Habitats Read online

  When Bart’s car had stopped, he didn’t immediately get out, but turned to look at her. Stacy thought about turning to him and seeing if he’d kiss her, but her suspicion levels kept her from wanting a kiss. She opened her door. “Let’s see your place.”

  Bart got out slowly and led her to his door. Inside his door, she turned brightly to him, “Wow, this is a big apartment for just one guy, what is it, three bedroom?” She glanced into the living room. Before he responded, she said, “Hey Bart? Can you forgive me? I hope you won’t feel like I was leading you on tonight, but I just remembered that I’m switching to day shift tomorrow.” She shrugged, “I’ve got to get up at six. Can I take a rain check on seeing your bedroom?” She lifted an eyeb cifts room. row and tried to look flirty.

  Bart actually looked relieved. “Hey, no problem.”

  Before she’d been suspicious… now she despised him as well.

  Basir walked her back out to her car. When he was almost back to the apartment Farshid stepped out of the shadows, “Fool!” Basir said, “You left the Quran out in plain view!”

  Farshid sneered, “The word of Allah hides from no one!”

  “That may be, but leaving the word of Allah out in plain sight is going to keep us from getting that port we wanted!”

  “Bah,” Farshid waved dismissively, “we’ll get it from someone else.”

  ***

  Carter’s HUD chimed and he looked up at it from the story he’d been reading to Jenny. His pay had just been deposited. Curious about the promised bonus, he told his AI to open the statement. “Damn!” he breathed.

  “What is it Daddy?” Jenny said, looking at him with concern in her eyes.

  “Nothing bad, kiddo,” he said smiling down at his serious daughter. “I got a bonus for helping with the rescue of those people on the space plane.”

  She frowned, “What’s a bonus?”

  “It’s when they pay you extra.”

  Her eyes widened, “So that should help you pay down your college loan?”

  “Yep,” he grinned. Jenny focused on his loan because her mother wanted so badly to pay it off before they spent money on frivolous things like going out or movies or vacations. Sometimes it seemed like the little girl looked forward to getting the loan paid off like it would be the beginning of a new life. He winked at her, and in a slightly louder voice said, “Maybe we can talk Mom into going out to dinner and seeing a movie this weekend?”

  Abby looked around at them, “What?”

  Carter smiled at his wife, “I got a bonus. Jenny and I are thinking we could splurge on dinner and a movie with a little of it this weekend?”

  Abby looked at him and sighed, “Come on Carter, I hate always being the bad guy, but we’re still $35,000 in debt. If we can just continue to control our spending, at the rate we’ve been going we’ll have it paid off in a couple more years. Then, we can start ‘splurging.’ But until we’re actually out of debt…” she shrugged, “I want to keep to our promise to avoid extravagant spending.”

  Carter turned down to Jenny and grinned, “You heard your Mom,” he stage whispered. “No frivolous spending… until my AI transfers some of this money to Bank of America.”

  Out of the corner of his eye he saw Abby shoot to her feet, putting her hands to her cheeks, “Carter!” she squeaked, “How big csizye was this bonus?!”

  He grinned up at her and quietly said, “Fifty K.”

  “Oh my God!” Abby put out her hands and Jenny, then Carter rose. She gathered them in a big hug and a moment later they were all jumping up and down together. “Oh, Kiddo,” Abby said to her daughter, “are we gonna splurge this weekend or what?!”

  ***

  Warren’s AI said, “You have a call from Vivian Varka of Portal Technologies.”

  “Accept. Hello Ms. Varka, what’s up?”

  “One of our employees has been offered money to lift a flammables port. I’m not sure of all the circumstances. There may have been some seduction and a falling out, but in any case, we have an address for you and your FBI boys to check out…”

  Thirty minutes after the team had arrived at the address Varka gave him, Warren’s AI said, “DNA on the doorknob matches the DNA in a house that blew up in a propane explosion in Atlanta, as well as DNA on a suspicious package diverted at the Memphis FedEx center. That package contained a port addressed to the White House.”

