Robert Asprin - Mything Persons

my internal batteries, so whatever minimal magic I had

at my disposal would be ready for our efforts. In ac-

tuality, what I did was worry. While I had indeed taken

part in several criminal activities since teaming up with

Aahz, they had all been planned by either Aahz or Tan-

anda. This was my first time to get involved in master-

minding a caper, and the stakes were high. Not only

Aahz's but Massha's and Guide's futures were riding on

my successful debut, and my confidence level was at an

all-time low. After much pondering, I had decided to

swallow my pride and lean heavily on Guide's expertise,

which was why it hit me so hard when I discovered that

he knew even less about successful jailbreaks than I.

"Sorry, Guido," I said, trying to restructure my

thinking. "I guess I'm more tired than I realized. Didn't

mean to snap at you."

"Don't worry. Boss," the bodyguard grinned. "I've

been expectin' it. All the big operators I've worked with

get a little crabby when the heat's on. If anything, your

temper gettin' short is the best thing I've seen since we

started this caper. That's why I've been so jumpy my-

self. I wasn't sure if you weren't taking the job seri-

ously, or if you were just too dumb to know the kind of

odds we were up against. Now that you're acting normal

for the situation, I feel a lot better about how it's goin'

to come out in the end."

Terrific! Now that I was at the end of my rope, our

eternal pessimist thought things were going great.

"Okay," I said, rubbing my forehead with one fin-

ger, "we haven't got much information to go on, and

what we do know is bad. According to Vilhelm, Aahz is

being held in the most escape-proof cell they have,

92 Robert Asprin

which is the top floor of the highest tower in town. If we

try to take him from the inside, we're going to have to

fool or fight every guard on the way up and down. To

me, that means our best bet is to spring him from the

outside."

My assistants nodded vigorously, their faces as en-

thusiastic as if I had just said something startlingly

original and clever.

"Now, with my powers at low ebb. I don't think I can

levitate that far and spring the cell. Massha, do you

have anything in your jewelry collection that would

work for rope and climbing hooks?''

"N—no," she said hesitantly, which surprised me.

She usually had a complete inventory of her nasty

pretties on the tip of her tongue.

"I saw a coil of rope hangin' just inside the door,"

Guido supplied.

"I noticed it, too," I acknowledged, "but it isn't

nearly long enough. We'll just have to use up my power

getting up to the cell and figure some other way of

opening the window."

"Ummm... you don't have to do that. High

Roller," Massha said with a sigh. "I've got something

we can use."

"What's that?"

"The belt I'm wearing with all my gear hung on it.

It's a levitation belt. The controls aren't horribly reli-

able, but it should do to get us to the top of the tower."

I cocked an eyebrow at my apprentice.

"Wait a minute, Massha. Why didn't you mention

this when I asked?"

She looked away quickly.

"You didn't ask about a belt. Only about rope and

climbing hooks."

MYTH-ING PERSONS 93

"Since when do I have to ask you specific questions

... or any questions, for that matter, to get your in-

put?"

"All right," she sighed. "If you really want to know,

I was hoping we could find a way to do this without

using the belt."

"Why?"

"It embarrasses me."

"It what?"

"It embarrasses me. I look silly floating around in the

air. It's okay for skinny guys like you and Guido, but

when I try it, I look like a blimp. All I'd need is Good-

year tattooed on my side to make the picture complete."

I closed my eyes and tried to remember that I was

tired and that I shouldn't take it out on my friends. The

fact that Massha was worried about appearances while I

was trying to figure out a way to get us all out of this

alive wasn't really infuriating. It was... flattering!

That was it! She was so confident of my abilities to get

us through this crisis that she had time to think about

appearances! Of course, the possibility of betraying that

confidence set me off in another round of worrying.

Wonderful.

"You okay. Boss?"

"Hmmm? Yeah. Sure, Guido. Okay. Now Massha

floats up to the window, which leaves you and me free

to...."

"Hold it, Hot Stuff," Massha said, holding up a

hand. "I think I'd better explain a little more about this

belt. I bought it in an 'as-is' rummage sale, and the con-

trols are not all they should be."

"How so?"

"Well, the 'up' control works okay, but the 'altitude'

is shaky so you're never sure how much you can lift or

94

MYTH-ING PERSONS 95

Robert Asprin

how high it will go. The real problem, though, is the

'down' control. There's no tapering-off effect, so it's

either on or off."

I was never particularly good at technical jargon, but

flying was something I knew so I could almost follow

her.

"Let me see if I've got this right," I said. "When you

go up, you aren't sure how much power you'll have, and

when you land. ..."

"...it ain't gentle," she finished for me. "Basically,

you fall from whatever height you're at to the ground."

"I don't know much about this magic stuff," Guido

commented dryly, "but that doesn't sound so good.

Why would you use a rig like that, anyway?"

"I don't ... at least not for flying," Massha said.

"Remember, I told you I think it makes me look silly?

All I use it for is a utility belt... you know, like Bat-

man? I mean, it's kind of pretty, and it isn't easy to find

belts in my size."

"Whatever," I said, breaking into their fashion dis-

cussion. "We're going to use it tonight to get up to the

cell even if it means rigging some kind of ballast system.

Now all we need to figure out is how to open the cell

window and a getaway plan. Guido, it occurs to me that

we might pick up a few lessons on jailbreaks from your

experiences even if they were unsuccessful. I mean,

negative examples can be as instructive as positive ex-

amples. So tell me, in your opinion what went wrong in

the plans you followed in the past?"

The bodyguard's brow furrowed as it took on the

unaccustomed exercise of thought.

"I dunno, Boss. It seems that however much planning

was done, something always came up that we hadn't

figured on. If I had to hang our failures on any one

thing, I'd say it was just that... overplanning. I mean,

after weeks of lectures and practice sessions, you get a

little overconfident, so when something goes wrong

you're caught flatfooted, know what I mean?"

Nervous as we were, that got a laugh from both

Massha and me.

"Well, that's one problem we won't have to worry

about," I said. "Our planning time is always minimal,

and for this caper we're going to have to put it together

in a matter of hours."

"If you take hours, you'll never pull it off," Vilhelm

said, entering our planning room just in time to hear my

last comment.

"What's that supposed to mean?" Massha growled.

"Say, are you sure you guys are on the level?" the

vampire said, ignoring my apprentice. "It occurs to me

that I've only got your word on all this... that Vic is