Ovid 12 : The Rescuer free porn video

Ovid 12 - The Rescuer By The Professor There is nothing stranger than watching a violent storm cloud build and knowing with absolute certainty that it is nothing to worry about. The cloud approaching Ovid was massive, boiling with shades of black tinged with green completely hiding the afternoon sun. Distant rumbles of thunder were like heralds announcing the approach of a royal visitor, and the flashes of lightning were almost constant. I was just coming out of March's Department Store when I saw the cloud. Most of the residents of Ovid were hustling about, one eye on the storm, certain that it was about to hit our town with its full fury. Of course, they didn't know what I knew - that the gods would never allow such harm to come to Ovid. We might get a "gullywasher" as heavy rains were called in Oklahoma, but the winds would be no more than moderate and twisters would pass without incident. There was going to be a serious early fall storm somewhere though, I realized. Although more common in the spring and early summer, September storms like the one approaching could be just as violent as those earlier in the year. This one might even cause a few deaths in its path - that is unless the storm's victims happened to stumble upon Ovid first. I turned away from the cloud and tried not to think about that. I silently cursed that I had chosen to walk downtown, leaving my car parked back at City Hall. The Judge had given me the afternoon off since things were slow. I took advantage of the time to pamper myself. I managed to talk Bobby Sue into a last-minute appointment at M'Lady and then snooped around March's for something to go with my new look. Walking had been an easy decision. I had worn comfortable shoes that day with just a low heel - good for walking. And I had plenty of time to shop and get back to the car to pick up Ashley at the sitter's. I needed to get back in fighting shape since having Ashley. I had never realized before how much strain having a baby could put on a girl's body. The things a woman has to do to look good! Of course, growing up male, I had never worried about it. But I certainly wasn't male anymore, and in a way, it seemed as if I had never been. My previous life as a boy growing up back east and going to college at Notre Dame seemed like someone else's life. And I suppose it really was. I was the only one who even remembered that life. I was starting to regret my ambitious walk though. I had only walked half a block when the rain began to fall. At first, it was just a light sprinkle, but I didn't want to waste a perfectly good trim and set at M'Lady, so I needed to find a port before the storm broke loose. Even though my heels were pretty low, I wasn't prepared to run in them. The choice was obvious. I ducked into the office entrance for the Farmer's and Merchant's Bank Building and walked the flight of stairs up to Susan's office. Susan Jager and I hadn't seen much of each other lately. First, both of us had young babies to care for, and second, the work had been piling up for Susan while she had been out. The life of a lawyer in individual practice isn't an easy one - even in a small town. Plus, Susan's practice had grown steadily as her reputation as a competent attorney grew. It seemed as if the only time I got to see her was when she was defending someone before the Judge. "Cindy!" a pleasant voice called out to me as I closed the office door behind me. "What a pleasant surprise. I just called over to the courts and they told me you had the afternoon off." The speaker was a pleasant woman in her forties with mostly brown hair and a motherly smile. Dori Smithwick had been Susan's legal secretary since she had opened her office. Of course, Susan hadn't really opened the office. It was there when she was transformed. So I suppose in a way, Dori had been working for Susan since before there had even been a Susan. It all gets so complicated sometimes. Dori had been a shade for most of that time, but a few weeks earlier, a poor girl strung out on drugs came to Ovid. Although the girl aged twenty plus years and lost all of her memories, she had made an excellent Dori. Given that the girl would have been dead from an overdose within a week, it wasn't a bad trade. "I do have the afternoon off," I replied. I pointed at my hair. "See?" "Oh, it looks great on you," she said with a smile. "Has Jerry seen it yet?" Jerry was my husband, but once he had been my fraternity brother. As I said, it all gets very complicated sometimes. "Not yet. He's still at the store. But I told him I had the afternoon off, so he promised to come home early. I got a sitter and he's taking me out to Winston's tonight." "Well Susan is out taking a deposition right now," Dori told me. "But if you want to go on in, Myra is just setting out some files for her. I'll get you a cup of coffee while you wait." I smiled. "Thanks." Myra Smithwick - Dori's lovely daughter - was just finishing up when I stepped inside Susan's office. "Hi, Cindy!" she greeted me brightly. "Hi, Myra." Myra was one of the true success stories in Ovid. Formerly something of a bimbo, she had turned her life around. After spending a year as the girlfriend of one of the local high school jocks, she had dumped him, toned down her makeup and wardrobe, and buckled down to become a great student. In fact, she earned a scholarship to Capta College starting in the fall and had plans to go on to law school. Those who didn't know the inner workings of Ovid considered it a small miracle. They would be surprised to know they were right, but not for the reasons they thought. Myra had once been as male as I had been, and her determination to escape from the life the Judge had given her had come from outside the persona Myra had before a transformed road worker had been given her life. "So how are you and your mother getting along?" I asked her quietly once I had closed the door. I've always been a little curious as to how much of a person's old self survives the transformation. I can't quite bring myself to believe that all of the old personality is lost, even though the memories are taken away and replaced with more appropriate ones. "Great," she replied. "Of course she doesn't remember who she was before." I nodded. That wasn't uncommon. The majority of transformed people lost all knowledge of their former lives. They were like my husband and my twins and believed they had always been the people they had been transformed into. "Still, I wonder," Myra added. "Every now and then she does something or says something I wouldn't have expected from her. She even acts a little younger sometimes. Do you suppose even the people who don't remember who they were retain just a little of their old selves?" "I'm not sure," I answered honestly. "But I've suspected that might be the case. It seems a shame to lose all of your old identity." Although there was I time when I might have envied them, I thought. It was very unnerving to find myself suddenly transformed into a woman. When I was changed, I had gained not only a few years in age but a husband and two children as well. It might have been easier if like them I had thought that had always been my life. But of course if that had been the case, I would have missed out on a lot of excitement in Ovid. "Well anyhow, she's still mom to me," Myra concluded. "How's Ashley?" "Doing fine," I said with a smile. "I have to pick her up at the sitters in a little while. I just thought I'd duck in out of the rain and see Susan for a minute." "What? It takes a rainstorm for you to come and see me?" I hadn't heard the door open since the rain was now making quite a racket. I turned and saw Susan looking very wet but happy to see me. "I can see why you ducked in here," Susan said, laughing as she gave me a sisterly hug. "I like your hair that way. It would have been a shame to ruin it in this weather." "Thanks." Before we could say another