Lifter: Proton Field #2 Page 19

  Vinn swallowed, “A… A date kind of ‘take you out to dinner.’”

  “We work together.”

  Vinn’s eyes had dropped back down to the floor. He snorted, “I’ve noticed.”

  “And I’m…” Myr paused, feeling like she didn’t want to say it, but decided it did need to be said. “I’m… older than you are.” She didn’t have the courage to say how much older.

  “Yeah, I’m pretty good with math.” He shrugged, “But pretty much every girl over the age of twelve’s more mature than I am, so that’s nothing new.”

  Myr laughed, “It’s good to see you’ve got a firm grip on reality.” She sat and looked at him for a few seconds, then said, “You gotta take a shower first!”

  Vinn’s eyes shot up to hers, then widened with excitement, “Yeah! I’ll be back to get you in… thirty minutes?”

  It actually took Vinn about thirty-five minutes to get back to her place. Myr had tried to talk him into just letting her meet him at the restaurant, but he’d claimed that wouldn’t be a date. She’d been a little worried because she was ready in about twenty minutes. That was more time than it usually took her to get ready to go somewhere, but she knew that a lot of other women would’ve spent much more time on their appearance.

  She just ran out of things to do.

  When Vinn came back to get her, he didn’t just have his AI contact hers when he pulled into the parking lot like she’d expected. Instead, he actually knocked on her door. When she opened the door, she saw that he’d dressed up. He looked better than she’d ever seen before, even when she’d met him on his first day at work. In fact, his clothes looked suspiciously new—as if he might have purchased them specifically in anticipation of this date. He’s really been working up to this, Myr thought, touched to realize what a big deal it was for Vinn. Glad I put on my skirt. I guess I really ought to get some nicer clothes.

  As she got in his car, Myr said, “Where’re we going?”

  Vinn gave her a look that bordered on wide-eyed. “Um, I was thinking, because we’re here in Kansas City, that I should take you out to a steak place. But now I’m realizing that I have no idea what you like to eat. Is steak okay?”

  Myr laughed, “Sure. You’re buying, and I don’t have any dietary weirdities, so wherever you want to go’s fine. I was only making conversation.”

  Vinn spoke to his car’s AI, telling it to take them to Delbert’s Steakhouse, a new place Myr had recently heard about. She said, “That place’s pretty hot right now. I think you have to have reservations… And I’ve heard they’re pretty hard to get.”

  He gave her what she’d have sworn was a shy look, “I have reservations.”

  “What! How?”

  He looked back out the front of the car, “I might’ve had them for a few weeks.”

  Myr was shocked to the point of speechlessness. Her initial impulse was to punch him on the shoulder, but instead, after a moment she said, “It appears… that you’ve given this a lot of thought… and I want you to know that I’m touched.”

  Vinn turned back to her and grinned, “Good! I’m glad you noticed. I’ve…” he stopped, apparently thought better of whatever he’d been about to say and instead went with, “I’m really looking forward to talking to you about something besides work or basketball.”

  Myr put on a dismayed look, “What else is there?”

  “A few things,” he said with a little laugh. “Where were you born?”

  Myr laughed, thinking that he must have read up online, getting suggestions about what to talk about on a date. However, as they had their dinner, he pulled her life out of her, seeming interested in even the most boring parts. To her surprise she found she enjoyed telling him about it.

  After a while, she realized that the information flow was almost entirely unidirectional. She started asking about his life as well and began to learn that being a boy genius had a few downsides.

  The fact that he’d obtained his pilot’s license when he was fourteen led them briefly into touching on work. Myr complained about the FAA’s requirement that anyone who was going to fly their spacecraft had to at least do a flight training ground school and learn about FAA regulations, airport operations, and radio communication. “After all,” she groused, “the ship’s AI has all the certifications it needs to do that stuff.”

  He shrugged, “I can see where you’re coming from, but even though the technology seems to be ready, they still aren’t letting AIs fly planes without a certified pilot.”

