Free Red Thunder by John Varley Page A

that way, loosely, it would finally behave itself. More or
less. If I squeezed it too hard the bubble would still squirt away,
like when you squeeze too tight on a bar of soap.
    So
now
where was I?
    Results of first round of experiments:
    It seems to be weightless.
    It seems to be frictionless.
    I didn't need to log on to my physics textbooks to know both of
those things were impossible, in the real world. Weightlessness,
frictionlessness, those ideas were useful in math, to define a pure
condition the real world never attains.
    Tentative conclusion: I'm probably missing something.
    No weight, no friction. How tough?
    I got a hammer and some nails. I cut a small hole in a piece of old
linen sheet, not big enough for the bubble to go through. Then I used
thumbtacks to pin the cloth to the desk with the bubble trapped inside,
just a piece of it showing.
    I held the tip of one nail to the surface of the bubble. I tapped
the nail head lightly with the hammer. The tip slid off the bubble
surface. I looked at the bubble through a magnifying glass. No dent or
scratch I could see. I tapped it again, this time a little harder.
Again the tip slipped off. No dent, no scratch.
    I withdrew to seek counsel with myself.
    I know a scientist is supposed to welcome a challenge, he's supposed
to rejoice at results inexplicable and unexpected... but I'll bet a lot
of them don't. I'll bet a lot of them try to shrug it off, especially
if it doesn't fit their theory. If this thing was ever made public, I
had a feeling a
lot
of theories would have to be rewritten.
    The hell with it. I started whaling away at it with all my strength.
    After seven or eight blows the piece of linen tore and the bubble
floated up above my desk again, swirling in the eddies my swinging arm
had made in the air. I caught it before it could float into a hiding
place, and put it under a glass tumbler.
    I put my face down close to the desk. There was a new, circular
depression in the wood surface. And on the bubble... no dent, no
scratch.
    Answer:
very
tough.
     
    I FOUND I couldn't sleep. I went out on my little
balcony and watched the cars go by. Not as boring as it may sound, many
of them were full of students shouting and laughing. People in
convertibles would see me up on my balcony and wave, sometimes invite
me down to join them.
    Not too many people on the sidewalks. There used to be a few hookers
who staked out corners within sight of the Blast-Off. Then the Golden
Manatee moved in, and the cops ran them all off. Now, the preferred way
to buy sex in this neighborhood is to get a room in the Manatee and
call one of the escort services. I imagine you'll get a better class of
hooker, but be sure to bring a lot of cash. You'll pay more tipping the
bell captain to bring your escort in the back way than you would have
paid for a whole night with one of the chased-away streetwalkers.
    One girl seemed not to have got the message. She came strolling down
the sidewalk, bold as brass, on three-inch cork platform shoes. She
wore a silvery blouse tied up between her breasts and a hollerin'
orange miniskirt. Lots of lipstick, lots of piled-up blonde hair, and
big, dark, pink-rimmed sunglasses at one in the morning. She looked up
at me and grinned.
    "How about it, cowboy? Should I come up?"
    Cowboy? I thought it over.
    "Not sure I can afford it," I said.
    "Sure you can, sweetie."
    "Oh... well, all right."
    "That's what I love. Enthusiasm. What's your room number?"
    I told her, and in a minute I could hear the clunking sound of her
huge cork soles. She knocked on the door and I turned off the lights
and opened it.
    "Twenty dollars gets you all night," she said.
    "All night? Hell, it's already one-thirty."
    "C'mon, stud." She put her hand in my groin. "I can tell you're glad to see me."
    "That's a banana for my pet monkey. And all I have is ten dollars."
    "That'll have to do, I guess." She came into the room and closed the
door. I jumped her as she turned around. I pressed her back