word, lightning seemed to hit the side of the building. A bright flash nearly blinded us, and when our vision cleared, there was a very lovely woman - apparently Hindu from her sari and caste mark - standing in front of us. She smiled at us, her dark brown eyes twinkling, and made a little bow with her palms pressed together before her. "And a good day to you," she said in the singsong voice of an Indian princess. She reminded me a little of Apu's wife on The Simpsons. Then she looked up at the sky and called, "Thanks for the ride, daddy!" It was, of course, Diana. Someday she was going to run out of new identities, I thought to myself. In the time that I had known her, I had never seen her in the exact same body twice. Yet every body she chose was uniformly beautiful. This one was more exotic than most but certainly no exception. "Been in India?" I asked. "Yep," she replied with a grin as the Indian accent disappeared. "I had a long visit with my old pal, Shiva." "So the Hindu gods are real, too?" Myra asked. Diana had allowed Myra the same privileges Susan and I enjoyed - the ability to speak freely of the gods. I was pleased because Myra, despite her youth, had become a good friend as well. Since she had started working part time for Susan, I had gotten to know her well. She had even appeared at Susan's side a time or two in court. Of course, in our previous lives, Myra would have been older than me, so I suppose it all averaged out. "Sure, but I'm not supposed to admit that," Diana said, the grin still in place. Diana would usually tell us about anything - except the purpose of Ovid. When it came to that, she could be as reticent as any of the other gods or goddesses who flitted in and out of Ovid. Diana was a frequent visitor to Ovid, preferring to live elsewhere. I was not sure if she really called anyplace home, though. I had actually been expecting her visit. She always seemed to know when something unusual had happened in Ovid and timed her visits accordingly. Myra, Susan and I even had a little running bet going as to which case would attract Diana next. Myra had actually won the last round, so Susan and I had to buy her lunch. I had missed out when I had predicted she would show up to hear the story of a married couple who had strayed into Ovid and had their sexes reversed while remaining married. Apparently that was just too mundane for Diana. She had preferred to hear about a traveling salesman who had ended up as a three year old girl - not one of my favorite stories, to be honest. "I suppose you want to hear about the escape," I ventured hopefully. That had been my current bet in the pool. "Of course," Diana replied as Myra and Susan sighed. They'd have to buy me lunch. "It's not every day something like that happens. Daddy usually keeps better control of things." "Maybe it's because your father is a couple of thousand years behind on technology," Susan suggested. "Well, he hasn't exactly needed it before," Diana pointed out. "So start the story already." "Okay," I agreed, leaning back and relaxing in one of Susan's big leather chairs as I allowed myself to drift into my trance... *** My cubicle felt like a prison. Oh sure, I could get up and go to the bathroom or the break room pretty much any time I pleased, but my cubicle would always be waiting for me. It imprisoned me from the heat and sunlight of a bright Dallas summer day. It reminded me that it differed from my Spartan apartment only in size. It isolated me from my coworkers. It bored me to death. But when you got right down to it, it was all I had. I tried to concentrate on the stream of data that was advancing slowly up my screen. That way I could forget just how empty my life was. I could fill it with data. I could try to tell myself I was contributing to the greatest advance in software since Microsoft had developed Windows - although there were some who would probably argue that Windows wasn't that significant an advance. But I knew in my heart I was just another cog in the great machine. Software magazines didn't come to interview me. Sure, I got offers from other firms, but so did every other programmer. If I left Aldeberan Netware, I'd just be replacing one cubicle for another. And I wouldn't know anybody at another company. Of course, I barely knew anyone at Aldeberan for that matter. Hell, my supervisor could scarcely remember my name. He called me Jack about as often as he called me Jeff. Yeah, that was me - Jeff Bradshaw - programmer by trade and nonentity in the pattern of life. I suppose when you get right down to it, I had brought it all on myself, I thought. I had always been a loner. It wasn't as if I could blame that on someone else. Sure, I had been an only child, but my parents had lived in the same house in Topeka, Kansas, since I was seven, so I had every opportunity to make friends and keep them. Maybe if there had been someone close to my age in the neighborhood, I might have turned out differently, but there wasn't. Oh, there were a couple of guys down the street who were three or four years older than me, and there was a girl in my class just a block away, but no one I could call a good friend. The Pattersons next door to our house had a little girl who wanted to be my friend, but she was three years younger than me and I wanted nothing to do with her. Now I regretted ignoring her. She was a runner-up for Miss Kansas a few years ago - or so I heard. On the other side of our house were the Skinners. They had no children and proclaimed with pride that they never wanted kids. I was a constant annoyance to them. My boisterous play in my own yard seemed to annoy them. My parents asked me to keep a low profile so as not to bother them. I think that had something to do with my attraction to the computer. I could play with my little Atari and not disturb the Skinners. Besides, I didn't need any friends when I was on the computer. My world became defined by the size of my monitor. It was only natural that in college I would study Computer Science. I was very good at programming and soon developed a reputation for being something of a whiz at anything that involved a computer. So how had I ended up in a dead-end job when I showed so much promise in school? I don't really know. No, that's not true. I did know. I just couldn' t relate to people. In fact, I still couldn't. I barely knew the programmers in the cubicles on either side of me. Oh sure, I knew their names and we worked together on projects, but I didn't really know them. It wasn't that I was unfriendly. And I would have liked to have known Kathy Reynoso better. She worked in the cubicle next to mine. She was very attractive and I would have liked to know her much, much better, but I was too shy. Besides, I was probably not her type. I wasn't a bad looking guy, but I had never been able to do very well with women. I looked up at the clock. It was only two, so I had at least four more hours to go. It wasn't that I had a large amount of work to do, but programmers were expected to put in long hours. If I left at five like a normal person, my workaholic supervisor was sure to know. He might not remember my name, but he'd remember I left early. What was the old saying about programmers? It was something to the effect that the best way to manage them was keep them in a cage and feed them raw meat. Well they had the cage part right, I thought, looking around my cubicle aimlessly yet again. As for the raw meat... well, no such luck. I did have a Payday candy bar in my desk drawer, but that was for later. It was something to munch on until I got home to another frozen pizza. Determined to stop feeling sorry for myself, I cast about for something to do. There was always my email. Maybe there would be some inane requirement from HR or something which would occupy my time. Anything to keep from gazing at strings of code. At least the company was pretty liberal about email. I could get my personal email forwarded to the company