THE ANSWER has narrow escapes

The old guy shook his shaggy gray mane.

“We’ve been a skateboard making family for eight generations. SurfSkate Incorporated is the oldest existing California corporation. SurfSkate!” He shouts at me waving his hoary hand with thumb up and middle and ring finger curled in, pinky finger out like an exuberant tea drinker.

“Hang loose!”

“SurfSkate!” answer his heavily armed minions as a punk howly guitar music rises. Not my suit this time, which I have muted for the benefit of our negotiations. Good fast drum line has me tapping my foot. Space takes a defensive poise. I see by the red flashing lami on his collar that he has armed his defensive systems. Watch out skaters he’s been known to attack rolling objects.

“We’ll help you dude…” he pauses in his spray painting a camera node, “We can get you to tera.”

His creaky beach drawl makes me guffaw: “On Skateboards!” I’m vaudeville aghast.

“Sure dude for this wave set, but we’ve a bus stashed nearby.” He implored. His Hench-dudes glanced back to the smoky corridor, met eyes, turned imploringly.

“Dudes! Surfs up!”

“Lets skate this city!" Drums pound, guitars roar.

Space leaps into my arms which have gone automatically into my: “Hey Wait a Minute!” mode.

“Minute! Too late!” A spray of flaming plastic particles accompany a boom and a concussion wave that snuffs the bright drippy smoky shrapnel.

“Wipe out you hodads!” Precedes a three gun return salvo that collapses the overhead and service walls exposing the compress luniment structural rock face.

Two more skaters roll up fast sliding to a stop at either side of surf granddad, they whispered to him in jargon. I hope our suits are recording so I can amplify that later. Space has his ETACS armed so there is certainly full field holo video. The Moon lawyers insisted on permanent full field vid holo after the legally ambiguous testimony Space gave in court during the chicken bits incidents, I got it lowered to ETACS active only with a hefty fine. If he hadn’t jumped up onto the judges desk and ate exhibit C there would be no record of what my doggy’s been doing these last eight years. When he’s with me and armed for combat he’s part of the research archive of permanent history.

“Lets skate!” Is the call to action. The two new arrivals have a double long, double wide model and I holding space in my arms am pulled upon it.

“You must put your feet on the board dude!” I am commanded.

“I haven’t rode wheeled plywood in thirty years. How could I brodie on this giant?”

“You mean an Ollie? A brodie is to land on your face.”

“No. Yeah a brodie.”

“We’ll do all the work. It’s a two dude cargo board!” I’m the cargo. I crouch and assume my surf board stance which is a reverse goofy foot cringe.

As they plant their feet to kick us into motion Space wriggles free, jumps down immediately to hairy our wheels.

“Up dog shields.” Murmurs the paramilitary beach bum behind me. Obviously Captain of this ship. A close look at the board reveals it’s mostly lami’s on top of more lami’s. It’s systems’d out. The edges lined with rocket nozzles.

A fine blue spark meets Space’s latest lunge. “YIPE!” He circles back for a rear attack. Good thing I’ve removed the propellant from his missiles.

Five of us and angry yapping dog weave away from the destruction. We pick up speed beyond the debris. Moon gravity makes for excellent skating. We three, gunner-dude, cargo-me, pilot-guy, undulate gently as we go smoothly zig-zagingly down the wide corridor. They go upward, I go downward, burst of jet thrust. I go upward, they come down, burst of jet thrust. I try to lean the corners but a hand on my shoulder keeps us from a low-G tumble.

“The boards got us dad. It calculates our turns. We’ve got Autofoot 3000 technology. Hang on.” Hang on to what?! We clear a eight step down stairway by not the side ramp. We jump some trash as two more security surfers on sleek boards with turned up ends join us.

Space is flanked by hostile rolly jet powered things. He notes their approach as he scampers attackingly to launch a full multi-target missile strike to their wheels. But the rockets skitter from the little silos ineffectually to error trajectory self-destruct along the deck behind us. No room along the floor for fireworks and so many skaters so our four escorts skate up the walls kicking and dropping back down to shoot up the other wall, dodging protrusions, jumping hatchways, painting ID panels and camera clusters, covering from above every corner with dull black ACA-ZAPS force packet launchers.