  “They should be. It seems to me that the complexity of getting from one location to the other in the air’s a lot lower than going somewhere on the streets where there’re a lot of other vehicles and pedestrians, especially kids.”

  Vinn snorted, “You’re probably right when it comes to flying our spacecraft. But, when you’re flying an airplane or helicopter, the issues of keeping it in the air are a little more complex than steering a car on the street.”

  “Agreed, I’m just saying that for spacecraft where aerodynamics don’t matter, I don’t think I ought to have to learn a lot of that stuff.”

  Vinn tilted his head, “If you don’t know the FAA regulations you might tell the ship’s AI to do something that’s not allowed. Having it enter an airport’s flight path or something like that.”

  Myr drew back, “It’d just tell me I couldn’t do that!”

  “What if you overrode the AI because you didn’t understand?”

  Myr grinned at him, “I think you’re just siding with them because you’d already learned all that crap.”

  He shook his head, “I hadn’t used it for a long time. I had to review… And, they made me take the test again.” When she opened her mouth to make another objection he put up a hand and said, “We’ve strayed perilously close to talking shop, something I promised myself we weren’t going to do on my date.”

  Myr lifted an eyebrow, “Your date?”

  “Um, you know what I mean.”

  She leaned forward and rested her chin on a hand, eyes twinkling, “No, I don’t. Please explain.”

  Vinn snorted, “I admit, I’m not very good at this. I really think you should cut me some slack…”

  When Vinn’s car arrived back at her place and parked itself out front, Myr sat for a moment, wondering what would happen next. The junior prom in high school had been her only real date so far in her life. She’d occasionally gone out with groups of other kids in college and she knew that many of them had hooked up at the end of those evenings. However, Myr had always been worried about keeping up her grades and had excused herself to go back to her dorm and study before anyone had gotten that far with her. Or maybe no one wanted to be with me anyway? She’d always wondered whether anything more would’ve happened even if she’d stayed around longer.

  Other than a clumsy, fumbling kiss when her date had dropped her off after the prom and a single uncomfortable make out session with a boy she hadn’t really liked during a college group outings, she had no real understanding of what Vinn might be expecting.

  Vinn might have even less experience than I do, she suddenly realized. He may be hoping I’ll make the first move!

  She told herself that she needed to turn and look him in the eyes. I should lean a little closer to him and say thanks. Instead, she sat there like a lump, staring out the front window and trying to think of something to say. Something that’d be less inane than an observation on the weather or the stars.

  The silence broke when Vinn opened his door of the car and got out. Myr worked the handle on her door and started to push it open but Vinn called out, “Wait! This is a date. I’m coming around to open your door like an old-time gentleman!”

  Myr snorted. She couldn’t help it. She found this completely hilarious. Despite vigorous suppressive efforts, when Vinn swung the door open her shoulders were still shaking with repressed laughter. “Are you okay?” he asked.

  Doing her best not to choke, Myr nodded without looking up at him and held out
her hand daintily with the pinky finger elevated. Once he’d taken her hand, she stepped out and stood, saying, “I declare…” She looked up, hoping against hope that he’d found it humorous as well—that he wouldn’t look hurt because she was laughing—that…

  He was standing right next to her, his head bent down and his face mere inches away. He’s going to kiss me! she thought, suddenly afraid that she’d keep giggling and hurt his feelings.

  But then his lips touched hers and all other thoughts and concerns faded away in surprise. Wow, this is uhhh…!

  ******

  “It works,” Joe Jenkins voice enigmatically said behind Nancy.

  She turned curiously, wondering what the out of context statement referred to. “What works?”

  Joe had an almost beatific look on his face, “Dystrophin-BG IIIa. The MDX mice and the cDMD dogs are definitively way better and neither are showing any evidence of rejection. None of the human rejection panels have shown any reaction to BG IIIa either.”

