A solid cliff suddenly loomed out of the mist ahead. The girl covered her eyes and screamed shrilly. The quick-thinking habits of 20 years were not completely drowned in liquor. Jan yanked at the controls, and the aircar shrieked in protest as it changed its direction to the vertical. Jan and the girl were hurled so violently into the transparent elastic protector curtain that they were stunned. When Jan came to, they were approximately two miles above Pike's Peak. The sunlight was dazzling.
"Hey, baby, we're still airborne," Jan cried, jabbing his elbow into the girl's ribs.
She looked down at the mountain and groaned.
"It takes more than an old cliff to do a spacecaptain in," Jan yelled. "Look baby, did you know we could do this?" Jan cut the power and let the aircar descend in a series of erratically fluttering loops. The mountain rushed up at them. The girl covered her eyes and sobbed, "Don't, please don't!"
The mountain top was covered with a multitude of people dressed in white. They faced a great golden crescent that gleamed like fire in the rising sun. Jan was so fascinated by the spectacle that his coordination failed him. He was conscious of the white-robed people fleeing in terror as he fought to regain control of the aircar.
They crashed. Their speed had been only about 50 miles per hour and the protectors saved them from injury. They scrambled out to survey the damage.
"Well, it won't fly again soon," Jan said. He breathed deeply of the thin air.
"What a hell of a place to crash," the girl said. "Those are Mohcans holding their spring equinox festival. They'll probably stone me." She looked down at her transparent gown. The white-robed people had resumed their places and were singing a hymn as though nothing had happened. It was slow, sad, august, a mighty organ sound of human voices.
The girl's face was chalk white. "Let's run for it," she begged. "They're dangerous. They're dangerous as hell. Please believe me." She turned and started to run down the path that had once been the cogroad, stumbling in her high-heeled shoes.
Jan ran after her, weaving as though the mountain were a deck on the high seas.