servers and read it at work. Not that I got a lot of personal email, but I suppose it was the thought that counted. I had ten unread messages. Good - there were a couple from HR. Human Resources was always running one study or another, or telling us about some exciting new benefit like free checking at a credit union in Mongolia. The rest were just boring stuff. But one caught my eye. There was no sender listed, but the subject line read "Your Best Friend." It had to be an ad, I thought. Maybe it was some sort of sex aid. I'd have to stop surfing through those X-rated sites. They were finding out where I lived. Or maybe in was some sort of new virus, I thought suddenly. In spite of the anti-virus protection and firewalls and all that happy shit the company had invested in, I'd hate to be the one to unleash a powerful new virus into the system, even though the computer I was using wasn't tied to the research system. Well, I had to depend upon our tools and assume that if it was a virus, it would have been detected. With confidence, I pressed the key to retrieve the message. What I saw on my screen seemed to be directed at someone else since the message began as if I had known the sender all my life. In fact, I had never heard of the sender before. I checked again. No, it was my email address and my name. Someone had to be playing a cruel trick on me, I thought. But who? Frankly, none of my coworkers were close enough to me to make it worth their while to pull such a stunt on me. My curiosity was piqued. I pulled a container of fruit juice I had forgotten about out of my desk drawer and settled back to read what appeared to be a very lengthy message... From: (Sender Unknown) To: Jeff Bradshaw, Aldeberan Netware Subj: Your Best Friend Jeff, I know you're going to think I'm nuts, but I'm not. Even though you've probably never heard of me I'm - or at least I was - Andy Skinner, your best friend. Now before you press the delete key figuring you've got some sort of loony writing you, hear me out. It's sort of complicated. Remember back in Topeka and you were a kid? Remember the Skinners next door - or at least I hope they moved in next door. They probably didn't have any kids as you remember, but they did have one - me. They didn't want me; they never wanted kids, but accidents do happen and mom wasn't the sort to submit to an abortion, being Catholic and all. The result was me. By the time we moved in next door to you, I was twelve years old. I hadn't exactly had the happiest childhood in the world. My parents never missed an opportunity to tell me how I was a big accident and how much simpler their lives would have been without me. Oh, they were never cruel enough to say it that way, and they kept me clothed and well fed, but they made it obvious they just tolerated me because they were supposed to. So by the time we moved next door to you, I was a wreck. You weren't so much yourself, pal. I remember the very first time I saw you. You were tall and skinny and looked pretty nerdy. I was the cool one. But I envied you. God, how I envied you! I might have been a better looking and more athletic guy, but you had parents who loved you dearly. I would have given anything to have been in your shoes. I think that's why we became friends when you get right down to it. I gave you something you'd never had before. I gave you self confidence. When we were together, you seemed to come into full bloom. You laughed more, carried yourself better, and appeared to be a normal guy and not some nerd. I don't mean to hurt you with these comments. You and I talked about this many times as we got older over a bottle or two of beer. I wish you could remember that. In return, you gave me something I had never had before - a real family. Your mother... honestly, Jeff, I thought she had to be the most beautiful woman in the world. I would have done anything for one of her smiles. And then there was your father. He went fishing with you and took you to ball games, and when we became such good friends, he took me along, too. I had never experienced anything like it. And then there was you, Jeff. You were the brother I never had. I could talk to you... tell you things. Do you remember back in...? Oh, no. Of course not. You wouldn't remember when I told you back in our junior year of high school how much I loved Beth Ann Mitchell. I'm sure you remember her, though. I had managed to get her out on a date and just fell for her. I told you all that. I poured my soul out right in front of you. Then when she wouldn't have anything to do with me, it was you that told me Peggy Winters was hot for me. I promptly forgot about Beth Ann thanks to you. And I was there for you, too. I'm the one that coached you on how to win Suzy Norton when we were in college together over at KU. I hope when reality shifted it didn't take Suzy away from you. If it did, I'm really sorry, Jeff, but it wasn't my fault. Okay... I probably lost you with that comment about reality shifting, didn't I? Now you know you're reading something written by somebody who's one cherry short of a hot fudge sundae. Well, maybe I am. There are times when I wake up and think I must be out of my mind. I'm not Andy Skinner. Andy Skinner never looked anything like this. In fact, there never was an Andy Skinner, was there, Jeff? I'm sure you're completely confused now. Maybe I should leave out all the personal stuff about you and I being friends and get on to what happened to me. Then it'll be up to you to decide if this is a true story or just the ramblings of a madman with email. I'm really banking on the fact that the Jeff Bradshaw I once knew was a very curious guy. No matter how strange or bizarre something was, you wanted to check it out. Remember when you thought our high school physics teacher was in contact with aliens? But no matter. On to my story. It starts with a road trip. Dave Malloy, Connie Hancock and I were all three on our way to an install at Vulman Industries. Since you don't remember the players, Connie was our sales rep for the Southwest Region, and Dave and I were the techs sent to install the network at Vulman - Connie's new account. Did I mention we all worked with you at Aldeberan? Well we did. You and I used to always say if we were single, we'd be fighting it out to see who got Connie. She was really sharp - short dark hair and a sweet face and a body that would make every tech in the office fall silent when she walked through the place. Dave was single, and he loved to go out on installs with Connie. Not that it did him any good - Connie couldn't see him that way and Dave was too shy to make a good move on her. It was funny to watch. And it wasn't as if Dave was a bad looking guy. Actually, I had heard more than one girl back in the office say they wished he'd ask her out. He was about your size - six feet and maybe a little more, decent build and a shock of unruly blonde hair that endeared him to folks in smaller towns - like Ovid. I was asked to go along because the Vulman install was going to be a pretty good sized one and we wanted it installed and tested in a couple of days. I don't know how well Vulman is known outside of Ovid, but apparently they're an important defense contractor and they make parts for Ford. They have a sales office in Washington and another in Detroit that somebody back there was installing on the network. Needless to say, their system had to be state of the art and secure enough to connect with DOD and other government agencies, as well as Ford. The hardest part was finding Ovid. For some reason, it didn't appear on any of the maps, and when we rented a car in Tulsa and asked about the town, no one at the Avis counter had even heard of the place. It was apparently a common problem - or so we had been told. The people at Vulman had bought the system by coming to Dallas to handle all the paperwork. They had warned us that due to a cartography error, Ovid had been left out of the