Chapter 330: Archangel Michael with the Police, FBI and Lifeguards

Thursday, April 5, 2007 (Continued)

I was flying toward downtown LA's tallest skyscraper, the 1,017-foot Library Tower, intending to start a press conference on its helicopter pad. It was about fifteen miles from the pier to the CBD (Central Business District; a.k.a. downtown), and I was flying it at about eight hundred feet and 30 mph, to let people see me reasonably clearly and to give time for word to get out so I wouldn't have to hang around the CBD waiting for the news organizations to get their people aloft.

It took a surprisingly short time for them to react, as I saw the first two helicopters coming my way only ten minutes after I'd taken flight. They were rapidly approaching from the same direction, and were both media choppers, something I checked by sending a sight blob a few hundred feet to my side to see their logos.

I maintained my velocity as they approached. They buzzed around me at a distance of not much over a hundred feet, the cameraman filming me from various angles. I waved, and out of habit, pointlessly smiled.

One of the pilots decided it was safe to edge closer, moving into formation fifty feet to my left, the other staying about hundred feet above and to my right.

Both choppers had two people in them, a pilot and cameraman. I couldn't tell how excited they were, as they were both belted firmly into their seats, the cameraman's face was obscured by his camera and the pilot was busy concentrating on his job - concentration being a very good idea when there was another helicopter in the immediate vicinity plus whatever on Earth I was.

A couple of minutes later another media chopper arrived, the first two staying carefully in their relative positions while the third buzzed around me.

Shortly after that a police helicopter arrived, also giving me a look-over from all directions. I was watching to make sure none of the choppers collided, ready to intervene if I needed to, but they were all very careful. The police chopper settled into formation above and behind me, at a greater distance than the others.

The four choppers and I flew in formation toward the Library Tower for another five minutes, when two more choppers arrived. One was another news chopper, four people onboard rather than the usual two. The other was a large FBI chopper containing several guys, the two in the open hatchway pointing rifles at me, which was decidedly unwelcoming and unacceptable of them. I sent a sight blob in for a closer look. Their riflemen's fingers were outside the trigger guards, but only just.

I was internally debating what to do about this. There were many possible responses, so it was a lively debate. Then the FBI chopper's loudspeaker yelled, "THIS IS THE FEDERAL BUREAU OF INVESTIGATION. YOU ARE ORDERED TO FOLLOW US." It turned and headed in a different direction.

#6: <Our wings can't be as impressive as we thought if they think they can order us around.>

#13: <I guess we've been thinking "Angel", but it's a very human-looking body and that's the easiest assumption for them. They probably think they've got authority over us. We can't let them think that.>

#11: <That's for sure.>

I hadn't planned this day in detail because there were too many unknowns. I had quite a few ideas for little events, and several more intentions which needed the right opportunities to present themselves, but I knew I'd mostly have to wing it. One thing I did know for sure was that I wasn't going to let the Government order me around. I had to establish that fact right from the beginning, so I quickly decelerated to a stop, standing on my feet with my arms crossed and my wings folding against my back before they slowly faded into nothingness over a couple of seconds. I watched carefully for a potential accident as the other helicopters overshot me and then individually reacted. They were well behaved though, separating from each other before maneuvering to return to me.

The FBI chopper returned too. I kept one sight blob focused on it, keeping an eye on the riflemen who were tracking me with their guns. They were well inside my maximum range, so if they put their fingers inside their trigger guards, something very unexpected would happen to them. It yelled at me, "YOU ARE ORDERED TO FOLLOW US." I ignored the order as it tried to lead me off again.

Instead I waved my hand at my feet, and a dozen bright green light blobs appeared just beneath me, in the shape of rectangular strips about 4" wide and 36" long. I made a motion of moving my two hands apart, and the light blobs spread out horizontally until I was standing in the middle of a reasonably well defined 9-foot by 9-foot square.

I turned to face the police helicopter, roughly to my west. I made another small motion with my hand to apparently cause two more collections of light-strips to appear on the western side of the square. One pile was two feet north of the center of the side of my existing square, the other pile two feet south of the center of the square's side. All but one light in each pile moved horizontally and perpendicularly away from the square's edge, leaving another light-strip behind after another three feet, create a 'path' (I hoped they realized) extending about thirty feet from the edge of the square I was apparently standing on.

