Pasha pulled over a chair and sat down with a whoosh. My God! he thought.
Gettnor said, “Oh, and they can carry freight too… Lots of it.”
***
“Cho is calling,” Jong’s AI said.
“I’ll take it…” Jong responded, “Has something happened?”
Cho said, “Daughter come back to Gettnor’s house. Still inside.”
“Okay,” Jong said somewhat wearily, “put the team on standby. Call us up immediately if the daughter and father leave the house.” They put the team on standby to attempt a kidnapping any time the daughter was at the house, but the father never left the house with her. It was beginning to seem like the daughter and father never would leave the house together. It had seemed so plausible back when the plan to kidnap them from an outing had first been assembled. Jong felt more and more certain they were going to have to scrap that plan and come up with another.
He took a few minutes to check the surveillance cameras.
Nothing had changed.
***
Tiona opened the door to her dad’s basement laboratory. To her great surprise, Vaz wasn’t there. She looked over at the bench where she usually worked and saw a curved tube about two inches in diameter and sixteen inches long lying next to the safety harness her dad had made her for the flycycle. It looked like the design he’d had up for a 20 kilowatt fusor the last time she’d been over.
She went over and looked at the tube more closely. Sure enough, it had a power cable coming out of one end. She picked it up. The power cable snapped into the lift disc of the safety harness and the tube itself fit around the edges of the disc, attaching to Velcro pads there.
Tiona was putting the harness on when she noticed that it had a joystick Velcroed onto it at her right hip. Sure enough, when she had the harness on and had her AI interface with it, the AI asked if she wanted the joystick activated.
Once she had given the affirmative, she pulled up on the handle of the joystick. She felt the bottom edge of the disc pull off the Velcro tab that had held it to her lower back. It rose to a horizontal position. When she lifted the joystick further she heard its faint hum rise in pitch to become inaudible as the harness tightened around her body. Seconds later, her feet lifted off the floor as the disc pulled her up into the air.
As expected, when she pushed the joystick forward, the disc tilted and she floated forward as well. Moving the joystick back or to either side moved her in those directions. Gently lifting the joystick took her right up to the ceiling.
Excited to try the flying harness outside, Tiona started up the stairs. She asked her AI to connect her to Nolan, “Hey boyfriend, my dad modified the flying harness with a fusor. Wanna meet me at that pasture where we tried the flycycle and try it out with me?”
“Wow, he works fast. All I’ve managed to do is draw up a plan for the space harness and work out some of the control circuits.”
Tiona gave a little laugh, “All he did was put some of his fusor components in a smaller tube and limit its power output. Well, and he came up with controller program and a joystick. Are you gonna come try the harness with me or not?”
“Sure, see you there.”
Tiona saw her mother working at a screen in the family room, “Mom, do you know where dad is?”
Lisanne barely looked up, “Out in the garage, working on one of the cars.”
Tiona rocked back. Her dad had never, to her recollection, worked on a car. Lisanne took their cars to the dealer if they needed something done to them. She turned into the little passage that led to the garage. Opening the door, she called out, “Dad?”
“Over here,” his voice came from the far side of the garage.
As Tiona started that way she noticed that the front end of the family sedan was up in the air. Vaz lay on the ground underneath it. Tiona squatted down and looked underneath. There were a couple of jacks under the frame lifting it, as well as another pair holding a steel bar just above Vaz. Puzzled, Tiona studied the setup for a minute before she realized that, if the car fell off the jacks, the steel bar would still keep the engine from crushing Vaz.
She peered up at the bottom of the car, wondering what her dad was doing.
There were big discs on the bottom of the car!
One huge one stretched from one side of the car to the other side under the middle of the frame and nearly from the front wheels to the back. Four smaller ones were arranged, two in front of the wheels and two behind the wheels. “You’re making the flying car?!”
“Almost done,” he grunted. “Shall we take it out for a drive?”
“Yeah!”
Vaz started scooting out from under the car, “First I’ve got to let down the jacks.”
“Where’s the fusor?”
Vaz looked disappointed or maybe unsettled. “In the trunk.” His lips pinched, “It should be in the front where the engine is, but I didn’t want to take the engine out for this test. Besides, I put the pushers in the trunk too.”
“Pushers in the trunk?”
“Yeah. So the car won’t have to tilt forward to go forward. I put a row of thrusters behind the back seat to give it a forward and reverse. Also, without needing a drivetrain, those pushers will be able to make it go like a car on the street if you’re driving it instead of flying it.”
Tiona stared toward the trunk of the car, wondering why she hadn’t thought of using pushers to move vehicles on the road instead of just for flying. She suspected her dad’s earlier embarrassed look was because this first flying car was kind of a kludge. With all its original street hardware and then the flying hardware just tacked on, it wouldn’t actually have room in the trunk for suitcases. He’d probably rather have built a “designed from scratch” flying car, but at least this one would look like a regular car until it took off.
