The Pike: Ships In The Night (12 page)

I read the result through tears, “1, 3, 34,471, 103,413.”  Then added in a hoarse voice, “Ninety-eight point seven percent accuracy in predictive states of the qubits.”

The guys were cheering as I cried.  I didn't understand, I felt so... happy, but I was crying.  We had done it.  Sure we lost a bit of accuracy on 'first try' results, but weighted sets would eliminate that.  This was amazing... but I was crying, and it just confused me more.

The boys all stopped their celebrating and looked at me with their own confusion.  They did the only thing they could think of and just hesitantly reached out and put their hands on my shoulders.  Jamal asked in a quiet voice, “Are you alright, Schrodie?”

I shrugged and giggled through my tears. “I'm happy, but I'm crying.  They are contradictory, and I don't know how to properly process it.”

We stood there a few seconds, the boys lending me support through tactile contact.  Then Len brightened and said like he had just had an epitome, “Doctor Hannigan is a girl.”  He looked at the others in question, and they nodded and smiled.

What?  That wasn't an explanation!  I wiped my eyes on my sleeve and giggled out, “Shut up.”  This got them all chuckling.

I took a deep breath and exhaled then grinned so wide my cheeks hurt as I whispered to them, “I'm going to run it again.”

We all turned to the screen in excited anticipation.

When Sunday morning rolled around, I absently wondered how I was going to get Imme to the barbecue.  It didn't show much class to bring a girl somewhere on public transit.  Besides the guys would rib me tirelessly if we got off the bus across from old man Porter's place.

A taxi then?  I wasn't hurting for cash yet.  Most of my expenses were paid by the city of Seattle, the SFD Firefighters Fund, and insurance.  But it wouldn't last long paying for hour long taxi rides.

I exhaled as I made my way out of the little studio apartment above Mrs. McGreggor's garage.  The silver-haired retiree had been a godsend through all of this.  When I was confined to that damn wheelchair, she had made room in her guestroom downstairs for me since I couldn't navigate the stairs.

I love the old lady, she's about the nicest landlady someone could want.  But when I graduated to crutches from the chair, I was so relieved to be back in my own place again.  Now it was even easier to navigate the stairs without the crutches.  I still have to put my weight on the railing like I do the cane, but I felt semi-independent again.

Once I got down, I swung up the old metal garage door.  It creaked and groaned in protest, singing the song of old, disused metal.  A bit of dust filtered down in the early morning sunlight.  I stepped over to the old dust covered drop-cloth and reached out.

With a quick swipe that sent a cloud of that dust into the air, I pulled it off to reveal the crotch-rocket underneath.  My old Kawasaki Tomcat motorcycle.  I felt a sad smile twitching on my face.  I had almost abandoned her down here after the accident.  Trip had brought her home for me, and she's been under that tarp since.

My leg is strong enough now that I think I can ride her again.

I smiled knowing that this would be an experience in the real world that Liya hasn't had yet.  I hoped it would be fun for her.  It was either this or I borrow Mrs. McGreggor's old beat up station wagon.  I know I've fallen down the cool scale to the bottom, but there is no way I'd show up on a date in that.

I sighed and started going over the bike as I said, “Let's see if we can't get you running.”  I knew the battery would be toast by now, but there was nothing wrong with my right leg.  I mounted up and turned the key.  Nothing.  I smiled, gave her some throttle and stomped the kick starter.  Two kicks later she was roaring to life.  My smile grew.  Yeah.  This would work.

I spent some time cleaning her up and getting ready.  Imme had said she would be working on a project with her father today and to show up early if I wanted to see what she was working on.  She was being extremely playful and had a permanent smile on her face.

I almost couldn't get her to stop talking about her breakthrough Friday night on the ferry and at the restaurant, and about how much my comment had helped her team.  It seems that even with this breakthrough, an uphill battle would begin.  Their advancement would need to be peer reviewed to prove conclusively they had accomplished the feat, without giving away any of the trade secrets.

Their competitors would be conducting the review, as they were the only ones with the expertise and qualifications to certify their results.  The two companies, especially Sky Computing would do their best to tear down the accomplishment as derivative and simply simulated annealing.

