3rd World Products, Inc., Book 5

by Ed Howdershelt

  Nodding, I said, "Yes. That big, that fast. But just like you when you chase a lizard. A lion won't see you as another cat, Tiger; it'll see you as small food."

  Looking thoughtful, he asked, "Many lions there?"

  "Yes, many, and there are many other animals much larger and just as mean. Sue, how about showing him a wildebeest, another lion, a cheetah, and a hyena for size comparisons?"

  The wildebeest appeared, but the floor area wasn't quite big enough, so half of the critter seemed to be standing on the back porch, on other side of the glass doors.

  Next to the wildebeest appeared a lion, a cheetah, and a hyena. All but the wildebeest stared fixedly at Tiger, their jaws slightly open as they panted from the African heat.

  Cats have a lot of pride; Tiger would have felt it necessary to pretend to want to go anyway, even with his fur again half-standing on end. I didn't give him a chance to argue.

  Tapping my cup on the table to make him look at me, I said, "Tiger, I don't want to take you with me if I have to go. I don't want to lose you and I'm absolutely sure that Steph, Sue, and Elkor would be very angry with me if you ended up as a pile of lion poop."

  Sue rolled her eyes at me and said firmly, "Yes, we would be, Ed. Very, very angry with you."

  When Tiger finally tore his eyes away from the animals and looked at her, he said, "You must not be angry at Ed. I stay."

  Too prideful to ask Sue to make the leering animals go away, Tiger simply turned his back to them and began washing himself to show us his lack of fear.

  The animals disappeared and I reached to pet him as I said, "Thank you, Tiger."

  Regarding me thoughtfully for some moments, he said, "I will go -- only? -- if Elkor can come with," and started washing his left shoulder and arm.

  Sighing, I said, "Tiger, even the people in Africa would see you as small food."

  That made him stop washing altogether and stare at me in total disbelief. He'd met people who weren't really fond of cats, but the idea that people would eat cats was unthinkable.

  Nodding, I added, "It's true, Tiger. The people there will even kill and eat lions. And they wear the lion's head and skin."

  Tiger turned his shocked gaze to Sue, who looked at me.

  "Show him, Sue. An African native wearing a lion skin. You must have some Masai footage in the pile somewhere."

  Her expression told me she thought I was pushing things a bit, but a barefoot warrior clad in a lion's head and skin and holding a spear and shield appeared in the same spot where the lion had munched the rabbit.

  I asked, "Sue, how would that guy react to seeing Tiger? He's hunting for his entire village and he's out there with half a dozen other guys looking for anything edible. Even if they nail something big, anything they find is meat for the pot."

  She got it right. Instead of using his spear, the image jammed the spear butt into the ground and eased his hand toward a bladed, feathered dart at his waist.

  The dart flashed directly at Tiger's chest and vanished. Tiger had again turned into a fuzzball. I heard his claws clack lightly on the table as he hissed and briefly looked for the dart.

  This time there was less fear than indignation in his reaction as he looked at me and asked sharply, "Why go there?"

  "Business," I said, "To help Stephanie."

  Looking back at the native, Tiger hissed, "Bad, bad place."

  Standing up and sipping my coffee, I replied, "Yeah, that's how I see it, too," then I patted Tiger and said, "I'm going to run some errands," as I headed for the den.

  My do-list included a few checks that could have been mailed, a visit to Staples for an ink cartridge, and a stop by my accountant's office. As I made out the checks, Sue appeared.

  "Tiger's still upset, but less so," she said, "Did you really feel it necessary to exaggerate?"

  "What did I exaggerate, exactly? I didn't ask you to make anything bigger than life, did I?"

  "You gave Tiger the impression that all of Africa is populated by lions and Masai natives."

  "It sure seemed that way when I was there. Guess there may have been fewer of each in the deserts, but I wasn't in the deserts. Could be there weren't all that many in the jungle, either, but all the other predators and pests more than made up for 'em."

  Closing the checkbook and standing up, I said, "If you want to talk, come along for the ride. I'm taking the car for its weekly run around town."

