One reason Heather chose a 'costume' that is all white with a matching cape is daytime flight. The epidermal layer was the cloth, but the cape was something Heather had to build and attach. Her solution to that was that it was not that different from the hair on her head. Heather can build hair, which is not living but is a protein complex. Heather could similarly extend the 'fabric' covering her 'skin' into whatever she needed the material to look like as it solidified.
The big flowing cape was meant as a sight gag. Superheros have capes. Heather spent a great deal of time composing a material that would flow correctly. That was more of the disguise. A report of a caped person flying would be received with proper incredulity.
At night, it has become easy, with practice, for Heather to absorb light. Night flight is stealth flight. The worst case is a fleeting shadow across the moon from a particular angle. If Heather had any lingering worries at all about the night sky, it was something else up there flying about, not seeing her, and running into her. Birds and bats mostly. Above a certain altitude, the problem went away. Planes she could sense coming from a long way off.
A black outline in the sky during the day would be much more obvious. A figure clad head to toe in white, other than the face, would be much harder to spot, especially when she is up high. Technically, she could be any color she needed to be. Color is about what EM wavelength she absorbs versus what she reflects. Heather could be sky blue if need be. Standing against a red wall Heather could be the same color red. Far more effectively than a color-changing animal possibly could. She is not using pigments and dyes to achieve the transformation. Heather worked with the wavelengths themselves.
As camouflage, it was flawed at the moment because it is utterly uniform. A painted wall has variations. Heather standing next to a colored wall is solidly monotone. A patterned wall is beyond her ability so far.
A new body and color morphing via controlled reflectively made Heather confident no one is going to figure out who is driving her designer body unless she said something stupid.
She still worried about how she walked. Some stores use AI to analyze a person's gait to identify a repeat customer. Gaits are not fingerprints, but they can be distinctive. A man that walked like a woman doubly so.
The new body's narrower hip geometry helped her with changing that. Her natural sway is gone. It was never a conscious thing to have. She did not know she had it until Bill happened to be following her along a sidewalk one day and gave her a wolf whistle. They were already together at that point, so he felt comfortable in expressing his appreciation.
Bill was at work. Cristine at School. Heather's two minutes of work done for the day. Heather was up daytime flying and testing out things. She, now as a caped 'he', overflew a young man standing next to a Jeep, frustrated by the flat tire on the driver's side rear.
Heather paused in the air to study the situation. The Jeep was shod in massive offroad tires. The vehicle body had been significantly raised up to allow the immense things to even fit. The proportions were almost comic. A toy car come to life but is now broken down.
There was not a spare tire bolted to the tailgate as there usually is on cars like this. If there were, it would block the rearview mirror and render the tailgate useless. Given the size of the tires, Heather assumed whatever device it is used to attach tires to tailgates could not be adapted to something this large. Or perhaps it would have bent the tailgate off the back of the vehicle. Tailgates are only sheet metal, and those things would be heavy. Hit a bump, and the tailgate would sheer right off the car. Tires like that would need their own trailer. A support vehicle following it around. Something.
How would someone not gifted with Heather's abilities even lift a tire that size onto a bracket?
The young man was slumped down against the tire. A picture of being dejected and defeated. Heather assumed he is stuck.
She landed silently in front of him.
"Having a problem with your vehicle?" She asked. A nice test of her new vocal cords with someone else. Not her voice. Much more male-sounding.
"Uh..." The young man boggled. Heather had a good definition of that term now. Boggle. What happens to you when your car breaks down, and someone flies in and asks you about it.
The young man looked up into the air. "Did you just FLY here?" he finally was able to ask.
"Do you need some help?" Heather asked, very evenly to try to calm the young man with her casual tone.
"I..." He tried.
"Looks like you have a flat on that big tire. No spare? No air pump? No can of pressurized tire goo?" Heather asked to try to get him to focus on his problem. Not him. Her as him.
The young man shook his head 'no'. Best he could do. Heather decided his driver's license was probably recent. It would match his age. Still more boy than man. That probably explained his inexperience in having a special needs car like this.
"I see. No cell phone?" She asked.
"No signal." He managed.
Heather looked around the countryside, seeing things he could not. "Oh. Yes. Of course. Dead zone here. The worst place to get a flat. Do you have a jack?"
"Yeah, but it's useless. Doesn't work with these tires. Too small." He said miserably.
The boyish man waved at the front tire. A sudden torrent of his misery spilled out. "I just bought these. Expensive as hell, man! I couldn't afford a fifth tire. I didn't even think about needing a taller jack for all of this! I was saving up for the spare tire. The big extra swing mount I had to get for it. I thought: 'Hey! These are brand new tires!' and I didn't think this would happen so fast! These things are supposed to be offroad tires! How do they even get a flat on a regular road! These are supposed to the tough, right?"
