They flew in just beneath the cloud cover, approaching the Renaissance Regency Hotel And Convention Center from the south. It was a bright and sunny day; the previous night’s rain and thunderclouds were nowhere to be seen, and the windows and rooftops of Boston were already drying off. The Fangirl’s propulsion system whined and hummed, the warp nacelles giving off a sharp-tinged keening sound as the car sped through the atmosphere, no doubt giving some poor Air Traffic Controller somewhere a heart attack . . . if, that is, she hadn’t been in Stealth Mode, which thankfully, Misto had been wise enough to activate before they had ascended into the clouds back at Martha’s Vineyard. Yes, it was a fantastic day on which to attend con . . . and Dizzy had resolved that nothing was going to ruin it for her.

“Hey Misto,” she said. “Isn’t there supposed to be a Firefly cast reunion panel this year?”

“Yup,” he said, as he worked the controls. “And JMS is supposed to talk about those rumors of a B5 reboot.”

“Don’t they talk about a B5 reboot every year these days?”

“Well, yeah, but this time they say it’s really happening. There’s also talk of a Netflix Original Doctor Horrible series. Joss Whedon is going to show the pitch trailer for it in Exhibit Hall B — -tonight, in fact!”

“Wow, that’ll be something. I wonder if we’ll ever see another shot at another Firefly series?”

“Don’t hold your breath, dear Diz,” chuckled Misto. “That ship has sailed, if you ask me.”

“Oh! What about Penn and Teller! I hear they’re coming as Rebo and Zooty this year!”

Misto smiled and nodded. “They are indeed. I just heard about that myself this morning. I can’t wait to see them. You can be sure that auditorium will be packed with B5 fans, and Penn and Teller fans. And there’s gonna be some huge B5 fandom virgin baptism and conversion going on there. I’m so there. I booked us two tickets to the show. Yes, you had to get tickets to it. And yes, I knew you’d be so scatterbrained with getting ready that you wouldn’t remember to order yourself one, so I booked us a pair. See how kind and thoughtful I am? You’re welcome.”

She leaned over and hugged him. “I love you, Misto.”

“Likewise, Diz,” he said. “But I still think it’s a bad idea . . . bringing the . . . well, the you-know-what with us in the trunk.”

“Eh, it’s locked in a safe inside another safe, both with security alarms on them, which connect back to my Apple Watch, and those safes are inside a kinetic force-field, and all of that is locked inside the trunk of the car. Which is protected by its own security measures designed by yours truly. This is the best way to ensure it doesn’t fall into Ravenkroft’s hands. Or anyone else’s. I mean, c’mon . . . it’s the last place he’ll think to look, right? And even if he does . . . it’s protected. And you have to know the access codes to get past the security measures, and you have to have this.” She held up her watch. “And this ain’t comin’ off unless I’m dead, skeeziks.”

Misto sighed. “Yeah, that’s the part that kinda worries me, Diz. And the Evangeliojaeger . . . you’re not wearing it right now, and I’m worried there’ll be a problem with deployment if you need it . . .”

“Oh, quit it,” she said, and smacked his shoulder. “You worry too much. This is con, Misto! We only come here once a frakkin’ year! Enjoy it!”

He sighed again. “Coraline loved con. We went every year, too. You remember.”

“I do,” said Dizzy, nodding. “I do.” She squeezed his shoulder.

“We made so many memories together, she and I. I miss her so much at times like this. Oh well. Maybe I’ll meet someone new here this year. You never know. Maybe I’ll. drown my reminiscent sorrows in the eyes of some cute cosplayer whose last name I don’t know or can’t remember because of the Aftershock or the Tullamore Don’t.”

“That’s the spirit!” said Dizzy, and grinned at him. “Plus, in your Thanos costume, I’m sure you’ll be a big hit with the ladies.”

“The womenfolk do tend to love the rippling man-flesh.”

“Aye, we do,” she replied. “Ah, we’re here. Set ‘er down right about . . . there. On the roof of the parking garage. Nobody parks there because everybody thinks those spaces suck. Well, more for us.”

“Roger-roger that, Diz,” said Misto. He pushed in on the steering wheel and adjusted the other flight controls, and the Fangirl descended toward the Renaissance Regency Hotel And Convention Center’s enormous parking garage, just across the street from the main buildings. A steady stream of people were walking from it into the main hotel entrance; all sorts of costumed con-goers were milling about near there; others hung out on the balconies of their hotel rooms, and still others were splashing around in the hotel’s large, enclosed pool area. The hotel’s large main courtyard, which the main buildings encircled like a fortress, was presently home to a miniature Renaissance Faire put on by the Society for Creative Anachronisms. Pennants and banners waved in the air and courtly men and women in their finest medieval dress bowed and danced, and wandered from vendor to vendor, to stage performance to stage performance; in the center of it all, an actual joust was just now taking place on actual horseback, with real wooden lances.