  Nancy sagged back in her chair, waves of relief and joy flooding through her system. BG IIIa was their most promising gene modification for Duchenne’s. It was a small enough self-inserting modification to the dystrophin gene that it could fit into an adenoviral vector. It had modifications of the epitopes that were usually responsible for immune rejection of dystrophin to make them the same as other epitopes which were universally expressed in almost every human—thus they shouldn’t be rejected. They hadn’t been sure that the new gene would work, or that it would avoid rejection if it did, but if it was working in both the mouse and dog models of Duchenne’s… And if the antibody testing protocols the lab had weren’t showing any evidence of rejection… Feeling somewhat lightheaded, she closed her eyes for a few seconds. Then they snapped open, “Wait a minute! You didn’t just get all those results this morning! Why am I just hearing about them now?!”

  Joe grinned at her, “It’s been tearing my heart out to tell you about promising results and then to have to come tell you later when they fail. Since this one looked so good, I wanted to wait until I was sure there weren’t any problems.”

  Nancy rose to her feet and gave him a shove. He stumbled back a couple of feet, but she pursued and started thumping his chest with her fists. “You jerk! I can’t believe…” Her throat seized up on her and suddenly she couldn’t continue speaking.

  Joe put his arms around her shaking shoulders and just held her until the violent emotional storm finished washing over her. When her legs collapsed under her, he settled her back into her chair and just held her hand as she sobbed.

  Finally she got her voice back and said, “Sorry…”

  “Hey, I get it. It’s a lifetime of angst boiling to the surface. No worries.”

  ******

  Nina’d been hiding near the road most of the day. She’d been tempted by all five of the vehicles that had driven by, but had been afraid that some of the Abus might be hiding along the road just waiting for her to step out and try to hitch a ride. The Abus had tramped up and down the road several times and in the late morning had come by with Greg, Penny, and Linda whom they’d obviously recaptured. Presumably her friends had been hiding near the road like Nina, just not as successfully. She wondered about Mark and Wendy, thinking that surely she couldn’t have been the only one to get away. When the camp had roused after Wendy fell, Nina hadn’t thought she’d have any chance of escaping. She’d only decided to run in the hopes that her attempt to escape might help some of the others by dividing the pursuit.

  In her effort to distract, Nina’d exploded out of their sleeping place, running west rather than along the path to the north that would’ve taken her to the road. She’d made no attempt to be quiet or sneaky at first, hoping to bring the Abus after her. To her surprise, she’d found herself almost immediately on a relatively wide path that headed west. Even in the dim lighting she’d been able to keep a rapid pace. After going what she’d estimated was several hundred yards, she’d started to wonder if she might escape as well. She slowed and tried to be stealthy. Eventually she moved off the path and hid silently while she listened for pursuit. It wasn’t long before some of the Abus came along the path behind her, flashing lights here and there as they went, but they passed her hiding place without noticing her. After a while they passed by again on their way back to camp.

  She suspected that the Abu’s had focused most of their attention on the path to the north since that had been the most direct way out of camp and the path they’d have expected their captives to be aware of. Besides, Nina thought they’d probably mostly gone that direction since that’s where they’d heard Wendy fall.

  Nina wondered whether she might be safe where she was, now that they’d searched down that path. However, she suspected they’d be back once it was light. Resolutely, she’d started moving carefully northwest, hoping that the road didn’t curve away and that she’d still encounter it even though she was moving obliquely toward it.

  She’d come to the road just before dawn. With great trepidation she’d dug herself into some dense vegetation about fifteen feet from the edge of the road and settled down to rest and wait.

  And wait and wait, second guessing every decision to let another vehicle pass without trying to flag it down.

  By late afternoon, she’d been very hungry and had dreaded waiting through another night, even though she thought that might be safest. When a truck came along the road just as the sun was dipping behind the trees, she took a deep breath and trotted out, waving for attention.

