Permission is given to post on any free site as long as the story is not altered and the headings remain intact.

Fair warning before reading. When I write stories, I’m a writer, and while not a bad one, I am not practiced at that.  I am not a businessman, lawyer, doctor, theologian nor a hair care expert.  Though I do have a working knowledge of many of these fields, I am an amateur not a professional writer. So there might be a whole bunch of factual errors in this piece.  I did what research I could, but my primary goal was to tell a story, not to write a dissertation.

In addition, it has been many, many years since I took an English class; and my grammar, as many of you have commented on before, is politely described as eccentric.  I did the best editing I could and I’m getting better, you wouldn’t want to see my first stuff, but there may still be many errors below.  I  practice, practice, and practice; and hopefully become a better writer, in the meantime, please bear with me as I submit to you my humble offerings. What you do read below has been cleaned by the finest editor on this, or any other, plane of existence. I wish I could tell you this "Angel's" name, but her major condition of working with me is that she remain nameless. If you cringe and some of my mistakes just try to imagine what she had to go through. 

And a last comment, this story includes some religious issues in the telling of the tale. Please don’t feel I’m being self righteous or shoving my idea of Christianity upon you.  I tried leaving the universe open to many diverse possibilities, so there’s room enough for us all to get along.  Also, I make light of some sacred and hallowed institutions.  Please don’t take offence.  As the great Kevin Smith once said, "-- even God has a sense of humour, just look at the duck billed platypus."  If this or stories with a TG element are likely to offend, you should probably leave now, though I don’t understand why you’re here, if that were the case. To the rest of the readers, please read, and I hope you enjoy.

Anyway, here is my humble (keyword their) offering to you.

 

The Archangel Files: The Heir

  By the Last Boy Scout.

 

Things were pretty bad for Michael Lane, a 21-year-old college dropout. The circumstances leading up to his departure from higher education were complicated, and tragic. Mike was a good old boy, from a good old family.  If the United States had a landed aristocracy, the Lanes would rate a duchy at the very least. Even as it is, they have congressmen in their pockets, and senators waiting for permission to breath.  The Lanes were living at the pinnacle of the finest civilization that history had ever produced.  No enemy had ever come close to vanquishing them from their pedestal, not since old man Lane had walked off of the boat in 1833.  No enemy that is, except themselves.

When such an empire reaches such great power, it become much more than one man can manage.  Old man Lane, surviving a civil war in his adopted country, had retired, and left the managing of his company to his three sons.  But as they were not as capable as their father, they became envious, and paranoid about what their brothers were doing, and in less than a year after relinquishing his power, old man Lane was forced to return and sort out his sons. After watching the trouble develop and grow, he concluded that wealth and power like this could never be shared; and he put forth an unbreakable family law that only the eldest may inherit the control, and he would reign supreme.

Brother went into combat against brother more viciously than was done during the civil war, which had made the family its fortune. In the end, Thomas Lane was the last surviving heir.  Rather than present such an opportunity for conflict in the future, he tried to arrange that he had but one son.  When his wife presented him with a second son, he ordered the baby sent away to an orphanage, denying it was his.  He would see no more heirs fighting for control, if he could help it.  Such was the force of the personality of Thomas Lane, that he imprinted his own ideas upon his son, who did the same for his son.  And it continued downward, thru time, until the present, when Mike’s father, John Lane had gotten married, and had taken control of Lane Incorporated.

It was now the 21st century, and of course, one man did not manage Lane Incorporated all alone.  Executive vice presidents and regional directors all managed divisions and subgroups of the 35 Billion dollar private company. But no matter how mundane, in the end, the final decisions were all made by one person, the Chief Executive Officer, President and Chairman of the Board, John Lane.   Lane reigned more completely than any absolute monarch of any country in earlier eras.  You see, in the end, those rulers were ultimately accountable to their people, who would rise up in rebellion if angered enough; but a Lane was accountable to no one.

The trouble was, John lane was an old man. He had married late, and fathered late, and while 65 years old may be a vigorous enough age for a healthy man in 2002 .  It was an age when many a man looks forward to easing up a little, to enjoy the golden years of his life.  John Lane wanted to retire; but he felt his son was not ready for the mantle of leadership. "Not, by goddamned ready, one little bit.", was his spoken observation.

John Lane was cursed by his own traditions.  In other dynasties there was always a second in line to the throne.  However, after five generations of only one child, there were no brothers or sisters, neither were there any cousins nor seconds cousins.  No one was available to assume the mantle of one of the largest private fortunes on earth, but a 21-year-old kid, who right now, was freezing to death on Interstate 80.

   Mike had gone to Harvard, for about a minute, then Yale, Dartmouth then steadily down the list until ending up at Creighton University.  It wasn’t a carefully thought out decision to attend there, he simply wanted a place as far away from his family and the clinging responsibilities as he could manage.  It wasn’t that he wasn’t intelligent, far from it.  Lanes always tested high on the IQ exam; rather, it was a question of motivation.  Pass or fail, sink or swim, Mike had always known what his destiny would be.  He could become the greatest biochemist on earth, and not be able to spend one day in a lab, because the family business needed be run.  He could have the athletic ability to rival Michael Jordan, or Joe Montana, and not be able to play one game.  What man would try and tackle or block the heir apparent, who could buy and sell you, your parents, your parent’s friends and an armoured division, just for fun.

"Friends" were forthcoming, of course, but none wanted to meet Mike. They wanted to get into the good graces of Michael Elmer Lane, Executive Vice President, at age 18, of Lane Incorporated.  Whenever he arrived at a new school, he had maybe a week, until they came out of the woodwork, tipped off by the society pages or scandal rags.  Those few people he had met, before the news spread, usually got shifted off to the side in the resulting stampede.

There had been girls after him, lots of girls ; by the time he was 19, and had learned how to hide his mail, and his e-mail address, he had received one thousand one hundred and fifteen marriage proposals, most of them from women he had never met, and several of them from men he had never met.  He had "dated", at least that’s what they called it, by dressing up in a tuxedo and accompanying, whichever prissy muffin, his mother or his father had decided he should take, to whichever charity event his attendance was required.  None of these outings had resulted in a second engagement.  While this may have been some men’s fantasy, it wasn’t his.  Some of these girls would do anything to have a relationship with the Lane heir.  Mike knew he wasn’t going to find true love in these conditions, when one time, he jokingly ordered a girl to bark like a dog; and she had actually done it.

Mike had never taken a girl out to a movie, or to some cheap pizza place. Never, had he necked in the back of a car.  Hard to do that with a five-man security detail which would rival some heads of state always present.  One time, when Mike did a tour of Stanford University, he had almost witnessed a full-fledged gunfight as his detail "bumped" into the one guarding the daughter of the U.S. President.  The excitement would have amused Mike more, if the secret service agents hadn’t been so quick to apologise, almost getting on their hands and knees at the thought of offending The Heir.

The situation had gotten so bad, even at Creighton, that Mike had packed up what he could, given his "friend" a check for $20,000, then driven his car westward. Trying to get away from school well wishers and his very own praetorian guard.  Mike didn’t know where he was going, his only plan, was to stop whenever he hit the mountains, and then to decide where to go from there.

The specific incident which had set off his flight, had been the university president’s smarmy offer, to completely ignore the sexual complaints filed against Mike and his fraternity, due to a party held over the past weekend.  That Mike hadn’t even been to that party, and as far as he knew nothing improper had happened, was of course, only of secondary importance to the University president, who wanted a new sports-center.  Mike had told the President to go perform a certain anatomically impossible act upon himself, then sicced his father’s lawyers on him and the university.  If the wolves left him with his retirement plan, Mike would be surprised.  

The trouble was, it was winter; and he hadn’t checked any weather advisories before leaving.  Never having driven for himself, longer than it took to get the license in the first place, and hardly ever being on his own, Mike can understandably be forgiven his error in judgement thinking the "few flurries" would go away soon.

Only they didn’t.  And, over the last hour, the "few flurries" had become a full-force snowstorm.  And with the wind picking up, a full-fledged blizzard was more than likely to develop. 

Not being completely stupid, Mike slowed the car down until barely going 15 m.p.h.; and decided to pull over and wait out the storm at the next town.  The trouble was, going 15 m.p.h., and not being able to see 15 feet in front of him, the next town was becoming difficult to find.  Panicking due to his lack of experience and being on his own for maybe the first time in his life, he increased his speed hoping to get to safely that much quicker.  What it did do, was send him to oblivion that much sooner.  The tires of his Toyota spun out, and the car, after doing a complete 360, crashed off the road and into a snow embankment.

"Why the hell couldn’t Nick have had a truck, or an SUV, like any self respecting teenager." Mike said, angered at his own stupidity.

Mike was a 6’2, 200 pound, dark haired young man, who even if he didn’t have all his father’s money coming to him, still could have attracted a few backward glances from the female portion of the species.  He knew though, that his good looks could quickly be spoiled by decomposition, unless he found a way to survive this situation. The engine was still running, but no matter how much gas Mike applied, the car wouldn’t move back up the hill in reverse; and trying to go forward proved equally pointless.

Mike hadn’t had much real life experience at much of anything, no matter how much he despised his constant supervision, they had made sure he didn’t want for, or have to do, really anything.  He had read though, extensively. He rationalized that if he stayed in the car, he would be suffocated, succumb to fumes, or even more certain, simply freeze to death.  There was still some traffic on the highway, not much, but he might catch a passing car, if only they could see him, that is.

Emptying out his suitcase, Mike put on first one, then two additional layers of clothes, trying to bundle up as best as possible against the cold devastation of the storm.  After a quick examination of the car and the trunk, he didn’t find anything helpful like a flare, or a survival kit.  A college student seldom needed one thought Mike. Climbing up the hill into the freezing winter wind, he made it up to a level surface he deduced was the road.  Looking as far as he could in either direction, he could see no sign of a city, or of a passing car.  He didn’t see anything but the endless whiteness, and the markers by the side of the road.

Thinking that walking, at least, would keep him warm, Mike headed on the interstate in the opposite direction he had been travelling. He didn’t know what was ahead, but he did know he had passed a town, a few miles back.  Cursing life in general, and himself in particular, Michael Elmer Lane began walking through the unknown whiteness.

 

"Its one of yours boss," said Gabriel, as he looked down from his vantage point in Heaven.

"Christ!" said the Archangel Michael, as he took the viewing disk from his associate.

"Yes?" came a questioning voice.

"Not you kid.  Sorry to bother you." Said Michael chagrined at having disturbed him.

"Its all right Mickey,  Happens all the time. We still on for the poker game Friday?."

"You bet, but no more guilting me out of giving all my winnings away.  We play for markers this time"

"I am understandably reluctant about matchsticks"

"We’ll figure something out.  See you around."

"He’s a good kid," said Gabriel, as he turned to his friend

"Yea," said Michael, as he turned back to viewing. "But this one sure isn’t."

"Oh, I don’t know. He’s never done anything really wrong.  I got his file right here, and in comparison to some of my cases, we should nominate see him for sainthood.

"But he hasn’t done anything really right either He was given everything.  Leaving aside his Boss given talents, he’s got all that power and money: and he hasn’t used it for anything more noble than a big party for his friends."

"Spreading happiness is a noble goal.", countered Gabriel.

"But that’s all he has to show for his life, a few keggers,.  How’s he supposed to face Pete with just that in his résumé."

"Your talking yourself up to something boss,"

"How did we get roped into doing this, Gabe? Time was, you and me rained down fire and brimstone, led all the angels of heaven, and fought all the armies of hell.  How do we rate, when it comes down to it, being glorified guardian angels?"

"Its one of the Big Boss’ pet projects. You know that.

"The whole human race is one of his pet projects and one that isn’t exactly panning out, if you ask me."

"I don’t know Mickey, these new guys, the Romans, they really know how to have a goodtime.  I know Pete doesn’t care for em much, because of how he arrived here, but I kind of like them."

"You need to get out more Gabe," said Michael smirking.

"Probably true.  You want me to handle this one, then?"

"No.   I've got it.  I have something extra special planed for this disgrace to my name."

"Try to keep your temper, the last time you were in that part of the world, the geography got rearranged."

"Hey, the Grand Canyon is a natural wonder of the world"  

 

Mike Lane was starting to get the idea that maybe getting out of the car was a bad idea.  No car had passed him since he had started walking.  Apparently, every other resident of the state of Nebraska was smarter than him; and were staying off the roads.  Mike had no idea how far he had gone, or how far he had yet to stumble through the snow.  The town he had thought was only a few miles back, might as well have been on the moon.  Mike knew that unless someone stumbled upon him soon, he would likely die out here.

Mike was about to give up hope, and try to go back for what little shelter the car offered, when he began to see a gathering of lights in the distance.  The snowstorm was scattering the light all over the horizon; but ahead there was something making the light.  Perhaps not the town.  Perhaps only a farm. In any case, Mike didn’t see any other option; he started stumbling toward the lights.

Time didn’t really have meaning; if it was measured at all, it was in paces, an entire lifetime in a step.

So cold.

Just a few more steps. One step at a time.

The lights were getting closer; Mike could begin to distinguish buildings.

Cold.

A few more steps.

But those few more steps were not forthcoming,.  Mick stumbled in the snow, and his already protesting muscles would follow orders no longer.  With one last heave of will, Mike struggled up, but he could only go a few more feet, before frozen limbs collapsed in admitted defeat.

Mike could see the town ahead; and he tried to scream for help.  The best he could manage was a weak wail that could not have been audible for ten feet.

‘I’m going to die’, Mike thought to himself.

The realization didn’t seem to bother him; since he stopped moving, he had actually started to feel a very comfortable warmth travel thru his body.  Mike knew enough to know this was not a welcome warmness, but a final stage of hypothermia.

"I’m sorry Daddy," Mike said before closing his eyes, and welcoming whatever was coming for him.     

"Come on wake up," said Archangel Michael, as he slapped Mike Lane hard across the face.

"I’ve got a nice pancake breakfast ready for you,"

No response.

"I’ve got three blond co-eds just waiting to get in your shorts." Michael said having difficulties.

"Oh come on. No one’s that dead," said Michael with exasperation, and looking up.  "Kid, little help here, please."

Mike Lane jolted up from his deceased slumber with a gasp.

"Thanks kid, I’ve been out of practice."

This was not Mike’s idea of the afterlife, so he can be forgiven for not understanding the situation he was in.  He looked around and saw a simple 12 by 12 room with a single bed, a TV, and with curtains drawn.  A simple Spartan hotel room, of the type he had seen on television a thousand times before: but never, ever stayed in.

"Who the hell are you?" asked Mike, when he saw the middle aged blond man in a three-piece business suit.

 

"I’ll thank you sir, not to use that word in my presence; and to answer your question, my name is Michael," sharply informed the Archangel

"Well Michael, my names Mike." Said Mike Lane trying to make some sort of sense of the situation.

"Nice to meet your Mike."

"Same here Mike, how did I get here Mike?"

"Well Mike your recently deceased; and I needed a place to sort you out.  The side of the road just didn’t seem appropriate for the proceedings."

"I…see.  Well, actually I don’t see; but I wouldn’t want to be impolite."

"My thanks, how are you feeling?"

"Actually I can’t really feel anything at all, not just physically, but emotionally too.  Somehow, I have the feeling that I should be feeling something about my supposed death.  But feelings aren’t forthcoming, does that make sense?"

"Actually it does, you learn to accept anything after a few assignments, you roll with the punches in my job."

"Which is?"

"Archangel, or perhaps I should say The Archangel. I usually don’t rotate back to the world for grunt work like this but the Boss wanted it done"

"The…Boss?"

"Doesn’t like being called, that,…other word, thinks its clichéd, bit of an eccentric, really."

"Well if anyone’s entitled."

"I’m glad you agree."

"The last thing I remember was walking through a blizzard.  Am I to assume then that I, that I didn’t make it."

"One may assume that yes," replied the Archangel amused.

"What now," asked Mike confused.

"Well that’s the question isn’t it?  Some of my more sporting associates are taking bets on what I’ll choose.  You’d be amazed on what you can wager on after a few eons.  Hey Gabe," said the archangel shouting upwards. "How’s the bookmaking going?"

"Even money you drop him into a third world country; or you give him exactly what he’s been praying for, that’s always a favourite," said a disjointed voice from heaven.

"What about the third option?"

"Come on boss, not even you’re that vindictive."

"No.  I suppose not," replied Michael, as he turned back to Lane

"Third world country?," Mike Lane asked.

"You’ve seen the movie, I’m sure, a spoiled little rich kid is shown how the other half lives by a mystical switch; and then learns a valuable life-lesson about what’s he’s always taken for granted; and he could have done to make the world a better place, yada yada yada.  Not one of my favourites, nature abhors a vacuum, He likes an orderly office.  As soon as we send some brat to Bolivia, another rises in his place, no I like to keep them in their present situation and teach them a lesson in siiu."

"The third option?," Mike asked getting progressively more concerned.

 "Don’t even bring that up.  I was just joking.  No, I’m talking about giving you exactly what you have prayed for."  

"Would you please elaborate, I don’t recall sending any prayers up to heaven."

"Nothing quite so direct, no.  But you have been wishing for happiness haven’t you,?  Or more importantly, a way to make something of yourself your father can be proud of.  What was it you said ?  Oh yes."

"I’m sorry daddy" Mike’s voice was perfectly reproduced inside the hotel room.

"Did I actually say Daddy?"

"Yea,"

"Well shattering as that is to my masculine ego, how did you plan on making me happy."

"Funny you should mention your masculine go, cause that’s what I’m going to remove.

"My ego?"

"Your masculinity."

"I’d rather you not." Mike replied, now gravely concerned.

"I’m afraid you haven’t got much of a choice Mike. You’ve made a hash out of your life as a male.  So we are going to switch things up a bit; and see how you handle it from the other side.  Don’t think a set of XX chromosomes will solve all your ills either.  In most cases, it’s a much more difficult life; but you were stuck in a rut, with no idea of how to get out of it.  This will force you to make a change in your life, and use some of  those Boss given talents you’ve wasted for 21 years."

"A near death experience isn’t shaking things up enough?"

"No.  I’m afraid it isn’t.  You wouldn’t believe some of the recidivism we get.  We kill a guy, have a nice long talk with him, tell him to shape up; and sure, he’s on the straight and narrow for a while, but soon enough, he thinks it was all some dream, that  there isn’t really a Heaven, Hell or New Jersey and he doesn’t have to be good anymore.  Changing you into a woman will be a fairly prevalent reminder that this wasn’t some kind of dream."

"New Jersey?"

"We had to put purgatory somewhere; and all the good real estate in New York was too expensive."

"I can get a you a good deal on a few thousand acres in Westchester.

"Really?"

"Yea, but I suppose you already broke ground in the Garden State."

"Yes we have, but I’ll make sure to keep you guys in mind next time a project comes up."

"We always appreciate new clients."

"Growth rates are not something my outfit worries to much about, sooner or later we get everyone’s business."

"What about the competition? I would think they’re eating into your market share."

"Not so you would notice, sure they have good years and bad years, buts its pretty much stabilised these days."

"Good to hear, not sure I would like it if the "competition" got a monopoly."

"Neither would .  Well Mike, it’s been fun, but I gotta run.  The Cubs are about to sign a truly phenomenal pitcher; and I want to make sure things go as planned."

