enough to cooperate. If they won't cooperate, she'll knock 'em out and it'll be up to you to make sure their stuff goes with 'em."

  She balked just a bit and narrowly asked, "If it's really an emergency, why do you care about their carry-on luggage?"

  Sighing, I said, "Aw, hell. Just do it, lady." To Sue, I said, "I'm going up front. If she doesn't cooperate, zap her and toss her on a flitter."

  Meeting the attendant's gaze, Sue noddingly replied, "No problem."

  Such was the effect of Sue's heavy theta waves that the passengers barely noticed me as I walked to the cockpit.

  "Five suit on," I said as I reached the forward cabin and approached the cockpit door. Sue had cleared the area, but sometimes I'm just not a real trusting soul, and we still didn't know how the gas had been delivered.

  Several minutes of rooting around the cockpit later, I'd made a small pile of odd items in the middle of the deck.

  Through my implant, I said, "Sue, I'd like all loose objects from the cockpit and cabins to leave with us. Put it all on the last flitter run and don't let anyone aboard it unless Linda okays them."

  "Okay."

  "Also, make sure nobody jettisons anything once they're aboard the flitters. In fact, you can keep them all sedated until they're in someone's custody downstairs. Did you figure out how the gas got aboard?"

  "Not yet, Ed."

  Hm. Little things can mean a lot. Steph or Elkor would very likely have said only, "No, Ed," not "Not yet." They'd have reported only progress, not intent.

  "Sue, you're kind of special. I'll tell you about it later. How's the evacuation going?"

  "Smoothly. I've only had to stun two people. The others have generally cooperated. We should have everybody off the plane in another five minutes or so."

  As I made my way back to the hatch, I said, "Great. Would you give Linda an update, then patch me through to her?"

  "Okay."

  A few moments later, Linda said, "I'm here, Ed."

  "Hi, Fearless Leader. I just wanted to know where I'll be after we evacuate the plane. Do you want me to stay aboard?"

  "No, we're going to track it and prepare an interception. Sue will send one of the flitters to pick up two teams once the passengers are on the ground. After that you can stay or go."

  "Toni and I were on our way to see Selena."

  "Okay. Anything else?"

  "Nope. Everybody and everything will be on the ground in Pensacola for your interrogators, ma'am."

  "Investigators, Ed."

  "Oh, of course, milady. My mistake. 'Investigators'."

  Linda sighed, "You're kind of a putz sometimes, Ed."

  "Oh, yes, milady. As you say, milady."

  With a snicker, she said, "Thanks for helping," then she tapped off the connection.

  As I returned to the hatchway, I saw two people waiting to step across to a flitter. Both of them sort of noticed me, but were so enthralled by Sue's theta waves that my appearance caused them no particular curiosity or interest.

  They stepped onto the flitter and its field tunnel stretched as it moved away from the hatch. Another flitter lifted up to the hatch opening, rising into the tunnel field and becoming its new terminus as the other flitter departed for Pensacola.

  Something clunked softly behind me and I turned to see a stream of various objects heading for the hatch. Hats, gloves, thermos bottles, a sweater, books, papers, sunglasses, unserved meals, and a hundred other odd items flowed past me to the flitter and arranged themselves neatly on its deck.

  "Damn," I said, watching overhead compartments open and empty themselves into the stream. The last three objects to float past were the flight crew, still out cold.

  Sue laid them gently on the flitter's deck and asked, "Are you waiting for a personal invitation?"

  "Just thinking," I said. "Every once in a while I'm struck by just how unique and wonderful you are."

  Appearing in front of me, Sue smilingly leaned to kiss me and replied, "I'm no more unique and wonderful than Steph or Elkor, but thanks for saying that."

  Stepping across to the flitter, I said, "Uh, huh. There are only two others like you on Earth, so you qualify as unique and wonderful. Don't bother trying to deny it, milady."

  Shrugging, she grinningly said, "Okay. If you insist," as the plane's hatch closed. The flitter banked away from the plane and a few moments later we settled to hover a foot above the tarmac near a hangar.

  I didn't bother looking around; all airports look pretty much alike to me, and the people on the ground were more interesting. The passengers were being herded into the hangar by cops and paramedics.

  Toni grinned and waved at me from my flitter and I hopped over to it as the flitter Sue and I were on passed it. Sue remained aboard the odd-items flitter as it entered the hangar.

  The console came alive and Sue said, "Later, everybody. I'm going to help sort things out here."

  "Thanks, milady. See you later."

  "Uh, we're leaving?" asked Toni, "Don't you want to find out what happens? Who's behind the hijacking?"

  Shrugging, I said, "Maybe it'll make the evening news. I'd rather be playing with you and Selena."

  After a moment of peering at me, Toni said, "Bye, Sue. It was nice seeing you again. Can you drop in later?"

  "Sure, Toni. I'd like that."

  One of the cops spotted us, seemed confused to see anyone aboard a flitter, and approached in a meaningful manner.

  I said, "Flitter, opaque the canopy and resume our course to Selena's condo."

  "Yes, sir," said the flitter in an uninflected female voice.

