The Weapon - Resurrection - part 22
By Diana the Valkyrie
Flight training
Update: 19/06/2003 to valkyrie05



We took the short cut home. It's quicker by air. I've made a couple of short
hops in airplanes before, but this wasn't remotely similar. I could feel the
wind in my face, and the movement was far from smooth; Wendy was turning
exuberant loops, rolls and spins as we flew though the air. I suppose it's
like getting your legs back. She landed at my front door, and I leaned against
the door, trying to control my unruly stomach. Airsick? Well, let's just say
that it was just as well it was such a short flight, I managed not to disgrace
myself in midair. I lost the battle with my stomach, and ralphed into the
front garden. Not good. Not cool at all.

Then I fumbled with the key and let us in. She headed for the kitchen, her
feet not touching the ground; I went to my study. I'm a chronic list maker and
planner, and I was making a list of all the things we should do now. She
should do now. Hmmm. A horrible thought hit me - now that she could fly, would
she stick around? I'd hate it if she left me now; she's been here only three
days, but ... well. What does she need me for? She has Duncan, she can fly,
she has everything she wants and needs.

An hour later she made her dinner-gong sound again, and I sat down to a very
frisky curry. While I was eating, I brought up the question of what the
Guardian of Humanity should do now. "Duncan used to read the newspaper each
day, to see if there was something I might help with." "Sounds good, I can set
my PDA to scan the news-sites. But I think you should start off by offering to
help the authorities; the police, fire fighters, people like that." "Doesn't
work, David. The last thing they want is someone like me doing their job,
making them look incompetent. They won't call on me to help until it's far too
late. And anyway, that's just one country, I'm not the Guardian of England,
I'm the Guardian of Humanity. They tried to get me to join their silly
military, and I just plain refused, plus I gave them a demonstration of why
they didn't want to argue with me about this. Ever."

"The aircraft carrier?" "No, that was another incident. I chucked a pebble at
one of their tanks, and vaporised it. Anyhow, they don't like me, I'm not
something they can control. Constable Guardian of Humanity, reporting for
duty, SIR! I don't think so."

"Then I suppose I'd better start scouring the webnews each day to see what's
happening." I decided to end the uncertainty. "Wendy, now that you've got your
morale back, and you can fly again, will I still see you?"

She looked across the table at me. "Oh, David, do you think I'd leave you now,
after everything you've done for me? Besides, you remind me of Duncan, in a
way." Gratitude and a resemblance to Duncan. I suppose a declaration of
eternal love was too much to hope for; I'd settle for what I just got.
"Anyway, who'd cook you curries?"

I smiled at her.

"But don't start looking in the news just yet, I've got some catching up to do
first. I want to see Fiona, she was like a mother to me, then I want to see my
babies, then I want to check up on a few other people, and make sure the
Island is OK, and ... " "You want to make sure your family is OK." She nodded.
"Yes, exactly. I couldn't do it before, because I couldn't fly, and you know
how difficult air travel is these days."

I certainly did. At the big academic conferences, ninety percent of attendees
just sent their remote PDAs to sit in for them, and I did the same. Watching
the conference through a cam, and listening to it on headphones isn't the same
as being there, but what with the cost of travel and the travel restrictions,
there was no choice.

"Dead easy now, though," she said, and grinned at me. I smiled back. "Wendy,
could I go with you?" "But you don't know any of these people." "I'd like to
meet your family." "I could take your remote PDA, you could meet them that
way." "Wendy!" "Only kidding, yes of course you can come, I'll fly you."
"Gulp," I gulped. "But first, you need a bit of training, I don't want you
doing the technicolour yawn all over my costume." "Me neither. Training?"
"Tomorrow," she promised.

I went to bed. I suppose I was kind of expecting her to accompany me; she had
the last three nights. But she didn't. She just vanished, I had no idea where
she'd gotten to. "Wendy?" I said. But there was no answer. So I slept alone.

Next morning, over kippers, toast and Marmite, she told me where she'd been.
"The middle of the sun. You know how you have a favourite place where you go
to be alone and think about things? That's mine. I've really missed being able
to go there. And I had a long talk with Duncan while I was there, we haven't
had such a long talk for such a terribly long time. He wanted me to bring him
up to date on things, so I did, and then he apologised for his remark about
going to heaven. He hadn't meant it literally, he said, it was just a
circumlocution for dying. And when he heard how I'd tried to get to heaven to
be with him, he went very quiet for a while. I think he realised how sad I'd
been. But I told him it didn't matter, it was OK now, and there was nothing
for me to forgive." "You mean, with your Duncan emulator." "Yes, of course. So
then I swam around a bit, to see what the black-hole count was looking like in
there, just in case I need a few, you know? And when I told him about the
Church of the Holy Guardian, he laughed just like he did in the old days. And
I wanted to give him a big hug and a cuddle, but I can't, so it's not the
same, but it's better than not having him at all. And I can hug you instead."
And she did.

