Jumper Cable (12 page)

“But you’re so much fun to be with! If I have annoyed you in any way—”

“No, Jumper. It has been wonderful with you. You truly appreciate me, and I have enjoyed showing you how not to freak when you are near a woman. But my time in this realm must be limited. Olive can’t summon another imaginary friend until I fade, and your party will surely need other friends.”

“The sight of pan ties still freaks me some,” he said desperately.

“You just want me to stay with you longer.”

“Yes,” he said, doing a human blush in the darkness.

“You’re so sweet. But you need a real woman, not an imaginary one. So let’s see if I can shore you up against pan ties, and then I really must go.”

“Yes, shore me up,” he agreed. He had discovered that freaking out, or coming close to it, was actually a pleasant experience.

“You understand, what ever you do with me is not really real,” she said. “It’s like a dream: it may seem real, but it’s imaginary, because I am imaginary.”

“It does seem real,” he agreed eagerly.

“However, imaginary actions can have real effects. Your education is real, and your growing immunity to freaking is real. Even if our relationship is unreal.”

“I hate to think of it that way.”

A pale ray of moonlight was coming in a window. Angie went to stand in it, in her underwear. When the light struck her pan ties, Jumper almost freaked, but managed to hang on to consciousness.

“You are doing well,” she said. “Maybe your spider nature helps shore up your immunity.”

Then she lighted a candle and tried it again. This time he did freak, but recovered fairly quickly. They ran through it again, and again, until he was able to look at her and retain his composure, though severely buffeted.

“If you can handle my pan ties, you can handle any pan ties,” she said. “I suggest that you conceal your ability, however.”

“Conceal it?”

“Fake freaking out. That way no one will know you have become relatively immune. It could save your life or sanity, if a hostile nymph vamped you.”

“Wenda and Maeve aren’t hostile nymphs,” he protested.

“True. But if you ever encounter another maenad, she may try to nullify you long enough for her to get within tearing and biting range. If you fake it, then you can bite off her head when she attacks you.”

He nodded in the human manner. “I could do that.”

“You are ready, Jumper.”

He feared she was right. “Could we pretend I’m not, one more time?” he asked timidly.

“Ah, Jumper, you are miscast as a spider! You could make some lucky woman a marvelously submissive human husband.” But she came to him, and they made love one more time, in the flickering candlelight. It might not be real, but it was delightful.

Then she dressed and went to the door, and he knew he would not see her again. “Thank you, thank you, Angie Ina,” he called after her.

“You truly make my heart throb.”

“Welcome, Jumper. It’s nice to be so sincerely appreciated.” She was gone, leaving him both fulfilled and desolate. Jumper got up, cleaned, dressed, and was ready when Olive came to fetch him. “You’ll never believe what happened,” she said. “I found my imaginary friend Angie Ina. It seems she had gotten lost. Now she’s back in my mind where she belongs.”

“I do believe,” he said, with mixed feelings. At breakfast Princess Dawn took one look at him. “You are ready,”

she said. “So it’s time to start the mission.”

“It is time,” he agreed, slightly sadly.

“Where dew we start?” Wenda asked.

“Well, the Magician says to emulate the ogre,” Olive said. “So maybe we had better consult with the ogre. Ogres are justifiably proud of their stupidity, but he might know something.”

The others nodded. It was time to see the ogre.

For a good two and a half moments it felt weird being a spider again, with eight eyes and eight legs and no concern for pan ties. Then Jumper settled comfortably back into his natural role.

Except in one respect: he discovered that he retained his memory of, and appreciation for, certain manform activities. He did now have an interest in pan ties, and in the activity they suggested. Angie had left her mark on him.

“It’s good to have yew back, Jumper,” Wenda said.

“Thank you, Wenda. But I was always Jumper, and value your friendship what ever my form of the moment.” More than that: he now could see that in her filled-out form she was a luscious nymph, one who would be pleasant to hold and kiss. But for at least two and a half reasons he could not say that.

In fact, all six and a half of the girlform companions were appealing individuals. The half, of course, was Haughty, who lacked the human lower portion.

