Science Fiction 2010

Gleefully, you whir around. You are a neat model helicopter, fluttering among aisles and shelves of the library that is one of their cities. At the speed of your fly like mind, you peer and appraise your way through hundreds of scenarios. Looking for a landing.

With ugly, brazen deliberation, you flit from fact to secret. Uh, in, but not of it: moving among the mundane, just like you planned. You mean to keep your integrity. Swear it again, Baby; with feeling.

At an intersection you see a girl. Like A Woman, only younger. The touch of thought coasts you invisibly to her side: Girl child at the crossing. What's that package she is carrying? Ooh, you may be The Vampire Wolf.

Right from the slender biped's shoulder, you peer closely at her face. She shifts. Her nose wrinkles for a second. Then she appears to return focus. It seems clear you have been detected. Less than corporeal you can not be materially seen. Can you?

'Course not. Even their gravity for you, is negligible. The laws of inertia are strong as ever, however. Of this, you have been distressfully reminded, from time to time, to the tune of light embarrassment.

Virtual invisibility does have advantages: When you do lose it, crash and fall, no one seems to notice.

With the huge kite like wings folded, you are forced to amble up on the tips; a monster on stilts, you guess. Some kind of bat, maybe. If they could see you, these people might react as they would to one of those old Tokyo smashing beasts. Rhodan, of the fruity, warbling air raid siren.

The futile squadrons of mosquito like jets. The F-86 usually, in fact. The packets of crude Mighty Mouse rockets you aim with the longitudinal axis of the whole waggling kerosene airplane. Give me a break. The Army colored P-80s. Jeep simple.

To the big bellied waddling Sumo named Rhodan, the jets are hardly more than a belt of sparkling, sometimes pesky gnats. It's those high tension wires up on the other side of the valley you have to watch out for, Big Boy. No wonder the bipeds keep smiling. Life here is a dirty amusement park. Isn't that right, Baby? These are the rides. This is A Television Show. We are here to cheat and be cheated.

But you know, you'd better stop that drifting. Striding across valleys, indeed. Come on, you aren't big at all. Just maybe, lets see, seven and a half of their feet. Hmm? And you certainly aren't dangerous. Rhodan! Imagine these people scampering before you like insects. And they would too. Wouldn't they? Yes, it would be like ...

Hold! Do not imagine that which you would not manifest. You are not here to trip, but to learn, if you can. That is what you tell yourself.

Ah yes, doctor. This girl with the package. Extend a tentacle and lay sensors right up near her eyes. For a look in the windows. She is just a kid. You know her intimately by the way she stands: Tall, easy and slender.

Her clean dark hair: The honey warm smell of it. Her high cheeks; the brightness of her eyes, so brilliant they blow dust from your soul. Then she faces you. Shades her eyes with the long cool fingers. She looks steadily back at you. You stand there, smiling, and wish you had pockets.

The group of waiting pedestrians is abruptly freed with a WALK signal.

As if they might actually have places to go or things to do, they step off immediately, almost purposefully; more like cattle in a chute than they would like to admit. Left behind for a moment, you push off as hard as you can, to catch up. You float and stumble along, gaining on her maybe a little too quickly. She moves casually to the nodding heads of drivers on hold in vehicles all around. Men suspended behind windshields. Breathing heavily through auto grills.

In the traffic, a massive bus plunges gracefully to a halt. Hippo in a tutu, up on one toe, all them tons tumble smoothly down. Inertia is finned back to juice the batteries and light the lights. People scamper safely as a cartoon family of ducks before the smiling steel bumpers, the hooded rolling eyes that are headlights. Best of all, of course, no one sees the pale red monster who lopes among them: You.

Alas, you have pushed off too hard. You are about to drift right by the target. And, buffoon, there may be a problem in the matter of imminent confrontation with the brick wall at the end of the crosswalk.

You need maybe a little easy reverse input. Gently, so you don't topple. Oh boy. Some monster. Can't even walk right. In your unblinking and grave owl eyes, you see yourself as you start to skitter: A cat too fast on the linoleum floor. Some kind of vulture clown on ice: a gargoyle. Wing tips skidding patting and paddling uselessly in the wrong direction. There can be nothing serious in this. Sure you are laughing hard as you cruise past. As you go by, you see the plastic wrapped package she holds is actual antique commercial personal computer software. All military camouflage colors. Stenciled every where loudly with the comely caveat: "Top Secret."

Charmingly "real."

Your covert appearance is nothing but ridiculous. The woman, even as a girl, is cool as ice. Whatever kind of body you are in, the nature of the relationship is immediately clear: You are without dignity.

You do have a sense of humor. Helplessly carried on the slow flipping wave that is inertia you spontaneously whisper down to her face as you glide by: "Boo!" No one can see or hear! Your idiot frozen smirk threatens to crack your face. This wondrous glee is nearly too much!

But she turns and appears to look right back at you. And her nose crinkles again. The cherry lips purse. Just for you, she mouths a silent response. Curious.

She puffs an exaggerated "B." Forms the "oooh" with the round mouth. The sweet eyes are keen with knowing. What is she soundlessly saying? "B?" Plus "Oooh?"

Yuh. The shock of the beam of direct clear illumination completely uncouples every vestige of the illusion of control you harbor. No question of trying to recover. The composure drops like skirts about the ankle. You break loose and appear to accelerate, sailing rapidly on away.

You hit the wall like a bag of hollow sticks. The clattering collision is abrupt and comic. As lights flicker and the pain kicks in, you feel the tug of your stupid bony lips. And always; the grin.

From the ground you see her coming lightly on across. She stands close, apparently not doing anything, supposedly not seeing you. Turning up, you perceive her, silhouetted against the sky. Indeed, she waits. You smell the light fresh scent of her: Almonds and flowers. Why is it always to be this way?

With the wall and her arm for balance, you come first to your feet, then sorting the folds and bones of your wings, get back up on the tips. With a drifting appendage, you select one of her elbows, and she leads you where she will.