I made another vague hand motion and another collection of green lights-strips appeared at the end of the path. Some of them moved to define the outside of a large square, twice the size of the one I was standing on; the others to form a large "H" in the center of the square. I was using green light-strips to look nothing like a very important yellow sphere I'd be using in the future, if my Angel Plan progressed to its ultimate conclusion, although that was a LONG way ahead yet and very doubtful about whether it'd happen.

The total 'floor area' defined by the three regions would've used up about 75% of my maximum number of NP-points if I'd made a floor out of NP-plates. Each mind can lift just over 200 kg now, which works out to be fourteen pounds per fingertip. There wouldn't be nearly enough fingertips in contact to hold up the weight of a helicopter, so I had to cheat. Very little of the floor area had NP-plates; only what I was standing on now. I'd create floor sections on demand, when a helicopter landed or when people were walking around.

The police helicopter was about a hundred feet higher than me and an equal distance to my west. I pointed at the pilot with my right hand while I extended my left hand palm down at waist level. My right hand then opened up and 'came down for a landing' on the back of my stationary left hand. I paused for half a second, then pointed at the pilot again, then at the "H" of the landing pad, followed by an open handed offering of the landing place to him. I gave a small bow to indicate it was a polite request. I folded my arms and sat on an invisible seat I'd made for myself, leaning back with a casual body language while I waited for him.

It took them about three minutes to decide, or get ordered, to 'land' (we were eight hundred feet above the ground, so "land" isn't the most accurate of terms). He didn't fully land either. He came in above the "H" and, keeping his revs up, he changed the pitch on his blades to decrease the helicopter's lift so it was descending very slowly. It dropped slowly onto the invisible platform. I didn't have to add many fingertips under it to support the meager weight the pilot was risking.

I stood up and walked along the pathway to it, keeping my hands away from my side, palms up and open in a non-threatening "I come in peace" manner. The two policemen waited for me, the helicopter maintaining full revs and putting only a fraction of its weight on my landing pad. I was also keeping a VERY close eye (sight blob) on the FBI riflemen. So far their fingers were outside the trigger guards.

The pilot had landed so his passenger was closest to me, which saved me having to walk around to him. I stopped about ten feet away. The high-revving engine was making far too much noise to permit talk and I didn't want to use light blobs to spell out words. I used a sight blob to look for a winch in the chopper, but it was a very small chopper and it didn't have one. It had a coil of rope though, which would work okay.

I pointed at the helicopter just behind the cops' seats. Both cops turned to look back to see what I was indicating. I used NP to float the rope slowly up and out of the chopper. I used NP to pull several feet of one end free, then tied it to a strut near me, the closest cop watching with wide-eyed amazement.

I flew the coil up to him, dropping it in his lap. I motioned for him to tie it around his waist, and then to get out of the chopper and walk along the walkway. I pointed at the engine and my ears, then shrugged to suggest helplessness. Then I knelt on the walkway, leaned out to the side, moving my outside hand up and down beyond the line of lights, showing him that there was nothing there. I did the same on the other side, then stood and jumped up and down three times where I was, to indicate it was safe. I motioned for him to walk down the path again, then I turned and walked back to my seat again. I was deliberately overdoing the politeness and consideration I was showing, hoping to convince the world what a polite, moral angel I was.

I could see he was talking on the radio. After a few minutes, he started doing as I'd requested. I waited patiently, as he was understandably VERY thorough, including leaning out of the chopper to check the knot I'd tied. Dad and I had done enough outdoor activities that I'd learned how to tie a good range of knots, so he found my knot satisfactory. The FBI's chopper was also hovering nearby patiently, hands off triggers and loudspeaker microphones, waiting to see how this played out.

The cop dropped the coil of rope next to the chopper, seeing it very reassuringly land on the invisible platform. Then he climbed out onto the skid. Hanging on firmly with both hands, he felt for the platform with his foot. Finding it, he slowly increased the weight on that foot, until it was bearing his full weight.

With one foot still on the skid, he crouched down to feel the platform with one hand. (NP-plates have a smooth feel, and seem to be body temperature because they don't conduct heat.) He picked up the rope. Winding it around his arm close to where it tied to the helicopter, so if he fell there'd be very little slack involved. Still hanging on to the helicopter with both hands, he cautiously moved his second foot off the skid. He paused for a couple of seconds, then was ready for the REALLY scary part - letting go. He summoned his courage, his hands suddenly letting go the helicopter and grabbing for the rope to arrest his feared fall. Nothing happened.

After a few more seconds of very reassuring "nothing happening", he turned to face me.