The Good Magician painted a compass on Olive’s wrist that pointed toward the Ogre residence, and she checked it every so often. The first part of the trip was on an enchanted path, so they had no concern about

safety. They walked along in a loose group, still getting to know each other.

Dawn fell in beside Jumper, who was at the rear. He was able to travel much faster than the humans, so was not setting the pace. “That was smart of Angie,” she murmured. “To immunize you against pan ties.”

“She said it could save my life or sanity.”

“She’s right. Also it makes sense. You’re immune as a spider, so this extends it to your human form.”

“I won’t assume human form unless I have to,” he said. “I have many potions and counterpotions, but I don’t want to waste them.”

“That, too, makes sense.” She paused. “Are you really immune in this form?”

“Yes,” he said, glancing at her with two or three eyes. It wasn’t a lie, because he was immune in both human and spider forms, thanks to Angie.

And paused himself, for she was wearing only bra and pan ties. She was very pretty, for a human, and the items were nicely filled. But they affected mainly his memory: he would have loved to see them when in human form, when it might have been possible to do something with them. As it was, they were interesting but hardly freaking. As a spider he was limited to looking, not touching.

“Just testing,” she said, and in half a moment she was fully dressed again.

He had heard from one of the other girls that Dawn and Eve were two of the naughtiest princesses extant. He was beginning to believe it. They were both Sorceresses, but would they really help the mission? They encountered a man walking in the other direction. “Well, hello, lovely maidens,” he said jovially. “And hello, huge ugly spider.”

“He is Jumper, and he is knot ugly for his kind,” Wenda said firmly. Her flesh was much firmer now, instead of wooden; perhaps it contributed to her dialogue.

“I apologize,” the man said. “I am Michael, and my talent is to touch a picture, or draw one, and be transported to that scene. So I travel a lot, and see many interesting things, and tend to speak my mind openly.”

The girls introduced themselves. “Could you draw a picture of the Ogre’s Den and enable us to go there instantly?” Haughty asked. Michael shook his head. “Sorry. It works only for me.”

“Ah, well,” Haughty said, disappointed.

“I don’t suppose one of you lovely creatures would care to—”

Michael began.

“No,” they chorused.

“In that case I’ll be on my way.” He sketched a picture in the dirt with one finger, stepped on it, and vanished.

They resumed their trek.

A peculiarly shaped mountain loomed ahead of them. It resembled two enormous wheels connected to each other by rods. What did this portend, if anything?

“Found something,” Olive called from ahead. “Not sure what it is.”

The others caught up to her. It was a small corral with several wheeled frameworks in it. Jumper had never seen anything like it, but of course this wasn’t his realm. The other did not recognize it either. Yet it was right beside the enchanted path, within its protection, so must be useful in some way.

Eve touched one of the contraptions. “It’s a bicycle,” she announced, using her talent to know about anything inanimate. “Made in Mundania for human transportation by a company named Playing Card.”

“But doesn’t look anything like a playing card,” Olive said. “It’s not flat, and has no hearts or diamonds or what ever.”

“They don’t care about what makes sense in Mundania,” Eve said.

“This can efficiently carry a person along a flat path.”

“I wood like that,” Wenda said. “I’m knot used to so much walking.”

“That is surely true for most of us,” Olive said. “But this doesn’t look much like a magic carpet, either. How does it work?”

“You sit on its seat and push on the pedals with your feet,” Eve said.

“I think I grasp the principle.”

“We don’t,” Phanta said. “What good would pedal pushing do?”

“Maybe I can demonstrate,” Eve said. She put her hands one one of the bicycles and wheeled it out onto the path. Then she put one leg over it, grasped the handles with her hands, set her feet on the pedals, and pushed.

They stood amazed as the bicycle rolled forward, carry ing her along.

“See?” she called, turning her head to look back at them. “It’s easy!”

But the bicycle, not correctly steered during her distraction, veered into a tree trunk. Eve crashed, and fell to the ground, her feet over her head. She wore black pan ties, matching her hair. Jumper clamped down on his freak reaction, thankful again for Angie’s training. As it was, he needed all eight feet on the ground to maintain his balance.

