seemed as marvelled about the car as I did, “I’m going to go with… no. Yeah, no, definitely not.”
“Wolf, could you grab the keys?” He nodded and started feeling around inside the glove compartment, “This is a really nice car, the seats are so soft... There we go,” He tossed the keys over to me, “Mind if I borrow it at some point?”
I shook my head as I turned the keys in the ignition, “No, not at all. So where are we going to go?”
Wolf shrugged, “There’s an old air field about twenty minutes west from here, could be a nice place to let it loose.”
A deep purr rolled from the engine and the tablet lit up, “Good morning John, and welcome to the HCV, today I will be running you through a tutorial on how to effectively use this vehicle, state safe testing area.” A strong, British male’s voice pushed through the centre console and into my ears.
I looked over to Wolf, whose jaw was dangling open, “Did… did the car just talk to me?”
His jaw slammed shut and he nodded, “Tell it we want to go to airfield seven…”
I started but before I could finish the windshield came to life, “Now connecting to OLHUD and LAP. Please wait… Complete, now finding route to airfield seven closest to your position. Upon exit of facility go left.”
I was still very confused, but I grabbed the wheel and followed the car’s instruction.
Wolf was sitting bolt upright, “This is cool… but at the same time really unnerving.” I nodded slowly, I felt as if I made any sudden movements I would scare the car.
I followed the directions of the car in complete silence until we were on a strip of tarmac that must’ve been ten kilometres long surrounded by sheds with the corpses of several passenger planes. In fact, the only exception in this aerial graveyard were a few small jets that still looked functional.
“No officers or civilians within a one hundred kilometre radius, discretion is unnecessary.”
I opened my mouth several times before I said anything, “Is that the car’s way of saying floor it?”
Wolf smiled widely, “No no, I believe he means floor it or he will.” I now shared his grin and dropped the accelerator. I could feel the difference between last night’s drive and today's, the tires held us to the road while we picked up speed. I looked down at the speedometer which had just spun past one ninety, “Wooooooooh!”
At two twenty I could feel that the front of the car was getting picked up by the wind that we were cutting through. “Stabilising vehicle, feel free to continue course.” The front of the car stuck to the ground again.
At two seventy Wolf let out a howl, “This is amazing!”
The tablet flash once, “Approaching current maximum speed, would you like to activate back burners John?”
I nodded, “Yes! Full speed car!” There was a loud whooshing sound and the speedometer started flicking violently at three fifty, “Holy crap!” My whole body was stuck to my chair, I didn't know if I was holding the steering wheel to steer or to hold for fear I’d get blown away if I let go.
I heard a shout from my side, “John! We need to stop! We’re gonna run out of road or pass out!”
I tried to nod but my head was quite literally stuck, I eased of the accelerator, “Car! I need help stopping!”
A click sounded and the whooshing stopped, “Shall I deploy the chute John?”
I was struggling to close my mouth after I last spoke, “Yes please!” One of my hands slipped from the wheel and flung back to smack me in face.
The car began to steadily slow, the speedometer spinning backward, I could pull my hand from my face at one seventy as I began to apply the brakes myself and we eased to an eventual stop.
I managed to lean on the door handle in such a way to make it pop open. At which point I slumped lazily out onto the gravel, I could hear Wolf doing the same. I managed to stand and stumble to the back of the car where I fell again. But the car supported my back as I did, allowing me to be in a roughly seated position. I heard Wolf collapse next to me, I couldn’t lift my head and my whole body tingled.
A few minutes passed and then we started laughing, “That was possibly the most fun I’ve had in two hundred years.” I flung my head backward to rest on the car. There were three long lines of charred gravel behind us, as well as large billowing clouds of smoke.
I looked at the rear tire, which looked fine, and back at the road and started laughing more, occasionally coughing huge lumps of air out of my body, “I think the tires broke the road.”
I heard Wolf shuffle slightly, “Ha! They did too.”
I started to feel warm in the afternoon sun, “I think we should get back in the car.” There was a grunt of approval from my side as I stood and proceeded to half walk, half fall back into the car using the roof as a ballast.