  She pretended to consider the offer. It was a way of making a silent statement and inviting further discussion that she'd learned from Selena. I figured she'd refuse, and she did.

  "No, thanks. I'll stay here with Tiger, I think. See you later."

  I didn't bite; I headed for the door with, "Okay. Later."

  Chapter Eighteen

  As I left the house, I tucked my checkbook into a pocket, said, "Five suit on," and strolled to the car through the pouring rain, moderately fascinated by the way it hit my field and ran off. Casting a flat field above me as I opened the car door and got in kept the rain out of the car.

  Up the hill toward the Deltona Boulevard light, a silver Ford sedan's brakelights came on as its headlights shone on the garage door of the old Damma house.

  Well, the house wasn't all that 'old', really, but the Dammas had lived in it for six years before moving. It had sat empty for a few months, then the realtor sign had been removed from the yard and I'd figured someone had bought the place.

  My main concern had been that a family with screaming kids and a noisy dog had moved in, as had happened all too frequently over the last few years as retirees died off and left their homes to younger family members.

  Nope. Whoever moved in apparently did so while I wasn't home. I never saw any kids, never saw a dog. Never saw the new owners, either; not coming or going or working around the house. The lawn was mowed weekly by a service and a white Ford the same model as the silver one went somewhere every morning and returned in the late afternoon.

  All that info had more or less occurred to me at once about a month after they'd moved in. If I'd been more socially inclined, I might have walked the whole block or so necessary to say 'hi'. Instead, I just punched up county records of the property transfer on my datapad.

  They were James and Louise Golding, and they'd taken out a standard mortgage on the house. Both were insurance claims adjustors, according to their listed occupations.

  Hm. 'Insurance adjustors'. We'd used the same cover job for Ellen and Gary when the big ship had arrived. I checked further and found little more than that both had Florida licenses for their occupations. Well, duh. What was a cover without the proper paperwork?

  At that point, I'd said to hell with it. If they were there to keep an eye on me, so be it. Could even be they were exactly what records said they were. Didn't matter.

  I was over the hill and turning south on Deltona before the silver Ford moved. It backed out and waited at the light as I lost sight of it beyond another small hill.

  As I parked at the post office, I saw a silver Ford pull into the drive through lane and stop by the boxes. It continued around the little circle and across the street to the 'Pack and Ship'. Nobody got out and it was too far away to see who was in the car. I went into the post office, watching the Ford through the big windows. A woman waiting for a break in the rain seemed to take sharp notice of the fact that I wasn't wet.

  A UPS truck pulled in over there and parked directly behind the silver Ford, cutting off my view, but I saw the truck driver chat out his door for a moment before getting down and going into the shop.

  After cleaning out my post office box I headed back to the window. The truck was still there. I headed for my car and drove out of the lot with a glance at the silver Ford when the angles were right. It was empty.

  Tailing and being tailed when nothing much is at stake can become a game of sorts. Not knowing for sure whether you're being tailed is just part of that game. You go through the motions and stay alert on general principles.

  At the ba
nk, I made deposits and chatted with a couple of the women who handle my accounts, then stood by the doors watching the rain for a few moments. A silver Ford sat under the awnings of the defunct Texaco station across the street.

  Hm. The rain was coming down fairly hard. Maybe the driver just wanted out of it for the moment. Might not be the same car, either.

  I decided that it was time to head over to Staples, which was half a block past the gas station. Bidding the bank ladies goodbye, I went to my car.

  As I passed the station, I noted the license number of the car and took a minute to scribble it on scrap paper when I parked. Grabbing a couple of ink cartridges and a few other items, I checked out and put the stuff in the car, then headed back the way I'd come on the service road.

  The silver Ford was still there, but now there was a brunette woman standing beside it, talking on a cell phone. I kept an eye on my rearview mirror until the car and woman were out of sight, but she didn't get back in the car.

  Rain pounded hard on my windshield for a few more minutes, then abruptly stopped altogether; not unusual at all in Florida. In fact, sometimes you could be standing in bright sunshine and watch hard rain a hundred feet away.