databases. They provided us with a hand-drawn map so we could reach the town without difficulty. Of course it wasn't until later that we learned the truth. "This road isn't even here according to the Gousha Atlas," Connie commented. We were driving on some state highway - two lanes and winding through forested hills. It was actually sort of a pretty drive. I needed it to relax. Dave had been driving all morning and nearly pulled out onto the interstate right in front of an eighteen-wheeler. Time had stood still for us, but the trucker had made an amazing swerve barely missing us. How he was able to keep from hitting us seemed like a miracle. It wasn't until later that I realized just how much of a miracle it really was. "It seems to be the right road according to this map they drew for us," I said after we had calmed down from our near accident. I had practically memorized the crude map. "There's no highway number on the map, so I can't be too sure." "It's the right road," Dave told us confidently. "Look." He was right. There ahead of us was a commercial sign welcoming us to Ovid, and as we crested a small hill, we could see the town laid out before us. There was nothing unusual about the town from a distance. It just looked like one of a thousand little towns that populated this part of the country. Oh maybe it was a little neater - just a little more prosperous looking, but still it was not unusual. As we got closer, we could make out the neat clapboard houses, uniformly white or other light colors nestled among the trees. Some were fairly new - an indication that the town was still growing unlike many small towns. It was probably due to Vulman's success I told myself. All it took was one successful business to keep a town like Ovid in beer and skittles. "Should we go straight to Vulman?" Dave asked. "Well, the map leads us there," I replied. "We might as well." That meant driving through town on the highway, so we got a chance to see all the roadside businesses that populated all small towns. Connie was reading over the installation plan and Dave was busy driving, trying to be extra safe to make up for his near accident earlier. I on the other hand had plenty of time to look around. At first, I saw nothing out of the ordinary. The only thing I found a little odd was the lack of recognizable brands on the roadside businesses. I would have expected to see a Phillips 66 gas station or something similar, but I saw brands of gasoline I had never heard of before. And while most towns the size of Ovid might have a McDonalds or a KFC or at least a Pizza Hut, Ovid had only a local places, like Rusty's Burger Barn. But that wasn't the strangest thing I saw. If the businesses were a little odd, some of the people were downright unbelievable. They were transparent! No, wait a minute. That isn't quite right. I don't want you to think you could actually see through them. You couldn't do that. It was as if you could sense what was behind them, sort of as if one tiny part of your brain was telling you they weren't exactly there. Does that make sense to you? Probably not, but just keep reading and I'll tell you more about them later. "Holy Cow!" Dave exclaimed while we stopped at a stoplight. "Did you see that?" Connie looked up from her computer. "Did I see what?" "That woman who just crossed the street on a bike," Dave explained. "It's like you could... see right through her." "Dave!" Connie said in mock exasperation. "So what if she was wearing something revealing? What makes you think I'd care?" She had misunderstood, I realized when I saw the troubled look on Dave's face. He didn't clarify his remarks, but I could tell from his expression that he had seen one of the transparent people as well. Now not everyone was transparent, although most of the people I saw were. Still, Connie didn't seem to notice at all while Dave and I did. Maybe we should have said something to her, but she would have just thought we had been smoking something funny. It probably wouldn't have made a difference. But if I had known then what I know now, I would have demanded that Dave turn the car around and head out of Ovid as fast as possible. Come to think of it, though, that might not have worked. Vulman Industries wasn't exactly a huge place, but it was getting bigger. Construction crews were working on an addition to the building, and from all indications, it wasn't the first addition. The company looked like a combined office and manufacturing plant, and from the expansion and the well-kept facility, it was easy to see that business was good. It had to be, I thought. Our systems were good but they weren't cheap. Normally, this would have been a cushy assignment. The building was new enough that there would be no electrical problems, and with both Dave and Connie there, the install should be a snap. Plus the company looked prosperous enough that no one would get upset when we nickel and dimed them with all the little add-ons that always accompanied an installation like this one. But I didn't feel like I was on a cushy assignment. I felt there was something very wrong about this - the town and its people seemed just a little bit out of kilter. I really wanted nothing more than to rush through the installation and get out of town, forgetting that I had ever even heard of Ovid. Like a lot of this message, that may seem like an overreaction to you, Jeff, but there was really an odd feel to Ovid - something that made you want to want to get away while you still could. As we got out of the car, I tried to tell myself it was just my imagination running away with itself. People weren't really transparent. It had to have been a trick of the light, or maybe I was just tired. Maybe Dave was tired, too. After all, Connie hadn't seen anything out of the ordinary. So it had too be my imagination. Peggy had warned me not to stay up late watching those spooky movies on cable. I had nearly convinced myself once inside Vulman's lobby. A cheery blonde receptionist - buxom but hardly transparent - had paged the project manager for the network install - a Holly Cache. I had just settled into a comfortable chair in the lobby chastising myself for being so foolish when my little rational fantasy collapsed around me. "Brenda, will you FedEx this package for me?" I looked up out of curiosity to see the receptionist accept a package from a young man in a tie. He was quite fit, with dark hair and an even tan. His tie was stylish and his manner professional. He was also transparent. Well, so much for my theory about just being tired, I thought. Dave noticed it, too. He motioned with his head for me to join him. Then he announced to Connie, "Be right back. I want to check something in the car." "I'll go with you," I announced, picking up on his ruse. "What the hell is going on here?" Dave asked me once we were outside the building. "I don't know," I said in a worried voice. "But did you notice how that secretary didn't see anything strange?" "Neither did Connie," Dave pointed out. "She was checking that guy out as if there was nothing wrong with him." "I don't like this," I muttered. "So what do we do?" Every instinct in my body told me it was time to run. I wanted nothing more than to jump in the car, drive back to Tulsa, and catch the first plane to Dallas and pretend as if Ovid never even existed. But something else told me it wouldn't be as simple to do that as it sounded. "I think we need to do this install and then worry about what's going on," I said slowly. Dave just nodded in agreement and the two of us reluctantly went back into the office. When we reentered the lobby, Connie was standing, talking with a very attractive woman. The woman looked like an Indian princess with her long black hair and perfect bronze skin. She wore her white linen business suit with all the poise of a model, displaying her long, beautiful legs as if she were on a runway. She turned and smiled at us. I would have done anything