"It will be nice to see them win a series"

"Win, Ha, not while I’m around, that pitchers going to the Yankees, the boss sent a memo down about the Cubs and he doesn’t like to be disappointed. 

Now lie still, cause this, is gonna hurt."

"Wait!"

"What?" asked the Archangel, getting more than a little annoyed

"Can’t I at least say goodbye to captain winky"

"Oh, if you must."

"In private please."

"Mike, I helped design that piece of anatomy.

"I would rather you turned around, please.

"Fine thirty seconds, then we gotta do this thing"

"Thank you," said Mike gratefully.

"Hey! Where do you think you’re going!" yelled the Archangel as Mike suddenly took off, running out of the room.             

Mike Lane only got about ten feet before he was grabbed by an invisible force, and unceremoniously carried back into the room.  He didn’t really think he could get away from the Lord’s chosen champion, but he had to give it a try.

"Cute," said the Archangel annoyed. " Just for that little stunt I’m going to make sure you’re much more now."

"Isn’t there any other option?, Can’t I just give away a bunch of money?," queried Mike, grasping for any reprieve.

"Doesn’t work that way, contrary to what certain organised religions claim.  Your money isn’t the solution to all the problems in the world. And it wont insure your soul’s salvation.  Just remember what I said, shape up.  I’ll be watching you.  Now salute the captain, and get ready.   I gotta be at Wrigley.

Mike was  awakened by a hard knock on his hotel door. His mind was fuzzy, and he was certain his memories of last night had to be a dream. That belief lasted about 1.5 seconds, enough time for him to turn his head, and realise that he wasn’t a he anymore, not at all.

‘What the hell’ thought Mike, when he saw long strands of brunette hair impinging on his vision. Then he saw the other things.

Knock!

Knock!

"Ma’am I have your breakfast" came a Spanish accented voice from other side of the door. After waking up as a female, waking up to find out that he had room service was no great surprise; and still in shock, Mike got out of bed and began walking towards the door.  The shoulder length hair kept swishing ; his rearranged hips and legs made his walk anything but graceful,; and the lack of anything between those waddling legs shoved the transformation into his mind with every step he took.  Eventually, Mike reached the room’s door and took stock of his appearance in the mirror mounted on it.  With two prominent protrusions Mike felt a concrete wall wouldn’t have been protection enough for decent attire, but he supposed the nightdress would have to do.

 "Yes," said Mike in a soprano voice as he opened the door.

"Your room service, breakfast Ma’am."

"I’m afraid I didn’t order any and I couldn’t pay for it anyway, I’m sorry," said Mike suddenly aware that he left his wallet in his other body.

"Yes ma’am, but its been paid for by Mister Angelo before he checked out along with your room for the day, he even left a rather large tip.  I wish we had more guests like him.  It must be nice to have an expense account like that.  If you’ll just sign here ma’am, I’ll set it up on the table, or would you prefer your breakfast in bed?

"The table is fine, thank you," responded Mike, as he released the chain, opened the door, and took the ticket as he admitted the man.

"Beautiful day today, ma’am.  The snowstorm left everything white.  We didn’t have many guests last night, because of the storm, and I think I’ll take my kids to the hills for sledding later today.  I never sledded in Bolivia"

"What did you say?," Mike asked

"Bolivia, I immigrated from there about 15 years ago."

"Was it nice there." asked Mike, out of curiosity

"It could have been," he answered sadly. "But, we were so far behind everyone else, we just couldn’t catch up. If we had stayed there, we would have starved to death, not to mention any children we have."

"I’m sorry," Mike replied, suddenly feeling guilty

"Why should you feel sorry ma’am, you didn’t do anything  Now, when you’re finished, just leave the tray outside the hall, and if you need anything else, just ask for assistant manager Santiago.  I’m afraid most of my staff couldn’t get in today.

"Thank you."

"Have a nice stay ma’am," said Santiago as he left.

It turned out, the archangel was as good as his word.  Mike lifted up the silvered cover and found three buttermilk pancakes, three links of sausage, tea and orange juice.  Whatever lay ahead in his new female life, at least she would go ahead on a full stomach.  After several tries Mike was able to sit down in his nightdress, and cross his legs. He made a valiant attempt to do so in a masculine manner, but his hips weren’t designed that way anymore; and they fell into the stereotypical female fashion. Whatever else had changed, his appetite had not, the pancake, sausage and OJ disappeared in short order; and Mike was sipping his after breakfast tea while it was still piping hot.

 

Refreshed and sated, Mike took a more comprehensive stock of his body.  Mike didn’t have a tape measure so he could only guess his new dimensions.  He had lost height, but not drastically so,.  He was short of six feet, but he guessed he was about 5’10 or 5’11, respectable for a woman.  Mike would have preferred to not have breasts hidden behind his nightdress at all, but he grudgingly admitted if he had to have them, then his were just the right size.  About C cup, not too large to manage, but enough to draw attention, on second thought, bad idea, he didn’t want any attention directed at him.

Mike walked over to the mirror above the dresser and examined his face.  The shoulder length brunette hair shone lusciously and bounced with every movement of his head.  The features were much softer than his own, he didn’t recognise the exact face but he could clearly tell that it was his own. A almost perfect recreation of his mother with just enough of his father thrown in to make Mike feel this is what his sister would have looked like if his mother had not had her tubes tide. Or more accurately this is what Mike would have looked like if he had been born female.

 

Damn that archangel to the competition!  Why did he have to make Mike so cute.

"I got a lead," said security chief Conklin, as he entered John Lanes office in New York.

"Where is she," asked John, his voice betraying his concern.

 

"Kearney Nebraska."

"Kearney?, What was she thinking."

"Apparently, she borrowed a car from one of her girlfriends with the intention of going to Colorado."

"And slipping your detail in order to do it.  Those people don’t work for me anymore, get it done."

"That’s going to be difficult sir," said the security chief. "Your daughter has developed something of a sentimental attachment to them, and they to her"

"Which is probably how she was able to hoodwink them and slip away.  No Jack, they’re gone.  Pay their severance package, and give them references, they have given good service for years; but as far as I’m concerned, if this is their ‘protection’, all those years we’ve been lucky."

"Yes sir," Jack Conklin replied,

"You get her back now Jack, she’s all I care about, safe and sound, without a hair touched on her head; or I’ll consider the twenty years you’ve given me to be lucky too.  Are we clear?." Asked John Lane coldly

"Yes sir, I’m on my way personally.  I won’t let you down"

"Then why are you still here."

"Yes sir," said Jack Conklin, as he rushed out of his employer’s office.

Mike didn’t know what to do with himself.  One look outside had ended any notion he had of leaving the hotel room for town.  After a very pleasant shower experience, Mike located his suitcase, it was remarkably the same suitcase he had taken from his dorm room, but instead of jeans sweatshirts and men’s jockey shorts, there were woman’s jeans, skirts, blouses, dresses, panties, bras, and items that the male mind couldn’t even, and didn’t want, to try to identify this early in the morning.

One item that surprised him, though perhaps he shouldn’t be surprised by anything today, was a small looking cloth backpack.   Mike had seen some girls carry similar ones around on campus. Being a reasonably intelligent fellow, he deduced this served as his new purse.  Apparently the Archangel Michael was a great one for the details. Mike knew most girls carried their whole lives around in their purses, and now he was no different.  He dumped everything out onto the bed for an inventory, all the contents of the main pouch and then all the side pockets, until the cloth purse was an empty shell.  Pieces of paper, old recipes from years ago, lipstick and other makeup items, five different pens, one paper pad, one electronic PDA that never seemed to have been used, one key ring that probably rivalled the one necessary for a nuclear missile silo, sanitary napkins, which put Mike into shock, at what he could now expect every month, that is until he found the tampons, which shocked him even further, a penlight, a multitool, a can of mace, three breakfast cereal bars, and a billfold were all identified and memorized.

Opening up the billfold, Mike found out his new identity.  Michelle Lois Lane.  Mike was ready to kill that trickster archangel, bad enough to turn him into a woman, bad enough to name him after a pop culture character, but a character from Superman was just putting salt in the wounds.  Further examination of the billfold told Mike that he had all the same credit cards, club memberships, and even the correct amount of cash, as best he could remember it.  Turning one of the flaps, Mike was surprised to see a family photo, he had never carried  any of them around in his old wallet, and didn’t expect to find them in his new one, but there it was.  His father looked the same, a little more vigorous even, his mother was smiling like she always did, and seated in front of them both was the girl Mike had been transformed into.

The archangel hadn’t been kidding, he had left him in the same situation as before. Same mother and father, same school, same fat bank account but with one minor change.

Knock!

Knock!

"Yes," Mike asked when he opened the door to find Mr. Santiago.

"I’m sorry Ma’am, but I’ve received a rather urgent call from the hotel’s corporate office, some heiress is on the loose; and they think she may be in the area.  They asked me to check the register to see if she was staying at the hotel, and I have, but your name wasn’t listed, the bill was paid by Mr. Angelo you see."

"Yes I see, this heiress, her name wouldn’t happen to be Michelle Lane would it?"

"Why yes, is that, are you?"

 "Yes," Mike replied smiling.

"I see," the manager’s manner suddenly became much colder. "I will inform the interested parties at once Miss Lane. Your security detail will be here in a few hours; and I must politely ask you to remain here until they arrive.  We wouldn’t want any harm to befall you in the dangerous city of Kearny.  If there’s anything I, or the Holiday Inn Company may provide you in the meantime, we are at your service."

"Have I done something wrong Mister Santiago, you don’t seem as cheerful as before?"

"Miss Lane, I would rather not answer that question at this time, I value my livelihood.  Rest assured, no one will bother you while I am here, good day to you Ma’am," finished Santiago as he stiffly exited the room.

Mike was used to such treatment, it was meticulously courteous, but completely false politeness.  People took one look at the name and the stock portfolio, and they stiffened up.  It appeared that the situation was no different as a woman, except now, he could look forward to males stiffening up a particularly body part, in addition to their stiff manner.  Oh joy.  Old Captain Jack, formerly of the United States Marine Corps, was probably punching a hole in the sky trying to get to Nebraska in one of the companies Gulfstream jets.  He had slipped away a few times before, but nothing quite as dramatic as this.  The last time had been to see "Lord of the Rings" without a fellowship of his own.  The hobbits had gotten to Lothlorien when the film was shut off, the lights turned on, and ten very humourless armed people filed in and found him in his seat.  Mike quietly had gotten up left, and never did get to see the film in a theatre.  No matter how much Mike had complained to his father about the lack of theatre experience, he wouldn’t let him wander into so exposed a public place without a guard, and a greater entertainment black hole than the Praetorian Guard was hard to find. When he further complained that a DVD wasn’t the same thing, John Lane’s solution was to buy a significant interest in the AMC theatre company and ask them to have a theatre empty for his son’s convenience.

Mike had never used it.

The earlier mentioned Praetorian Guard arrived several hours later, with an anxious Jack Conklin at the head.  Mike had refused to answer any of their questions and simply packed up his new clothes, handing the suitcase to one of the guards specifically chosen for the task.  Mike allowed himself to be led into a waiting car; and the bleak winter wasteland was a perfect metaphor to his feelings. The Gulfstream made a short jump, returning Mike to Omaha and Creighton University.  Apparently his female self had never had a sexual harassment complaint filed against her by a co-ed, and therefore he had no cause to tell the university president what to go do with himself.  The apartment designed for four, but occupied by him alone, was as dreary as ever.  The few female touches that were evident, did little to change his mood for the better, but rather highlighted the humiliation he was now experiencing.  And to make matters worse, Susan Lane was inside too, waiting for her daughter.

 Susie, as she allowed her friends to call her, was not the typical corporate trophy wife.  Indeed, she had done almost everything wrong, if one wants to court one of the richest men in the world.  She had been a medical student at St. Johns Medical Center, and was completely unimpressed with a 35-year-old man, who didn’t have the common sense to stay on his horse.  And she, being of Irish decent, was not the least hesitant in telling John Lane exactly what she thought of his middle aged neo-adolescent stupidity.

He was in love.

She wasn’t.

He sent her not a single bouquet of flowers; but instead had the annoying tendency of filling a hospital room to the brim with flower baskets, while she was getting some much needed sleep between shifts.

Susan O’Neil took those flowers, and redistributed them around the hospital. Not to be discouraged, John Lane was single handily responsible for the New York flower boom of 1973.  He tried everything, romantic serenades by Frank Sinatra,  yachting expeditions to faraway tropical beaches, $10,000 a plate dinners with President Nixon, all of which seemed to have the opposite effect he was hoping for.  Diamonds, Gold jewellery, priceless works of art, she wasn’t having any of it.  Which only made him want her more.  Finally, John’s father Fredrick, concerned about the huge flow of capital from his company’s coffers, decided to see what kind of girl could drive his normally phlegmatic son over the edge.

When he met the girl in question he made it known he wasn’t impressed.

Indeed, he informed Susan O’Neil he agreed completely with her sentiments, as she obviously wasn’t a suitable consort for his heir apparent.

Big mistake.

No one tells an Irishwoman whom she can date; Susan accepted the latest offer from John simply out of spite to his father.  Her plan was to go on one date, just to stick it to the old man.

Only it hadn’t gone according to plan.  Because John Lane demonstrated a little more grace than he had when he was sent to St. Johns Medical Center in the first place. Indeed, once given the chance, he swept her off her feet.  After a six-month long whirlwind romance, carefully catalogued by the National Inquirer, they wed.  Fredrick Lane was more than happy to participate in the happy occasion.  You see, while Susan may have been an Irishwoman, he was a Scotsman, and he was getting slightly worried about his sons slackness in the grandchildren department.

Fredrick was getting even more worried when six years into the marriage she still hadn’t conceived.  After a short conversation with his daughter-in-law, Fredrick determined that in order to produce a child the two people had to be in the same room in the first place, and John Lane had been neglecting his marriage duties.  Instead, he was trying to build his company to world prominence in the wake of his father’s retirement.  Not helping matters much, was the now Dr. Lane, who was also too busy to see the proper part put in the proper hole more than once a month, as she was involved in pioneering new methods of organ transplant.

A Scotsman was never to be underestimated were procreation was concerned, and still having significant influence over the companies security department, and the governing board of the St. Johns Medical Centre; Fredrick made the suitable arrangements, and had the happy couple kidnapped, dropped on an uninhabited island in the pacific with enough supplies for a year, and no way to contact civilization

.

A ship came for them six months later.

A child was born to them four months after that.

Only in this reality, instead of a bouncing baby boy, Dr Susan Lane had given birth to a sweet, sugar and spice and all things nice, Michelle Lois Lane. 

 

All things considered, Susie showed remarkable self-control in waiting even the ten seconds necessary for the security detail to leave the room before jumping down her new daughters throat.

"Where have you been, young lady?  Your father and I have been worried sick." Susan asked harshly.

"I’m sorry mother," Mike answered suitably scolded.

"Sorry isn’t going to cut it Shelly, nor will any of your witty stories.  Do you have any idea what could have happened to you?"

"I have a pretty good idea," answered Mike thinking about the conversation he had with another Mike.

"I don’t think you do, because if you did, you wouldn’t even think about running away from proper protection. Let me just highlight your father and  my nightmare scenario. We’re sitting calmly in the winter house, sipping tea, and reading the New Yorker, when Jack Conklin USMC walks into the room with a phone saying ‘boss they got your daughter.’  Your father takes the phone but I cant hear what’s he’s told, I can only look at his face, and see the fear the phone generates.  The next thing I know a box is carried in by the butler, it was just dropped off at the door, inside is a piece of your clothing, your right index finger, and a photo of you tied up with today’s New York Times as ‘proof of Life.’  The message inside reads ‘$10,000,000,000 or she dies!  Two days’!  Your father calls his people; but they can’t release the funds, or sell off assets that quickly.  He calls the banks but they can’t loan him any money because, suddenly, he’s a bad credit risk.  He calls and is connected straight to the president, but is politely informed that it is not his government’s policy to negotiate with terrorists, but he offers the services of the FBI. The kidnapers, because they have the government infiltrated, send us your left index finger the next day, and up the ransom to $20,000,000,000 because we ignored their orders and contacted the authorities.  Your father is out of his mind with worry and the entire world economy is shaken to its base by the necessary arrangements to get the money in time.  Tens of thousands of jobs are lost in the US because divisions of Lane Inc. had to be sold off at bargain basement prices to be stripped by any corporate raider that can pay soon, and pay cash.  Money to developing nations are halted, Syria doesn’t get its World Bank loan and decides ‘what the hell, might as well try it, better to die than live in poverty’, so they invade Israel. Israel retaliates with nuclear weapons, and the powder keg that is the Middle East explodes with hundreds of millions dying.  But it was all for nothing, because you had angered the kidnappers with your smart ass mouth, and they decided a dead hostage was a lot simpler to manage than a live one.

EVERY TIME YOU  DISAPPEAR FOR TEN SECONDS! THAT’S WHAT WE FEAR BECAUSE THAT’S WHAT CAN HAPPEN!

"I’m sorry Mom." Mike said crying and falling to the floor.  It wasn’t just the female hormones flowing through his body, he was well and truly ashamed of what he had put his mother and father. through.   No matter how much he didn’t care for his life, he always knew his parents cared for him. And this was how he showed them gratitude. "I’m sorry mommy," he said again, as he fell into his mother’s arms bawling like the little girl he now was.

"I’m sorry"

Mike woke up the next morning in his own bed, which was clearly her own bed now.  The fluffy and embroidered pinkness of it all was enough to turn a man’s stomach, it was probably a good thing then, that there wasn’t one in the room. Mike rose, grabbed his towel, and went off to the bathroom for a shower.  Passing one of the apartment’s guest rooms, he saw his mother sleeping soundly.  The sight of her still shamed Mike, even a day later.  Entering the bathroom, Mike disrobed, and once again marvelled at his new form.  The subtle curves were turning him on.  Even though he consciously understood that the girl in the mirror was himself, the deep, dark, hidden male mind only saw SCREWABLE: FEMALE- ONE and looked no further than that.  The shower was quite the experience; normally he took ten minutes to clinically scrub his body, wash his hair, and brush his teeth in the morning.  But showering as a female was a much more drawn out affair.  The fruit scented bath products in the rack were mysterious to Mike, but he presumed their purpose, if not their smell, was similar to what he had known as a male.  Beyond the obvious detail of needing more time, to wash more and previously unknown areas, Mike was distracted by the sheer sensuousness of his body.  The water, massaging his nipples and new vagina, sent waves of pleasure all through his body.  Not being able to help it, and not fully aware of what he was doing, Mike began picking up where the water left off, massaging his breasts and inserting one of his fingers in his new primary sexual organs.

Within moments, Mike had experience his first female orgasm followed, shortly thereafter by his second, and his third.  He likely would have begun developing calluses on some very personal places, if his mother hadn’t banged on the door, telling her daughter not to turn into a prune.  After a few seconds, to make sure the by-products were washed away, Mike exited the shower and padded himself dry. After his first experience with a hotel towel yesterday, he understood that his more sensitive skin would not tolerate scraping himself dry with a harsh towel, like he had done for years before.  Dressed in a flower print bathrobe, Mike now had to face one of the most frightening places known to mankind, the ladies dressing room.