  Multiple terrible scenarios went through her mind as the truck slowed. It could be a vehicle belonging to the Abus themselves. It could be some men who would rape her because they were the kind of men who would think any hitchhiking woman must have loose morals. Resolutely, she told herself that being raped by such men would be better than being a captive of the Abus for another day. And, she thought, if I can get free, I can help the police find those sons of bitches.

  When the truck stopped, she saw a man driving, an older woman in the passenger seat and a child sitting between them. The old woman said, “Quick, get in! This isn’t a safe place for a pretty girl like you!”

  Relief washed over Nina as she swung up into the cab, “Thank you for stopping. You’ve probably saved my life.”

  The old lady narrowed her eyes, “You’re a foreigner?”

  Nina nodded, “Yes, though my father was from Mindanao. I came here with a mission to build a community center for Lopana. I and some of the others were kidnapped by Abu Sayyaf.”

  The woman leaned forward to look backward out the mirror on the passenger side of the truck. “We heard about that.” The man was driving the truck manually, but Nina could see he was constantly looking back through his side-mirror. The woman said, “The road’s clear, let’s put her in the back.”

  The truck slowed and the old lady said, “As soon as the truck stops, climb in the back as fast as you can. Bury yourself in the cassava.” She shook her head, “If Abu Sayyaf stops us…” she glanced down at the child and thought better of whatever she’d been about to say. Instead she looked back up at Nina, “We can’t have them find you with us.”

  As the truck shuddered to a stop, Nina leaped out and climbed the rails into the back. The truck had started rolling again before she was all the way in. The entire back of the truck was piled full of cassava roots. Nina dug a trough in them up near the cab of the truck and laid down in it. She pulled piles of the roots back over her body, leaving only an opening over her face and shoulders. She kept her arms free to pull roots over the last bits of her if someone searched the truck. The lumpy roots immediately began gouging her. Damn, this is uncomfortable, she thought.

  Nina thought it was about an hour before she felt the truck slowing. She shifted around so that the cassava would be gouging her in different spots in case they were being stopped by some Abu Sayyaf and she had to lie still. Then she started to hear the sounds of a town around her and began to hope she was going to b
e able to get out. When the truck had stopped, she heard the old woman’s voice say quietly, “Hold still. We’re just getting gas and this town is known for having quite a few radical Islamists. They might belong to Abu Sayyaf. You shouldn’t try to get out until the next town.

  Nina froze in place and wished she’d pulled some roots over her face.

  Nothing happened in that town though. About thirty minutes later, the truck stopped again. This time the old woman told her to climb out. When she did, they proved to be parked at a small police station. The men there called the national kidnapping task force, but wouldn’t let her call home.

  When the task force people arrived, they still wouldn’t let Nina call home. “We don’t want anyone giving away the fact you’re out of Abu Sayyaf’s reach. If the kidnappers learn you’ve gotten completely away, they’ll move farther and faster. That may blow our best shot at freeing the other victims.”

  “But… I’m gone, surely they must already expect that I’ve gotten free since they haven’t recaptured me yet.”

  The man shrugged, “Probably, but don’t you think your family would be willing to wait another day or so to learn about your freedom in order to give your fellow captives their very best chance?”

  Nina nodded, “Okay. Let’s get back out there to where I escaped!” She already felt frustrated that it’d taken hours for the first person from the task force to arrive.

  To her dismay, they didn’t get back out to the campsite she’d fled from until early the next morning. At that point, they showed up in force with about sixty men, all armed to the teeth. She got the impression that no one in the task force wanted to take on the crazies of Abu Sayyaf without overwhelming force at their backs. To her dismay, the men in the task force appeared more focused on killing the kidnappers than they were on rescuing the captives.

  They had little trouble finding the spot where Nina had caught a ride in the truck because the driver rode back out there with them. It did take a little searching to actually find the campsite since Nina had no chance of retracing steps she’d taken in the dark. She only had a vague idea that it was southeast. However, with so many men it didn’t take terribly long to find the campsite. It was deserted as they had expected.