  A pickup had stalled in the intersection at Deltona and Forest Oaks. I offered to give the guy a shove with my Olds to get him out of traffic and he happily agreed, steering toward a convenience store parking lot after we got him moving.

  Parking on the other side of his truck from Deltona, I asked what was wrong with the truck. He said he didn't know and didn't care, then apologized for snapping and held up a cell phone as he said that his brother was on the way "to pick up the piece of shit truck he sold me".

  Just as he said that, the silver Ford squealed through a left turn in the intersection and hauled ass north on Deltona. I waited a few moments to see if any other cars seemed to be in that big a hurry, then moved out to follow her at a distance.

  Halfway to the house an ambulance and a firetruck passed me and turned exactly where I intended to turn to avoid the light at Deltona for the last block home.

  The silver Ford was parked in the street with half a dozen other vehicles. Cops were leading three guys and a woman out of the cream-colored house across the street and two doors down from the Damma house. I recognized a drug test kit on the hood of one of the cars.

  A bust in progress, less than a block from my house. The cop in the street waved at me to keep moving. I asked him what was going on. He repeated that I should keep moving.

  Whatever. It would be on the news. I kept moving past the firetruck and the silver Ford, where the woman was on her cell phone again. The woman looked at me as I passed her and I nodded, then headed for my own driveway.

  "Sue," I said as I entered my house and opened my coffee mug, "That looks like a drug bust down the street."

  She popped into being near me and replied, "You thought the couple at 9417 were observing you, didn't you?"

  Warming my coffee, I shrugged and replied, "It wouldn't be all that unlikely, y'know, with all the stuff that's happened here over the last few years. And I own a flitter and work for Linda." Capping my mug, I added, "And then there's you, of course."

  Sue actually seemed startled. "Me?"

  I looked to see if she was kidding. Apparently not.

  "By now, the agencies would have to know who and what you and Steph are. They'd have some idea of what you can do and they'd think you belong to me. That would make a lot of people very nervous, and I'd bet that only my affiliations with 3rd World and Linda keep the hounds away from my door."

  Her blank look almost made me chuckle.

  "Think about it, Sue. Just for example, I've been landing the flitter in my front yard for years, but I've never once heard objections from the FAA. If I tried that even one time with a mini-copter or a motorized glider, I'd face fines and jail."

  Sitting at the kitchen table, I continued, "Then there's the mountain trick. I'll bet you can tell me which agencies know that we went over there, and I'll bet there are at least three. If any of them knew what really happened to the mountain, they'd see me as the proud owner of something more dangerous than a dozen H-bombs. I'd say chances are good that only the fact that Linda and 3rd World have me on their payroll keeps the US government from trying to pick me up. And you."

  Looking somewhat shocked, Sue softly said, "Yes. Of course they would. I feel so naive, Ed."

  Shrugging, I quoted, '...to see ourselves as others see us...' and said, "Well, actually, they probably think I did it, if it makes you feel any better. And they likely think I dropped a special bomb or something. I kinda doubt Linda would have told them every little thing about the operation."

  Sitting back, I added, "Fact is, it's doubtful she told Danvers or Saunder anything, either. Neither of them asked us anything about the mountain, and Danvers kept the press and military away from us, so it's likely they were specifically instructed not to ask. In fact, I think the truth of what happened to that mountain is probably known only to Linda and those of us who did the job. And maybe to some Amarans who know about using fields to transmute stuff, but they aren't talking."

  Nodding, Sue said, "The sharing of such information has always been kept to a minimum by Amaran policy. I didn't realize that it was restricted to prevent panic."

  Sipping coffee, I chuckled, "Not panic, just rampant greed and paranoia. Panic would come later, after they'd convinced themselves you're too powerful and thereby too dangerous."

  Continuing her apparent revelation, Sue replied softly, "Some people would see me that way, wouldn't they?"