Mike had never had any steady girlfriends, certainly not any live-in ones.  Nor had he had any sisters, and being who he was, with a career mother who had hundreds of servants, he hadn’t spent any mornings getting ready with her either. Indeed, Mike had nothing to go on beyond what he had seen on television, or read in a few books, which wasn’t going to help him much.

"Well, this is going to be fun," Mike said to himself.   "The least you could have done was give me an instruction manual."

The new woman knew enough that wet hair shouldn’t be allowed to dry on its own, unless the grunge look was the desired fashion.  Plugging in the hair drier, Mike went about attacking his shoulder length tresses.  At least it was relatively straight, the brunette with hints of auburn hair yielding easily to the drier and brush. After a near eternity, of about 15 minutes, Mike was finished with his hair, and he set his dryer and brush down, to search trough his wardrobes.  Mike, as a male, had had about three changes of about every style, from t-shirt and shorts, to penguin suit.  One of the apartments bedrooms had been given over entirely to a dressing room, and Mike could see that as a female he had even more clothes, a feat he would not have previously thought possible.

"If I ever catch myself saying I have nothing to wear, it’s a sure sign of approaching mental illness."

Not brave enough to try on anything complicated, Mike put on a simple white bra and panties.  The bra snugly secured his breasts, and it simultaneously made Mike feel more comfortable, and safe, and then embarrassed and nervous, that his mother would burst in to see him in drag.  The panties covered his new vulnerable anatomy, and while he was still pained at his loss, he still felt significantly better that their was at least something, however thin, between his womanhood and any knuckle dragging pre-hominid XY out there who might wish to get into said womanhood.

With the easy part done, Mike was now faced with one of the most critical decision of his new life, what to wear.  Since just about every style and fashion was represented, he had no idea how his female self usually dressed.  The only thing he had to go on, was what had been packed in the suitcase, and if that was any indication, she was as much at home in jeans as she was in dresses.  Well Mike certainly wasn’t at home in dresses, so he chose a pair of jeans from one of the drawers. He pulled them up to about his hips before meeting stiff resistance, and abandoning his attempt.  Apparently, this was one of those pairs of women’s jeans that were painted on, rather than worn.  Searching through the drawers, Mike eventually found a pair that seemed much looser than the first.  They looked reasonably good on him, and had the extra-added bonus of allowing him to breathe.  Remembering that jeans matched with just about anything, Mike took the first suitable blouse he found, a lemon colored one, and put it on despite the buttons on the wrong side.

Mike hadn’t been without a watch in his life if he could help it. Some things were apparently ingrained at a genetic level, as he had a selection of over twenty to put on, all synchronised.  But beyond the watch, Mike had no idea what jewellery to put on.  Small earrings were attached to his lobes when he woke up yesterday, they were some type of glittering stone, and knowing his father, they had very little chance of being fake diamonds.  Wearing diamonds with jeans somehow seemed a bit tacky to him; but, since he didn’t really have much of any option in his jewellery chest but diamonds or precious stones, he decided to leave them in. No doubt his mother would say something about it, if it turned out to be improper.

The makeup table was a complete mystery to Mike, and he could only hope he could get by with nothing, for the time being.  He certainly felt he didn’t need any enhancements to the beautiful face he now wore.  His parents did good work, if he did say so himself.  Mike remembered that he couldn’t go through a department store without being bombarded by chemical warfare in the guise of perfume.  And that in that same area, professional makeovers, and makeup tips, were supplied to any willing woman.  Hey, who was he kidding, he was a Lane heir, he could probably have Victoria Secret, Elizabeth Taylor, and the president of every makeup company in the world to wait on him, to clothe, to accessorise, and to make him over, at the drop of a hat.  Indeed, that’s probably what had happened in this alternate reality.

"Shelly, are you almost done," called Susan Lane thru the door.

"Coming mother," Mike said, as he gathered up his purse and walked into the living room.

Mike walked into the kitchen and saw his mother making breakfast, something he had seldom had the opportunity to see before.  When he had moved to the apartment, his father had tried sending several family retainers out.  But Mike had refused.  He wanted to look after himself, well, everything except the laundry and the dishes.  A man could only do so much.  Apparently Michelle suffered from the same streak of independence.  It was an artificial independence, Mike knew, that beyond the obvious point, he hadn’t paid for any of it. There was a five man crash team in the apartment next door, that could take over a small country with the credit they had access to, if they had the need.

"Eggs scrambled or sunny side up?" his mother asked cheerfully.

"Well Susie homemaker, scrambled please with ham and cheese."

"One more crack like that, and you’ll be wearing your eggs."

"Yes Dr. Lane ma’am," said Mike grinning.

"After breakfast I thought we could spend the day together.  This city you exiled yourself to, doesn’t have a respectable store, but it has enough to occupy our time"

"Shopping?" Mike asked uncertain

"I know we had a bad time at Harrods, with their silly policy on private armed guards, but after your father called things were sorted out. I don’t think the JC Penny would react the same way anyway."

"Dr Susan O’Neil Lane shopping at J.C. Penny?"  He asked, trying to sound shocked.

"You should know better than anyone, I’ve shared my research findings to you countless times.  When you are shopping, it doesn’t actually  matter what you buy.  Its simply the act of shopping.  It’s extremely therapeutic.  It will cheer you right up, I know it will."

"Oh, I don’t doubt it will cheer you up, but has it occurred to you mother, that I already have an entire room devoted to clothes, were would I put more?"

"What’s wrong with you Michelle, usually all I have to do is annunciate the first three letters or so of S-H-O-P-P-I-N-G, and you’re up faster than a speeding bullet."

"I’m just not feeling myself at the moment."

"Well then, this will put you to sorts.  Listen to "doctor mom" honey, I’m writing you a prescription of at least four new outfits, and assorted accessories.  Which reminds me, you don’t have any make up on."

"I woke up this morning, mom, hating my looks,.  I was hoping you could help me with my make up, make me look like a whole new woman."

Susan Lane brightened up considerably at the thought of helping her daughter with her make up.

"Well if you insist."

The Limo dropped them off at 11:AM. and the 10-person security team spread out to provide a perimeter of protection for the two Lane ladies.  Mike had no idea what he was doing, and simply followed his mother wherever she led.  Apparently the  tradition of shopping was second nature to her.  The dressing room experience was not what he expected.  On the drive over, he held fantasies that he could see other woman in various stages of undress.  Then reality came to the forefront, he was the lane heir, and the security team emptied out the entire dressing room area with a suitable cash payment to the manager.  If Mike were to be entertained by the feminine form, it would have to be his own, which wasn’t what he had in mind.  At first, Mike gave in to whatever his mother suggested, not really caring what she chose. This earned him several questioning looks from his mother.  Eventually, she took an extremely hideous skirt off the rack and held it up to Mike for comparison.  There was only so much a man could take, and Mike put his petite foot down.  His mother seemed slightly put out by her daughters refusal, but in reality, was pleased Shelly was finally getting into it. The refusal was more like the Michelle she was used to.   After two and a half hours, they had a respectable collection of bags and boxes, again, being carried by the chosen security guard.  The reason that one was specifically tasked for this, was so that those guards that were armed and needed to draw their weapons in a hurry, would not have to drop packages and bags first.  More than one secret service detail attached to the first lady or daughter, had been caught by that one, before it became standard operating procedure.

After clothes shopping round one was finished, Mike and his mother went to lunch at a local restaurant.  Mike had wanted to order a cheeseburger and fries, his customary lunchtime staple, but his mother had given off such a laser eyed stare and cold, gruff frown, that Mike changed the order to a chicken salad, before the waiter left the table, much to his mothers pleasure.  The two talked about family and friends some of whom Mike was not aware of.  He resolved to find the always-ubiquitous girls diary and try to piece together his new life.  During the lunch, Mike was left with the impression that his relationship with his mother had changed significantly from when he was a male.

They had never been distant.  They had always related to each other, and understood each other.  But now, Mike felt his mother was much closer to her daughter than she was to her son.  Understandable really, some things could not be talked about mother to son.  Some of the conversation left Mike blushing.

"Its how I know he doesn’t have anything on the side, even if his secretary wasn’t older than him, no man could be that vigorous with two woman at once, despite ViagraÔ.  Though, I think it ironic that he was in on the ground floor in purchasing Pfizer stock.

"MoTHer! I did not need to know that.  Ah! Scarred for life" Mike said, embarrassed as he covered his eyes at the thought of his parents having sex.

"I was just trying to shock you out of your shell, you have barely said a word all day." His mother said concerned.

"I’m still reeling from last night, I really am sorry mom, and I don’t know what I was doing."

"Nor do I, why you would just pick up and head west, I don’t understand.  It wasn’t some boy was it?  No one tried to do anything to you while the detail was away?"

"No mom, no boy did anything to me," and never will Mike thought.  "It just became to much for me all of a sudden."

"I suppose I can understand that Shelly, sometimes I wake up in the middle of the night and have to turn over and see your father, just to reassure myself it wasn’t some fairytale dream, and sometimes maybe a nightmare."

"Cinderella, my life aint," said Mike laughing.  "I’ve hardly had the poor life scrubbing floors, or the wicked step-mother, but I often wonder about the happy ending."

"Don’t worry Michelle, Prince Charming will come around some day."

"Later, rather than sooner mother.  I’m not sure I can handle a boyfriend right now."

"You’ll have to deal with it, later, sooner or  however you wish, you’re the heir, and you have to have an heir of your own someday."

Ahhhhhhhhhhh!!!!

" That’s not really something I want to think about either, right now, Mom."

"Well, just don’t take too long young lady, your fathers not getting any younger, and if I know him, he may try a repeat of history."

"If I know Dad, there’s not a man on this planet that is good enough for his daughter to be left alone on a deserted island with."

"Probably true, but that doesn’t mean he will stop looking, nor should you"

"Yes mother."

Going to the restaurant’s ladies toilet was hardly Mikes first time relieving himself with his new equipment, but it was the first time he had done it in public.  One of the female guards got up and performed a visual inspection, insuring that no snatch and grab team was hiding under the stalls, after thirty seconds Mike was given permission to enter.  Even if the guard hadn’t indicated which door to enter Mike could not have subconsciously forgotten his new appearance and entered the male restroom, because there was no way he could forget.  Instead he walked toward the skirted stick figure like he was walking to his own execution.  When Mike did enter, he jumped from a rather large noise.

Bang!

"Sorry," said a blond haired young woman, as she hit a machine on the wall again.  "It caught me by surprise and the damn machine wont give"

Bang!

Uncertain of what she was talking about Mike asked her

"What caught you by surprise?"

The blond woman gave Mike a funny look of surprise, but then stepped away from the machine with "Tampax" prominently displayed in pink letters.

"Oh," started Mike, embarrassed on a whole number of levels the blond would never be aware of. "I’m sorry, I wasn’t thinking like myself today, I think I have a tampon or two in reserve inside my purse if you would like one."

"Would you, you’d be a lifesaver, I can pay you," said the blond woman reaching into her own purse for more money.

"Don’t worry," said Mick as he removed one of the tampons from his purse, treating it like it was both an item of pure evil, and some great grail from a mystic quest. "My bank account can suffer the cost of one tampon."

"Cindy Watson," the woman said extending her hand.

"Michelle Lane," replied Mike, shaking the woman’s hand, in a woman’s fashion, and then handing over the woman’s sanitary device.

"Ha," Cindy laughed. "No, I don’t suppose one tampon will bankrupt you, did that little gremlin with a sour puss who walked in a few moments ago belong to you?"

"Yes, I just met her, but she doesn’t seem to have much of a personality."

"Guarding someone like you I can understand why."

"So you know who I am," Mike asked curiously, seeking reassurance that it wasn’t some grand conspiracy by his family, and that other people knew him as a woman too.

"I’m a business administration student at Creighton, Lane Incorporated is a case study for us."

"How do we rate?" Mike asked, suddenly curious for an outside opinion.

"Pretty well, all things considered, no toxic waste dumping, or mass layoff in the name of efficiency.  At least, not one that anyone’s caught anyway."

"I’m an economics major at Creighton."

"Yes I know, a few people have pointed you out to me, I just didn’t make the connection.  Now I’m sorry to be impolite, but I think I’m leaking."

"Of course, sorry to delay you."

"See you around"

"You too"

The rest of the day passed normally, or as normally as it could be, if you were spending it in skirts and the opposite gender to what you were born.  The jeans had lasted till lunch, but the slightly larger nails Mike now had, caused him to drop his coffee all over his jeans.  Beyond the immediate burning sensation in areas of his body he didn’t want to burn, now Mike needed something to wear in their place.  So it was probably handy that they had just finished clothes shopping, and probably fate, that Mike had agreed to three skirts and one dress, in his apathetic agreement to whatever his mother chose. Faced with no alternative, Mike was now dressed in such a sugary female fashion, that he was starting to worry if it were possible to expire from acute embarrassment and sappiness poisoning.

"Oh, isn’t that Christmas display so cute, the Santa is just so jolly," said Dr. Susan Lane, F.A.C.S.

Apparently not. 

"Where is Christmas this year, mom, Fiji, the Cayman Islands?" Mike asked suddenly curious.  Christmases for the Lane trio were always an adventure.

"Omaha," replied Mikes mother, smiling wickedly at him

"What?" asked a puzzled Mike.

"Your father and I never really agreed with your decision to exile yourself out here in the sticks, even if it does give you a better chance to escape from the pressures of New York society.  There’s not much to recommend this place, but it has a sense of peace and quiet, which your father and I suddenly approve of.  What with my new panels, and his problems with the Internet bubble, we have decided kith and kin is a much better alternative than some Polynesian paradise.  Besides, it’s been ages since I’ve had a white Christmas.  I’ll be staying here to set things up, and your father will be arriving on the 22nd"

"What about your practice? Mike asked concerned.

"You and I both know what that really is, your father letting me play with my toys.  Sure, I know that I’m one of the best in the world, and my colleagues do as well.  My grateful patients certainly appreciate my attentions, but I don’t really have a practice anymore.  I get called into interesting cases every once in a while, but since mister Debney, I haven’t had anything permanent," Susan Lane informed with a hint of bitterness.

Apparently, Mike switching genders had not changed anything about his mother’s life.  For almost two decades Dr. Lane had been one of the foremost surgeons in the nation.  She became so well known in her doctor persona, that people who met Doctor Lane at a hospital charity event, would meet Mrs Lane at some other benefit, and never realise they were one and the same.  And then came Barry Debney.  It had never been proven error had been committed , at least not conclusively; and Mike’s mother had always insisted the liver transplant had gone according to the book.  Susan believed Mr. Debney drank himself into rejecting the new organ.  Regardless, when he expired three months after the operation that should have extended his life by 15 years, and left behind six children with his widow, it was a malpractice lawyer’s wet dream.  They knew Dr. Lane and Mrs Lane were one and the same.

The original claim of one billion dollars was the largest civil action in the history of the world against a single person.  But it wasn’t the sort of a place in the history books someone sought.  Normally, a bereaved widow of a construction worker, with no life insurance, and six children to feed, could not have had a legal staff that rivalled some of the small fortune five hundred companies.  But the legal team had agreed to work free of charge, to be paid only if a settlement or judgement was reached.  In actuality, Jack Conklin found out, eventually, they were doing nothing of the sort.  They were being paid by secret retainer from a consortium of business rivals of Lane Incorporated. The whole thing was an opportunistic attack upon John Lane, with his wife and an innocent family caught in the middle.  Even if no billion-dollar judgement was ever reached, the mere threat of one was enough to send much of the companies dealings into hysterics.

The sharks had smelled blood, and they had used every dirty trick in the book, and several that were too foul to be put down in words, to try and force the large payout.  During a long and drawn out legal battle lasting seven months, Dr. Lane had attended every day of the hearings, sitting calmly and dignified, daring the lawyers and the jury to find fault with her.  The lawyers couldn’t bear up under the strain, but continued on anyway, refusing to make eye contact.  Toward the end, the "bereaved widow," had stopped coming to  the hearings. Finally, Conklin found out, this was because the small stipend she was given by the lawyers for her participation, wasn’t enough to feed all six of her children at the same time.  Mrs. Debney was working one, then one and a half full time jobs to make ends meet, while her "lawyers" were treating themselves to hundred dollar lunches and Cuban cigars.

When she found out, Susan Lane, against her lawyers advice, acting not as Mrs. Lane, or Dr. Lane, instead approached as Susie Lane, and she talked to Mrs. Debney.  Finally, understanding how they were both being used as puppet’s pawns in a game of big business, Susan made a settlement offer, still disregarding the lawyers.  Mrs. Debney had refused the offer, stating she was forbidden from accepting any offer without the lawyers present.  Mrs Debney cried, trembling in the arms of her new friend, stating she never wanted this, indeed had wanted to back out months ago; but her lawyers said they would take away everything she had left, and would separate her from her children, if she dropped the suit and "broke her contract."

Hell hath no fury like an Irish woman scorned.  Arranging for suitable police investigators to be staking out the Debney home.  Susie told her friend to invite her lawyers in, and inform them she was dropping the case.  The police caught on tape threats, blackmail, coercion, and even one case of sexual harassment.

The Judge was, as expected, not amused; and he threw the entire case out of court, fining the "dream team" the entire seven month court cost.

Jayne Debney could have been left with nothing.  Indeed, she was entitled to nothing, as Dr. Lane still insisted it was a perfect operation, and there really was no evidence to the contrary, and not everyone could be saved.  Regardless, Susie Lane, had, out of her own reasonable fortune, set up a trust for Jayne and her six children, buying a house for them to live in as well.  No one in that family would need to go hungry again, and every last one of those six children would be given tuition for any college they could get into.

It was a happy ending for almost everyone involved.  The Debney’s were taken care of, John Lane’s company was safe from a billion dollar legal hit, even the lawyers made out on the deal, the retainer from the backing consortium being more than enough to cover the fines, and leave them a nice hunk of change.  Everyone got their happy ending but Dr. Susan Lane.  St. Johns Medical Center had apologised profusely, but the associate professor job had been filled while she was on sabbatical.  Johns Hopkins regretted to inform her.  Mt. Sinai was accepting no applications at this time. No mater how great a surgeon she was, no hospital was willing to risk their name being attached on a lawsuit to such a prominent target.  And no insurance company would cover her, despite her long and near perfect record.

Saddened by his wife’s rudderless life without her surgery, John Lane had purchased a small teaching hospital in Vermont, within commuting distance of their New York home by helicopter.  But it wasn’t the same.  John made sure that every patron was pre screened, both that they wouldn’t have any complications, and they would not seek legal action if there were.  Dr. Lane, as expected, did not think it was the same, and for the past three years had resigned herself to teaching her art to other surgeons rather than performing it herself.

"Won’t they miss you?" Mike asked

"Walter Crumbly is officially the hospital administrator, but he knows where his pay check comes from, I could leave and return as a ninety year old great grandmother and my office would still be there."

"There you go again, bringing up the procreation again, can we have one conversation without talking about babies"

"Sure, after you have one, and he grows up a little, then we can talk about the terrible two’s"

"MoTHer!" Mike yelled embarrassed.

"MoTher!  I am not going," Mike vainly tried to protest the next morning at breakfast.