“Ouch!” she exclaimed, scrambling to her feet. She had bruises and scrapes on her arms and legs.

“I have a friend!” Olive exclaimed. “A nurse.”

Her friend appeared, dressed in a white uniform with a cute white cap. She hurried to Eve and quickly applied salve on the hurts. Soon the injuries faded; the salve was magically healing.

“Thank you, nurse,” Eve said, flexing her limbs. “I’m feeling much better now.”

“It’s my job,” the nurse said, and faded out. It occurred to Jumper that Olive’s talent was more useful than he had thought. It had provided entertainment, education, and now healing. Eve returned to business. “Of course you have to look where you’re going,” she said. “I’ll try this again.”

She did, and this time rode the bicycle along the path without crashing. She stopped, turned it around, and rode back. It looked remarkably smooth. Jumper felt guilty for his continuing fascination with her briefly exposed pan ties. He wished he were a true human, and that he could be with her and— but he had to stifle that. He had no right to harbor such a desire. Angie had taught him not to freak out, but had not taught him not to desire.

“That could bee useful,” Wenda said.

She was right. Jumper, observing carefully, judged that the girls could travel forward about three times as efficiently on bicycles as on foot, and faster.

“That’s the mountain!” Maeve exclaimed. “It is shaped like a bicycle.”

“It’s a Mountain Bike,” Eve agreed. “That’s why the bicycles are here: they are a gift of the mountain.”

The others decided to try it. They got bicycles and tried riding them.

There were many false starts and several falls, but in due course all of them managed it.

They rode on, and now were able to keep Jumper’s pace. They moved rapidly along the path.

Until Olive’s compass indicated that they had to diverge from the enchanted path. The bicycles needed smooth land for their wheels; they could not be used in the rough forest.

They parked them regretfully in another corral and resumed footing it, following the compass. Now they would have to be on guard, because their safety was no longer assured. They set off afoot, with the two princesses leading the way so they could spot anything dangerous, alive or not. Jumper brought up the rear, again, to make sure no predator attacked them from behind. Haughty was tired, having kept up with the bicycles well enough, but at the expense of her energy, so she perched on Jumper’s back.

“I never would have thought I’d ever be friends with a spider,” she remarked. “But you’re satisfactory, Jumper. When you were in manform you were positively handsome.”

“I wouldn’t know.”

“Well, now you know. That’s why the girls have been eager to help you adjust. I daresay one would have joined you in your bed at night, if you had asked her.”

“I wouldn’t ask.”

“Maybe one invited herself.”

What was she after? “Why do you think so?”

“Because someone pretty thoroughly defused your freak index. That surely didn’t happen on its own.”

Now he knew: she was after his night secret. “Why do you think so?” he repeated.

“Because when Eve crashed on the bicycle and upended, you didn’t freak. She’s a princess, a Sorceress, and a d**ned pretty young woman. Any man should have freaked, yet you didn’t. You saw the color of her pan ties and took it in stride.”

“Black,” he admitted. “Matching her hair. Most appealing. Perhaps it was fortunate I was not in human form.”

“Don’t give me that, you sn**k. Once a man, always a man. I’m a harpy; I know base motives.”

“I have no base motives.” Base desires, certainly, but not base motives. She dismissed that with a laugh. “Was it Olive? She took a shine to you the moment you assumed manform.”

“No!”

“Phanta? She’s a willing wench.”

“No.”

“Maeve? She certainly knows what it’s all about, having run afoul of the stork.”

“No. You are insulting these fine maidens.”

“Then it must have been Wenda. Woodwives are notorious, and now she is fully fleshed. She must have been eager to try out her new backside.”

“No!” he said, disgusted.

“Now this intrigues me. You have just eliminated all the prime suspects, because the princesses weren’t on the scene then. Yet I don’t think it would have been Wira, and I strongly doubt it would be MareAnn. Are you trying to deceive me, Jumper?”

“It was Angie Ina,” he snapped. Then realized that he had given it away just when he had her stymied. She had halfway tricked him into revealing it. It seemed that harpies were good at that sort of thing.

“The imaginary doll,” she said musingly. “That was dangerous and irresponsible of her. You could have dropped dead.”