Space now indirect fire disarmed leaps onto the moving cargo board to settle between my feet with a growl and a dirty look up at me.

“What?” I play ignorance of the multiple missile failure. He growls a little louder. I know how much he loves his missiles. “I’ll reload you later. These guys are friends I think.” He seems to accept this. No alien or robot smells from these guys, definitely human. My lami sleeve analyzes his dog-suit smell data. One or more of our new companions has marijuana cigarettes in his pocket.

Quickly we run out of corridor into a large long plaza with several open stories of balconies. I see heavily armored police lurking behind improvised cover. It is the edge of the combat zone. Beyond the police lay normality. We are up to them fast.

“Halt! Stop! Tomare! Alto” And thirty seven other languages all in one sound. There was then a flash of dark. Deep solid dark. Some one must have tossed a dark matter grenade. Those are very expensive. A million monets just went up in dark. Before it disperses you can’t see at all with concentrated dark matter loose in the room unless you have hyper-quantum infrared goggles. I have to check by reaching up and grabbing for gunner dudes head. Then, I have them in my hand! Goggles! Putting them on I get to see our board with lift from the left side of the barricade fly across the obstruction bouncing a few helmets to land with a tremendous oscillation and take off ripping away through their assorted police and emergency vehicles. These skateboards are perfect for weaving through people and obstacles which we do now as we slow down a pace or two. Our follower catch’s up to us in the crowds of the long plaza, which I know even in infrared, to be the mid ring promenade shopping district. They aim to cross the dome.

“You can loose the gogs now man.”

“Still dark back there?” I ask the outrider.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about?” He lies with a down dude frown as he peals the IR’s strap from my head by hooking the lens with his tanned manicured fingers.

On through the crowds of shoppers they gleefully skate the promenade and then the esplanade crossing over and over the boulevard. Upon the boards we ride the grill-work and the ramps, the moving sidewalks, the rest bench’s, the planter garden margins, across the no skateboarding placards, the platforms and concourses, the esplanade went by again, led by a cackling shaggy headed gray bearded ancient bandy legged palm tree bordered shorts wearing flowery shirt waving crazy straw hat topped madman. When did he change clothes? In the dark? They all look like they just got back from the beach! Their suits must change. But where did the hat come from?

“Cowabunga!” Is the call to charge the police cordon lines this time from behind them. Across the tops of their vehicles we descend. Every one of the police that I can see is facing opposite towards the front lines with hyper IR goggles strapped firmly in place. This makes the tossing of the flash grenade seem sensible I’m sure. We stopped eventually far beyond the wild blind firing response and my eyes began to refocus.

“What are we doing back here?” Our headlong flight from battle had led us right back into the combat zone. We have stopped at the hub arterial tunnel turn off that is plainly marked in illuminated lami’s one meter tall as Crater View Estates Earthrise Lane B! We began this all at Earthrise Lane A! “Why the hell are we back here?” Their surfer suits were all dark again. Fine pixel scatter camo.

“We gotta meet the bus, dude, we’re a little early.” To high fives and back-slaps. “SURFSKATE!” They shout. They take their places as any LZ perimeter security professional would have recommended.

“Why did we have to go all around the third dome if we were only going here? Twice!”

“It was fun.” “Fuk’n A” “Yo dude!” “Sweet sweet ride!”

“Dude, we’re here cause they think you’re back there in mooner world.” Everybody we went by certainly got a good look at me and Space going up and down on this huge skate board. With cameras everywhere it’ll be old ENT news by now. “Those holy rollers’l never think you’d like come back to where they almost had you! And we can cut a big hole in the place and like not get billed. They’ll hit the Mormons up for it.” Almost all of them audibly snicker at the thought of that. To reinforce this plan two of them spray paint polygamist slogans over convenient surfaces: “Deseret now!” and “Hear the Horn!” “Ski Utah!”, “One is not enough!” just leaving the section above where the dust and sparks begin to fall.