"You really have no excuse Shelly, your finals are finally done, no class until January 21, and as far as I have been able to see, no social life beyond watching television and reading Captain Kangaroo."

"That’s smoking cigarettes and watching Captain Kangaroo mother

"You smoke!"

"No, Mom, that’s just how the song goes you know ‘Smoken CIIIGarets and wat chin Capt Tain KANNGGuro!  Now don’t tell me there’s nothin to do.’

"That frightens me on so many different levels I would just as soon forget it ever happened" Susan Lane after shaking her head at her daughters singing.

"What?  I think I sing well."

"Oh you do, its just that it is one of your fathers favourite songs, and you sung it just like he did, even right down to the chicken like nodding of the head.

"Chicken like?"

"You should have seen yourself in the mirror Bawwk! bawwk! bock!"

"Ditto," replied Mike Lane with a raised eyebrow.

"But back to my original point, you can go to the Aksarben dinner, everyone who is anyone in this town, admittedly no great distinction, is going to be there, and so must we."

"Why?  You usually have to be dragged to these affairs with the same steel manacles as I."

"This is a medical benefit for the local children’s hospital.  And I received an invitation form the chief of surgery in my Dr. Lane persona, and that’s the one I’m accepting, rather than the several I received from the local blue bloods with the intellect of flees.  If I have to storm the beachheads of Society, I’ll need some emotional support from my loving daughter."

"Are we at least going to have some fun?"

"Like what?"

 "Oh, I remember a few years back when at the charity auction for war orphans you went bid for bid with Mrs Gates knowing full well that she had to have the item in question, and you were going to leave her hanging with last bid, what was it she paid for the Picasso ten times market value."

"Twelve," Susan replied smiling at the experience.

"What is it, that resurrected that thinly veiled, mile long vindictive streak of yours?"

"She called me Susie homemaker, that bitch, she hasn’t worked a day in her life. What was really funny about it though, was when the bidding got to ten million, and she had to halt the preceding for a quick call back to Redmond, so another of her accounts could be opened."

"And the auctioneer asked if you needed time as well"

"And I answered ‘I don’t worry about pocket change’" replied Susan with an evil grin.

"Still you took an awful risk?"

"No I didn’t, if two of the richest woman in the world were fighting over a painting then it just had to be worth it.  If I was stuck with it, I could have turned around and offloaded it for a nice profit the next day.  Besides, compared to some of the other corporate trophy wives escapades, it was a small matter.  I’m entitled to a few foibles."

"Corporate trophy wife?" Mike asked

"First prise of course"

"Of course," replied Mike. "All right Dr. Mom, when is this gig?

"Tonight at eight."

"Well, come and get me when its time to go."

"Michelle! We have to start getting ready."          

"What are you talking about?," said Mike as he looked at his watch. "Its only 10AM."

"Half the day wasted already, come along dear."

The only upside Mike could come up with, after spending most of a day in a beauty salon, was that he didn’t have to actually do any of the work and he could sit back and have others do it all for him.  Not that he actually enjoyed it.  Between the picking, prodding, priming, plucking, and PLEASE GET ME THE HELL OUT OF HERE!  The outside might have been fairytale beautiful, but the inside was a cowering wreck.

After a complete treatment of various unknown agents to every square inch of skin, Mike was beginning to worry about chemical warfare.  But since his mother was lying calming in the seat next to him taking it all with a contented expression, Mike supposed the beauticians weren’t trying to kill them, yet.  The entire process took five hours, and by the end Mike was famished, and he needed to relieve himself before he peed his panties.  The trouble was, after all the hours of effort, the highly paid professional tortures did not let him leave until they had given him instructions on how to keep everything in its place while he went about the rest of the day.

Oh, of course, none of the dozens of gowns lying in his closet would be suitable for tonight.  And even though Susan complained long and hard about the lack of selection, it did not stop her from seizing control of a dress shop and ordering about its staff in a manner that would have made a marine drill instructor proud.

The first dress she wanted him to try on was pink

The second was pinkish.

The third was off pink

The next was bright pink

Mike started to detect a trend developing.  Only the fact that time was running out, and the makeup had yet to be applied, forced "El Commandante" to halt the fittings, and force her daughter to make a decision.  Mike would have honestly preferred sackcloth and ashes to any of the items in front of him, but quickly understood his mother wouldn’t go for it.  As all were equally awful on him, from his vantage point anyway, Mike played a mental game with himself.  He imagined what he would have preferred to see on some other girl at the dinner tonight.  He tried to promote the idea that the Michelle Lane in front of him wasn’t him at all.  Eventually Mike made his decision to a chorus of ‘oh how lovely’s’ from every female on the staff.  Immediately, Mike was having second thoughts about the matter, he suddenly realised that he was the person in front of the mirror.  And that his taste in woman’s coverings was firmly linked to the proportion of the woman it didn’t cover.

But before Mike could  foment a revolt, the gown was boxed up and handed to a waiting guard.  The two Lane women then set off for Mike’s apartment for a quick, and badly needed meal, and the arrival of the makeup artist.  There are certain people that just oozed sex from every pore, and Lisa Powel was one of  those kind of girls, who when she entered a room, screamed "I AM WOMAN HEAR ME ROAR!" without ever saying a word at all.  Taking control from el commandante, who was happy to turn over command, Lisa set Mike down on the kitchen chair, unlocked her three makeup boxes, and proceeded to paint a mistresspiece.

The makeup session was shorter than the beauty salon, but every bit as painful.  If anyone made a crack about the ‘pains we woman go thru to be beautiful’ Mike was quite certain he would have gone on a ten state killing rampage.  Eventually the proceedings were over, and Mike was handed a clutch bag with the essential ingredients to touch up any accidents that could occur tonight.

Then, it was time to put on the dress.   Making a bit of an ironic statement that no one but him and a trickster angel would get. Mike had not selected a dress of girly pink, instead one of boy blue.  The deep navy blue silk gown was both elegant graceful, with a hint of provocative that he really should not have allowed, but it was too late now.  Matching shoes had been provided by the shop, and while the three inch heels took some getting used to, they were not that difficult to manage, as long as one didn’t move.  Mike was quite content to let his mother be a mother hen and select the proper jewellery for him to wear.  Though he did not have the first idea about what coordinated with what, he drew the line at the tiara.  It just seemed a bit too pretentious to him.

Finally, and for the first time that day, Mike was allowed to see the full effect in a full-length mirror.

He caught his jaw before it really dropped that far, but it was a near thing.

Damn, I’m beautiful, Mike thought to himself

"Damn, but you’re beautiful. Its times like these that I’m thankful we have several very large men with several very large guns to guard your virtue.

"MoTHer!"

 

The gathering was like a hundred others Mike had been to before, with one slight little difference.  As a Lane, he was still the center of attention, but he was a female Lane now, and some of the male attention he was receiving was a frightening and new experience for him.  He had seen avarice looks from some of the man-eater muffins that threw themselves at him when he was a him.  But this was different.  It was more fundamental than the gold diggers after a large fortune.  If anything, all the men in the room saw the beautiful woman first, and the money second.

Great, just freaking great Mike thought to himself angrily.  Finally I get people to notice the person before the bank balance, and It’s a hundred penis's lining up to make a more personal deposit. 

The waiter took their invitations and led them to their table, eight other people were situated around it.  There were three couples of a reasonable prosperous middle class appearance, which were obviously shocked that they were sitting with The Lanes.  But Dr. Alan Thomson knew his associate from back east would not want to spend the evening discussing the most recent fashions, but rather the new techniques in the field, so he had conveniently sat her at his table.  Along with him was he pretty wife, clearly shocked at her husband’s casual manner toward near royalty while at the same time clinging to every word Susie said.  Also at the table were the couple’s two children. They were Stacie, who was wearing a remarkably similar gown to Mikes, and their son Philip, in his first year at Creighton medical school, and also an Ensign in the Navy ROTC.

Mike smelled a plot.

Phil was a nice enough looking guy, if Mike was into that sort of thing, tall, dark, and reasonably handsome, particularly in his dress white uniform.  And who, probably because his mother and sister were present to slap him upside the head if he didn’t, showed a remarkable courtesy in speaking to Mike’s face rather than the area beneath it.  Mike was quite content to sit there quietly and munch on the rabbit food these events always euphemistically called "dinner," and wait for the whole thing to be mercifully over.

That was when The Mothers Stuck Back.    

"Honey, wouldn’t you like to dance tonight?" Mikes mother asked him.

"I can’t dance at all tonight," said Mike thinking of Eliza Dolittle and the embassy ball.

"Shoes are bothering you" Susan asked concerned.

"Among other things," Mike replied trying to put on a brave face.

"Best go out on the dance floor before the auction and see some of the perspective bidders, you don’t want to be caught unaware," said Mrs Thomson helpfully.

"That’s all right, I wasn’t planning on bidding on anything," Mike replied tiredly.

"But, Dr. Lane, I thought you told her." Mrs Thomson seems confused.

Mrs Thomson was halted by frantic waves from Mike’s mother.

"Told me what?" Mike asked concerned.

"Well its nothing, well not really." Susan replied uncomfortably.

"Tell me what?", now more concerned

"Well, Omaha isn’t New York dear, they don’t have much items of artistic interest that would warrant a normal charity auction, so instead they’re auctioning off another product."

"What Mother?"

"Dates."

"Dates?"

"Yes"

"Well, I’m pleased that I wont have to be a part of that," stated Mike coldly

"Well, there’s a little problem with that Shelly, you see, I already put your name on the list."

Mike wanted to shout at the top of his soprano lungs, ‘YOU WHAT!’; but he knew from long experience, making a scene would be detrimental to his cause, and would never work anyway.  If he got too rambunctious a secondary purpose of the security detail was utilized, and he would have been ignominiously carried off kicking and screaming.

"Did it occur to you mother, to ask my permission before selling me off like a cow at the stock yards?"

"Well, I didn’t think it would be a problem dear, she replied sweetly. You did say you wanted to be of help, and you also wanted to meet new people.  This will put both in one package."

"How very efficient of you." Mike said sarcastically

"I thought so," replied his mother choosing not to hear her daughter’s tone.

"And when were you going to tell me about the approaching slave auction mother?" 

LADIES AND GENTLEMAN, MAY I HAVE YOUR ATTENTION PLEASE.  THE AUCTION IS ABOUT TO BEGIN,.  MAY WE HAVE THE BACHELORS AND BACHELORETTES APPROACH THE STAGE PLEASE.

"Oh, right about now," answered Susan Lane wincing

"Just keep grinning Lady Macbeth, in a few years your heading to a third rate nursing home."

"I’ll own the nursing home dear, and any facilities I’m at, will never be third rate.  Now, go on with you."

The auction proceeded as expected, with men bidding on woman, and woman bidding on men, this was Nebraska after all.  Even Philip Thompson was put up for bid, and he fetched a healthy five thousand dollars, from a woman in the back, Mike couldn’t see.  And of course, the worst part was saved for last.

AND NOW, THE BEST WE HAVE SAVED FOR LAST, TONIGHTS CLOSING ENTRY, DIRECT FROM NEW YORK,  MICHELLE LANE.  WHAT DO I HAVE FOR A FULL EVENINGS ENTERTAINMENT WITH THE BEAUTIFUL ROSE OF WESTCHESTER?

Mike had taken several self defence classes and if the auctioneer didn’t stop laying it on very thick, Mike resolved to find out if human knees could bend forward.

"$100,000" came to opening bid from a twenty something penguin in the mid section.

"$150,000" countered a cattle baron-looking fellow up front.

"$200,000," said a distinguished looking fellow of about fifty.

‘Oh come on, that ones old enough to be my grandfather.  A girl has to have her standards.  Come on Mr. Penguin, rescue me from grandpa.’

"$250,000, countered the penguin, though he began to visibly pale at the thought of spending a quarter million dollars on a date.  Mike, who was well aware of how valuable he was, considered himself worth much more.

"$500,000," bid the 50ish man to startled gasps around the room. After further examination, Mike could identify the bidder as the President of First Info Services, a local and quite successful company.  Not that that made it ok for Mike to go on a date with him.  After a moments introspection, Mike realised he didn’t want to go on a date, with any man.  He quickly did some number crunching in his head, and realised he had a little over $730,000 in his personal account; and he was about to spend three quarters of a million dollars bidding on himself so he didn’t have to go on a date, when even this hope was taken from him.

"One million dollars," came a familiar voice from the back of the room.  One,  that because of the bright stage lights, Mike could not see to identify.

"One million going once."

The auctioneer looked to the First Info president, who shook his head.

"Going twice."

"Sold to the gentleman in the back row for one million dollars.  Well ladies and gentleman, I don’t know the exact figures but I am happy to say we more than made our goal for the evening.  Lets all thank Miss Lane for her attendance, she fetched more than all the rest combined," finished the auctioneer pleased.

Laugh it up old man, one more word from you and I’ll sic Captain Jack on you.

Mike was led down the stage to meet his owner for the next evening.  Half the way there, Mike saw the earlier mentioned Jack Conklin handing over a check to one of the officials and smiling at Mike.

Speak of the devil and he by god appears

"Well Captain Jack, I didn’t know we paid you enough for this, and what would my father say. Your old enough to be my…..

"Boyishly beautiful elder cousin," replied the forty nine year old, balding, former marine.

"Something like that, I know you wouldn’t do something like this without orders so were is the intriguer in chief"

"Over with the Thomson’s.  Well, with my duty here being done, I’m off to set up the security for your fathers arrival."

"What hotel is he staying at?"

"No hotel, he decided he might as well buy a home out here, if your going to be spending so much time here.  You wouldn’t believe how ridiculously cheap the real estate is, in "The Flyover".

"The fly over.

"Sure, you have New York on one side, Los Angeles on the other, in between is The Flyover"

"What about Chicago?" Mike asked curiously.

"We don’t speak that name in mixed company Milady.  Daly’s town you know, he may be a quarter century dead, but we still don’t go anywhere near that thing.

"What ever you say Captain Jack"

"I believe your mother is calling to you."

"Michelle, I would like you to meet your date for tomorrow evening.  Now, you make sure he’s a gentleman, I paid five thousand dollars for him; and, the least he can do for that money is open a few doors."

Susan Lane came up leading a sheepishly embarrassed Philip Thomson; Mike couldn’t find it in his heart to dislike the med student.  He was as much a pawn, trapped in the clutches of evil Moms, as he was.

"What mother," asked a greatly annoyed Mike. "In our long history together, would make you think that I would go along with this shameless attempt at matchmaking."

"Its not shameless.  I’ve got a whole bunch of shame.  A 21-year-old daughter as beautiful, smart, and talented as you, and you haven’t had a steady boyfriend yet.  If you don’t do this for me, I’ll just die of shame."

"With you being such a health Nazi, I somehow doubt it."

"Shelly, please, you need to get out and start dating, dating.  You’ve been sheltered long enough."

"Why should I get out"

"Its not healthy to spend all your days reading,"

"Funny, as a doctor, I would have thought you would be aware of the health risks associated with what your pushing me into."

"Oh, I know you wont get into any sort of trouble, you’re to smart a girl"

"Am I now? Well, Mr. Thomson, front and center!"

"Ah, yes Miss Lane"

"As my address has been written on half the toilet stalls on campus I assume you know it."

"Yes Miss Lane.

"And my telephone number written on the other half".

"Yes Miss lane".

"I will inform my service to forward your call.  You will be in front of my door at 6:00PM sharp tomorrow evening.  Make one phone call to announce your arrival. Now about your car."

"My car?" he asked uncertain

"You have one I presume."

"Yes,"

"It will be washed and cleaned, both inside and outside, and filled with a full tank of gas.  If your automobile cannot be made suitable for female habitation you will provide a limousine. Understood?"

"Yes Miss Lane."

"There will be a movie?"

"Ah, yes ma’am."

"Dinner?"

"Of course ma’am."

"After dinner coffee and treat?"

"As you please ma’am."

"You will be entitled to one goodnight kiss, as a mater of courtesy from me,

"Thank you ma’am."

"As a matter of curtsey too me, I ask that you not use excessive tongue or saliva, as it offends me."

"Of course ma’am"

"If you behave yourself like an officer gentleman, and your manner pleases me, I will invite you upstairs for an evening of wild, wanton sex is that understood Sailor?"

"I am at your service ma’am."

"That is all."

"By your leave ma’am."

"Dismissed."

With a curt nod at Philip, and a mischievous grin at their two mothers, Mike gracefully walked out of the room, leaving behind one amused ROTC Ensign, and two suddenly perspiring elder females.

Mikes amusement at the practical joke he had pulled on his mother lasted about five minutes, until he realized, that in less than 24 hours he would have to actually go on a date, as a woman, with a man.

On second thought having a security detail wasn’t such a bad thing anymore.

December 21st and the holiday season is upon us.  Merry freaking Christmas. Mike thought to himself the next morning.  His mother and he had returned home around midnight, and she wouldn’t let him get to bed, before he assured her that he was just joking, and that indeed, providing her with grandchildren was the furthest thing from his mind at the moment.  The morning progressed normally, as normally that is, for a recently transformed woman about to go on her first date could be.  It was only through complicated negotiation that he convinced his mother that another shopping expedition wasn’t warranted, as he already had enough apparel to clothe a small army.  The argument was made when Mike brought a third party into the proceedings, and secured a powerful ally, by pointing out to the security detail leader, that a mall at Christmas time was probably too crowded and too high risk an environment to tackle.  Susan Lane pouted for a few minutes, but gave in to her guard’s best judgment.  They had been through too much together.

Since Phil had already seen more skin than Mike would have liked to show, modesty was a rather moot point right now.  Mike had originally laid out jeans and a sweatshirt, until his mother had pointedly informed him that Phil would likely take him to a nice place for dinner.

"But Mom," Mike complained. "This is just dinner and a movie, and he’s a starving college student, he’s not going to have the money to… you didn’t?"

"I slipped him a little green."

"How little is a little?"

"Ten."

"Ten what?"

"Ten hundreds"

"A thousands buck for one date!"

"So the least you can do is wear a skirt"

"But its freezing outside, and was this before or after my little gag."

"After of course,.  I couldn’t let it go unchallenged.  And wear pantyhose.  It’s part of the PAIN we woman normally go through to be beautiful."

"If I hear you say that phrase one more time, you really will feel pain mother."

"That’s all right dear, there’s a doctor in the house."

Eventually, Mike gave in and wore a skirt, but had to go through three pairs of even the heaviest pantyhose. Before he successfully put on one that didn’t have runs when he finished. And he slipped an extra undamaged pair into his purse because he would probably suffer a casualty before the night was over.  It was ridiculous, it was the 21st century, and woman had to wear skirts when it was 21 degrees outside.  Even with a heavy coat over the skirt and blouse, Mike was leaving some very sensitive areas exposed to nature’s elements.  He prayed to the Big Boss upstairs that Phil’s car had a good heater, because if it didn’t, the whole thing was off.

Make up was a trying experience.  While his mother was out, Mike had spent most of the day practicing his skills.  It’s amazing what a person could read on the Internet these days.  And, after hours of work, he knew he could apply the bare minimum, which was all he was willing to anyway.  If Phil was expecting the full beauticians treatment out of Mike all the time, it was best those illusions were shattered early.