The door closed automatically behind me, “Turning on AC, shall I put some music on sir?” I adjusted myself in my seat and took the relief of the air conditioner blowing cool jets of air into my body,
“Yes, some smooth jazz would be nice.” I pulled on my seat-belt, my body was beginning to come back to life. The sound of a deep saxophone poured out of the centre console.
“Shall we continue to weapons in the tutorial sir?”
I looked over to Wolf who was shaking himself out. “Yeah, that could be fun.”
I nodded, “Yep, let’s get started.”
The tablet flash up and a display of the car appeared, “In this vehicle there are a number of weapons ranging from tactical immobilisation to lethal. From stun to high density explosive, where shall we begin sir?”
Again, Wolf and I looked at each other and smiled, “The explosives, definitely the explosives.”
“Very well sir,” A red trigger popped up on either side of the steering wheel where my fore-fingers usually sat, “Please select a target.”
I looked around for something when I spotted a large rock, “That large rock over there.” A red reticule circled around and stopped on the rock, “That’s the one.”
A quick beep rang in my ears, “Locked on, pull the triggers when ready.” I grabbed the wheel, hovered my fingers over the triggers. I shot Wolf one final look and pulled the triggers. There was a click and I felt the wheel vibrate as two of what appeared to be miniature spears attached to a deodorant can went hurtling toward the rock. When they reached it they wedged deep inside before blowing the top half of the monstrous rock into tiny pieces. “That… was… awesome! John, can I blow something else up?”
I was still in awe as the larger chunks of rock peppered the ground, “I think I need to get a drink. It’s been a big day.”
I heard a throaty chuckle to my left, “That’s true, we should actually probably be getting back. They have habits of sending pick-up crews if it seems we've kidnapped members of the public and are doing general evil. Speaking of which I could use some food.”
The triggers slipped back inside the wheel, “I take it I should set a course for the base sir?”
I nodded, “Yeah, let’s go.” the tracks appeared again leading back to the main road and I followed. “Hey car, do you have a name?” It felt sort of weird to ask a car this, but at the same time it… he… I don’t know, the car spoke back and usually things that spoke had names.
“My designation is HCV, being High Classification Vehicle, but during my development I was codenamed Robert.” A vehicle that has the capacity to level an entire city and he has a name like Robert. Funny world. I pulled into the underground parking facility and found my space,
“Robert, I like that name. Well, see you later.” I stepped out of the car.
“Good evening sir.”
I followed Wolf back to the elevator, “How long is it until the mission again?”
Wolf shook his head loose once we were moving down, “I think that’s the fastest I’ve moved on the ground, um, two days. Greg gets back tomorrow, we’ll feast then as well, and then the meeting is on Friday.”
We ste
pped out of the elevator and made our way to the bar, “What do you mean feast?”
Kate, Steven and Jason were sitting around a table with two free seats which we swiftly occupied, “No-one’s sitting here?”
Kate shook her head, “Nope, Mike and Kyle were here, but they left early.” Wolf waved over my shoulder, did some kind of hand… thing, then gestured to Kate, myself then himself.
“Now, the feast, just like you said, we’ll feed up big before we leave, steaks, blood, the whole shebang. It’s going to be a four-five hour flight in the jet, so I’m thinking we start at around ten on Thursday morning and then get some sleep, we can ship out at maybe two on Friday morning?” I nodded as a tray with six shot glasses filled with a clear liquid slid onto the table in front of me.
I looked over to Wolf who had the same, although he’d just downed his third, “Guys, we are going to go have fun tonight, last night we can for a while, there’s a club on the fourth floor. I’ll see you guys there in, what, ten minutes? I’m gonna get changed.”
Before I said anything he’d finished his remaining shots and disappeared, I looked over at Kate and the guys, “Um… me and Steven can come too right?” I shrugged my mouth trying to catch up with my brain which was still partly in the car. Then Kate came to my rescue and used words which I was so grateful for,
“Of course you guys are invited, come on John, let’s get up there.” We stood and I had to stop and marvel at just how beautiful she was, again. Seriously, just jeans and a
The Mulligan Planet Page 12