After musing a moment, she decided that, considering the “inelegant though functional” look of the saucer, this practically invisible modification of a nice BMW design might be an easier sell to car manufacturers than one her dad had built from the ground up. His designs tended to be functional, not pretty. She said, “No problem, if we like the way it works, we can take the motor out of the front and the gas tank out of the back.”
Her dad gave her a surprised look, “I hadn’t thought of taking the gas tank out. We’ll need to put in some kind of electric motor to run the power steering and brakes though.” He frowned, “A real design would use purpose built motors for the steering and to pressurize the hydraulics for the brakes.”
Tiona shrugged, “Leave that for the manufacturers. Let’s take this baby for a spin.”
Vaz tilted his head curiously, “Spin?”
Tiona laughed, “Slang for a drive.” She opened the passenger side door.
Her dad cleared his throat uncomfortably, “Why don’t you drive?”
Tiona drew her head back questioningly, “Come on, the AI’s going to drive, right?”
“Yeah, on the road. But up in the air…” He shrugged, “You’ll need to fly it with the joystick.”
“And you don’t want to?”
Vaz just shook his head, looking uncomfortable.
Tiona went around and got in the driver’s side. She reflected again that it was odd that it was still called the “driver’s-side” when virtually no one actually drove anymore. There were still controls to allow manual driving off-road or in some kind of crisis, but most young people had never used them.
The AI opened the garage door and backed the car out onto the street. Tiona told the car to start toward Jellico’s farm.
Vaz said, “Jellico’s farm?”
“That’s where Nolan and I tested out the flycycle.” She patted the straps around her body. She doubted her dad had even noticed she had it on, “He’s going to meet me there to try out the flying harness.”
Vaz eyebrows went up, “You’re going to fly around outside?!”
Tiona laughed, “I already flew it around the basement, there’s a limit to how
much fun you can have doing that!"
***
Cho’s voice came in Jong’s ear piece. Jong had never heard Cho sounded excited before. “Car just leave garage at Gettnor’s house! Man an’ woman inside. Think it father and daughter. Chase car, you follow, it going east! You tell others where it go… they catch up soon.”
Jong was on his feet, running out to his car. He knew the rest of his team would be on their way as well. Soon he was directing his car’s AI according to a running description from the chase car that they kept parked near the Gettnors’ house. Two of the team’s cars, driven manually, turned over to parallel streets and raced ahead. Jong wasn’t too worried that they would be stopped. Now that everyone let their AIs drive their cars, there weren’t that many police patrolling the streets.
Nonetheless, getting past all the vehicles whose AIs were following the law was difficult. It took a surprisingly long time for them to get two cars in place in front of the Gettnors. In fact it only happened shortly before the roads thinned out into the countryside. Jong was quite a few cars back. Two of his team’s cars were just behind the Gettnors and two were out in front, though his front two cars had a stranger’s car between them.
Jong studied the map, trying to figure out the best place for his lead cars to stop and block the road. He told those two cars to slow a little in hopes that the strange car would pass the one in front, though that would require a request from its passenger to its AI. “Okay,” he said, having his AI direct his words to the entire team. “There’s a curve to the right in another mile and a half. Yun,” he said, speaking to the driver of the car right in front of Gettnor, “you slow down as soon as you start into the curve. Wang, you pull up beside Gettnor’s car and force it off the road shortly after they begin the curve.”
Jong nervously studied the satellite view of the road ahead, hoping that he’d correctly interpreted the layout and that the woods on the inside of the curve would keep people from seeing what was going on. “Ambulance crew,” he barked, “you’re lagging behind!” The plan was for three cars to pin Gettnor’s vehicle at the side of the road. His men would get out, break Gettnor’s windows, Taser him and threaten the daughter. It was extremely important the ambulance be there promptly so that passersby would simply think there’d been some kind of accident, but that the authorities already had it in control. In addition, the ambulance had better tranquilizers to control Gettnor with. It was hard for Jong to credit Stillman Davis’ stories of Gettnor’s physical feats, but he refused to let his disbelief cause a major error.
***
Tiona frowned. For some reason the cars in front of her had been traveling surprisingly slow. She glanced over at her dad, “What’s with this traffic?!”
From the expression on his face, he hadn’t even noticed a problem with the traffic. He peered ahead as if he was wondering what she was worried about.
He hardly ever gets out on the road, he probably has no idea that we’re going slower than usual, Tiona thought. Deciding to explain it to him, she said, “They’re going really slow!” Then, to her astonishment, as they started into a curve, the car in front of them slowed even further. Peering ahead to see if there’d been an accident or something, she suddenly grinned and said, “This is where a flying car comes in really handy.” She spoke to her AI and pulled up on the joystick.
***
Jong tensely watched the satellite map his AI was displaying from the GPS feeds of his team’s cars. He wished he had real-time overhead observation that could show him the location of Gettnor’s car, but he reassured himself that it had to be right in front of Wang’s car. Wang started to pull ahead and to the left, presumably the maneuver they’d planned to force Gettnor’s car off the road.