It was at this point that Mike made a shattering self-realization.  He was thinking about the future.  He hadn’t evolved so much that he was thinking about white weddings and babies; but, he had just consciously thought, not only about this date, but the possibility of other dates in the future.  After a few minutes pondering, Mike realised that she had given in.  In hindsight, she had never really had a chance in the first place.  When the Lord’s chosen champion comes down from on high, and changes you into a girl, there was a snowball’s chance in…… that other place,  she was ever going to be a male again.  Fight however viciously, claw at it tooth and nail, he was stuck as a girl for the rest of his life.

Mike had a good cry then.  Only a little of it was due to giving-in to the female hormones.  The rest was simply a release of pent up sorrow and frustration.  She had wasted her life.  Never done anything noteworthy, cried and railed at every imagined injustice, and gotten herself killed in a fit of rash stupidity. The crying session lasted for about an hour or so, destroying all the carefully crafted make up work.  Eventually Mike stopped; and slowly came to the realization, that she was still alive, and she had a life ahead of her. Then she made a resolution to herself not to waste this second life the as she had the first.  Perhaps Phil wouldn’t be the right person, but that special someone existed. And perhaps her fate as the President of Lane Incorporated was preordained; but, Mike was determined to make the best of her lack of options.  After all, how many people, aside from Bill Gates, can say that if they drop out of college, they can still rise to lead a multibillion dollar company.

‘Being a woman isn’t so bad,’ Mike thought to herself. ‘ Sure, there will be PMS, periods, and pregnancy; and earning only 70% of what a man earns at the same job; and being expected to work, keep house, raise children and put a filling   meal on the table, and to look pretty all the while she’s doing it; and then to keep smiling whenever her butt was pinched.  What could a woman ever have to complain about?’

 

   Mike barely had enough time to repair her makeup before Phil arrived, promptly at 6:00.  Punctuality was a character trait she approved of.  It was clear however, that Phil was surprised Mike was ready too, promptly at 6:00.  It was his experience that when a woman asked you to be there at six, it meant don’t plan anything before 6:30.  Covering up his surprise well, Phil led her to his waiting car, which, Mike was pleased to admit, sported a quite effective heater.

"I know how you must be freezing in that skirt so I turned it all the way up."

"Bless you Phil" Mike replied gratefully.

"Thanks Miss Lane," he said appreciatively.

"For what, I should thank you?"

"For using my first name", replied Phil.  "I thought, due to your performance last night, that this would be a rather formal affair."

"That was just a show for our respective mothers, I certainly hope you didn’t take the last part seriously".

"Well no, but a gentlemen can hope cant he?," asked Phil, with a puppy dog look that was so appealing, it had to be practiced.

"Sure, if things progress along steadily, you can look forward to it, in three or four years."

"Well, a graduation present, oh joy Miss Lane," he smiled.

"Call me Mike," she told him kindly

"Mike?"

Damn

"Please call me Mike, it’s my nickname, short for Michelle." Mike clarified come on buy it.

"Oh, right, I thought your mother called you Shelly."

"That’s what my mother calls me, Philip."

"Gotcha, orders received and understood.

Dinner was Italian, pleasantly so.  Mike had experience so many undercooked, overrated, under proportioned, and overpriced meals in his life, that anytime a nice restaurant was both reasonably priced and appetising, was cause for celebration.  The dinner conversation was agreeable, and mostly covered both of their families.  Mike wasn’t feeling any fairy tale sparks, but she was impressed by Phil’s self-assured manner.  Not many people could do that in the presence of a person who would someday be able to buy countries.

"Wine sir, Miss?" the waiter asked when the meal came.

"No, thank you," Mike replied

"None for me thanks." agreed Phil

"You don’t drink," Mike asked curiously.

"Never developed a taste for it.  We never had it around the house.  Dad being a surgeon and all, he never drank, couldn’t afford the slightest hand tremor. When all my friends grew up and started thinking it was ambrosia, I tried it a few times but it tasted horrible.  I could never see the point of spending huge amounts of money for something nasty, which could put me in jail or some similarly compromised situation.  How about you?"

"Same deal, my moms a surgeon too, and dad, well he doesn’t like anything to dull his wits; it’s a lot like being the President of the United States, he can be awakened in the middle of the night, and have to make split second decisions that effect the lives of thousands."

"Wow."

"Yea wow. I always knew that’s what I was destined for, and despite my father’s ideas, I am probably ready for it.  But, it’s not something I’m looking forward to with any great enthusiasm."

"Why on earth not?  All that money, you wouldn’t have too worry about anything anymore, why wouldn’t someone want what you have?"

"Your training to be a doctor, right?"

"Yes,"

"A practicing physician, or one of those ‘look at me I have a diploma’ society stars?"

"I want to help people," Phil said defensibly.

"Of course you do, that’s a noble goal. But supposing you couldn’t? Suppose something tragic happened, your fingers were amputated, and you couldn't perform surgery, ever again.  You could still help people. Right? , Teach other surgeons how to heal, maybe do more and even better work that way?"

"I suppose."

"But would you be happy, standing on the sidelines, never again being able to do that which you loved."

"I don’t know"

"Well your honest at least, lets make it more interesting.  Suppose you turned out to be a descendent of long lost Russian archduke; and you’re the heir to billions of dollars hiding in Switzerland.  The only catch is, you have to live in Eastern Siberia, your ancestral home, for the rest of your life.  To claim the money, you’re exiled to a town with three donkeys and a bar.  But with that money you can build hospitals, schools, universities, make a difference in the lives of millions.  A noble life’s ambition, right?"

"Yes."

"But would you be happy?  Never being a doctor.  Always having the rest of your life decided for you. Never to be free, to go where you want, or else those millions you could have helped would suffer instead."

"Your situation is different"

"Is it? You seem to think all that money means I can do what I want, but its not $35 Billion sitting in a bank, its in ships, factories, laboratories, fabrication works, movie studios, and a hundred and fifty thousand people around the world; a hundred and fifty thousand, and their families depending upon me.  Sure, I could cash in the minute I inherit, maybe lose a couple billion in the transaction; but what’s ten figures between friends.  I could have enough to live off of, the interest alone is more than me or mine could spend in a hundred lifetimes, but I would have to betray those hundred and fifty thousand people and their families to a company that maybe doesn’t have a comprehensive retirement plan, family medical and dental coverage, day-care, college scholarships, maternity leave, or any of the thousands of benefits, that make our people the best, most loyal and efficient in the world.  Assuming of course, that company wouldn’t lay them off first thing in a "productivity hire down."  While my father and I are at this game, that money is being used for good works, not just maintaining those hundred and fifty thousand and their families, but financing hospitals, schools, and universities, and making a good difference in the life of millions more."

"But your not happy," Phil finished.

"No, I’m not. I’m very unhappy" Mike admitted

"You seem determined to make yourself so.  If I were you, which I admittedly am not, I know I would look terrible in a skirt, I wouldn’t spend all my time thinking of the doom that is to await me, the situation that I couldn’t avoid even if I wanted to.   I would think about how I could make my situation better, force myself to be happy, other people manage it."

"Like who?"

"Your mother and father seem to do all right, certainly she seems a bundle of joy, and I know from my father, events in recent years haven’t been kind to her."

"That’s different."

"How so?"

"They’re in love."

"Well there, you see, all you need is love."

"Humph," Mike laughed. "And I suppose your offering your services as Prince Charming."

"Well, I hear chicks dig the uniform," Phil said with a grin.

"You have an overblown sense of your own attractiveness," huffed Mike, as she got up to leave. "Order us something for desert, I’ll be in the ladies room."

"I’ll be waiting."

Mike had got up because she needed to get out of that situation as quickly as possible.  She had actually started considering Phil as a possible part of her future. When she was a he, and all the girls were rushing after him, none of them had spoken to her with the same self assured bluntness, that at the same time said ‘I like you but don’t give me any crap.’  None of them would have dared play word games with The Lane Heir.

Great, Mike thought to herself.  I finally find someone I  could possibly spend the rest of my life with, but that person is wearing a penis.

"And what’s wrong with that?  If the part fits, but don’t you think your moving a little fast Michelle.You just met the guy," said The Archangel Michael slightly slurred as he popped into the stall with Mike.  She made a frantic grab for her skirt to cover herself from the view of the new occupant.

"There’s no need to cover yourself, I….."

"I know, you helped design that part of the body," Mike finished for him.

"Me? No, I didn’t have any part of that part, I was going to say that I had seen it all before though.  Remember, I’m the one that transformed you.  Nudity taboos," said Michael shaking his head. "I still can’t get over you people and your eccentricities"

"What are you doing here Michael? And what is that you’re wearing?

The archangel’s earlier appearance had been that of a successful businessman in a tailored three-piece suit.  The Archangel now wore hot green swim trunks and a T-shirt with "surfers do it standing up" written on it.  For the entire world to see, above his head where his halo should have been, was what looked like, a glowing golden paper party hat.  Mike could only assume the archangel’s wings were folded due to the cramped space.

"Oh,  we’re having a birthday party.  DON’T WORRY SERENDIPITY. I’LL BE BACK SOON, KEEP MY MAI TAI COLD! Michael shouted turning his head.

"Keep it quiet, someone will hear you."

"Small chance of that, we’re in a pocket universe where time has no meaning, helps keep the tourist from gawking.  Now I took some time away from the party."

"Must suck to have a birthday at Christmas time," Mike said, sympathising.

"The kid doesn’t seem to mind, good sport about everything really, doesn’t let who his father is, go to his head….. Of course, technically, he is his father but,--- Ahh!  I need another drink."

"You mean, --- but why are you celebrating it now? Christmas is in four days."

"Actually, it’s in about a hundred and four days, but like I said, the kid is a good sport about it, and moved it back for everyone else’s convenience.  The trouble is, around the twelfth century, after one of your religious leaders, who shall remain nameless, unilaterally set the date, this one, one who doesn’t deserve his name, unilaterally changed the calendar and reset everything.  We still haven’t synchronised our timetables upstairs, besides once is enough isn’t it?"

"I suppose so,  Wish him a happy birthday from me, I would have gotten him a gift; but I didn’t know where to send it, and what do you get for the guy who has everything."

"Nah! Its all right.  He understands, probably would have just turned around and gotten rid of it.  The kid is responsible for the practice of ‘re-gifting’" said the archangel, as he materialised a exotic coconut shell drink with an umbrella in it.

"Birthday party this year is in Hawaii," he said lifting up his drink in a salute. "Hey!  Do you suppose we can get Magnum P.I. to make a guest appearance?" as he took a deep drink from the shell.

"You need to get out more."

"Probably true, the boss has cut back on business travel but we wrote off the party as a legitimate expense.  NOW!  Where was I, oh yes, your three day follow up. How are things going?"

"You mean you don’t know."

"Contrary to what you may believe, you’re not the center of the universe, I can’t follow your every action and intention, that’s what the boss is for."

"Can’t you ask him"?

"He is understandably busy, what with running the universe and all."

"And, I thought I had a bad gig."

"Cough it up little lady I’m staying reasonably sober for this," Michael said irked.

"Well, things are going, all right."

"Just all right?"

"Well, I’m on a date."

"I noticed, nice looking boy."

"If you go for that sort of thing."

"Are you?" Michael asked curiously.

"I’m beginning too." Mike admitted.

"Good, continue."

"You didn’t, change anything with my head did you?"

"You mean flip the switch, turn AC to DC that sort of thing?"

"Yea."

"Nope, were big believers in free will upstairs, the competition may warp your mind but we have a strictly hands off policy."

" Except for the occasion sex change."

"I mean, as far as your mind goes, that’s your personal property, the body though, that belongs to us.  Are you happy?" Michael continued questioningly

"Well," Mike had to think about it. "Yea, I guess I am, I’ve kind of accepted what my fate is now, and stopped whining about being a poor little rich boy.  A new acquaintance said I should make the best of what I have coming, and force myself to be happy, like my parents."

"Good, I’m glad all it took was swift kick up your butt and a little rearrangement of said."

"Tell me, please, is there any way back?"

"Back to being male"

"Yea,"

"My side can’t do anything for you, you could probably swing a deal with the competition, but you wont like the fine print," Michael said shaking his head.

"Then I’m stuck?"

"Is that so terrible?"

"No, it isn’t.  I just had to know Michael, so I could close a chapter in my life."

"Don’t think about it as closing a chapter, but as opening an entirely different book, one with a happy ending."

"Can you really tell me how it will end?"

"That’s entirely up to you."

"Good," Mike said pleased nodding her head. "Good."

"Well, since you’re in such a happy mood now, you can fill out the proper paperwork," said the Archangel as he materialised a file.

"Paperwork?" asked Mike confused.

"Its what makes the world go round, well, not really, but close.  Its not much, a fairly straightforward file here Michelle.  It’s a written confirmation that you’ve received your new body, and its condition upon receipt, just mark off whichever box fits.  Five levels of measurement for the various categories, poor, fair, acceptable, above average and ‘sweet Jesus’.  Wait a minute, hey! How did that one get written in." Michael asked confused.  "Humph! nepotism.  And the last piece is your Archangel evaluation form, it’s a new program instituted by Pete, he wants to know how were doing our jobs.  Personally I think it’s just a bunch of papal bull, but he’s got the ears of .important entities.  Just fill it out when you get the chance, and a cherub will come by and pick it up. We’ll meet again in thirty days for the follow up. Aloha!" finished Michael the Archangel as he handed the file over to Mike and disappeared in a flash of light.

Mike took several seconds to shake her head, then wiped her now permanent new anatomy, and put her skirt back on.

"What’s that?" inquired Phil, as he saw Mike carrying a tan colored folder to the table.

"Don’t ask" replied Mike cheerfully, giving Phil such an incredible smile that he was completely distracted. 

Despite being in the presence of an officer and a gentlemen Mike’s security detail wouldn’t leave her alone.  Being opening weekend , tickets to The Two Towers were limited, and they were forced to pay several teenagers fifty bucks a pop to see a later show, in order to get the entire entourage inside.  The guards were still unhappy about the dark crowded room, but Mike had put his foot down about the movie, and received backup from an even higher authority than John Lane, his wife.

"We probably could have gotten all those tickets for free, all you would have had to do was flash them a bit," said Phil sighing.

"A bit,"

"Two or three minutes, it would have been a bargain."

"I’m pleased that your not one of the types of boyfriends who gets jealous and protective."

"Am I?"

"What?"

"Your boy friend?"

"Temporary, provisional and subject to congressional approval."

"Well at least I know were I stand, milady," said Phil, giving Mike his arm. "Shall we?"

"Just don’t getting funny ideas about the battle of Helm’s Deep, I’m not your stereotypical girl, and it’s not a scary movie."

"My precious, I’m wounded," said Phil smiling.

"So how was it? He asked at the finish.

"Cool, seeing movies in a theatre is much better."

"You say it like it’s a special experience."

"It is, this was my first time, well all the way through anyway."

"I’m sorry" Phil said, considerately saddened.

"Why should you be sorry?  It’s not your fault.  Being The Lane Heir means I’m a kidnapping target, and my guards don’t like crowds, or darkened areas where they can’t see any possible threats.  It was only the fact that this trip was completely unplanned that they acquiesced at all. It’s rather difficult to plan a kidnapping with two hours notice."

"I can imagine, I guess I really didn’t think about what your life has been like. What growing up with the constant threat over your head must have done to you."

"It wasn’t fun," Mike agreed. "But I don’t want to think what could happen if Captain Jack and his Praetorian guard weren’t here."

"Neither would I, I’ve developed something of a sentimental attachment to your beautiful form."

"Flattery," said Mike glancing up to Phil and grinning. "Nice choice"

"I thought so," murmured Phil, as he kissed her.

Mike responded to the kiss, giving in completely, for about a second. Then he realised what he was doing, and broke the kiss jerking away from Phil’s embrace.

"What?  I’m sorry" Phil tied apologising.

Mike couldn’t form words, and instead instinctively pressed the panic button on her wristwatch.  Three seconds later the five-person crash team burst into the row from where they had been waiting and dragged Mike away, physically blocking Phil from following her.  The last thing Mike saw, before being carried out by two three hundred pound gorillas, was Phil being pistol whipped for his insolence.

"Shelly?" said Susan Lane through her daughter door. "You can’t stay in there forever, what happened last night?"

‘Ha!’ Mike thought to herself, ‘shows what she knows,.   I’ve got a bathroom and running water .  I’ll probably starve to death in a few weeks, when my candy supply runs out; but, that’s a far better option than going outside.’

"Shelly your father is going to be at the airport in a few hours, and were all going over to the new house, you haven’t even packed."

"Go away," Mike said weakly.

"Shelly, you open this door right this minute."

"No!"

"I went to catholic school you know, I can pick locks, or maybe I’ll just have Captain Jack shoot the door down and make you pay for the damages out of your allowance.

"I don’t get an allowance any more I get interest on my trust fund"

"Shelly open this door this instant."

"No!"

Sniff

Sniff

Even she couldn’t be that evil Mike thought.

Sniff Sniff Sniff.

Yes she could, she’s an Irishwoman.

"Michelle" came Susan Lanes sweet voice. "Oh Shelly, I just made a new batch of white chocolate macadamia nut cookies, fresh, and hot from the pan.

"Away with you woman!" Mike yelled back defiantly. "You can not tempt me with you heathen tricks!"

"I’ve also got some ice cream here. Mmmm! Good! iiice-ssccream,"

"Ice cream?"

"To go with the cookies"

"It  won’t work.  I am above such hollow attempts at bribery!" Mike shouted, less defiantly than before.

"Its Colorado River Rapids," Susan explained.

"The dark fire will not avail you, flame of Boston. Go back to the Shadows. YOU, SHALL NOT, PASS!!!" Screamed Mike, trying anything to get her to stop.

"You know, the type that Blue Bunny stopped making for the public, but your father got them to ship us twenty boxes a year special." Susan continued.

"I, You, I, ….not fair" said Mike pleading.

"Vanilla, mixed with butterscotch, hazelnuts, caramel covered peanuts.."

"Chocolate swirls" Mike finished for her, as she burst open her bedroom door to grab the ice-cream bowl an and cookies from her mothers hand.

So what happened Shelly?" asked Susan Lane; after she and her daughter had disposed of half the cookie sheet, and were working on the ice cream.

"Nothing, until the end it was a text book date, dinner, movie, flowers even."

"What kind?"

"Not really sure, it was white."

"Carnations, continue."

"The movie was nice. Wow mom, those special effects, and the surround sound!"

"Continue please" Susan interrupted.

"Yes well, then he kissed me.

"Well,"

"I really don’t have any point of comparison, it seemed nice enough."

"So?"

"I panicked,"

"Ah," said Susan understanding.

"And I hit the panic button"

"Uh oh"

"And the crash team burst in, carried me away, and probably beat him into a concussion."

"That, probably, was a tactical error on your part Michelle," Susan winced.

"I’m going back to my room."

After severe cajoling, and with the helpful presence of several large armed men, Mike was taken out of her room, showered, shaved and generally made ready to greet her father.  The Millard airport was a small municipal affair, with little traffic, but completely suitable for a small business jet.  John Lane exited his craft first.  He was still robust looking at 65; and the sparkle in his eye brightened noticeably when he saw his wife and daughter.  Mike didn’t know how her relationship with her father had changed with the sex change; but, it hadn’t exactly been roses before.

