Free Encompassing by Richard Lord Page B

shrugged.
    Renfield went on.  “If we get the twists right, it will seem to them that Christina, whom they are aware is the mother has taken an old strategy as she plummets to the ground.  They will think they’ve won and not note the rest of us going around instead of over.  She will hit a tensile resistance point that’s going to really hurt those hips, but she’ll be projected upwards.  If we get it right, she’ll go over the top and land close enough to run the rest of the way, hence the rest of the skydiver part, because some of the tents will be used as a parachute.  You do trust me, right?”
    Christina came at Renfield furious!  “If I didn’t know you were brilliant I’d hate you for putting my life at risk after, well, all I’ve done.”  She looked downward, then up as she started to move, “Well Brady, get your people working on twisting some tents, but please put the best of them on making the chute!”  Christina looks back at Renfield with a look of anger he didn’t think she could muster as she left the tent in a quick march to her own.
    Brady looked at Renfield, “Soooo?”
    Renfield looked up and said, “What?  She’s probably going to pack her other set of underwear.  If she actually needs them, make sure no one comments on it, okay?”
    Brady looks at Adam.  He holds a finger to his chin and then points with his elbow resting in his other hand.  “So this is how you impress the ladies?  Seems like a bad strategy to me.”
    Renfield looks back at Brady and comments, “A good strategy is determined by the winner.  I plan to win.”  Then he also leaves the tent and begins to survey the route.

CHAPTER 21
    “Laughter cures some things.  Good love cures more.”  -- from the book of Brian
    Christina came bolting up the hill and ran straight into Renfield’s arms screaming, “Don’t you ever do that to me again, but it was amazing!  I love y…”  She stopped short.  “I’m sorry.  Way too soon, huh?”  After a bit of a pause as they both stared away she asked, “Do you miss them?  The other ‘me’s’.”
    “Of course, very much, but this you I want to get to know and what you were saying was not out of line.”  You have residuals of the other ‘you’s’.  They were special to me.  You are too.  You’re you.  Does that sound, too soon?”
    “No, Ren, I get it.  I feel odd that you know more about me than I know about you, but I get it.”  Christina begins to pull away.
    Renfield holds her arm as she turns and when she looks down at his hand he says to her, “In one night, I barely know this you.  But I can tell you have an appetite for adventure!  That works!”
    “Two nights!”  She corrects him.  “We have tonight.” She turned to show she didn’t need the change after all.  Renfield grins as he looks at her derriere, inspecting more than her lack of requiring a change.
    Renfield laughs.  He regains his composure and replies, “Best we take advantage of our lead, but hard to turn down a proposal like that!”
    “One problem, your ‘no tent’ or mine?”  She was pointing out the obvious.
    “Oh, umm, we do seem to have a problem there.  It’s OK, eat. ‘Problems are solutions that haven’t happened yet’.”
    “You have a lot of sayings.  Are they other people’s?”
    “No usually they are things I tell myself when I am bored.  If you hadn’t noticed things for me tend to be active.  When they are not, I get, well bored.  I repeat them to myself when I have to, ummm, rebuild me.”
    “About that and the other thing…”
    “Christina are you getting all specific with me?”  Renfield grins at her.
    “No creep!  Yes, I get that was vague, but so are you!  Just tell me something.  How is it you, I don’t know, move through time back to where you began all of this before?”
    “Hmm, that would be the hardest to explain.  It’s not like bending space or a wormhole.  I see where I need to be and my mind