I guess it is really cutthroat in the industry.  I asked why the industry as a whole couldn't just be excited about the breakthrough.  Liya explained that it was going to change not only the entire face of the computing industry but also quantum mechanics contributions to the physical world.  Their competitors, who were all so close to their own breakthroughs, didn't want to be seen as failing.  So every attempt would be made to discredit her team and their findings.

My advice to her was, “Just tell 'em to go fuck themselves.”

I tried so very hard to not laugh at her confused response. “It would be highly improbable that they could physically...”  I almost kicked myself when I placed a hand on her cheek, and she stopped talking and blushed profusely, looking down with her hair falling forward to obscure her face.  I was being too forward with her, but I was moving so glacially slow for me.  I usually burned bright and hot, but she was... different.  She was... well... she was Imme.

I punched the address she gave me into my cell's map application and slid it into the dock behind the small windscreen on the bike.

After securing my cane to the seat, I checked the spare helmet to make sure it was secure as well.  I switched on the Bluetooth headset mounted in my own helmet and looked at it for a moment.

Such a deep purple it looked black, until the light hit it at the right angle, giving it a depth like a candied apple.  There were flames of a slightly lighter purple embedded in the layers of translucent paint that were only visible when the light hit it at that same angle.

I stared at the flames, I was falling into them in an endless loop.  They were my whole world, and there was only pain.  That's how I knew I was alive, the pain of the fire biting at me, raking its red hot talons though my gear and sizzling my flesh.  I stretched my hand toward my mask which was just beyond my reach.  My lungs were burning.

I tore my eyes from the helmet with a herculean effort.  I was getting light headed as I panted, pushing the unwanted memories away.  I slammed the helmet over my head and grabbed my black leather gloves, jamming the left one over my hand to hide the scars as I tried to calm my thudding heart.

I made a fist a couple times with the glove, pushing away the phantom pain and being left with the dull ache I have grown accustomed to these past months.  I put on the other glove and slapped down the visor on the helmet.

I cranked the volume on my cell and cued up ‘Slapped’ by Leather and Heels.  Fuck the flashbacks, I wanted to feel like me again.  I stomped the starter just as Penny Franklin screamed out her signature, “Meeeeoooowww!” on the hard rock song, through the speakers in the helmet.  I violently twisted the throttle, and the bike went screaming out of the garage, the torque of the monster so great I was riding a wheelie as she gripped the pavement.

My heart thrummed in time with the driving beat of the drums, and every downstroke of Penny's power chords on her guitar matched me shifting each gear.  I ignored the shooting pain in my leg as I shifted.  This wasn't a time for my new reality as Allison Fraiser, this was me... Sparky Fraiser, if just for a moment.

I screamed with Penny, venting all my rage and frustration as I laid out across the bike, making us two parts of the same machine, tearing up the road to the beat.  It felt good.  I felt a tear on my cheek as I smiled fiercely while the world blurred past.

When I felt like I could breathe again, I relaxed and slowed, with a certain far too cute brainiac on my mind as I headed north toward Bremerton.  I found myself arriving there faster than I would have thought.  Had I gotten so used to the bus moving along so sedately?  I had driven this route on my bike hundreds of times to catch the ferry.  Even then I had preferred the serenity of the ferry ride to center myself before my shifts at the Five.

I navigated northwest to a cute little low-income house by the Narrows.  It was a tan single level, that looked to have been built in the sixties.  It was in fairly decent shape but showing its age.  The small yard was well kept with flower beds lining the road, and the house.  I smiled at the irony that Lili seemed to like lilies.

There was nothing remarkable about the place except for the fact that it was on the water.  Waterfront property was like gold.  People paid a premium for property at Rocky Point just a stone's throw up the Port Washington Narrows from there.

There was a small garage which wasn't attached, it was a separate structure ten feet off the house.  Same color, same condition.  I idled the bike into the short gravel drive and moved to the side of the familiar minivan, as not to block it.

I pulled off my helmet and stuffed my gloves into it before hanging it off the handlebar.  I ruffled my hair, running my fingers through its length to get rid of the helmet hair.  I liked my hair.  Straight, black, and lustrous.  My parents said it came from my mother's side.  Grandma Selkirk hailed from India.  It didn't take much more than that to get it draping over my shoulders and down my back.

Lili stepped out a side door while I shut down my bike and looked on.  She had a pitcher of what looked like lemonade on a tray with some tall glasses.  I unzipped my riding jacket as she took a couple steps toward the garage before she noticed me.  I smiled and waved, and she made her way excitedly over to me, her own smile beaming.