short of leaving Peggy for one of those smiles. "Guys, meet Holly Cache," Connie said, obviously amused at our reaction. "And it's Mrs. Cache." Blushing, Dave and I each shook her feminine hand and introduced ourselves. Her casual but firm handshake reminded me more of a man's handshake than the lifeless grip so many women had. I found to my relief that despite her model 's looks, Holly was just good people. I could see the wheels turning in Dave 's head though. If only she was single, he was thinking sadly. "Holly will be our liaison on this project," Connie explained. "She's given us a conference room to work out of." "I'll take you there now," Holly volunteered. The conference room wasn't far from the lobby, and it was close to a break room with soda and candy machines along the wall. I looked around to see if any of the transparent people were lounging about, sipping sodas and swapping stories, but the room was empty. "While Holly gets you guys set up, I'm going to visit the little girl's room," Connie said, pointing across the hall. When she was gone, Holly looked at the two of us. "Okay guys, what's wrong?" Dave and I glanced guiltily at each other but neither of us spoke. Just then, a secretary bustled into the room. She was young and as pretty as all the other women we had seen at Vulman with the bright red hair and cute freckles of youth. And she was transparent. "Holly, here's that site map you wanted," she said, favoring us with a smile. Holly noted our expressions. Then she said, "Andy, Dave, meet Darlene. She' ll be working with us on this project." The secretary - Darlene - stuck out a hand. Without thinking, I took it and was relieved to note it was as solid as my own. I was visibly relieved but Darlene failed to notice. Dave had a similar reaction when he shook her hand. After the usual small talk, Darlene left the room. Holly looked at us with a mischievous smile. "Feel better now, guys?" "Uh...yes," I admitted while Dave nodded. "Look guys, while you're in Ovid some things might seem a little strange. Just ignore it. You'll understand before too long; I'm pretty sure of that." "But..." Dave began. Holly shook her head, the luxurious dark hair floating in waves. "No buts. Believe me guys; it's for your own good. Now, let's get started on the install." Reluctantly, we followed her advice. I suppose we had little choice. Besides, Holly might be an attractive young woman, but she carried herself like someone who was used to being in charge. She had planned out her part of the install with almost military precision. Soon, Dave and I got with the program, ignoring the transparent people as if they were just normal folks while we went about our business. It may seem strange that we were able to stop worrying about the transparent people just like that, but we had a job to do. We could figure By the end of the day, we had accomplished far more than we had anticipated. "We may only need to be here one more day," Dave told Connie as we drove to the Ovid Inn where the company had rooms reserved for us. "Dave and I can have everything finished by tomorrow at noon. Then we can do a little administrator training with Holly in the afternoon and leave tomorrow evening." Connie frowned. "Do you think that's a good idea? We have a full day blocked out for training." "Yeah," I agreed, "but Holly is picking up on it fast. I don't know what her background is but she knows computers and electronics better than a lot of our employees do." "What?" Connie said in mock surprise. "A woman who knows about such things? Why, I do declare!" "Okay," I admitted laughing, "so some women are as good at this sort of stuff as men. I never said they weren't." I hadn't either, but the best techies I had known were almost always men. You and I talked about that over more than one beer, Jeff. We both knew some good female techs, but it has always seemed as if men dominate the field. Take Connie for example. She had great customer skills and a working knowledge of the product, but despite a strong background in computers while in school, Dave and I - and you for that matter - could run circles around her when it came to the complicated stuff. Dave and I stayed quiet about the transparent people until later that night. The three of us had made good use of our expense accounts at a great steak place called Winston's. Dave and I had made it a point to ignore the transparency of many of the town's residents. A satisfying chunk of red meat and a liberal amount of wine were what Dave and I needed to relax us and help us to forget the strange things we had seen in Ovid. For that matter, Connie was no slouch in either the steak or the wine department. How a little thing like her was able to wolf down a steak as big as mine will always be a mystery. The night was still young, so Dave and I decided to take in the local nightlife. Connie begged off and headed back to her room to call her latest boyfriend and get some sleep. Dave and I decided a place on the highway called Randy Andy's was just about right to celebrate a good day. "Besides," Dave said with a grin, "the place is named for you." "The Randy part or the Andy part?" "Both." I think we were both a little disappointed with the place once we walked in. I guess it's too much to expect a strip club in a small Oklahoma town. Randy Andy's was just a bar - no strippers, no hookers, and not even any loud rock music. Well, there was music, but it was Faith Hill on a jukebox, and the volume was set high enough so you could hear it but low enough that you could still talk over it. There was a smell of grease and beer in the place, but oddly no smoke. Not that I minded; I gave up smoking years ago when I married Peggy. We took a table and ordered a beer from a hot looking babe with an eagle tattoo on her ankle named Sly. That is, the waitress was named Sly. I never did learn what the eagle's name was. She was a friendly type, but Dave and I both got her message: look as much as you want but don't touch. When our beers came, Dave hunkered down, ready to talk. "What do you think is going on here?" he asked me quiet enough not to be heard beyond our table. "I don't really know," I sighed. I looked around the room. Some of the patrons were real enough, but others had that strange near transparency that made them seem entirely unreal. Jeff, it's hard to explain what we were seeing. I'm sure you've conjured up images of ghostly beings by now, but it isn't like that at all. If you glance at one of the transparent people, you might not notice anything wrong. But if you look at one of them - and I mean really concentrate on them - you can sort of make out what's directly behind them. If one of them walks up and starts talking to you, you can see what's behind them, but it seems to fade in and out, as if concentrating on what they're saying makes it harder to concentrate on their transparency. And when you shake hands with them or pat them on the back, they feel as real and as solid as you or I. "Vulman is involved in government projects," Dave pointed out. "Maybe this is some sort of an experiment - you know, shifting dimensions or something." "Maybe," I allowed, "but why is it that some people don't notice? Connie didn't see anything out of the ordinary." "I don't know. Maybe only men can see it." "But Holly knows," I pointed out. "She even warned us not to remark on it. I saw you talking to her alone this afternoon. Did she tell you anything?" "Nothing," Dave said with a shake of his head. "It's almost as if there's some taboo or something against speaking about it. Everybody just acts like it's all normal. What about you? Didn't you wire the president's office?" "I did," I replied. I told him about meeting Eric Vulman. He was friendly enough, I suppose, but he seemed to be different, too. I didn't mean to imply that he was like the transparent people - just the opposite in fact. He seemed to have a... presence about him. Even though he walked with