On tenterhooks, Jong’s stomach clenched when Wang pulled back into the right lane. He assumed it must be because a car was approaching in the left lane, but then Wang’s voice came in his ear, “Jong! Gettnor’s car just lifted into the air and flew away!”
By the time he’d muttered a curse and said, “What?!” Jong already knew what had happened. Gettnor had installed some of the damned thrusters in his car! Disheartened, Jong said, “Try to follow it.”
Wang said, “We can try, but it not fly very high so we not see it very far. Do you want us split up?”
Jong said, “Airplanes usually follow a straight path. This flying car will probably do the same, Try to get an idea what direction it’s going and split our cars onto roads near that line.”
“It already drop behind some trees,” Wang said. He proceeded to pick out some landmarks on the map that he thought were along the line that the flying car seemed to be traveling on. Then he gave directions to each of the cars so that they would follow roads that would get them near those points. “Keep your eyes open for car. It black BMW 700 series. Call rest of the team if you see.”
Jong felt a little irritated at the way that Wang was bossing his team, but Jong hadn’t seen the direction the flying car had gone. Without having seen the line the car flew off on, it would be impossible for Jong to direct the team. Better that the team succeed with Wang directing it, than we fail with me trying to tell them what to do even though I couldn’t see, he thought. For a moment he considered criticizing Wang’s English, the man usually did better, but that would be petty at the moment.
***
Leaning against his car at the side of the road near the pasture, Nolan wondered what had happened to Tiona. He’d had the longer drive and had expected her to be here before he arrived. “AI, connect me to Tiona,” he said looking down the road toward Raleigh.
In his ear, he heard Tiona say, “Hi Nolan, what’s up?”
“Where are you? I thought you would have gotten here before I did.”
Cheerfully, she said, “What’s up?”
Trying not to sound irritated, he said, “What’s up, is that I’m wondering where you are?”
“Well,” she said, “if you knew what was up, you’d know where I was.”
A sudden certainty came over him. He looked up in the air, expecting her to be flying over him in her harness. Instead, an entire damn car hung about thirty feet over his head!
As the car began to descend to land right behind his, Nolan said, “You’re a little too much of a wise ass for your own good, you know?”
“Now, now, don’t talk to me that way. I’ve got my daddy here to protect me.”
Trying to sound miffed instead of excited to see a flying car, Nolan said, “He won’t always be there to protect you, you know? I can just give you an IOU for a spanking.”
“Oh, you brute!” Tiona said as if she were trying to sound horrified, but a little giggle at the end gave her away.
The BMW settled gently to the ground about twenty feet behind Nolan’s car. The driver’s side door burst open and Tiona leapt out and ran to throw her arms around Nolan. As he hugged her, he saw the passenger door slowly open and Tiona’s father slowly get out. The man stood expressionlessly beside the car without closing the door and Nolan worried that he was angry about Nolan hugging his daughter.
Tiona released Nolan and said, “Come on! Let’s go try out this badass harness.” She grabbed at Nolan’s hand and tugged him toward the trees that bordered the pasture.
As Tiona climbed through the fence, Nolan looked back and saw Dr. Gettnor still standing there beside the car. “What about your dad?”
As soon as Tiona got through the fence, she looked back at her dad and said, “Dad! Come on!
“I think I’ll just go back home. Can Nolan give you a ride?”
“You can’t go back home! You’ve gotta see your harness in action! Come on!”
Dr. Gettnor stood there looking uncertain for another thirty seconds, then he closed the door of the car and started walking toward them. Nolan hadn’t really watched the man walk before. He had an oddly wooden gait, like a robot. Or like a musclebound guy—he lumbered along something like Schwarzenegger had in those old movies.
Nolan clim
bed through the fence himself, then stood there holding the wires apart. Tiona’s dad stopped and looked at the strands Nolan held. He looked as if he’d never seen a barbed wire fence before. He blinked, then asked, “I climb between the wires while you’re holding them apart?”
Nolan nodded his head, not sure he could speak without laughing.
Stiffly, Dr. Gettnor climbed through the fence. As he did so, he pushed down on the lower wire, stretching it much farther than Nolan had been able to leaning on it with his foot.
They walked through the line of trees and into the pasture. A few cows gazed at them curiously from across the field. They were only a couple of steps past the trees when Tiona lifted into the air. Soon she was sailing around in circles and making figure eights. She traveled up and down, swooping like a roller coaster, but for the most part staying at a height where the foliage of the trees would block her being seen from the road.
At first she seemed slightly clumsy and out of control, but as Nolan watched with amazement she seemed to get more and more coordinated in her swoops and turns. He hadn’t looked for a controller on the harness and wondered how she was doing it.
A couple of minutes later she swung down to land right in front of him. Animatedly she asked, “You ready to try it?!”
Disc Page 13