  "'Yes, sir'?" asked Toni. "That can't be Sue. Doesn't sound like her, either."

  "It isn't. It's just a chunk of computer we set aside so I can run the flit without her."

  "But 'yes, sir'? When did that start?"

  Shrugging, I said, "Don't know. I didn't put it in there."

  Chapter Two

  When we arrived in Tallahassee, we saw Selena's Mercury Sable in the lot, but she didn't answer her doorbell. I used my key and we found Selena in her hot tub, so we joined her there with kisses and drinks as Toni excitedly told her about our side trip. When she wound down a bit, Toni asked Selena how bad the office fire had been.

  "The fire was only in Dick's office," said Selena, "But the smoke was so bad they're having to clean half the third floor before Monday." With a laugh, she added, "The company's new unofficial mantra is 'Don't be a Dick'."

  Selena sipped her drink and pointed at the TV in the corner of the patio with a derisive snort and said, "Check it out; an ad for yet another show about people with telekinetic powers. Three TV shows and a couple of movies so far this season. If Hollywood ever had any originality, i
t's definitely in hiding."

  "They copy each other like monkeys," said Toni. "Remember when the three major science fiction TV shows all had their key people kidnapped, memory-wiped, and forced to work on some dismal industrial planet during the same week?"

  "Yeah. And there was that 'shooting at bumpers to set off airbags' thing, too. A week after Ed released his second "In Service to a Goddess" book, a new TV show about cops in Las Vegas used that trick. I think they stole the idea."

  "You'd never be able to prove it," said Selena, "They'd just blat out some 'great minds think alike' crap." Turning to me, she added, "But it was a helluva coincidence, wasn't it, Ed?"

  Nodding, I said, "Oh, yeah. But you're right; proving it would be damned near impossible."

  "And now," said Toni, "They've come up with a show called 'Jake 2.0'. And guess what? He's full of nanobots -- like Ed -- and he interfaces with computers -- like Ed -- and he works for a spook outfit -- like Ed -- and..."

  Looking very dubious, Sel muttered, "Oooo..." as her gaze shifted to me. "You getting paid for any of that?"

  Shaking my head, I said, "No, but if he starts using fancy field tricks like this..."

  Sending a neon-blue field tendril to the fridge, I opened the door with it, retrieved a bottle of Ice House beer, and bumped the door shut with a loop of the tendril as I drew the beer back to the hot tub.

  As I opened my new beer, I used a neon-red tendril to deliver my empty bottle to the kitchen trash can, took a sip of beer, and finished, "...That's when I'll hire a lawyer."

  Toni reached for the red tendril as it looped above her head, so I didn't let it disappear. As her fingers touched it, they slid along the surface for a distance, then wrapped around it, her nails barely touching her palm as she squeezed it gently. I made the tendril twine gently around her arm and stroke her cheek as she studied it.

  Peering at me, she grinningly asked, "Is it any kind of a coincidence that your field tendrils just happen to be almost exactly as big around as a certain part of your anatomy?"

  Glancing at the tendril, I laughed, "Huh. It was, yeah. It won't be from now on, though. Thanks for the tip, lady."

  Selena asked, "Ed, how come Sue and Tiger didn't come with you?"

  "Sue's working with Linda. Tiger wanted to visit the pond at the end of Crescent Street."

  Selena's left eyebrow went up. "Sue can split herself, Ed. She could have come with you."

  Nodding, I said, "Yeah, but she didn't."

  "What's she doing with Linda? Tailing the jet?"

  "Yeah, probably. They want to know where it's going."

  Toni gave me a look similar to Selena's and asked, "You mean you don't even know what she's doing?"

  "Nope, but whatever it is, she's doing it with Linda."

  I realized instantly that what I'd said hadn't come out the way I'd intended. The ladies glanced at each other with rather stark, exaggerated stares, then burst out laughing.

  We spent most of the weekend in the bedroom, the pool, or the hot tub. Sue joined us on Saturday afternoon and Toni asked her about the jet, but Sue said only that the jet situation had been resolved and quoted security rules.

  Time was made for visiting a couple of nice restaurants and even for the ladies to do some shopping. There was a minor furor when we landed at the main entrance to the mall, but it wasn't because we arrived aboard a flitter.

  The fuss was due to our abrupt appearance as we stepped away from the flitter's concealing field. One of two elderly women sitting on a bench inside the mall doors began screaming and pointing, then apparently fainted.

  Under the very wary gaze of the other woman, Sue, Selena, Toni, and I walked past the event as if we had no idea what was going on, but once we'd turned the corner by the fountain and found a place out of the flow of traffic, Sel and Toni cracked up with laughter.

  Eyeing them, Sue seemed highly skeptical of their humor. Her gaze shifted to me.

  "Sue," I sent through my implant, "We aren't responsible for that woman's inability to remain sane and reasonable. She might just as easily have freaked out if someone with pink spiked hair and a nose ring had walked in."

  "Still, Ed... Laughing at an old woman's fear..."

  "Uh, uh. Nope. She's old enough to have learned how to keep her cool, too. You didn't see anyone else freaking out, did you? Not even her friend on the bench. We didn't storm the building, ma'am. We just walked in like everybody else. She went nuts like a poodle at a stranger."