The very first memory Mike had was of childhood rebellion. 

It had to have been when she was around three, but she couldn’t narrow it down any further than that.  John Lane had made it a habit to spend at least an hour a day with his son, giving him time that he had never been shown as a child.  When his baby boy began to speak, in order to develop language skills, every day John had read something to his son. It didn’t matter if Mike didn’t understand it at first, eventually he did, he was a very bright and precocious boy.  But then came the economic slowdown of the early eighties; and John Lane couldn’t afford that hour anymore for his son.  He was busy just trying to make sure his company and people survived.  Soon enough that hour and become forty-five minutes, and then half and hour, and then every other day.

Mike didn’t understand about the Japanese export economy, or the value of the mark against the dollar.  All he knew at three, was that his father, who had always been there for him, and loved him, suddenly wasn’t there anymore.  One night, when a tired John Lane came come, Mike, full of the rage and spite that only children can manage, had told his father to go away, and that he hated him.  Mike would have forgotten it the next day, like all other threats made by children , except his father had taken his advice.  Mike remembered that day, because his father had never again returned to read him a story for bed, what few times it was done, later in life, it was done by a housekeeper or butler.  John Lane in reality, probably never thought of his son’s taunts as a reason to stop coming.  He was too busy hand holding President Reagan, but his son always linked his father’s absence with his own wishes, and his son hated him for following them.  It didn’t make any sense, it didn’t have too, he was a kid; and, he wanted his daddy!

They had always been distant from then on.  There was always an element of love underlying everything. Both knew how the other cared for them, but neither was able, nor willing, to express their feelings.  The father son relationship had grown, increasingly colder of late.  An apathetic Mike was shifted from university to university, rudderless, and without direction.  John knew his son had talent.  He even knew his son had ambition, but not once did he see his son live up to those talents and ambitions: and the thought of turning over the company to him caused his heart to grow colder and fretful.

But that was with Michael Lane, Michelle Lane could be a different story entirely.

John Lane approached his wife, hugged and kissed her passionately, despite all the onlookers, and after several seconds he turned to his daughter.

"I ought to belt you a good one for that little stunt." He said, not at all amused

Apparently not

"I really am sorry Dad," Mike replied honestly, meaning what she said.

"I know," John said simply, then taking his daughter in a similar hug, though thankfully, not so passionate a kiss.

"And what’s this I hear about a date last night?  The panic call set off alarms all the way to New York"

"It was just a mistake daddy, one of those tragic mistakes, noting happened, and I’m all right.  I guess we don’t need to try any unannounced drills this month.  The team is in top form.  Though they could learn a little more restraint, and a refresher course on justifiable force."

"Yea, I heard about that, right in the teeth, its probably a good thing his father is a doctor."

"Probably.  Well, what’s on the agenda for today?"

"Meetings, meetings, and more meetings.  You know, I’m kind of surprised by this city, it’s a scrapper.  It’s no New York. But Omaha is really booming where New York has been stagnant.  It’s the transportation hub, banking center, insurance and investment heart, and cultural focal point for an area two hundred miles in any direction.  I had no idea there was this much business opportunity before you came here."

"When will you be finished?"

"Tonight hopefully, tomorrow by latest, Christmas Eve on the outside."

 "Jonathan Edward Lane," Susan started threatening.

"Tonight, definitely tonight."

"That’s better," both Lane women chimed simultaneously.  

"May I come along Dad," Mike asked hopefully.

The question surprised John Lane a bit; interest in business dealing was a new thing from his daughter.

"If you like," John Lane replied, pleased. "Though I’m not sure what you’ll get out of it dear."

"This is my city pops, I may be able to offer some advice, and its high time the Executive Vice-president Lane started earning her pay, don’t you think?"

"Yes, I’m happy you agree," said John with a grin on his face, and a gleam in his eye, and a new joy in his heart.

 

The business dealings had taken longer than they hoped.  While Susan Lane spent the next two days organising the new house, and doing the various gift shopping, her husband and daughter were locked up in various boardrooms.  Lane Incorporated was a conglomerate that operated in a number of countries.  While there were secondary, and quite lucrative, ventures the largest and primary business activity was shipping.  The Lanes had ruthlessly horizontally integrated over the years until they owned trucks, railroads, airlines, container transports, even a few oil tankers. From factory, direct to markets halfway around the world, products could be handled by one company instead of a host of them.  Lately John Lane had expanded past shipping, to buying and selling commodities directly.  Purchasing corn and grain from the growers; and moving it around the world to where it was needed.  The only problem was, as he was beginning to understand, there was nowhere a more crotchety, touchy, bad tempered, crusty, irritable old coot than the Midwest farmer.

"Believe me, I mean no disrespect sir," replied the growers coalition spokesman.

"I should hope not," said John Lane annoyed.

"But you have to see it from our prospective."

"Which is?"

"Well, sir, we grow it, It’s our blood and sweat that fertilised it, all you do is move it."

"Leaving aside that its Dow Chemical that fertilizes your crops, when I ‘just move it,’ I move it to markets were it can be sold.  If I wasn’t here, the crops would rot here, unsold, while people over there go hungry."

"Well, yes sir, were not disputing that, you deserve to profit, a healthy profit, but can’t you make it on the other end."

"How do you mean?"

"We have a rough idea of how much the market will bear Mr Lane, this is our business. And with what you’re paying us and what you can expect to fetch overseas, well sir, it gives you almost a hundred percent profit"

"I think you over estimate my profit margin"

"Well that may be. You’re a private company, and you don’t have to be, shall we say, so meticulous in filing reports for the government."

"You’re getting dangerously close to disrespect."

"I mean no offence, but from what we've seen, your transportation network gives you a two to one advantage over your competitors. You cut out a hell of a lot of middlemen."

"I’m glad you approve."

"So you see, you can afford better than anyone else here to up your bid, I’m being blunt here sir its how we do business out here."

"Its how we do business in New York as well, we’re just a bit more subtle about our bluntness."

"Well, yes sir, so now that you understand our position, can you make your offer a little sweeter."

"I’m already paying 12 cents higher than current market value. If you’re unhappy with that offer, I can always go to Kansas."

"Now Mr Lane, why do you have to go bringing profanities into the conversation, particularly with your daughter present.  You could go 25 higher and still blow all your competition out of the water."

"Leaving aside that rather curious expression from a man who lives 1,500 miles from the nearest ocean. I would only be able to ‘blow my competition out of the water’ if I was willing to sell at the current prices overseas, which I’m not."

"But, I don’t?…."

"I’m afraid you underestimate the importance of this deal to my company Mr Dalton.  In itself, it’s a secondary concern only.  You see the United States, and the western world as a whole, is pretty much all taken.  Whenever a new industry emerges, the competition is, well, vicious is a kind word.  The developing world economies are wide open; however Lane Incorporated has invested, and will continue to do so, significant amounts of money down in South America, Africa, Asia and India.  The only problem is, just when things start to really get going, there’s a revolution, revolt or rebellion.  The last time Zimbabwe went up, an Undersecretary of State said, ‘another revolution in Zimbabwe, must be Tuesday.’  You see Mr Dalton, people find it very hard to work in my new ventures when they’re starving. And I am understandably reluctant to keep funnelling billions of dollars into a country that will only nationalise my investment, whenever the next famine comes along.  The foundation of every successful economy is a stable, and ample food supply at cheap prices.  When a people no longer have to devote every moment to survival, a society can develop specialists.  Doctor’s, lawyers, accountants, ‘businessmen’ who buy American TV shows, cars and computers.  Providing them cheap food is good for us, we get the money for the crops, and down the road maybe a prosperous trading partner, and they get to have full bellies.  All around it’s a win-win situation, meaning no disrespect sir, but this is my business and you….."

"The problem is Mr Dalton," cut in Mike trying to keep her father from saying anything rash. "Is that the current price for corn, wheat, soybeans, and a hundred other American crops, when they reach the developing economies markets, are more than they can afford to pay.  So we are left with the absurd situation of 800 million people around the world starving; while food rots away in the United States; and, the Federal government pays farmers like you not to grow more.  Lane Incorporated intends to bring them food that they can pay for.  Our integrated fleet is uniquely suited for this, but even we cannot afford to do this at a loss.  So, I’m sorry, we cannot afford to go 25 cents higher than market. 

Don’t get greedy, accept the deal as is, and we both will be made a little richer, and we can both get out of here for a Merry Christmas," finished Mike trying the good cop approach to her fathers bad.

"Well, meaning no disrespect Ma’am, but we have had competing offers for our futures, and they have gone 25.  I much rather would have done business with you people. I understand where your trying to go with this, and I agree, but I would be derelict in my duties if I took less.  I’m sorry," said Mr. Dalton, as he got up to leave. "We wont sign anything until the first. You have until then to make a counter offer. Have a nice day."

"Good bye Mr. Dalton" said John Lane coldly

"Goodbye sir, Ma’am" he nodded to Mike

"Who could he be dealing with," John asked her as Dalton left the room.

"He said it himself, we may not have the edge on port to port, but Nebraska to Nairobi?  We have a two to one advantage," clarified Mike as she sat down in the offices leather chair. "Could it be the Greeks?"

"Definitely not.  It just doesn’t make any sense, our commercial intelligence unit is one of the best in the world, we should have heard something.  No merchant can afford to go 25 over.  Even for a hybrid like us it would still be at a loss.  You can’t get blood from rocks, every food market overseas is as high as the market will bear."

"Maybe they think they can sell it in the US."

"That will be the day, we would have a revolution of our own if the price of food went up that much, and the cereal companies wouldn’t stand for it."

"They’re insulated, most of them own hundreds of square miles of farmland outright, they would just raise the price of their end product to correspond and grin all the way to the bank.  Could they sell it in Mexico?"

"Mexico feeds itself pretty well, and that makes even less business sense, it costs almost as much to cross a few hundred miles by train, as it does to ship it around the world by sea."

"From what you told me, this is a pretty integral part of our future plans. Shipping isn’t very profitable in its own right these days.  Were depending heavily on those factories, and our start up investment banks in the developing world, could someone be out there be operating at a loss just so we might suffer."

"It’s hard to imagine a company that would do it, take the billion dollars hit, and let people starve. "

"People were willing enough to go after Mom."

"That was different, high gain, low risk. A few million dollars saw them put a couple hundred million dollar wrench in our works; and there was no way for us to prove they did it.  Jack still isn’t sure he has identified all the players.  This is very high profile, very high risk, and very expense, a CEO would have to be mad!"

"Funny, I’ve heard that adjectives used of late to describe a few CEOs I know"

"Now none of that!" John yelled amused.

"I wasn’t talking about you, furthest thing from my mind."

"I’ll bet, come on munchkin, we need to get going. Your mom is ready enough to skin me alive as it is.  This can wait until after the holiday."

"We’ll find out who.  I’m still not convinced its not a bargaining bluff; he was pretty vague about who this new party was. We’ll sort this out" said a determined Mike.

"Yes we will, I was proud of you in there kido, you stopped me from making an ass of myself, and you made some good points.  Not that I’m complaining; but what’s gotten into you."

"My little trip westward bound changed me, I met someone who made me revaluate my life, I’m a whole new woman now."

"Well I’m pleased. Someday, Id like to meet this person that had such a profound effect on my daughter."

"Believe me dad; no you wouldn’t, not just yet" replied Mike, as she walked down the hall with her father.   

Christmas day not go well.  Mike woke up with a feeling, deep in the pit of her stomach, and she was proven right, immediately, when she went down to breakfast.

   "Gustav we have been working together all our professional careers……….I know we don’t have a contract. We have never needed one before.  Our fathers worked together, our grandfathers worked together…. when your family needed to flee Germany, due to that 13 year unpleasantness, we sheltered you here; and, this is how you repay me…………I can’t lower my rates Gustav…Because I would be operating at a loss……….This is a hell of a thing to pull on Christmas ……I know you don’t celebrate Christmas; but it’s the principle of the thing…. No…..yes….no…NO!….

SLAM! As John Lane crushed the phone into its cradle.

"Shmuck," he added to the man across the world.

"John, there is no need to shout, I’ve never seen you so exited," said Susan as she poured her husband some more coffee.

"That’s the third one since last night.  This is nuts.  It’s like a coordinated assault on almost every major division, this is Christmas, no one works on Christmas."

"Calm down dad," said Mike earnestly" If this is the loyalty our partners show us, then it’s best we were free of them."

"Loyalty is cheap, and business is business, the words gone out on us, if we were a public company, with stock on the exchange, I would be worried about a hostile takeover.  As is, when the NYSE next opens, we can expect every one of our subsidiaries that is traded to take a hit, wholly owned, partially owned, blue chip to penny stock.  Whoever is running this is audacious.  I’ll give em that.  Christmas's all over the business world are being interrupted and traders who don’t know how they're going to pay for little Timmy’s new toy, will be running scared and selling short.  A full day while the exchange is down, and people can stew, damn."

"I’m sorry Girls," said John Lane as he massaged his grey temples. " We’ll have the morning breakfast, we’ll open presents, but this afternoon I have to get on a plane back to New York."

"Oh John," said Susan concerned. " Are you sure?"

"Quite sure."

"I’ll come with you," said Mike certain she could be of some help.

"No, no! Shelly, you stay here.  There’s no need for you to get involved in this, things may, well, I may have to do some things I don’t want to."

"I’m a big girl and I can help."

"I know Shell, but this is war, and the president, and the vice president shouldn’t be in one place."

"You don’t really think anyone will…."

"Its been done before, but no, not really, anyway, you stay here.  You need your vacation.  I read the paper you did on China and the W.T.O., that must have been some piece of research.  My commercial intelligence boys tell me you uncovered a lot of stuff they missed."

"You read that?" asked Mike surprised.

"I read everything you write, it’s a fathers duty, now lets not have this completely spoil Christmas I can’t wait to see what you all got me, now, as I’m the patriarch I shall open first."

LANE ONE IS DOWN!  I REPEAT LANE ONE HAS BEEN HIT! SCRAMBLE ALL EMERGENCY SERVICES!" screamed Jack Conklin into his mic as he pulled his Glock out of its holster. "Anyone have a shooter?"

"Negative," came one guard

"No joy," said another

"John!!!" Screamed Susan Lane as she rushed to her husband’s side.

"Vercetii godamnit get them out of here!" yelled Conklin with a wave toward Mike and Susan.

"COVER!" screamed one guard as she identified oncoming fire

The guards were able to return fire and take out the sniper but not before Conklin was hit trying to shield his superiors family.

"Vercetti get them out of here," he whispered as his lungs began to deflate.  The last thing Conklin saw, was Susan and Mike being shoved into the Limousine and driven as fast as the car could get away.  Captain Jack Conklin, formerly of the United States Marine Corps, was pleased that he had at least seen to this part of his duty before the blackness claimed him, and he bled his life all over the tarmac.

"I’m sorry Mrs. Lane, but your husband is still in surgery," said an impossibly young ER doctor as he glanced nervously at the large armed and agitated guards surrounding Susan Lane.

"Very well Doctor, but I ask that you at least tell me what operating room he is in?" replied Susan.

"But, why, I’m, what good can that do you?"

"I wish to have flowers sent as a sign of gratitude to the staff on duty there."

"Well, it’s a little odd, and, well, you might want to wait until you know how things will go, I Mean..."

"Let me decide my own form of gratitude doctor,"

"Yes Mrs Lane, well its operating room four, Chief Nurse Flanagan can handle any inquiries."

"Thank you doctor," as Susan turned around and walked away.

"What the hell was all that back there, about flowers?" Asked a confused Mike.

 "That ass deals with a hundred aggrieved spouses a day, his function is more a councillor than a doctor, keeping families from getting in the way of where the real medicine is happening.  He wasn’t going to let me near your father so I’m going to go around him."

"How," Mike asked even more confused.

"You remember ‘Catch Me If You Can.’  Steven sent us a copy last month, ‘Why do the Yankees always win?  Because the team can’t keep there eyes off the striped suits.’  Hopefully I’ll have better luck at impersonating a doctor, in view of the fact that I am one of the best in the world."

Susan had never been to this hospital before, but she had been to a thousand others; and they all operated along the same theme with clear maps identifying areas for those who were unfamiliar with them.  Mike and the guards were led upstairs and into a female surgeons shower.  One of the surgeons wasn’t going to let the entourage in; but, the guard Vercetti sent her on her way, and then walked outside after her.

 Susan, after searching through the drawers, retrieved a set of female operating scrubs; and without a trace of modesty undressed.  She took a one- minute shower to get the blood off, a feat Mike would never have thought her capable of, then put on her scrubs.  Suitably attired she looked indistinguishable from any other doctor inside the hospital.

"Stay here, if anyone gives you trouble, call Doctor Thomson."

"I don’t think he likes us right now remember."

"Damn, well you’ll just have to be diplomatic then, I’m off to OR4, don’t worry sweetie he’s not going to die while I’m there. I have to go scrub in."

"Didn’t you just,"

"My hands, a shower isn’t enough, but you need one, here" said Susan as she took out another set of scrubs. " You’re all covered in blood take a shower then put these on. I….you be…"

"Go Mom, I’ll be all right"

"I love you."

"I know"

"Where did Mr Vercetti go," asked Susan as she walked outside.

"Right here," replied Vercetti as he came out of the male surgeons shower also in scrubs. "Just is case you can’t get in on your own." He nodded to Susan.

"Guns aren’t exactly sterile."

"I don’t need a gun to deal with a surgeon, they value their hands"

"Just hold back until needed we don’t want to step on any toes."

"No Ma’am, Werner your in charge," said Vercetti glancing to his left.

"Yes, sir" replied Werner as she watched both enter the scrub room with determination.

 

Left alone in the shower room Mike had a good cry.  For about ten minutes she was unable to form any thoughts more complex than why.  Why the attack on the company? Why, the more personal one? Why was her daddy going to die?

"He’s not going to die," replied the Archangel as he flashed into the shower room attired in his former suit.

"He’s not?" asked Mike sobbing

"No, I’m sure. He’s not on any of my lists, and he would be, not to pad your families ego any; but his death would be rather important," said Michael trying to console her.

"Why are you here?"

"Well I thought you might want to know…."

"For a guy that can apparently read minds your pretty obtuse, why are you helping me."

"Ah," said Michael understanding, "That why. Well it’s a long story are you sure your up for it"

"I have nothing else to occupy my time, and maybe it will help distract me from, from, what’s going on in there, ahg!" said Mike grunting in pain.

"Something wrong," asked the archangel.

"Tummy ache, we had to rush breakfast, Dad had to get to the airport and…"

"He’s going to be all right Michelle, I promise.  Everyone’s equal before the

 lord, but some are more equal than others, your father and you are important players in the game ahead."

"Game, is that what this is to you?" asked Mike offended.

"No. Michelle, it most certainly is not, that was a figure of speech," replied the Archangel harshly. "And I’ll thank you not to assume my actions as trivial, I was out saving the universe, when your race was but a gleam in the Bosses eye."

"I’m sorry, its just,---.   I’m sorry, I think you can understand, I’m not exactly feeling rational right now."

"Yea, I know, sorry for jumping on you like that, it hasn’t exactly been ‘heaven’ in Heaven lately."

  "Well sit down, Mike" said Mike indicating one of the chairs in the shower room. "Get it off your chest, make us both feels better."