  Abbas went to the door to take delivery of the food they’d ordered. Farshid and Basir both looked up in surprise as Abbas backed back into the room. Then Farshid found himself staring into the barrel of a weapon as men in helmets and bulletproof vests bearing the “FBI” insignia poured into the room.

  As he lay on his stomach, arms cuffed behind listening to someone read him those silly “Miranda rights,” Farshid wondered, how did this happen? We were so careful!”

  ***

  Dr. Hanson stepped into the exam room to see John Parker. “Hello Mr. Parker, sorry we’re running behind our schedule. How is your arm doing?” She glanced and saw that not only his wife, but Ell Donsaii had once again accompanied him. She continued to be surprised that someone as well known as Donsaii would come with a man to all of his appointments. Hanson had a vague understanding that Donsaii had stopped the man that shot Parker from killing a woman, and that Parker had somehow got caught with a wild blast of the shotgun. She wondered briefly if Donsaii somehow blamed herself for his injury and that was why she came with him on all these visits.

  Parker smiled and said as if proud. “My arm’s OK and my hand’s great!” He held up the prosthetic hand that they’d built at D5R. “Can they be joined yet?”

  Hanson’s eyebrows rose when the fingers on the prosthesis moved around in a very lifelike manner. It was hard to keep in mind that all the connections between Parker and the prosthesis, except the bone attachments, went through ports. She worried that Parker would be seriously disappointed when the prosthesis was “joined” to his arm. Most amputees e cst roxpected much more from their prostheses than the devices delivered. She tilted her head, “Well, let me see how your skin has adapted to the stems.” Parker held out his arm so she could look at the metal stems protruding from the amputation site. The skin looked tightly adherent to the soft tissue binding matrix on the stems. She checked it from all angles. “Looks good. Let’s try it on.”

  Parker held the prosthetic hand out to her and, feeling surprised once again at how light the prosthesis felt, Hanson fitted the sockets in the prosthesis over the stems that protruded from his skin. She snapped the fittings into place and leaned back to look at it. Parker pulled at the glove material that had been rolled up onto the wrist of the prosthesis and it came down over the junction between prosthetic and arm. Hanson blinked as Parker pulled the sleeve of his shirt down over his forearm to his wrist. The hand looked very natural! She thought to herself that if she didn’t know it was prosthetic she’d have a hard time telling without touching it. To her amazement, he reached up and smoothly unbuttoned a couple of buttons on his shirt, an immensely difficult task with a prosthesis. He stood up, reached in his pocket with his normal left hand and got out a small Swiss army knife, a chapstick and a digital key. He put the three objects in his prosthetic hand and put it into his right front pocket pulling the hand back out empty.

  “Which one should I get out of my pocket?” he asked brightly.

  Knowing that this task was nearly impossible with a prosthetic hand, Hanson chose the chapstick because it was the largest and perhaps easiest to for him to recognize by feel. She knew he’d have a difficulty telling if he even had anything in his fingers, much less being able to determine which object it was. She didn’t want him to be too horribly disappointed by failure.

  Instead he said, “How about, chapstick pinched between thumb and index and knife between small and ring?” Pulling his hand out of his pocket, he showed them that, indeed, that is exactly how he had them. He grinned at them, “I’ve been cheating and practicing with the hand even though it wasn’t a
ttached to me yet.”

  Hanson sat back in her chair, stunned. Despite the initial data, she hadn’t dreamed they would have results like this with their first human trial. She glanced at the others and saw Parker’s wife Lisa staring joyfully at his new hand. Tears were pouring down Donsaii’s cheeks though. Parker saw them and turned to her, “Ell, aren’t you happy for me?” he asked quietly.

  In a choked voice, Donsaii said, “So happy, yet...” her voice broke, “so sad.”

  Parker leaned over and put his arm around her. His prosthetic arm. He gave her a hug and quietly said, “Ell, I can’t lie and say I wouldn’t rather have my own hand back, but, just think of all the people with prostheses who are going to count this as a great day in history.”