  "To her, we appeared from thin air, Ed."

  "To her, to her friend, and to everybody else who happened to be looking out at the time. She's the only one who..."

  Toni waved a hand between us and we turned to face her.

  "Are you two having a conference without us?"

  I said, "Yup. Sue had a question about the old woman."

  "Why she freaked, you mean?"

  "You got it. Where are we going from here?"

  Glancing around, Toni pointed at a few stores and said, "There, there, and there. And maybe there. Where will you be?"

  "The bookstore or the restaurant area, unless you need me to carry your loot or watch you model lingerie."

  Selena snorted, "Yeah, right. We'll manage, I think. Sue, what about you?"

  Sue smiled and said, "I think I'll go with everybody."

  She glanced around once, waited until a few people passed us, and then a second Sue materialized beside Sel and Toni as the original moved to stand by me.

  "Ready," said both Sues in perfect unison.

  A clerk in the shoe store beyond us froze and stared. The Sue beside the ladies grinned and waved at him as they turned to go. My Sue tugged my arm to get me moving.

  Maybe five paces from the shoe store entrance I felt the clerk's stare on my back and said, "That guy's really having some trouble with your twin sister act, Sue."

  With a chuckle, she asked, "Want to go back and explain it to him?"

  "Oh, not unless he makes an issue of it, I guess."

  As we passed the games gallery near the restaurant section of the mall, I saw a couple of kids trying to maneuver a three-point grappler to grab a stuffed toy bear in a plexiglass box.

  The grappler dropped and wrapped around the bear's head, but the bear was wedged so tightly among the other stuffed toys it couldn't be budged. The grappler tugged upward and the spring-loaded arms spread, leaving the bear behind.

  I sent a tendril into the plexiglass box and probed against the bear. Yup. The stuffies had been practically anchored against each other. It was a ripoff game.

  Giving the tendril a sharp twist made the contents of the box erupt. The kids backed away a pace and made all the usual noises people make when something blows up in their faces. The bear was now lying on its side in a corner of the box.

  "Bet you can pick it up now," I said.

  The kids looked at Sue and me, then back at the box. One of them fished out a quarter and stepped up to give it a try. The grappler again settled over the bear -- this time around the body -- and the grappler winched upward with the bear dangling from the blunt hooks.

  Amid much cheering, the grappler dropped the bear into the hole in the front of the box and the kid retrieved it from the delivery chute.

  Sue and I continued walking toward the bookstore for some moments before she said, "That wouldn't have occurred to me."

  "What? Loosening up the pile?"

  "Yes."

  "Why not? They deliberately jam everything into those boxes so stuff won't come loose."

  With a glance at me, Sue said, "But by attempting a game, people accept the inherent risk of losing their investment. It could be argued that what you did was a form of cheating."

  Shrugging, I said, "It could be argued that the game was rigged, too. I'm happy with the results, ma'am."

  "But..."

  "But, hell. The game is about getting something out of the box. They... fudged... a little by cramming the prizes together. I fudged a little by loosening them up, so it e
vens out. The un-rigging just became, um... an unspoken part of the game."

  With a rather arch glance at me, Sue said, "I see. Would the same rationale apply to a game of roulette?"

  "Why would I be at a roulette table, Sue?"

  Manufacturing a sigh, she said, "It's a hypothetical question, Ed."

  Shaking my head, I said, "Nope. Just can't see it. It isn't me, ma'am. What else ya got?"

  "You're being difficult."

  "Not at all, milady. Here's the bookstore. Think up another scenario while we browse a bit."

  Sue looked around the store from the doorway.

  "You browse," she said, "I've read everything in the store," and disappeared.

  Keying my implant, I asked, "Was that a huff? It looked a lot like a huff."

  "You can envision a huff, but not a roulette wheel?"

  "I guess I must be subject to selective perception."

  "Maybe that's why you aren't seeing me at the moment."

  A guy in a brown sports jacket tapped my shoulder and asked, "Sir, where is the woman who was with you and who are you talking to?"

  He flipped his wallet open to display a rent-a-cop badge and ID, then flipped it shut and put it away.

  As a few people drew near or stopped in our vicinity, I said, "She left. Do you have some good reason for needing to know who I'm talking to?"

  "Sir, please don't be difficult. I need to see some ID. If you don't cooperate, I'll have to take you to the office."

  "For what?"

  "Creating a disturbance in the mall."

  Gesturing at the half-dozen people around us, I said, "Let's take a quick poll. Are any of you people disturbed?"

  There were some snickers and a laugh. Some guy said, "My girlfriend thinks I am," and there was another laugh.

  "I'm afraid you'll have to bust yourself," I told the rent-a-cop, "You're the only one creating a disturbance here."

  As Sue asked, "Should I reappear?" the guy gave me a droll look, reached for my arm, and said, "That's enough. I'll check your ID at the office. Let's go."

  Keying my implant, I answered both of them. "Nope."

  To the rent-a-cop, I said, "Why don't you tell everybody why you're hassling me? I'm sure they'd like to know what I've done to earn your attention."