"I’m not used to all this Michelle I’m just a simple soldier, I go where I’m told to go; and fight who I’m told to fight.  All this intrigue is giving me indigestion of my own," said Michael, as he materialised a shot glass of a pink fluid, Mike could only assume was Pepto Bismo, and then downed it in one gulp, tossing the container in the trash.

"Time was," Michael continued as he sat down next to Mike. "That we had to fight everyday death grip struggles, for eons it went on.  The lines have, have pretty much stabilised now.  We or they try a sortie every once and a while, a few million innocents are killed but nothing major, this is what is called peace."

"I never understood that Michael, God is---, I mean, the Boss is the Boss, how can he have rivals?"

"The Boss is the single most powerful entity in the universe, indeed the universe as we know it today exists because he gave it form, just thought it all up one day.  I don’t really understand it all myself.  It doesn’t pay to pry, but think about it for a moment. The Boss exists, but what was there before he existed. It’s the old chicken and the egg problem, did he create the universe or did the universe create him. From what he’s let slip their was an age, unimaginable for me, and I can imagine quite a bit, when their was nothing. He was there of course, a wave of unconnected energy, in a formless universe. But slowly, he began to coalesce, eons upon eons passed and a bit at a time he became aware, and soon enough with that awareness, came the ability to affect the area around him. You think him all-powerful, and omnipresent, and for all intents and purposes, he is.  But he has power just because he’s been around for a long time, and learned every trick in the book, and forgotten nothing.  He was the first, and the most powerful, but he wasn’t alone in the beginning.  While he’s the big papa of the family, there are a bunch of little bastards running around, not quite as powerful, but there are just so damn many of them.  Some of them are all right, some of them not so much.  You’ve probably heard of  bunch of them, your folklore is riddled with them.  Vishnu, Shiva, Jupiter, Isis, my pal Loki"

"Pal?,  I’ve read some stuff on him; he’s a real prick."

"Oh that’s just bad PR, he was just looking for a good time.  Anyway as these lesser beings, lets make a mob reference, and call the under bosses, started becoming aware on their own, they started making all sorts of messes around the Boss’s universe.  That’s when my people were created.  We do just about every little thing that really doesn’t warrant his time. Every once and a while, there’s some creature that gets to big for his britches; and that’s where I and my fellow Archangels come in.  We ‘take care’ of things to make another mob reference.

"What’s with all the mob references?"

"Oh, we get free satellite TV up in Heaven.  The Sopranos is very big upstairs, huh, were the ones that convinced them to go another season, the things you people do to each other. Huh!. Your art is the way we get to know you guys, and you’ve come pretty far.  I still haven’t forgiven some of those guys from the renaissance. You’ve seen how some of them paint me, I look like a magnificent poof!  We didn’t get many of them sent our way; but what few I did track down, got a long lecture on the respect due Archangels.  Anyway, some of the lesser entities began getting pissed.  Sure, the Boss was the Boss; but  they felt, I suppose with some justification, that they should have a small piece of the action.  The Boss was, well I don’t want to say spoiled, lets just say, a less mature being, than the older and wiser deity he is now.  He didn’t like people playing in his sandbox.  It doesn’t matter how it got started, its not really important anymore, but the sides were drawn, and we’ve been in conflict ever since.  Now, one to one, even one to ten, its no contest, Boss kicks the crap out of them.  The problem is, they started organising, banding together for common goals; and they found themselves a leader. A defector from our side, dissatisfied with the role he had been given.

"Lucifer?" Mike asked.

"That’s one of his names, yes. He was, we were close.  Time was, we fought side by side.  Now, whenever I see him, we cant have a civil word of conversation.

"You still see each other?"

"Sure, it’s oh so very civilised these days, treaties, zones of control, spheres of influence.  Every year we meet to negotiate, Gabe handles most of that end of the business I just provide the muscle.  You see Michelle, Lucifer wasn’t content with being a member of the staff; he thought he could manage the universe better than his creator. When he tried to ferment a revolt, he was put down, though it was a close thing.  Evil is, a messy word, but it’s the closest thing in your language to describe him now.  His one ambition is to see all that the Boss has worked for torn down.

"Why Michael?  What’s in it for God, why did he create us humans, what does he get out of it but frustration."

"You know, I asked him that once, he just replied ‘you expect me to give you the secrets of the universe on the first day.’"

"That’s no answer."

"Well it’s the only one you’re going to get.  I think, I just think, he was lonely. And wanted something to occupy his time."

"Well, your certainly making me feels important."

"You are, you may not like it, but you are, this war we fight, the victories are counted in souls, the life spark, the original piece of that first moment the Boss existed.  The side with the most at the end wins. Its not much more complicated than that.  You have a position Michelle that enables you to influence the lives and development of millions for the better, that’s and, if you’ll pardon the bad pun, a ‘hell’ of an important role to have.  That’s why my exceedingly valuable time is being spent putting you back on the strait and narrow."

"And it’s in your enemies’ best interests to stop us.  Is that what my fathers attack is, a power play by the competition."

"No, at least not directly, they’re opportunistic and they’ll take advantage of it, but we don’t believe they were responsible. It was all human. That Damn free will damn."

"That was a bad idea," Mike commented.

Was it? Without free will, their would be no human beings, and no souls.  If you can’t make your own mistakes, what’s the point of living?"

"You sure he’s going to be all right?"

"It will be a tough convalescence, and he may never again be the man you knew.  He’s going to need you to grow up in a hurry, but he will live to be a grandfather.  You have my word on that.

"Well I’m happy to know he’s going to reach a hundred and fifty."

"Not quite Michelle" said Michael, grinning.

"A hundred and twenty?" Mike asked pleadingly

"You wash up now Michelle.  Sort yourself out.  I’ll be back if anything else of consequence happens.

"Why didn’t you warn me?  Why didn’t you see this coming, and save him?"

"We can’t save everyone Michelle?"

"You should try."

"I know," responded Michael the Archangel sadly.

After the Archangel disappeared in a flash of light, Mike was left alone in the female surgeon’s shower facility.  Her coat had protected her from most of it; but her dress was a loss, and her face and hands were covered in blood. Whether it was Jack Conklin’s or her fathers she didn’t know.  Feeling dirty all of the sudden, she stripped off her dress, panties, and bra; and stepped into the shower.  The soap was industrial strength disinfectant and left an unsettling chemical odor behind, but it scrubbed off the dried blood quite well.  After several minutes standing under the pounding hot water, Mike was starting to feel cleaner and better, though her tummy ache had, if anything, gotten worse, and now was accompanied by a headache from the day’s stress.  All Mike wanted to do was curl up in a blanket and its artificial safety, for as long as she could manage.  But she knew, that with her father incapacitated, the executive decisions for Lane Incorporated, at least for the foreseeable future, would now have to be made by her. After turning off the water, Mike was surprised to see she had missed some blood, though how it had gotten down there she didn’t know.  After turning the water back on to wash it off, she was hit by another cramp of the tummy ache, and then made a shocking realization.

It wasn’t a tummy ache

And it wasn’t someone else’s blood

Mike was experiencing her first period.

Falling to the shower floor, with the scalding water still hammering into her, Mike collapsed emotionally.  She had seen her father and her close friend brutally shot, her company under attack, told she would play a pivotal role in the fight against the forces of Satan, and the cherry on top of the ice cream was that her cherry chose now to start leaking.

"Merry Fucking Christmas," said Mike to herself and to the world

Werner, one of the female guards, came in eventually, to check on Mike and found her still in the shower. Understanding that her ward was in shock she got Mike out of the shower stall, and into the dressing area while drying her off with a towel. Mike’s skin was beet red from the punishment, and she numbly changed into the scrubs the guard held out for her. Trying to form coherent words the guard calmly held her while Mike took her time.

"Its all right sweetie, I wont let them get you. Assuming they get past Vercetti anyway, he’s pissed right now."

"What …..what’s your name?"

"Mary Werner," the thirty something blond replied.

"I should probably have known your name."

"It s all right, I’ve only been on your detail a short time."

"Mary?"

"Yes?"

"I--, My--, I need…, I… period." Mike blurted out like it was a dirty word, which in the terms of the conversation it was.

"Oh, did you just start?"

Mike nodded her head.

"Well this is a hospital, I should be able to find some tampons, how is the flow?"

"What," Mike asked confused.

"Light or heavy flow dear."

"Light I suppose."

"Right, just wait here, Ill be back soon, and don’t worry, I wont let the men outside know why."

"Thank you, I, … thank you"

"Its all right Miss Lane, We all kind of like you, and want to look out for you.  You don’t have any idea how rare that is in our job."

"Thanks"

"Hold your legs together, I’ll be right back. Oh, maybe this will make you feel a little better, Mr Conklin was picked up by an ambulance after we drove off.  He got taken to a different hospital; but they think he’s going to make it"

Oddly enough that did make her feel better.

 

Susan Lane’s determination not to step on any toes, lasted approximately the amount of time it took her and Vercetti to enter the operating room her husband was in.  No one questioned her entrance; she looked for all the world the senior surgeon she was.  Susan saw that the surgeon operating on her husband was skilled, and that he most likely would have been fine.  But Susan Lane was far better than just "skilled" and she had a better chance of saving her husband.

"Excuse me Doctor." Susan interrupted.

"Yes, who are you?  I don’t like being interrupted while holding other people’s vital organs, I consider it rude."

"I apologise, I’m Doctor Susan Lane Chief of Surgery and full professor of the Spruce Harbour Vermont General Hospital.

"Doctor, Lane is it, my god, any relation to this man here," said the doctor as he continued about his work.

"He’s my husband?" Susan replied self-assuredly.

"And any relation to the Doctor Susan Lane of St. Johns Medical Center who wrote, ’On Heart Valve Replacement:  Myths and Marvels for Teaching Transplant Surgery.’ For the New England Journal of Medicine?"

"I was hoping my attempt at adding drama to my annals paper would have been forgotten."

"Not by me," replied the doctor as he nodded to the chief nurse who returned it. "I suppose you’ve scrubbed up properly."

"Of course," replied Susan

"Then it would be a shame to waste your talents, mine I know, are at best mediocre in comparison."

"I wouldn’t say that," Susan started.

"No you wouldn’t, I don’t believe you are licensed to practice in this state so of course I cant allow you in the room, to be listed on the chart for insurance purposes or on the hospital recorder.  Nurse Flanagan."

Kick!

"Thank you Nurse Flanagan" replied the doctor as he glanced at the closed circuit TV cutting out. "Doctor Lane you may proceed." 

 "Might I have your name doctor?" asked Dr. Lane

"Certainly, this has the making of a most interesting paper we could right together.  Ben Pierce, though you’ll have to excuse me for not shaking your hand." replied Pierce as he removed the two gloved hands covered in John Lanes blood.

"Dr Pierce this could be the beginning of a beautiful friendship" replied Dr. Lane as she moved in to take over.

The surgery lasted most of Christmas day and partway into the next. Eventually, even on Christmas, there were other operations; and the shower room was needed.  Werner objected, but Mike said it was quite all right, picked up her things; and the group found a family waiting room in which to wait for word.  It was a humbling experience for Mike, as if she needed another.  Still surrounded by nine guards, and for all intents and purposes now total ruler of 35 billion dollars and 150,000 employees spread out across six continents, she still had to sip the raw sewage euphemistically called coffee; and sit in cheap yellow plastic seats, like any other human being.  Mike noticed a young Asian man of about 25.  He was extremely nervous and moving back and forth in his chair. When any hospital employee walked near the waiting area, he would jump out of his chair, but he would look crestfallen when they continued on their way.  After the last exercise in futility, the man caught Mike looking at him, and smiled miserably.

"Its my wife and baby you see," he offered by way of explanation. "Its three months early, they said, I couldn’t be part of the delivery, and the baby must immediately go into the incubator."

"I’m sure it will be all right sir, I was born premature myself, I spent a month in the incubator, and I turned out fine, and that was over twenty years ago."

"Yes," he replied nodding his had again and again, "that’s what they told me, but, it’s our first child, and …I love her you see."

"I can tell."

"What are you waiting for?"

"My father, he had…an attack. My moms a doctor and she’s in there with him, she’s the best."

"And they," asked the man curiously at the guards.

"They’re his employees, they look after the family."

"Your father must be an important man."

"He runs his own business and does fairly well at it."

"Me too, well," he admitted sheepishly. " Not the very well at it part.  I run a bookstore, used and new books.  It’s not much, just me and my wife operating out of a small store downtown, and living above it.  It was really starting to turn the corner, we developed a client base that doesn’t care for the Borders approach."

"I’m glad to hear that."

"You know what’s really funny, I forgot to lock the door in the rush here. But I can’t head back because the minute I do they might have word. I hope its still there when I get back."

"I’m sure it will be."

"Mr Lang?" asked a young man in green scrubs.

"Yes," Mr Lang replied hopefully.

"I’m sorry to tell you this but your wife died on the table, complications resulting from childbirth. We managed to save the baby, but its in the incubator, and you cant see it right now, nor for the immediate future, My advice to you Mr. Lang is to go home and get some rest.  You can call hospital information tomorrow for further updates and arrangements for your wife, I'm sorry for your loss," said the young doctor without a trace of sorrow, as he turned and walked away leaving Mr. Lang catatonic.

"Mary, Stop that….thing" ordered Mike as she got up to face him.

Mary not believing the scene for her self was quick to reply.

"Now what’s going on here?" the doctor asked unpleasantly.

"I could ask the same thing of you, what kind off half assed attempt at being a human being was that?"

"I don’t know what you’re talking about."

"Obviously, you just told a man in less then a paragraph that his entire life was now destroyed. His wife whom he loved is dead, his child whom you did not even inform him which gender it is, was sick, and possibly dying. Then you went on, without taking a breath telling him to call a minion in the morning, to ship his wife’s body out of here.  Do you know what I’m talking about now?"

"Now listen here you little bitch, I don’t like being told my business.  I just got off a 20 hour shift, working Christmas for god’s sake, and I’m sorry if I didn’t put on kid gloves to handle some chink.  I told him what he needed to know, and I did it as courteously as I could manage."

"And without a shred of compassion.  Have you any idea what he must be going through?"

"Little girl, I don’t particularly care, I want to go home, sleep, for four hours and be back here for the day shift.  I don’t have time for compassion, I’m a doctor not a priest," said the young doctor as he tried to turn around and leave, and was summarily stopped by four armed guards.

"What is your problem lady? You on the rag?"

"You," Mike replied coldly. "Ms Werner?"

"Yes Boss" she replied

"Take a memo,"

"Yes Boss."

"I want this man broken by the end of the day, use every favour we have, call in his medical school loans, have him evicted, reposes his car, have the IRS investigate him for tax fraud, the FBI for suspected terrorism, send in the investigative journalists and the opinion editors.  And inform chief of surgery Thomson that if he ever expects to see a dime from the foundation, that this, thing’s, services are no longer required.

"Who are you"?

"Michelle Lane Acting President of Lane Incorporated.

The young Doctors tired face was now filled with fear.

"I’m going to break you, in two pieces over my knee unless you go over there on your hands and knees; and beg for forgiveness from that man over there do you understand me, doctor?"

The Doctor whimpered.

"Nod your head if you understand"

The doctor nodded his head three times.

"Normally I would be more diplomatic about this, but my father is lying on a table with a gunshot wound, while people around the world are attacking my company and yes, for your information, I am on the rag, Now Go and BEG!" finished Mike harshly pointing toward Mr Lang.

The doctor went and begged. After about three minutes of the most profuse apology Mike had ever seen, the doctor looked over at her stern expression asking if it was enough.  Mike, tired of his presence, regally nodded her head and the doctor fled.  Mr. Lang was still in shock; he probably had heard only every other word of what the man was saying.  After the Doctor left, Mike sat down next to him, and wrapped him in a hug.

"I have a son," Mr Lang replied dazed after a few minutes of silence

"I don’t want you to worry about his future Mr. Lane.  My foundation has quite a fund set up for widows and orphans; and your family rates on both.  Your son is going to go to any college he can get into, free of charge to you."

"You don’t have to do that," replied Mr. Lang confused

"I’m a Lane, Its what we do.

A few hours later, perhaps tipped off by a fleeing junior surgeon, Dr Alan Thomson showed up with his son Philip in tow.  Mike was too tired to be embarrassed, and greeted their approach with a simple nod.

"I was just told Miss Lane, I’m deeply sorry."

"Why should you be sorry?  It’s not your fault," stated Mike.

"Yes, well, rest assured, the entire hospital would be utilised in saving your father." Thomson said assuring.

"Oh, I believe my mother has already presumed upon your hospitals hospitality and gone in herself to the OR."

"Is that where she is, I had wondered, I’m not sure I approve, if the insurance companies find out..."

"Lane Incorporated will see nothing happens to you or this hospital doctor, we look after our friends, or soon we don’t have any."

"Right, I’m going to scrub in myself, I brought Phil here to keep you company, I’ll leave you two alone."

With that, Dr. Thomson departed leaving behind two suddenly, and highly embarrassed young people.

"I assume," asked Mike after an uncomfortable silence. " That you didn’t tell your family about how the date went."

"I told my mom, not my dad," He replied murmuring.

"Me too, I’m sorry by the way.  I had never really been kissed by a guy like that, and when I realised I liked it, I just sort of panicked and hit my panic button by mistake."

"Well, I was afraid this" he replied showing his bruised lip "was because of my performance.  I’m glad you liked it, because I wont be up for an encore anytime soon."

"I’m sorry."

"Its all right," Phil replied with a grin, which caused him to wince in pain.

"I suppose you’ll want nothing to do with me after this?" Mike asked certain the potential suitor was discouraged.

"Now why would you think that?"

"The beating you received, the very real possibility that dating me could cause people to attack you, like they did my father, and those are just the top two reasons I can think off the top of my head.  Give me time and I will come up with more."

"And are there any reasons why I should stick around you."

"I can’t think of any."

"Than please milady allow me," said Phil with a laugh, grin and another wince. "Your beautiful"

"Am not," Mike protested.

"Intelligent," Phil continued.

"I flunked, out of ten different schools."

"Brave, and not afraid to put wrong doers in their place, I heard what you said to that ass Buxton."

"How?"

"Hospital close circuit TV, when dad got the complaint call he keyed up the digital tape on his home system. Quite a show. We clapped, its what convinced me to come here."

"I’m having my period, it’s the hormones you know."

"Unneeded information at this point, but moving on.  Beautiful, intelligent, brave and vindictive, oh yea, the obvious, filthy rich, It’s something I look for in all my girls, I expect to be well kept, and your fortune will allow me to live in the lifestyle I can become accustomed to, quite easily.

Only the fact that he was smiling, despite the pain stopped Mike from having him pistol whipped for a second time.

"Its not safe being near me, you should know as well as anybody, I need my own Praetorian guard, for Christ’s sake."

"Let me decide for myself what is safe, I’m a big boy, I can look after myself."

"You’re an annoying and persistent boyfriend.   I’ll grant you that, temporary, provisional and subject to congressional approval, just hold me for a while and serve a useful purpose."

"Aye aye, Ma’am."

"Miss Lane," interrupted Dr. Thomson some hours later. "I just left the OR, your fathers going to be fine."

‘You’re an Angel Michael.’ Mike thought to herself.