a noticeable limp, it was as if he was almost regal. And yet we talked amicably. He was interested in our system and asked a lot of questions. And strangely enough, the questions were thoughtful and penetrating, unlike the usual simple-minded questions most CEO's asked me. Although he didn't volunteer the information, I suspect he was quite an engineer in his own right. Four bottles of beer on top of the wine at dinner accomplished nothing other than more speculation, and each beer seemed to cause us to consider even more outlandish answers. The funny thing is that we never hit on the real answer, and it was probably more outlandish than anything we imagined. I wish I could tell you what the answer was, Jeff, but we were right about one thing: there are some taboos in Ovid, and talking about some of them is forbidden. I can't even type some of the answers out. Whenever I try, my fingers come down on the shift keys and nothing happens. The next morning wasn't a terribly pleasant one for me. The three of us had split two bottles of wine with dinner. The four beers on top of that had created a hellish swimming pool in my stomach. I was popping Rolaids as if they were candy. At least a big fluffy cinnamon roll at a place called Nellie's Grill soaked up some of the stuff, but even that didn't help much. And I read someplace that coffee doesn't really help your hangover. If that' s the case, Dave and I wasted a lot of time drinking an entire pot. "I'm going to have to keep a better eye on you boys," Connie laughed when she saw our distress. The thing a person with a hangover hates most is another person without a hangover. I mumbled something unintelligible to her. Dave just groaned. Somehow, we got through the morning. In spite of our infirmities, the rest of the install went well. As we had thought the day before, we were finished before lunch. The ever-efficient Holly had her staff gathered in the conference room right after lunch. Connie handled most of that training session, allowing Dave and I to relax as we nursed our hangovers at the back of the room. We were finished by three thirty. While Connie was in no particular hurry, using the extra time to schmooze Holly and her staff, Dave and I were champing at the bit to get the hell out of town. Our bags were already in the car and Dave thought he could make it back to Tulsa in time to catch a late flight back to Dallas. I had even called Peggy from a Vulman phone (cell phones don't work here) and told her jokingly to kick her lover out of bed because I'd be home by midnight. At last, Connie said her last good-byes and we were ready to hit the trail. But it wasn't to be. As we bustled through the lobby, we found our path blocked by an imposing man. He was middle aged with graying hair and skin that was tanned and weathered by a lot of time outdoors. He looked almost uncomfortable in a suit, and I couldn't help but think that this was a man you wanted by your side when the going got rough. The only thing that kept him from being an aging Indiana Jones was the noticeable limp when he walked. I, of course had already met him. There was a bright smile on his face as he stuck out a large, strong hand. "You must be the rest of the team from Aldeberan," he said with a nod to Dave and an appreciative glance at Connie. "I'm Eric Vulman." When they had received his firm handshake and introduced themselves, and I had shaken his hand once again, he continued, "Holly has told me you all did a great job." We thanked him with suitable embarrassment. "We're all a little new at this networking stuff," he told us. "Is there someone we should get in touch with if none of you are available?" I imagine at least one of us will be available all the time," Connie told him. She was in typical sales mode. Actually, there were times when we were all out of touch - like now. Unless someone knew to call us at Vulman, they wouldn't reach us since none of our cell phones seemed to be working. We had just thought at the time that there were no cells in Ovid. Strangely, none of us had found it odd that we had been completely out of contact with the office for a couple of days. Normally, that would have driven us nuts. "Well, perhaps," Eric Vulman allowed. "And perhaps not." He said it so matter-of-factly that none of us found it a cryptic remark at the time. Later, we would understand why he had asked the question - or at least Dave and I would. Connie gave him a whole list of people to call - including you, Jeff. I doubt if he's called you though. You were pretty far down the list. Connie never cared much for you for some reason. Sorry, old pal, but that's the way it was. It was late afternoon by the time we actually pulled away from Vulman. I had driving duties, and I have to say I say so anxious to get away from Ovid that I hadn't been paying any attention to the speed limit. I don't really think in retrospect that it would have mattered if I had been paying attention to it though. When the Judge wants you, he wants you. Oh, I guess I haven't told you about the Judge yet, have I, Jeff? Well, I'll get to him in a little while. Just take my word for it - the Judge is someone you don't want to meet. Anyhow, my stomach dropped through the bottom of the car when I heard a police siren start up behind me. I could have sworn there hadn't been a police car in sight. Besides, I was only doing forty and the speed limit along the four-lane stretch of road leading out of Ovid had to be at least thirty-five. "Shit!" Connie muttered. "Now we'll be late for the evening flight." I looked at Dave and he looked back at me. We didn't have to say it, but both of us suspected there was far more at stake than missing the late flight. I don't know how to explain it to you, Jeff, but there's a feel to this place. It's a little like the feeling you get in a strange place when you think something is going to jump out at you from the shadows. You know it isn't rally going to happen, but the feeling just won't go away. The difference with Ovid is that there really is something hiding in the shadows, and just when you think it's all just you imagination, that "something" jumps out at you. Our "something" was about six feet tall, very slender and trim, and wore mirrored sunglasses even though the afternoon sun was abating. Remember the bad guys in The Matrix? Remember the unsmiling expression and the dark glasses the baddies in the dark suits wore? Well, take away the dark suit and put one of them in a police uniform and you'd have what was walking calmly toward our car. "License and registration," the officer demanded before I could say a word. With a sigh, I handed him everything he had requested. "I was only doing thirty-five, officer," I pleaded weakly, knowing I was doing forty. "But the speed limit is twenty-five," he told me, not bothering to look up from my documents. "Twenty-five!" Connie echoed from the seat next to me. "On this stretch of road? That's ridiculous!" Connie just couldn't seem to see and feel what Dave and I did. To her, this was just another small town with a speed trap. I don't know what it is about some women, but they'll cry and try to get out of a ticket when they're at the wheel, but they'll do everything in their power to piss off the cop when they're not driving. Go figure. "I'll have to ask you to follow me to the station," the officer said as he handed my driver's license and the rental agreement back to me. "Can we take care of this quickly?" I asked as politely as I could. "We're trying to make it to Tulsa to catch a late-night flight." "Just follow me," he repeated. "Well, I guess we'll have to stay at a hotel by the airport," Dave said with a sigh. Then he added, "If we're lucky." We weren't going to be lucky, I thought when we got to the police station. Jeff, that strange officer - Mercer is his name - booked us! There was this nice young black woman in a police uniform, and she took down all of our vital information and put