  "Yup. Oh, hell, yeah. No damned doubt at all. Could be some already do, ma'am. For instance, I can't wait to hear what Linda's El Grande Capitano Wallace has to say about anybody but the US government being able to zap mountains out of existence. No matter how she explains the event, it could be there's about to be a conflict of interests on that home front."

  Looking rather startled and dismayed, Sue suggested, "Maybe I -- maybe we -- should talk to him, Ed."

  It was all I could do to keep from laughing.

  "Uh, huh. Okay. Sure. We can try that. Just like I tried talking to him when we first met, but he still set course to get rid of me. It wasn't until he read what he thought was an intercepted private message from me to Linda that he backed off, and even then he didn't really give up the idea until he realized that forcing me out of Linda's life would also force him out." Pausing to shake my head for emphasis, I added, "Nope. I won't tell him a damned thing. If Linda tells him anything, it'll be because she absolutely can't avoid it and she'll have a really big trump card up her sleeve when she does it, milady."

  "What are you calling a 'trump card', Ed?"

  Shrugging, I said, "Oh, just some little way of keeping him quiet after he knows too much. You know; something to keep him from blabbing it to the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the President, who'd slap a national security lid on the whole mess just before they try to take total control of all 3rd World Products facilities, equipment, and personnel on Earth. Which would include you, Steph, Elkor, and me."

  Looking somewhat stunned, Sue finally sat down at the table. As she did so, Steph and Elkor appeared.

  "Hi, guys," I said, "Sue told you what we've been talking about?"

  Nodding, Steph said, "Yes. You've really upset her, Ed."

  "Too bad. It's that kind of info. Any disagreements about not telling Wallace?"

  "No. None. Absolutely not."

  Shrugging, I said, "Well, there it is, then."

  With a dubious look, Steph said, "But it may already be too late for silence, Ed. Jeffries and Myra saw me transmute oceanic detritus during our salvage demonstration."

  "Maybe not a problem. If pushed, Linda and I will say that it's an extremely power-consuming process that can be performed only for very short times on very small scales. You can refer all other questions to Linda. Or me, I guess."

  Giving me a wry look, Sue said sardonically, "Oh, good. I'd like to hear
you explain how the mountain disappeared."

  "No sweat. Some strange devices were supplied for the job. We used them as instructed and rushed the hostages to Landstuhl. For anything more, they'll have to get with Linda."

  "So now we're strange devices, huh?"

  "Only for the sake of this particular postulation, milady. For the record, I don't consider you strange at all. Unique, certainly. Special, definitely. Fairly wonderful, even. But not strange."

  "That answer -- talk to Linda -- won't satisfy some people."

  With a shrug, I replied, "What can I say? That's just too damned bad, 'cause it's all they get and that's how I'm gonna play it. How about you? Got a better idea, ma'am?"

  Sue glanced at Steph, then at Elkor, and said, "Not at this very moment. Have you discussed any of this with Linda?"

  "Ah... well, no, I didn't really see the need. We went to the same spook school, y'know. She knows me pretty well."

  Steph said, "It might be good to discuss this with her anyway, Ed. Just to be sure."

  Nodding, I said, "Okay. Ring her up."

  A field screen appeared and Linda answered with, "Well, hello, everybody. What's up?"

  I said, "Oh, nothing much, Fearless Leader. I just thought you might like to put in a little flight time, and we're taking the afternoon off. Can you tear yourself away for a couple of hours? Maybe leave everything behind for the whole afternoon?"

  Linda referred to some notes and replied, "Not the whole afternoon, but I could definitely use a break. It's one-thirty and I missed lunch. How about I grab something, then..?"

  "Nah. We'll feed you. We'll even save a cold beer for you. Look for us upstairs if you're interested."

  Grinning, Linda said, "Wow, free food! Okay, I'll be there. Thanks, Dragonfly," and tapped off.

  Sue looked thoughtful for a split second -- a fairly long time for her -- and said, "Ed, I just checked her schedule. In order to meet with us, she's having to postpone four appointments."

  As I gathered stuff to make sandwiches, I said, "No sweat. Counting Tiger, there are four of us, too. It'll all even out in the long run."