He quickly reverted to the previous issue. "How can you fly?"
Heather grinned. It felt odd with this face. "Came with the cape in the cereal box." She pulled that around.
Heather walked over to the flat tire. Smoothly knelt to look at the lug nuts. This body had muscles for days and joints that were as smooth as if they had been greased. They were, in fact, greased. When one builds their own body, they can design in sealed joints filled with Lithium grease. No need to stay inside human limitations. "You have a tire iron? And the lock nut key that will remove this special lug nut?"
"Yeah. Key is in the glovebox." He said, miserable.
"Well hidden. No tire thief would ever think to look there."
Heather stood smoothly. She realized this is another way she was not going to walk and move like herself. "There is a tire place back up the road about 7 or 8 kilometers. Let's get you and the tire to there."
"Kilometers?" he asked.
"About five miles." Heather translated. Another part of her disguise: Always use metric measurements. That would make her sound more international. Less American. Her accent is purely American, but she could do nothing much about that. She would throw in Spanish pronunciations when and where it made sense.
Heather spoke Spanish well enough for an Anglo, but she could never pass as native in it. She would use it as a seasoning in her words instead. Hint at a possible external origin. She never intended to have lengthy conversations in this body, in any case.
The youngster looked around for a missing something. Perhaps a plane or helicopter. "How will we get me and the tire there?"
Heather did not answer directly. "Hang on... Need to find something to prop up your car. Be right back."
Heather went around behind the car. As she expected, it had an accessory trailer hitch. Pretty heavy duty. The type of hitch that bolts to the frame. Heavy duty. Offroad cars often had things like this. Heather stood next to it and measured the hitch height against herself. The Jeep was angled down, but she only needed an approximation. Heather would add some extra height to compensate. She cross-checked the hitch height against the side of the Jeep that had the good tire on it. Heather wondered how far the suspension would decompress when lifted. The modified suspension on this thing was so far from stock she had no idea. This was more Bill's thing than hers. She added a wild-ass guess compensation factor for height, assuming it would decompress significantly.
The young man watched her work wordlessly and not comprehending in the slightest what she was doing.
Heather flew up and out over the countryside, scanning for an easy fix. She found what she was looking for in a large boulder. It looked like the farmer had pulled it out of the ground and moved it out of the way to plant crops. It was a perfect size and shape. Had semi-rounded and flat surfaces. Both would be useful. It would fit inside her bubble of influence and be tall enough to hold up the Jeep.
Heather carefully picked it up, transferring kinetic energy to it to move it upward. The rock was slightly buried in the dirt, so she injected the energy slowly, knowing it would jolt free. She did not want it rocketing skyward and need to chase it.
Heather flew back to the Jeep, boulder in her hands. The expression on the kid's face as she reappeared with a boulder was priceless.
Heather set the large rock carefully behind the Jeep, directly next to the hitch. She oriented a flat plane on the top of the boulder for the hitch to rest upon. Placed a rounded edge facing forward. The shoulder was firm, and gravel crunched as it assumed the full weight of the rock.
Heather looked at the boulder / Jeep relative heights from the side. "Perfect." she pronounced in her voice that was not her own.
"Holeee.... shit!" the stranded motorist said when he realized what Heather was up to.
Heather floated parallel to the ground, face-up, and went underneath the Jeep. There was plenty of room to do so. Even with the flat, it was very high off the ground due to the massive new tires the young man had put on it. Not to mention a lift kit he had installed to make the tires work. No wonder he had no money left for a proper spare.
Heather took no time to study how the lift was done. The changes to the suspension looked pretty Rube Goldberg to her, but she had nothing to compare it to. It made the driveshaft to the rear wheels take a hard angle that was annoyingly in her face.
Heather did not need to affect the entire Jeep to move it. Only the back end. It would drag the rest of the Jeep with it. Floating rearward for position and avoiding the driveshaft, Heather placed her white-gloved hands on the rear axle, on either side of the differential. She 'pushed' up. Leveled the Jeep. Then she changed the angle of the kinetic energy to move the body backward so that the hitch went over the top of the rock. Once that was well centered, she let it slowly settle. She watched to be sure the boulder did not try to roll forward. The suspension creaked as the body was held up by the boulder, allowing the rear wheels and axle to drape down.
None of the suspension modifications popped apart. Heather had not been convinced that would be the case.
Floating back out, she stood and came around to look at the tire. It was high enough now to be worked with.
"Aren't we supposed to loosen the lug nuts first?" the young man asked.