our personal belongings in envelopes. The next thing you know, she and Officer Mercer are leading us off to cells - one for Connie and another for Dave and me. "This is ridiculous!" Connie yelled as she was unceremoniously nudged into her cell down the hall from ours. It's a good thing she didn't have a tin cup or she'd probably have been banging it against the cell door. And it really was ridiculous if you think about it, Jeff. Nobody throws you in jail for a lousy speeding violation unless you were doing ninety in a thirty zone or drunk or something like that. The worst that would normally happen is you'd have to stay over and appear in court the next morning. Most of the time, you could just mail the money for the fine in. But jail? "Can we see a lawyer?" I asked as Dave and I were put in our cell. "In the morning," Officer Mercer told us. And that was it. I won't bore you with how we spent the night in jail. Let's just say it was only the second time I had ever been in jail and I didn't like it. Remember the first time, Jeff? No, I don't suppose you do. We were in college and ended up sneaking into one of those casinos over on the reservation near Topeka. Then they figured out we had phony ID's and threw us out. We drove back through a little town called Hiawatha and got arrested for drunk driving. We spent the night in jail there. I can remember how my parents wouldn't even bail me out and we had to wait until the next day for your dad to get us out. Yeah, those were the good old days. It's a shame you probably don't remember any of them. I suppose I should point out in all fairness that Ovid's jail wasn't like that little dumpy one up in Hiawatha. No, it was actually comfortable. The black officer - Hazleton was her name, Wanda Hazleton - brought us a pretty decent dinner. And the beds were actually comfortable, even though it was a little disconcerting to have a toilet along one wall. We were close enough to Connie's cell that we could talk to her even if we couldn't see her. She spent most of the evening ranting and raving about what she was going to do when she got back to Dallas and saw her own lawyer. Me? I just wanted to get our court appearance over with. I think Dave felt the same way. Although we didn't talk about it - except to make a few off-hand comments - both Dave and I realized this wasn't just a simple speeding case. If it had been, we would have been brought before a local magistrate - even if they had to pull him off the golf course - fined, and sent on our way. No, they wanted us and not just for our fine money. It was a sobering realization, I thought, as I drifted off for a few hours of troubled sleep. After a decent breakfast, all three of us were led from our cells into a courtroom. No one would give us a good explanation as to why Dave and Connie had been put in jail. After all, I was the guy who had been driving. They were just passengers. Well, they'd regret it in the end. Connie was serious about getting her lawyer on the situation as soon as we got back to Dallas. She was already muttering about false arrest and imprisonment and how the town of Ovid had better have a lot of money because she was going to sue them for plenty. Of course, that all depended upon our ability to get back to Dallas. The courtroom was well appointed with oak benches and wainscoting. And it was immaculately clean, the woods brought to a high polish in the morning light and floors so clean you could eat off them. I couldn't help but think the room was almost like a courtroom set you'd see in the movies - almost too good to be true. There were only two other people in the room when Officer Mercer led us in. One was a very attractive blonde woman sitting in the gallery. She was well dressed, wearing a tan suit and a skirt short enough that it showed off a fine pair of legs. I thought that maybe she also had an appearance in court that day. I could think of no other reason for her to be there. The other person in the room was a very attractive brunette. She, too, was wearing a suit, only hers was a deep burgundy shade offset by a white blouse. She was sitting at one of the tables at the front of the room, and I realized suddenly that she was our court-appointed attorney. "Susan Jager," she said, rising to offer us her hand. Each of us in turn shook it and introduced ourselves. "I'll be your attorney today, as you've probably guessed." "I'd prefer my own attorney," Connie interjected. "No offense." "None taken," Susan replied with an unwavering smile. "However, I should warn you - all of you - this isn't the sort of proceeding you think it is." That got my interest. "I assumed I was here on a speeding charge." "On the surface, that is why you're here," Susan agreed, "but you may have noticed that things are a little different here in Ovid." It was nice to know I wasn't just imagining things, but deep down, I would have been as happy as a pig in shit if she had told me that Ovid was just one big speed trap and I was about to get a thousand dollar fine. "Different...how?" I managed to ask. "For the moment, let's just say there's a lot more to Ovid than meets the eye," Susan replied. "You'll see what I mean." "All rise," Officer Mercer suddenly intoned. "Ovid Municipal Court is now in session, the Honorable Judge presiding." Yes, I though, turning to face the front of the room, Susan was undoubtedly right. There was more to Ovid than met the eye. I don't know what I was expecting, but the Judge wasn't it. I think maybe I was expecting someone who looked more like Count Dracula than the middle-aged man in his neatly pressed black robe who strode regally to the bench. He seemed very fit, his face lean and his beard neatly trimmed. His hair and beard showed only a little gray, and I estimated him to be no more than forty-five. His glasses were gold rimmed but did little to hide piercing eyes. "Be seated," he commanded, his voice betraying just a little of the famous Oklahoma twang. We took our seats and Susan whispered to me, "Just stay calm and everything will be all right." "Officer Mercer, what do we have on the docket today?" the Judge asked. "The City of Ovid versus Andrew Skinner, charged with speeding." "And the other two?" "Accomplices." It was too much for Connie. She let out a groan and rose to her feet. "Your Honor, I may not be an attorney but I know there's no such thing as being an accomplice to speeding and - " Her lips continued to move but nothing came out. I watched in horrid fascination as her eyes went wide and she grabbed her throat. At first I thought she was having some sort of seizure, brought on by her anger. Then I noticed no one in the courtroom was moving to help her. In fact, the Judge had a very satisfied look on his face. "We will have no more outbursts in this courtroom," the Judge demanded sternly. "Is that clear?" Connie could only fearfully nod her head. "Then sit down and be quiet." I wasn't sure if Connie sat voluntarily or was forced to sit, but one way or the other, she plopped down in her seat. "How do your clients plead, Ms. Jager?" Susan looked at me. I mouthed "guilty." To be honest, Jeff, I was scared shitless of the Judge. As wacko as it may sound to you, there were supernatural forces at work in that courtroom, and you could actually feel them. Of course, if I'd known what was coming, I would have done everything in my power to avoid a guilty verdict - not that there was anything I could have done. The deck was already stacked against us. "Guilty, Your Honor," Susan said formally, ignoring Connie's wordless protests. "The defendants will rise," the Judge intoned. Dave and I rose slowly to our feet, but Connie tried to fight it and was jerked rudely to her feet by some unseen force. "I find the three of you guilty as charged." Up to that point, the formal language of the court had ruled. Now though, the Judge closed his eyes and began to chant in some language I had never heard before. I suppose it might have