  ***

  Morgan Kinrais admired the shape of Raquel’s slender legs in her new ski tights. Even walking in her freshly rented ski boots the girl somehow managed to appear graceful and elegant instead of awkward like most people. Raquel was sup caqunteposed to be a beginner and Morgan worried that her brother wouldn’t be patient with her on the slopes. The Kinrais family members usually skied several times a season and were all pretty good. However, Shan had worked a spring semester as a ski bum and had become an excellent skier.

  Unfortunately, Shan’s idea of teaching someone to ski was to take them to the top of the mountain, give them a couple of pointers and then tell them he’d check on them as he went by on each of his runs. This had been successful with several of his buddies but had left an earlier girlfriend in tears. “Shan?” When her brother had looked her way Morgan said, “You go burn off some of your energy on the black diamond slopes while Lane and I take Raquel out for an easy run down the mountain.”

  “No,” he frowned, “I can go with Raquel. I’ll give her some pointers…”

  “No you can’t! You’ll be all critical and lose another girlfriend. We like this one. Besides, it’s time that your sisters had a little girl time with Raquel. We’ll take it easy and have a pleasant time while you’re off beating the mountain into submission.”

  Shan paused. It would be nice for Ell and his sisters to get to know each other. But, he’d been kind of looking forward to showing off in front of Ell at a sport where he could finally be guaranteed to be better than she was. It was a little hard to take, having a girlfriend who was better than he was at every sport they’d played together so far. On the other hand, he had been a little antsy about babysitting her on the beginner slopes. He’d reassured himself that, with her amazing athleticism, she’d quickly move up to the intermediate slopes. But he really didn’t want to spend a lot of time on the intermediates either. If his sisters really did want to ski with her while he blew the rust off, that’d be great. He shrugged, “OK, sis.” He pointed a firm finger, “Don’t break my girlfriend,” he admonished and started off toward the lift.

  “Wait, Shan,” Raquel called.

  Shan turned and stopped. Raquel strode his way in her boots, skis and poles on her shoulder. She leaned close and whispered, “How do I put the skis on?”

  He frowned, “You said you’d been skiing?”

  She grinned, “Nope, but I’ll learn fast and I didn’t want everyone freaking out over how fast.”

  He sighed, suddenly glad that his sisters were taking her up. “Put the skis down and put the toe of your boot into the front of the binding.”

  She put her hand on his shoulder to steady herself and tossed a ski down. She put the toe of her boot in, and as he said, “Now, stomp down with your heel,” she did so.

  She leaned up and gave him a kiss. “Thanks.” She dropped the other ski and stomped into it, then looked around as if surveying what everyone else was doing.

  In fact, looking at what everyone else was doing, was exactly what Ell had in mind. Trying to pick up just how people were getting around on their skis. If she’d known that Shan wouldn’t cn what Elbe taking her up the first time, she would have watched some video of beginning and intermediate skiers in order to have a better idea of how to perform.

  Her own skis on, Morgan waved Lane forward. She skied over to where Raquel had kissed Shan goodbye and was just staring around at all the other skiers. “Don’t worry Raquel, you’re better off not having the Shanster trying to give you pointers. He’s notoriously impatient. You ready to head to the slope?

  “The Shanster?” Raquel grinned at her.

  Morgan wrinkled her nose, and winked. “Old nickname. You ready?”

  “Sure.”

  Morgan pushed off toward a lift that went up to an area with many relatively easy slopes. She looked back and found Raquel skimming along behind her. Good, she’s not falling down just getting over to the lift. Morgan thought, not a total beginner.

  Morgan had picked a triple lift so she and Lane got on either side of Raquel. She noticed that Raquel was tightly focused on the people just in front of them who were getting on the lift, and for a second, she worried that Raquel had never ridden a lift. However, Raquel got on the lift without difficulty. The two sisters sat on either side of Raquel on the way up, chattering delightedly. The skies had cleared and sunshine poured down on a crisp cold day. Turning in the chair, it seemed like they could see forever. Raquel proved to be a lot of fun, laughing with them about the terrible weather on the drive up from the Denver airport the night before. A group of three handsome looking ski bums stopped under the lift waved up at the three girls. Laughing, Lane turned to Raquel and winked, “Too bad you brought your boyfriend on this trip. The three of us could go out in the evenings and devastate the men of this little town.”