She said, “Hello Allison, what a pleasant surprise.  Liya hoped you'd be joining us early.  Vince told her not to get her hopes up.”

She eyed my bike suspiciously.  Oh shit, I hadn't thought of that.  They were so protective of their daughter.  She probably saw it as a donor-cycle instead of a means of transportation.  Why did I suddenly feel like I was back in school again?

She said as she still gave my bike the stink-eye,  “Come on in, you can see the project she and her father have been working on since she was twelve.  She'll be thrilled you're here.”

I raised one eyebrow as I unlashed my cane.  “Thrilled?  We are talking about the same intellectually distracted lady here aren't we?”

She chuckled and countered, “She's a lot more emotional than she realizes.  She's just... special.”

I nodded my agreement with that assessment as I grinned and dismounted, putting my weight on my cane.  I reached a hand over toward the tray. “Let me take that for you Lili.”  She shook her head, keeping it out of my reach as she just turned to lead the way. Grr.

There was a little side door on the side between the two buildings, and she navigated quickly to it and stood.  I grinned and reached over her head to push it open for her.  She gave me a grin that looked so much like her daughter's and walked under my arm.

I stopped dead once I took a step into the old structure.  There in the middle of the little garage, which had a dirt floor, was a thing of beauty sitting on a tarp stretched across the ground.  I didn't have to even guess as to what I was looking at, it was a holy grail to muscle car owners, second only to a 1971 Hemi Cuda convertible.

I snapped my mouth shut when I realized it was hanging open as I gazed upon the cherry red, 1969 Chevy Chevelle Super Sport convertible.  Complete with the two wide white racing stripes along the length of the hood and trunk.

I swallowed, knowing that eight cylinder 396 engine would shake the ground as the monster prowled past.  I was looking upon automotive nirvana.

Vince was wiping down a pair of pliers with a shop rag beside a workbench with a pegboard full of tools.  The tools were meticulously arranged with clean outlines of every tool drawn behind each. I smiled inwardly, that had to be Liya's work.

He saw me and smiled broadly.  I was about to tell him the car was a work of art before he could greet me, but Imme stepped out from behind the open hood with a wrench in her hand.  She shrugged her shoulder to try to wipe away a grease smudge on her cheek, but it only spread it out more.

That was possibly the biggest surprise I had experienced in a long time.  I would never have guessed in a trillion years that the quirky quantum physicist could work on cars.  I found myself grinning, she was so multi-faceted and surprised me almost every day.

She said, “That's it, daddy.  The alternator is...”  She paused when she saw me and her own smile bloomed, and she looked down, blushing, her thick wavy hair falling forward over her shoulders.  “Allie, you came.”  She said it like she didn't believe it.

I took her in.  Her ever present, worn out canvas hightops, and a well-worn set of greasy olive colored coveralls that had the sleeves and legs rolled up to fit her.  There was a name tag, Juan, sewed on the left side of the chest.  The overall effect with that smile and the oily smudge on her face was twenty-one million percent adorable overkill.

I said, “Of course I came, did you think I wouldn't?”  Then I glanced over to her dad. “Hi Vince.”

The big man looked almost smug as he inclined his head and responded, “Allison.”

Liya shrugged almost bashfully and responded, “Law of averages.”

Like I was supposed to understand.

She quickly cleaned her wrench with a shop rag hanging at her waist and she scooted over to the workbench and hung it on the pegboard in its proper place.  Then she explained as she started wringing her hands. “Too many good things have been happening lately.  The law of averages states that something negative is bound to happen to return the static equilibrium.”

I shook my head at the mini mechanic as Lili placed the tray on the workbench.  “Well, I'm not going anywhere.  My word is my bond... Juan.”

She blinked at me then looked down at the name tag and then smiled and started to explain, “These are secondhand overalls, they were the smallest pair daddy could...”

I interrupted with a chuckle as I stepped up to her, reached out with a spare rag that was sitting on the workbench, and started to wipe away the smudge on her cheek.  She blushed again, and Lili said, “I brought lemonade.  You two haven't surfaced since early this morning.”

She offered me a glass, and I accepted it and asked Liya while I sipped, “You work on muscle cars?”  Mmm, it tasted like fresh squeezed.