I gave him a thumbs-up sign, which briefly brought a nervous smile to his face. I sympathized with him. I'm very comfortable with walking around on an invisible platform now, but I can easily remember how nervous I'd been the first few times I'd looked down between my feet to see several hundred feet of nothing. I had been nervous even knowing that I could fly, so he had to be very scared.

He cautiously slid one foot forward, finding the platform consistently there, slowly transferred his weight to his forward foot, he repeated the process with his rear foot, letting the rope out as he progressed.

When he got near to where the much narrower path started, he paused. If he could've looked any more nervous, I'm sure he would've.

I motioned my hands apart, and the lights separated by another two feet, making the walkway six feet wide and bringing a smile to his face.

He didn't really gain confidence, but he did manage to lose some nervousness as he made his way toward me.

He was mostly concentrating on his steps and the rope, so I was the first to speak, calling out to him when he was still a dozen feet away, "Congratulations on overcoming your fear. If anyone can get a medal for walking fifty feet, it should be you."

He managed to resist ROFL (Rolling On the Floor Laughing), instead nervously asking, "Who, or what, are you?"

"Call me Mike. I'm an angel."

"Like out of the Bible?"

"The short answer is 'Yes', although that book doesn't describe us very well. It's been a long time since any of us have visited this planet, so that's hardly surprising. Would you like a seat, or would you prefer to remain standing?"

"Ahh, standing thanks. Can I go back to the helicopter to report what you've told me?"

"Let me add some things first. I asked you to land for a number of reasons, one of which was to ask you to pass on a request of mine. Politeness is very important to me so I do not appreciate having guns pointed at me or being rudely ordered to fly in a particular direction. Please inform the FBI in that helicopter that they should leave, and in the future they would be well advised to treat me with respect."

"Ahh, I'll pass that on, but I don't think they'll do it."

"They'll do it; it's only a matter of how much incentive I need to apply. I'm starting by asking them nicely. If they refuse, I'll ask them less nicely."

^-- I created flat NP-plate superimposed with a flat, blue light blob, just above floor level immediately in front of the cop, telling him, "If you stand on that, it'll take you back to your helicopter more quickly and easily. Or if you're still too nervous of me, you may walk back."

"Ahh, I think I'll walk."

I canceled my offered ride. "As you wish. Please come back after you've reported in."

"Okay."

He made his way back several times faster than he'd walked toward me, climbing onboard and putting his headset on. There was no point in watching him talking so I used that sight blob to check around me, while the other blob continued to keep a close eye on the FBI guys.

The news choppers were still hovering nearby, most of them now in positions where they could get me and the police chopper in the frame at the same time. I'd been holding my position stationary above the ground to make life easier for the pilots, and there was now a sizable crowd gathering on the ground beneath us. I worried about one of the local homeowners going crazy with a rifle. I didn't have enough sight blobs to keep an eye on everything, or even half of everything, so my sight blobs were being overworked. I needed to reduce the number of potential problems so I decided to move the party up a few thousand feet.

I waved at the news-choppers to get their attention (probably unnecessarily), then I pointed upward. I created and opened my wings, slowly flapping them as I started raising myself, the light blobs and the NP-plates, the police chopper with it. The pilot got a scare, reacting by quickly lifting off and 'escaping'. I let him go, continuing to raise everything at the same unhurried pace.

It took me about a minute to get to what looked like 3,000 feet, on the way to my destination of 5,000 feet, when I heard a new sound and looked around to see a couple of Air Force fighters coming toward me. I was unhappy at this escalation, but logically speaking I shouldn't be too worried. I was a very small target, and I can dodge very quickly. If they fired on me, I could almost certainly intercept missiles with my NP, which meant they'd explode prematurely or be damaged by the collision and not to be able to fly properly. If the pilots shot at me with cannons or machineguns, I'd see the shooting a second or two before the bullets arrived at me. I could accelerate downward at 7 g, so be 35 meters away in one second, 140 meters in two seconds. I'd have to be damned unlucky to be hit. The trouble was that I had to keep my eye on the planes because I couldn't use sound as a warning. The bullets would be traveling so fast I might not get any sound warning at all.

I watched the two fighters do a flyby to inspect me, the closest coming within five hundred feet of me. I was not pleased to see missiles hanging off their wings. Once they were past me, I used the fighter-watching sight blob to look around. Everything was as it should be. The media choppers were keeping pace with my easy climb, the police chopper was nearby, and the only other development was another large media chopper arriving. My other sight blob showed me that the FBI chopper was rising with me too.