Mike allowed herself six uninterrupted hours of sleep, a full breakfast of sausage, eggs, pancakes, orange juice, and tea.  Dressed herself in an expensive, but conservative business suit; and, then she went to war.

There wasn’t the time to fly out to New York, so she took control of the companies offices in the First National Bank of Omaha Tower, the fight would be led from here.  There was a little reluctance on the part of the staff to allow her entrance; Mike wasn’t a well-known fixture at the small Omaha division office, even after living there for six months.  She mentally kicked herself for not shaping up earlier but resolved to carry forth.  After suitable, convincing, by the security detail Mike was allowed entrance to the executive office, outfitted for the president whenever he, and now she, was in town.  The banks of computers and TV screens were linked to the company mainframe via satellite and landline both; and was a communication center that rivalled some military setups.  And just like military commands around the world, there was a bit of confusion and insubordination over the transfer of command.

"Miss Lane," Harry Kemp began from the videophone.

"Madame Vice President, Mr Kemp," Mike corrected him.

"Yes, of course, but that’s really immaterial, Madame Vice President.  With your father incapacitated its tantamount to his death, and his will clearly states the board of directors would manage the company for a period of five years, at which point they would judge your suitability for the Chairmanship."

"Chairpersonship"

"Yes, of course, you Miss Lane, your father doesn’t think you’re ready for the responsibility; and I have to, with all respect, agree with him, my girl your only 21."

"Alexander had a good start and conquering the world at that age."

"You, Miss Lane, " said Harry Kemp mockingly, "Are not Alexander the Great.

"Yes, of course" replied Mike making sport of Kemps mannerisms. "He failed."

"Now listen my dear.  You have no power over the company. We will, of course, as a matter of courtesy, keep you informed in a general sense; but I’ll thank you not to barge into district office, like you have a say in things, now turn over control to the man you shoved aside, and head back to school like a good little girl.

"Suppose I say my father told me he thought I was ready to take over, that would render your stewardship invalid."

"What he may, or may not have told you, is immaterial.  We have only have your word for it.  I’m afraid I must comply with his last written instructions. Don’t be so competitive Miss Lane, we know what were doing here in New York it isn’t the sticks"

"And just what exactly have you done to combat the attack on our company.

"Were not at all convinced its is an attack.  Frankly, we feel your father was overreacting to a miner change in the market’s direction."

"Is this your final say then Mr Kemp; you will not allow me to assume control during my fathers incapacity, nor do anything to defend your company?"

"I’m afraid it is Miss Lane. I have a fiduciary responsibility to look after your interests, whether you believe it or not; it means keeping you away from adults business at this time.

"Your final decision Mr Kemp.

"Yes it is."

"Very well then Mr. Kemp your fired."

"Now your just being silly, a spoiled brat throwing a tantrum, as I’ve tried to explain to you…."

"What you believe is immaterial at this point. My father trusted me enough to give me the omega code, the secret pass code which releases every computer and device in the Lane incorporated system and more importantly locks out mutinous scum like you from doing any harm."

"Now listen here."

"I hope you enjoy the quiet, because even if you continue under the mistaken belief that you are still employed by Lane Incorporated, your computers will not turn on, your phones wont ring, your faxes wont send.  Indeed, in one hour all the doors of Lane Towers will be locked, and anyone still left inside will be trapped."

"You can’t!!

"I gave the order right about the time you mentioned fiduciary responsibility, you should be getting complaints in a few seconds or so.  Shutting down the corporate headquarters will put a cramp in my effectiveness; but it couldn’t be helped, I had to be certain my orders would be followed and not interfered with."

"You little….."

"Oh and Mr Kemp, if that is company cigar your holding in your hand I’ll thank you to put it back in the box, and we will be counting the pens and staplers after you leave.  Good day."  Finished Mike, as she cut off the videoconference.

In a crisis situation, it has been well documented; people will follow just about any orders, no mater where they originate, as long as those orders are clear, logical, and above all loud.  Mike wouldn’t admit exactly that she went about the day like a reincarnated Marine Drill Sergeant, but she did borrow heavily from Gunnery Sergeant Hartman of "Full metal Jacket."

 It was quite clear that the assault was originated in the United States; while some of the overseas interests were affected the biggest hits were American.  The whole thing appeared to Mike as though it were a smash and grab job, writ large. The companies core divisions were protected; because it was a private company; but almost 60% of the divisions were not, and someone was trying to strip them off.  Nothing physical happened, for the most part, the conflict was entirely physiological.  The biggest example was Fanfare Investments the investment and venture capital bank, which also held all the companies’ retirement plan.  A slew of articles were published from the Wall Street Journal to the Financial Times stating Fanfare had overextended itself, that it had made a long string of bad investments, and several large loans had defaulted.  Nothing of the sort had happened, and Mike was curious how those normally meticulous institutions, had failed to double check the source of their information, but it didn’t matter.  The word was out. Extra fear was generated by the 401K plans that were those banks single largest depositor.  A hundred and fifty thousand peoples people’s retirement plans from custodian to mutinous board of directors.  Due to recent sensitivity, any problem, however minor or imagined, in a retirement plan, set off an avalanche of withdrawals.

Mike couldn’t really blame them for their disloyalty.  They didn’t understand the full situation, and were worrying about the rest of their lives.  The psychological damage became all too real, all to soon.  Millions then hundreds of millions started flowing out, and it became a self propitiating prophecy, as Fanfare sold off its assets to cover withdrawals. It was a 21-century-old fashioned bank run.  And Wall Street smelled blood.  When trading stopped on the 24th, the shares were at a healthy $56.78 When Mike came to the office they were at $49.09. They were now at $23.25.  The Stock had been sold short, spectacularly so, and the attackers had only used the profits from the short selling to short even more, and eventually they would start buying back at rock bottom prices to seize control. Normally the SEC wouldn’t allow any company to purchase more than five percent of a companies stock. But that was the beauty of the consortium, many companies in no way connected on paper all acting together like they were the robber barons of old. Old Man Lane would have approved, but his descendent wasn’t liking it one bit. Mike had to beat them to the punch. Lane owned outright 34%, the largest stake, and while not a majority, insured that six seats and the chairmanship went to Lane appointees.  If the attackers could marshal 50.0001% they could block the companies every endeavour.  Mike solved the immediate problem of Fanfare by placing a buy order for 40 million shares of FanfareIVCB. Normally Lane wouldn’t be able to buy more than five percent either but John was a boy scout and he always liked to be prepared. Contingency papers were already filed.  At $24, Fanfare was ridiculously under priced, and Mike took advantage of the situation; both to halt the run, and to gain a solid majority of the companies stock, and to get a bargain at the same time.  The only problem was, in order to buy those 40 million shares, Mike had to use almost a Billion dollars of the company’s cash.  Which left her frighteningly little for other divisions under attack.  Mike had to perform triage, the investment bank held the nest eggs of all her people and enabled the companies to expand into a myriad of industries

Fanfare’s President, James Nelson, was technically an independent executive before the recent unpleasantness, but he shed all pretensions when he called to thank Mike.

"Thank you Madame President." Mr Nelson started to say gratefully

"You Mr. Nelson, I will allow to call me Miss Lane, or perhaps even Michelle.

  "I wouldn’t presume Miss Lane, I just called to thank you for the bail out. It came out of nowhere."

"It was an attack upon us Mr Nelson. All of our publicly traded divisions are under assault, you held my employees money, and I couldn’t see you fail, or fall into anyone else’s hands."

"Well, I understand your reasoning, but it must have cost."

"Much," Mike agreed.

"I’m sorry,"

"Why should you be sorry, it’s not your fault?"

"Yes, well, about that, I feel now, since you’re my superior, in fact, as well as in practice, that I should bring something to your attention.  Last week I was approached by a consortium of individual’s to…well, to aid them in an attack on your company.  To yield certain privileged information to them.  I refused of course, your family has always been good to me, and I sent off a report to your commercial intelligence unit."

"I never heard anything about it, and I bet neither did my father."

"Yes, in hindsight I should have brought this matter directly to your father’s attention."

"Yes you should of."

"I’m afraid you have a mole in your company Madame President."

"I’m afraid you’re right, please resend the report directly to this office as soon as you can, that is all Mr. Nelson

"Thank you Ma’am."

"WERNER!" Mike yelled outside her office

"Yes ma’am."

"Ready my plane for flight to New York, we’ve done all we can for the time being were going mole hunting"

"Yes ma’am.

Finding the mole, and the person behind the attacks, was rather simple; but in hindsight rather stupid.  Mike didn’t hit herself over the head too much, as she was only an amateur at this.  Approaching the commercial intelligence center at 10:00pm that night Mike made sure that all its employees were waiting for her.  Letting it be known she felt completely safe at the center of her empires security system, she dispatched her guards, and dealt with the assembled analysts alone.  She informed them all, that she was on the whole pleased with their work, but there had been a spy in their midst for some time, and the group before her must now ferret out that spy.  Mike herself would remain on the premises, annexing an office to perform research on her own. Please get to work, their president was counting on them.

It took about an hour for the mole to enter Mike’s office with a drawn gun.

"You know bitch, I thought you Lanes were smart, but no, you just walk in here and think you’re the queen of creation. Well your not.  I just sent everyone else home on your orders, and we’re going to wait here for the boss to arrive. You dumb shit!"

"Lower your weapon and you won’t be harmed I promise you."

"Just be quite, dumb kid," he said shaking his head.

"I can make it worth your while," Mike countered.

"I’m already a rich man from the years I've been inside your company, and there is ten million in escrow waiting to be released to me in Switzerland after your gone.  I’ll take the money that’s guaranteed over Lane promises any day."

"What did we ever do to you anyway?"

"You exist," the mole explained as he lifted his gun up again.

Eventually the man’s superior arrived.  Mike felt like she should have recognised him, even though she had never laid eyes on him before.  Eventually Mike understood, this was because he looked remarkably like her father.

"Hello Michelle" the men began "You can go now Leon," he nodded to the mole.

"Do you want the gun?"

"With her, I hardly think I’ll need it."

"Yes sir," said the Mole as he left

"I must say, I expected better of you. Going off in a half cocked rage, your father should have taught you better."

"Who are you," Mike demanded.

"Me, didn’t you notice the family resemblance, I’m Walter Lane. Your cousin, several branches removed of course."

"I don’t have any cousins."

"So sure are you, I’m the legitimate descendant carefully documented of course, of Thomas Lane. Five Generations ago, your great-great-great-grandfather, and mine, had two sons; but he had seen his brothers attack him over the family fortune, so he sent my ancestor away to an orphanage and kept yours.  Your side of the family kept this tradition, so you thought you were the only heir, and conveniently forgot about my side.  So would I, actually, but several years ago I was approached by a consortium that had got the bad end of certain deals of both your father and your grandfather.  They had spent millions researching your company, your family and its weakness, and they had found me. They actually originally approached my brother; but he met with an accident."

"Kept your side of the families traditions too didn’t you"

"Of course, I’m glad you approve, there were actually about a dozen people who had better claims than me for your fortune; but they met with similar accidents as well.  And so would you have, had not that guard of yours been so effective.  Then I would have presented myself to the estate as the nearest relative and inherited the business.  In exchange for the consortium to dispose of the necessary people, I would in the confusion provided by your families death and ‘unstable market conditions’ they provided, be forced to sell off most of the divisions of Lane Incorporated to the consortium.  After its all done, I would still be left with Billions.   I’m not so ambitious as you."

"And what about all the employees, people that have worked for us for years."

"What have they ever done for me?  Now your father and mother will be dealt with in good time; but you my dear, will have met with an unfortunate rape and murder in the cold streets of New York.  But don’t worry, its not incest five levels of consanguinity doesn’t really count". the Pretender added gleefully.

"There’s just one thing you have forgotten" Mike brought up defiantly

"Oh, and what’s that," the Pretender asked feeling ambivalent.

"Bond"

"Bonds?"

"James Bond, you obviously haven’t seen any Bond films, otherwise you would have known the villain never explains it all to the victim, and never leaves himself alone unless he is sure he can handle the victim alone. You just couldn’t resist coming and showing me up personally, could you?"

"I can handle you, I was All-State football and wrestling," he sneered

"So sure are you?, Captain Jack Conklin, whom you had shot with a sniper, was a marine, he didn’t really care for the army. He told me once. ‘You know how the army smokes out a sniper; they send out the new guy and wait till he gets shot.  They thought that one up at WestPoint.’  Well I really had no better way of finding the mole fast, than presenting myself as a target.  My security detail had fits when I suggested it to them, but I overruled them.  Hopefully Captain Jack will forgive me for acting like the Army."

Crash!

Bang! Bagg! Bang!

Thud

"What’s that!" The pretender asked terrified

"That? Well, that’s about fifty of my security detail, loyal to me, crashing in and taking out whomever you brought with you, they have been listening in to the recording I made of this conversation."

"What!" screamed  the pretender, as he turned to leave.

"Don’t run Mr. Lane" said Mike, as she brought up her gun. "I don’t really want to kill you."

"You can’t do this, You’re not the cops. You cant go around killing people, its against the law."

"A fine time for you to be worrying about the niceties of the law."

"FUCK YOU" the Pretender screamed, as he charged for her desk, perhaps thinking, being an All-State football player meant he was faster than a speeding bullet.

Then Mike fired her gun.

The bullet impacted in the stomach and drove Walter Lane to the floor.  Mike knew stomach wounds were just about the worst a person could receive.  It would take him hours to die.

"But?" He asked pleading, "your just a girl?"

Mike could not feel pity for the man who had harmed her family, and killed most of his own family in cold blood.  But she was not entirely with out shame, and decided to end his suffering quickly.

"Goodbye Mr. Lane" Michelle Lois Lane said unemotionally as she fired a second bullet into his head.

Eventually things returned to normal. John Lane recovered enough to be brought up to speed. Mike hid nothing from him. John said he was proud of her; but sad that she had to do what had to be done.  Mike agreed.  Soon enough, spring classes came, and while Mike had managed a now 40 Billion-dollar company for a month.  (Certain Lane held stock had suddenly and mysteriously risen in value), she still had not received her bachelor’s degree in economics, and still wanted a chance at a normal life, if only for a few more months.  Her father had readily agreed, there was time enough for adulthood after graduation.

Mike went back to Omaha into the arms of Phil Thomson, who had a healthy respect for Mikes guard detail, but still managed to help her sneak away a few nights a week.  Cindy Watson had proven a remarkable new friend by putting on a brunette wig and spending time watching movies in Mike’s apartment.  Soon enough the dating got serious, and serious became sexual.  Mikes first time was a wonderful experience, and the sensations of sex as a woman with her man were better then anything she had experience before.  The two quickly fell in love, and jokingly considered marriage after Phil graduated med school, some three years away, which would give them plenty of time to try each other on for size. Though Mike was having second thoughts about being a navy wife.  The only negative aspect of her life was that  the archangel had not shown up for her thirty-day check up, or the month after that, or the month after that.  Mike was left with the impression that she was no longer one of the Archangels cases because of what she had done in New York to Walter.

Mike sunk deep into a depression that even Phil could not lift her from.  She even briefly considered suicide.  But her hand was stayed, with fairly reliable every day evidence that there was an afterlife, Mike wasn’t willing to enter it, until she was sure where she was going.  Other people could be redeemed, and so could she. Mike devoted herself to every good cause she could think of, and was just about content never to see her guardian archangel again, when he showed up.

Mike was taking some much-needed rest, sunbathing in a bikini on her apartment roof, when she turned over to grab her drink and saw Michael.  He was lying back on a similar beach chair and towel, with his ludicrous green swim trunks, paisley Hawaiian shirt, sunglasses, and straw hat while sipping a mai tai. And he had a very contented look on his face.

"Now this is the life," Michael said with a sigh.  "Wish I got sent down more often, though I kind of miss the effect of the ocean. Forth story downtown isn’t exactly my idea of paradise. Do you mind?" asked Michael who then snapped his fingers.  With a flash of white light Mike was now on a tropical beach, due to the sunrise over the horizon at what should have been mid-afternoon, Mike assume she was now in Hawaii."

"Better," commented Michael.

"Does this mean I’m forgiven?" Mike asked laughing at the angelic high jinks.

"Forgiven? Oh, you mean about that snot nosed punk kid you did in, don’t you worry about him, I checked all the lists. He was always playing for the other side, in more ways than one."

"But when you didn’t show up for the thirty day follow up I assumed…."

"Well I’m sorry to burst your bubble young lady but your not the center of the Universe.   I got other cases too you know, a whole big pile of them on my desk, lots of other people like you that needed straightening out. I looked down and saw you were doing fine, check up enough for me."

"But you let me think I had screwed up, that I was going to hell!"

"I can’t help what you think," said Michael apologetically. "Free will remember?"

"Still you could have dropped a note or something."

 "I was pretty busy Michelle, this is the first time I’ve had a break in months, I choose to spend it with you; and you jump down my throat.  Christ!, talk about ungrateful.  Not you kid, sorry to bother you again."

"How are things going" Mike asked concerned

"SSDD, same shit, different deity, some of these punks have really been getting ambitions. There’s this operation in Oklahoma we’ve been keeping our eyes on. Then we had a minor godling on Crilon start a plague ‘just to see what it would be like’ he’s now imprisoned in a place far worse than you can imagine."

"Crilon, where’s that?"

"Oh, about a hundred and seventy light years that way. " replied Michael with a wave toward the sky.

"Another planet?!"

"Sure how many times have I told you, you aint the center of the universe, Earth isn’t the Bosses only project you know," said Michael condescendingly

"Well, will we ever meet them?"

"You’ll get around to them someday; and others will get around to you.  I’m kind of interested to see how it turns out myself. A species’ greatest test is what happens when they meet another that is just as smart as they.  Tell you; we’ve been making bets upstairs."

"How’s the bookmaking?"

"Even money you blast them, they blast you."

"No middle ground?"

"It’s a suckers bet, but there were a few takers, myself included, I guess I have a higher opinion of the human race than most of my people."

"Why is that?"

"You guys got the best TV. Which reminds me, I’m off to Hollywood, John Travolta is about to be offered an Oscar winning script, his biggest hit in years, I just want to make sure things go according to plan"

"Hey what do you have against John Travolta, " Mike asked confused.

Michael the Archangel the chosen champion of the Lord scowled and the raised an eyebrow at Mike.

"Oh" Mike said understanding. "Right, I remember that one now."

"Be seeing ya around kid" finished Michael as he and his chair disappeared in a flash of white light.

Michelle Lane sat back on her chair and smiled, fully content for the first time in months, while she watched the Hawaiian sunrise.  It took her about ten seconds to come to a sudden realization.

"HEY YOU ASSHOLE! HOW DO I GET BACK?" she screamed at the sky.

 

"Explain to me again how you ended up on Hawaii, with just a beach towel and a bathing suit," asked a slightly concerned Phil, as he picked his girlfriend up from the airport.

"Don’t ask," was all that she could say.

The End

 

Well people there it is, I’m considering making the "Archangel files" an ongoing series. More than considering actually since I have about 25,000 words of part two already written. If you think this is a good idea, or a incredibly bad one please post a review and tell me. I wont continue to write if I think no on reads. And I wont get any better unless people tell me how full of it I am.

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since 05/05/03