been Latin, but it wasn't like any Latin I had ever heard before. Rather than the stilted language I thought of as Latin, it was almost melodious with a cadence not unlike modern Italian. Remember when we took that Italian class in college? No, I suppose you don' t. As I stood there, I began to feel odd. It was as if my there were a thousand living things crawling about inside my body It's a feeling I hope you never experience. At least there was no pain, but there's every other sort of sensation all wrapped into one. I looked over at Dave and Connie. Something was happening to them as well. It was hard to tell just what was happening, but it seemed as if both of them were... changing. Jeff, this next part is the part where you may decide to erase this whole message and forget all about this, chalking it up to somebody who's gone completely loony tune. Please don't do it, though, I beg you! I swear all of this really happened. Even if you don't believe it, please read on. The most obvious change was happening to Connie. She was shrinking. Never all that tall to begin with, she was only four feet, then three feet tall. I didn't know where she was going to stop. Then I looked at Dave. He was shrinking, too, but not as much. And his hair - it had turned a vibrant red and seemed to be getting longer as I watched. Then I looked down at myself. The dress shirt I had been wearing with a tie the day before was changing color. No longer white, it was now bright yellow and becoming some sort of knit fabric clinging tightly to my chest. As for my chest, it was becoming smaller as well - less defined somehow. But then, two bumps appeared beneath the fabric. They were small, but growing larger. "Oh my God!" I screamed, surprised at how thin my voice suddenly sounded. Then I did what any rational man would do under the circumstances - I passed out. Have you ever noticed how women faint but men pass out? It's okay for a guy to pass out, particularly from, say, too much beer or what have you. But fainting is a sign of weakness, isn't it? So I didn't faint. I kept telling myself that as I climbed back out of my mental fog. I really didn't faint. "Are you okay, honey?" a soft, concerned feminine voice was asking me. I tried to grunt a "yes" but it didn't come out very clearly. It was more like a sigh, partially from the pleasant feeling I had of something cold and wet placed against my forehead. Slowly, I managed to look out of blurry eyes at Susan who was holding a wet cloth to my head. I knew where I was. I was lying on one of the benches in the courtroom. I must have passed out from the stress or something, I thought. That must have been why I thought I saw Dave and Connie changing. Obviously no one could be changed by a small town judge mumbling Latin over them. But just then, I put a small, slender hand to my forehead and learned just how drastically a person could be changed. "Holy shit!" I screamed in a high-pitched voice as I sat up with a start. It hadn't been a hallucination after all. I looked down, first at my hands. Then I looked at the rest of myself. Myself? Well, I looked down at who I had become. I was wearing a yellow tank top and very, very short denim shorts. And my body was obviously young - and just as obviously female. That's right, Jeff - I'm a girl now. I wish you could remember me as I was before and appreciate the irony of all of this. Of the two of us, I was always the guy sniffing around for a little pussy - before Peggy of course. Now I had one of my very own, and I wasn't very happy about it. "Who... what...?" I managed, then turned around to gaze at the bench. The Judge was nowhere to be seen. "He's gone," Susan said gently. "You and I are the only ones still here." "He... I..." Oh I was making brilliant conversation that day, wasn't I? "That's right, honey, he changed you into a girl," Susan told me. "Since girls as young as you don't always carry ID's around, it's my job to fill you in and send you home." "I... I don't want to be a girl." And I didn't want to be sent home, either. Something told me that didn't mean the place I shared with Peggy in Dallas. Susan gave me a sympathetic look. "I know you don't, but you are one and you 'll be one for the rest of your life." The rest of my life? But what about my other life? I wanted to ask. What about my real life? What about Peggy? We had planned to have a family. I couldn't have a family with her looking like this. Well, I suppose I could, but I shuddered at the thought of bearing children. Susan seemed to understand. "Just relax for a minute. I know what you're thinking. If you try to accept this, it will be easier for you." "Accept it?" I asked, trying to make it a fearsome roar. But it came out just a plaintive little cry. "How can I accept it? I'm not a girl. I can't be a girl!" Okay, I was a little hysterical, but can you blame me? Just think about what it would be like, Jeff, to wake up and find you have these little stick-like hairless arms with slender fingers tipped with pink polish. Think what it's like to have long blonde (that's right - I'm a blonde) hair tickling the tops of your shoulders. Think about what it's like - if you can - to have little perky breasts sitting on your chest and this curious feeling of emptiness between your legs. I felt small and weak. Hell, I was small and weak. And to top it off, I was starting to cry. "Don't cry, honey," Susan said in a tone that was surprisingly comforting. I couldn't help it. I buried my face in her breasts and cried like a baby. Eventually, the crying stopped and Susan helped me out to her car. It was a little Honda Civic. Apparently being a lawyer in a small town didn't pay terribly well. I plopped down into the front seat and waited for Susan to get seated behind the wheel. "Where are we going?" I asked, disgusted with the sweet little voice I now had. "I'm taking you home," Susan said. "You're Carrie Anne Summers now and you stayed home from school today because you weren't feeling well." School! Oh shit. "You're thirteen and in the seventh grade," she continued. "You're an only child as well." "I'm not going through with this," I said petulantly, trying to find some way of folding my arms over my chest without pressing on my little breasts. They weren't very large but I could feel them anyway. "You have to," Susan replied. "You really don't have a choice. Everyone in town will remember you as Carrie Summers. If you go around trying to convince people that you're a man who's been changed into a girl, they won't believe you." "Are you trying to tell me that we're the only ones who know who I really am?" I asked. "Not exactly," she admitted. "There are others like you - and me for that matter - who will realize you've been changed just as we were. But most of us learn to accept what's happened to us. We even come to be glad it happened." I shuddered as she spoke. I felt as if I had been dropped into the middle of a bizarre remake of The Stepford Wives. Susan had just admitted that she, too, had been changed and yet she enjoyed the change. I suppose she must have been a woman before. Maybe she was an ugly old crone made young and attractive by the Judge. Whatever her reasons, I knew that there was no way I would ever accept what had been done to me. My career, my marriage, my very life had been taken from me and I would never be happy in Ovid. "I know you don't believe me now," she said as if reading my mind. "But you' ll see. The important thing is to try to fit in." "Try to act like a thirteen year old girl?" I asked sarcastically. "What am I supposed to do - put pictures of Leonardo on my wall and listed to the Backstreet Boys?" "It might help," she replied. I don't think the sarcasm was lost on her though, and I wasn't pleased by her faint smile of amusement. "I'll get away," I argued. "I'll get out of Ovid. I'll get someone to believe me." Susan shook her head. "There isn't any way out of Ovid - at least not until you accept w