I needed to get the FBI to leave to free up that sight blob, so I stopped climbing. I closed and faded my wings, then pointed at the police chopper, indicating it should land on my pad again. It started doing so.

I stopped watching it, so I could use that sight blob to check the fighters again. They had turned and were now coming back for a second pass. The scary thing about that was that they dived toward me first, so I was in perfect target position. They passed by on either side and underneath me, at half the distance they'd passed me by last time. Two hundred feet is a considerable distance in some contexts, but it's very uncomfortably close when fully armed fighters are screaming past.

I had a few seconds before they could turn, so I checked around again. The police chopper was still cautiously landing, and had nearly done so. Hopefully it shouldn't take nearly so long for the cop to walk to me this time. I needed to allocate one sight blob to watching him walk because I had to create the panels for him to walk on. Everything else was fine.

The fighters didn't do anything dramatic, instead climbing and adopting an orbiting formation, keeping an eye on me from a thousand feet higher. It was annoying having them around, but no big deal provided I could keep an eye on them frequently - a quick glance every second or two. The FBI riflemen were actually more of a threat because they were closer, just as lethal, and I imagined that it was more likely for a rifleman to pull a trigger than an Air Force pilot to strafe or missile me over LA, so the FBI was going to leave, whether they wanted to or not.

I waited quietly, apart from the sounds of all the engines, until the cop returned.

He was looking worried, I guessed about what to say as he appeared to be getting used to walking on nothing. To save time I said, "Let me guess: your report was received with a considerable amount of skepticism?"

"Ahh, yeah. I told them what you..."

I interrupted, "Don't worry about whether they believed you or not. The choice between belief and disbelief is one of the core purposes of freewill. Meanwhile let me use the annoying, little FBI people as an object lesson."

I made sure to cover the triggers of the two rifles that were trained on me as I pulled them out of their owners' hands. Then I PUSHED every Fibbie back in his seat, including forcing his arms to his side. They were pinned helpless for the time it took for me to pull every weapon out of the chopper, including opening their jackets to pull their pistols out of their shoulder holsters. With one mind per weapon and another mind for each guy to hold him down, it didn't even take a second.

All the guns accelerated extremely rapidly around the outside of the helicopter, to brake to a sudden halt in a large group of weapons all pointing straight through the window at the pilot's face. He panicked, throwing the helicopter into a violent evasion away from me.

One of the guys in the open doorway facing me had taken off his restraints to get into position, and the helicopter's so suddenly moving away made him lose his balance. His arms windmilled, tempting me with the idea of pushing him out, so I could save his life and get good press for it. But his teammate grabbed him before I could react. A pity, because it would've made Great TV.

I flew all the guns back toward the cop standing in front of me, making sure that none of the barrels were pointing at him, because it's rude to point guns at people. The first the TV crews or cop knew about what had happened was when the mass of guns flew into their sight. They'd not thought to look at the FBI chopper because I'd not faced toward it.

When the cop jerked with surprise, I said, "I took all the guns out of the FBI helicopter. It scared them and they're fleeing now." I pointed at the rapidly retreating chopper. "I want to put these in the back of your helicopter for eventual return to the FBI, but your pilot might get scared if he sees them coming toward him, so please let him see you inspect each of them to make sure they're safe, and then follow when I float them to your chopper. It'd be a good idea to remove the magazines too."

I'd placed the guns at his feet while I was talking. I made an invitation motion toward them, which got him moving. He knelt and started processing the weapons.

Partway through the job, he looked up and asked, "Are you Archangel Michael?"

"Mike to people who impress me, as you did walking here. The short answer is yes, because other humans have called me that in the past; but you humans have a very poor idea of what an angel is so my answer isn't really telling you anything."

"You look human?"

"I've been around since before this planet was a molten lump, billions of years ago. Humanity evolved only a few thousand years ago, so I'm certainly not human."

"What are you then?"

"I'm an angel."

"You believe in evolution?"

"In the same way you believe 1 + 1 = 2."

"Oh. A lot of religious people don't believe in evolution."

"That's because a lot of religious people have a lot of stupid ideas. People are attracted to religions for many reasons, but it's often weak-minded people hoping to find something to believe in. They succeed more often than they should."

"You sound more like the Devil than an angel?"

"That's another stupid idea. There's no external personification of evil."