  Raquel widened her eyes. Lowering her voice she said, “Maybe we could get Shan drunk and ruin the town after he passes out?”

  Morgan giggled, “Fat chance of that. The boy can really hold his alcohol. We’re almost to the top, let’s lift the ski rest.” She noticed that when she and Lane lifted the tips of their skis in preparation for getting off, Raquel was a beat late. She wondered how many times the girl had actually been skiing? She didn’t mind an easy ski morning on the first day but she didn’t want to try to teach a total beginner either. If the girl was terrible, maybe she could just suggest a professional lesson?

  When Raquel was a beat late standing up and then threw her arms up a little to keep her balance as they shot down the little drop that cleared the landing area Morgan’s heart sank. This could be tedious, she thought. “Let’s go right,” she called to the others, knowing that the easiest green run laid that direction. Raquel’s skis ran straight ahead a moment, then to Morgan’s astonishment the girl jumped slightly into the air, twisted and landed so her skis were already turned to the right. Her skis began to run to the right which would have thrown her over to the left but she almost immediately stabbed out with her left pole and regained her balance.

  Morgan had never seen a maneuver with such a combination of… what? Poor technique and… athletic elegance? Morgan pulled up at the start of the broad, mildly sloped run and stopped. “This’ll be a nice easy run to stretch out the kinks.” She glanced at Raquel and saw her eyes darting from skier to skier as if fascinated by the way the rank beginners were navigating the slope. “I’ll lead,” Morgan said as she took off down the middle of the run. Once she felt confident Raquel had fallen behind a little she said to her AI, “Connect me to Lane,” then, “Lane, stay behind her so if she falls you can help her up. Also, watch her so you’ll be able to give her some pointers at the next stop.”

  Morgan made a few broad curves and brought herself to a halt at the top of the next, somewhat steeper section. She looked back and found Raquel following smoothly in the tracks that Morgan had made. Raquel even made the same kind of a “turning stop” that Morgan had made, with a couple of tiny judders as if she didn’t quite know what the skis were going to do, but had corrected instantly when they surprised her. Morgan wondered if she’d skied on a different style or length of ski on her previous trips.

  When Lane stopped beside them Morgan said, “You ready to head on?�
�

  “Yeah! This is fun!”

  Morgan tilted her head, the comment had sounded almost like Raquel had never been skiing before. But she was skiing too well for that. Morgan started down the next, steeper section. When she stopped, she found Raquel right behind her, then Lane zipped on by and onto the next section. Raquel started after Lane and Morgan brought up the rear.

  Morgan’s eyebrows went up. Raquel might have made a couple of weird moves at first, but she looked like she was actually a pretty good skier, following Lane, doing exactly what Lane did. Just like Morgan had feared, her younger sister glanced back, saw Raquel on her tail and turned off onto an intermediate slope. Lane always wants to push people, Morgan thought with some irritation.

  However, Raquel flawlessly followed Lane down the intermediate slope, still doing exactly whatever Lane had done. Raquel’s skis ran right in Lane’s tracks, her style even looked like Lane’s. Whatever had happened getting off the lift, Raquel had obviously been skiing before. Morgan began to wonder if they might even be able to move up to the expert slopes a little later in the week.

  At the bottom of that section of intermediate slope, Lane glanced back again, saw Raquel and Morgan right behind her and shot off the level area and down onto the next section. To Morgan’s surprise, though Raquel had been doing just fine, she pulled to a stop and watched Lane go down that next section from the top. Morgan pulled up next to her, “You OK?”

  “Yeah! Sure!” she said a little breathlessly. “Just tired. I don’t have much stamina. But I’ll be ready to go again in just a second.”

  Morgan eyed her with some surprise. How could someone so toned, so obviously physically fit, claim to be tired after ten minutes of skiing? If she was a struggling beginner Morgan could believe it, but Raquel showed no evidence that the run had been difficult for her. Nonetheless, she stood beside Raquel a few moments until the girl pushed off down the slope, once again fol cnce halowing, as near as Morgan could tell, tightly to the route Morgan thought Lane had followed going down that section.