It took me a few minutes to recover from that - it wasn't so much the hug that
did for me, it was the kiss that followed, she sort of gets herself deep
inside of you and never mind about my toes curling, I distinctly felt my blood
curling. And I knew that I was only getting this because Duncan wasn't
available, but, hey, I'll take what's offered. When Wendy's all over you, you
just don't think about the negatives.

"OK, flight training," she said. I stuck out my arms and waggled them like
wings. She laughed. I love it when she laughs. "No, I do that bit. You have to
learn how to be a passenger." "Isn't that, you know. Easy? I just sit there?"
"No, there's nothing to sit on. I hold you up against me." Sounds good. "But
there's a few things you need to know." "Like where's the emergency exit,
oxygen, lifebelts, that sort of thing?" She laughed again. "One out of three.
There's no emergency exit or lifebelt, if I crash then you're dead. But there
is oxygen."

She explained to me how she carried passengers. "When there's just you, I wrap
my cape round us both to make an airtight space, then I go vertically up, lean
over, and get into near earth orbit. After a fraction of an orbit, I retro,
de-orbit and land the same way I took off, if you follow me. With babies, I
stay below 2G, but you can take three gees for a short time while we boost. It
means I can get to anywhere in the world in less than an hour." "So what's
this about oxygen?" "I maintain normal conditions inside my cape, but if you
feel that you need oxy, just kiss me, and I'll feed you some. Oh, and there's
also an in-flight entertainment system." "Wow! Does it play movies?" "No, you
can't play movies, but you can play with me." Ah. I see. Grin.

"So where are we going," I asked. "Delhi," she said. "India?" I asked,
stupidly. She nodded. "I won't be able to get a travel permit." She laughed.
"Who's going to ask to see it? We take off from here, we land at Fiona's
hospital." "But that's illegal," I said. She just looked at me. "The Guardian
of Humanity shouldn't do illegal things." "Whose law is it that forbids it?"
"Indian law." "I'm not Indian." "And British law on the return journey." "And
I'm not British either. And it's a really stupid law. And anyway, the travel
permit law only applies to human beings, and I'm not human. So there."

Ah. Good point. "But I'd be breaking the law." "That's your problem, David.
You don't have to come with me, you can stay here and wait till I get back."
No way was I going to pass up the chance of a flight into space, out to India,
and a chance to actually meet Fiona, who I'd read about extensively. "Wendy, I
surrender." "You're getting good at saying that, baby. Lots of practice," she
smiled.

We went outside for what Wendy called "acclimatisation". First she took me up
to 30 feet, and we hovered, while I gradually convinced myself that there was
no way I could fall. Then she did the same at a few hundred feet, high enough
to kill me if I fell, low enough for me to feel the nearby presence of the
hard ground. Then up to 20,000 feet, and I was starting to get used to it,
when suddenly, I felt that I was actually falling. But she still had her arms
round me, and as we neared the ground, she decelerated and we touched down
like an autumn leaf falling in a forest.

"Whew!" I said. "Are you OK?" she asked. "Airborne!" I replied, and she
laughed, "Now we'll have some fun."

Maybe she thought it was fun. We were in a thickly wooded area, and she was
flying at zero feet. No, I exaggerate, we must have been at least two feet off
the ground. She was zigzagging around trees, and hugging the contours of the
ground as she went. After about five seconds, I couldn't take it any more, and
I closed my eyes. Then I found that it was worse that way, so I opened them
again. That meant I could see all the near-collisions, and after a few more
seconds, I started to scream.

She stopped; we hovered just above the ground. "What's the problem, David?" I
panted for a few seconds, and then said, "I, it, the, nng. Urp." She held me
quietly for a few minutes while I calmed down. "You OK now?" "A bit. What's
the point of this, Wendy? We aren't going to fly a couple of feet from the
ground, are we?" "No. It's about trust, baby. You have to learn to trust me."
"But I do trust you." "If you trusted me, you wouldn't have been screaming."
Good point. I swallowed, and said, "OK, let's try that again."

This time, I made myself watch as trees hurtled by, and I kept saying to
myself, "She knows how to do this, she won't let me get hurt." And when she
slowed down after a few minutes and zoomed up into the clouds, I knew that I'd
conquered my fears. So when she dropped me, I managed to overcome my
monkey-reflex to scream and grab; I just closed my eyes and said to myself
"She won't let me get hurt," while thinking that if she didn't catch me, there
wasn't anything I could do about it anyway.

"OK, I think you're ready now," said a voice in my ear. Her white-and-gold
cape wrapped itself round me, she cuddled me close, and I felt my weight
increase hugely as she boosted up into earth orbit. "Wait a bit," I said, when
the feeling of acceleration eased off into a feeling of weightlessness. "We're
going all the way to India, and I haven't packed any clothes, or even a
toothbrush." "You're looking at this all wrong," she replied. "It's an hour
there, an hour back, it's just like a trip to the middle of London by bus."

. . .