The story has been taken without consent; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

Damn, those dudes are seriously professionals, thought Dizzy. She also caught a glimpse of a cadre of Furries headed into the con, just by the front door. They wore animal mascot costumes and other anthropomorphic animal paraphernalia. Four cats, three wolves, two squirrels, a panda, and a skunk, all in various stages of costumed-adaption to their animal persona; one wore a full animal costume; another just whiskers, a nose, the furry arms and legs, and other suggestions of her animal form; yet another, just the ears and facial makeup and the tail. But all three were definitely Furries. Dizzy could spot them at a glance. They were an eccentric bunch, yeah, but hey, everybody had their own thing . . . and if identifying with (and as) animals was their thing, then who the frak was she to judge? Nope, that was right — nobody. Besides. Misto was a freakin’ werewolf. So what did that make him besides a real life Furry?

She herself had dressed as Lister, from the hit British science fiction series, Red Dwarf: Black leather pants, black combat boots with chains around the ankles, a black polo shirt, a pink bandana tied around one sleeve of a black leather jacket that had irreverent patches, inflammatory buttons, and a few offensive stickers adorning its every surface — where there weren’t spikes and chains — and a winking yellow happy-face button attached to the sleeve bearing the pink bandana. Weighted down with counterculture bling, and she didn’t mind one bit. If there were any Mundanes lurking about the con — and she sincerely hoped there were — they would be well and duly freaked if they stopped to read the tiny print on some of her choices. Well, good for them. Mundanes needed a good freaking now and then.

They hovered over the parking garage’s roof, and Misto extended the ground-driving wheels. They folded down and locked into place. Then he cycled down the Repulsivators, and the car gradually descended toward the concrete, which cracked a little as soon as the output from the Repulsivators touched it. Then, he shut them off. The car fell about a meter, and bounced on the tires and shocks.

“Woot!” said Dizzy. “Another perfect landing! You sir, are the man.”

“No, if I was ‘The Man,’ things would be a lot better in this country for black people.”

“Oh, well, I just meant — ”

He smiled at her. “Well, they would, if I was The Man. But I appreciate the compliment nonetheless, Diz. Y’know, I’m thinking of actually taking actual flying lessons. With what I’ve learned flying this thing, I’d have my license in no time.”

“Aye, thou wouldst indeed,” said Dizzy. “Now then. Art thou ready to rumble?”

“Aye. Let’s do it.” He grinned and got out of the driver’s seat and went around to the trunk of the car. It was hard for her to wait patiently while he opened the trunk and retrieved her custom-designed, alluzinium-made, Cybertronian mech-wheelchair. It came all compacted up into a box-shaped configuration, with two large, segmented wheels on either side. Those could be further broken down into other components, but for now they were wheels. Dizzy watched in the rearview mirror as he set it down on the ground in front of him. “Alright Diz,” he said. “Take it away.”

“Accio wheelchair!” said Dizzy. The cortical implant in her ear picked up the sound, and transmitted it to the wheelchair. The squarish box of metal on the ground in front of Misto leapt into life. The wheels spun, and the other components rearranged themselves, spinning and whirling, sliding and locking and unlocking into place, the motors and gears and wheels inside it all clicking, whirring, humming, and grinding as it unfolded into a comfortable — if somewhat ungainly and mechanical-looking — motorized wheelchair that now turned itself around, rolled around the corner, and came to where Dizzy sat, waiting, with her (gods-damned useless!) legs dangling outside the car’s passenger-side door.

“Nice work,” said Misto, coming around to see. “Nice work indeed, Diz.”

“Have I mentioned that Iron Man is my hero?” she said, smiling up at him.

“You might’ve brought it up a few times,” he said. “C’mon, I’ll help you up.”

He helped her into the wheelchair, and once she was settled into it, she placed the motorcycle helmet onto her head and mentally told the wheelchair to turn and move forward. It did so, rolling on ahead of Misto, who shut the car door behind them. She blinked, and sent another mental command, and a kinetic force-field went up around the Fangirl, and then the cloaking device engaged; she smiled as she saw Misto look back over his shoulder to check that it was working. She didn’t need to; she knew what she would see: The car, gradually fading from view into translucency and then a blur, and then total invisibility as it bled into its surroundings and vanished from sight.

“You know that thing isn’t stable,” he warned her. “The cloaking device, I mean. We could wind up with a Philadelphia, 1943 situation on our hands.”

“Yeah I know,” she said. “But if anybody is rootin’-tootin’ stupid enough to actually try and breach that frakkin’ force-field once they’ve bumped into it and know that it’s there — and nobody is going to be able to succeed anyway without sending the access code first — then they pretty much deserve to get partially welded to the concrete floor, or fall halfway through it and get stuck . . . wouldn’t you agree, el compadre?”

“Well, yeah, you kinda have a point, as usual,” he said. “Damn, thinking of the Philadelphia Experiment made me want a Philly cheesesteak. I wonder if the hotel cafeteria is open right now.”

“Can you not think of food for eight seconds?”

“I can, I just don’t want to.”

“C’mon. Let’s get our name badges and head to the registration desk.”

“Aye-aye, Captain Quirk.”