"What is your name?" Heather asked
"Billy."
Billy. Heather was amused. She was going to love telling her husband about helpless men named 'Bill'. "Well, Billy. Normally, yes. I can work with it this way. May I have the lug wrench?"
Billy was standing with it in his hand, forgotten. "Oh. Yeah. Sure."
He handed to her.
Heather was not actually sure this would work, but she thought it might. She placed the wrench on the lug nut. Holding the very end of the wrench, Heather gave it a jolt of kinetic energy. Her idea was that if the force was sudden enough, the lug wrench would act the same way an air hammer does. That the force would impact the nut primarily. Focus the energy.
It mostly did. The nut popped free with a metallic squeal. The tire also rotated somewhat. Not enough to be of concern. Heather quickly loosened the others, using the lock key on the one lock lug.
With the lug nuts loosened, Heather used her fingers to 'spin' the lugs rapidly off the studs. Directly touching the nuts, it was easy to impart them with directional kinetic energy. In retrospect, she never really needed the lug wrench.
Live and learn. Her cape and hands were already filthy. Heather wondered about designing a fabric that repelled grease and dirt.
Heather handed the lug nuts one at a time to Billy, who watched the operation stupefied.
"It's like you are... Like you have an air wrench for fingers!"
Heather looked at the grime on her hands. The downside of her choice of white. "Yes, well... Just fingers."
She carefully lifted the massive tire off the studs, set it on the ground, and rotated it to find the nail. Heather used her energy sense to speed things up. The ferric material of the offending nail changed how magnetic fields flowed around it. "Here is the problem. This nail went directly through ALL the belts. It's not in the sidewall, so I think they can fix this."
Bill told her once that some tires are fixable and some are not. It depended on where the hole is and what made it. Heather was not sure how that applied to monster truck tires, but she assumed a center of the tire nail puncture like this was repairable. Surely off-road tires are something people can fix? What would be the point of having massive tires like this if you could not repair them? Not that Heather understood the point of having tires like this on anything short of a heavy-duty truck. If she was going to offroad, she'd use a dune buggy. Something with a lower center of gravity.
Heather looked at Billy and tapped the deflated tire. "I can fly this up to the shop and tell them where you are, or you can come with me. Up to you."
"Fly?"
"Yes."
"Uh... Fly, I guess?"
"OK. Do you have your wallet? They usually don't charge much for a tire repair, but as you can see I have no pockets."
Billy patted his back pocket. "Yeah. Sure."
"And your phone?"
Billy patted his other back pocket. "Yes, sir!"
Heather smiled inwardly at the 'sir'. "All right. Put your arm over my shoulder. I need to carry you and the tire. I only have two arms." Heather stooped to make it easier for Billy to hook his arm over her shoulder. She made this body 1.9 meters tall, so she had to stoop over. Heather also made this body very strong. Once Billy was hooked over, she wrapped her right arm around him. Heather stood straight up and lifted him off the ground easily. She did not have to do any kinetic energy work. This body barely felt him as weight.
"Holy shit!" Billy exclaimed. Apparently, his favorite saying.
Lifting the tire with her left arm, Heather floated serenely up into the sky. The huge tire weighed nearly as much as Billy did. The weight was well within her body's performance envelope. No kinetics were needed.
If just picking Billy up got a 'Holy shit', Heather could only imagine what flight was going to do for him.
It turned out not as much. "This is so cool!" Billy enthused.
Heather thought about Cristine's reaction to her first flight and pondered upon the mutability of youngsters.
Heather sped up but did not block the wind in his face so that he would feel their speed. She covered her own eyes with the stilled air to form invisible goggles. Her cape tugged directly back as air velocity ramped up.
They landed near an open car bay door of the tire store. The pair plus tire landing by the opening was immediately noticed by several of the mechanics, who came rushing out.
Heather looked around, saw no security cameras she would have to deal with. She did not want her appearance to be recorded.
The people from the shop were all talking at once. Heather did not even try to respond to any of it.
She put Billy and the tire down near the open door and floated upwards. She, as he, gave Billy a salute. "Good luck, young man. They can fix it and get you a ride back to your car. Your Jeep is four-wheel drive. I placed the rock in such a way that you can pull forward and tip the rock. Drive right off it. If that does not work? You have a winch on your front bumper. Or: have them pull you off. Don't put the lugs back on the way I took them off. Tighten them fully after it is on the ground, and perhaps even drive back here and have them check it. Take care!"
Heather shot away, not responding to any of the other questions or excitement. She did not want camera phones suddenly appearing. Not that she could not deal with them, but easier to just be gone.