The one-to-one match of Jeffrey’s story to the identities of the three women rescued during the Empire State Building crisis had set her to thinking. Since the young man’s job at REI, and his low income stream, prohibited him from taking sudden plane flights to major cities, she had thought Jeff was simply co-opting a major news story as a means of feeling good about himself. And also a means to tell her how he was making progress in dealing with his depression episodes. It had been the most likely explanation for what Jeff had said. And she knew that delusional thinking sometimes happened with people who suffered from flashbacks and dreams about a traumatic event. Which the death of his father in the car crash had been. Jeff’s being thrown clear and then having to stand and watch as his father’s car burned in a flaming pyre had to have hurt him deeply.
But now, after watching the CNN and YouTube videos of how Green Mask suddenly disappeared in midair after stepping off the top of the Gateway arch, she could not help but wonder if the talk about teleportation and levitation and flame-throwing meant these abilities really existed. She was familiar with the wild claims of people involved in supposed parapsychology research. Now, if her own eyes could be believed, there existed at least one human with the ability to suddenly materialize in one location, then vanish from that site in a teleportation jump to elsewhere.
Could young Jeff really be this Green Mask guy? The recorded voice of the Gateway rescuer had sounded like Jeff to her, and the casual walking gait of the rescuer had been very similar to how Jeff walked. Course there were plenty of young men who were tall, blue-eyed, had short black hair and walked the way Jeff walked. But none of them had walked into her office and spun a tail of helping three women navigate through the streets of downtown Santa Fe. The hometowns of the women had matched exactly the hometowns of the Empire hostages. As had their age and descriptions. What if, instead of helping three women in Santa Fe, young Jeff had helped three women escape from captivity at the top of the Empire State Building?
Her stomach rumbled. Her mind whirled with What If? possibilities. And inside, in the core of her inner being, a voice from out of the Shadow part of herself said “He could be the one.”
If he was Green Mask, how could she know for sure? And if Jeff really was this superhero, was there any foundation for breaking the seal of patient confidentiality and telling someone else what she suspected?
CHAPTER TWELVE
The back door entrance to the REI store is easy to reach if you’re cycling up to it on Camino de la Familia. I stopped at the corner of Familia and Manhattan Avenue, pushed my bike over to the bike rack, parked it and looped the cable around the body frame and through the rack bar. Pushing the lock end of the cable into its socket I spun the dial on the lock, let go, turned and walked to the back door. It was almost 10 a.m. Saturday morning and I needed to get inside, register with the Kronos device, comb my hair in the bathroom, then head out to the retail floor wearing my REI badge that hung from my neck. The metal door pushed open easily. Inside the break room was empty, except for Billy, the friend who had mouthed off to Agent Van Groot. He looked away from the TV that hung above him. His face held a mix of hopeful and worried. Leaving my psychic shield up, I gave him the finger.
“Thanks for blathering that I don’t date, you turkey.”
Embarrassment showed on Billy’s narrow face. “Hey, sorry for that. It ain’t every day that a hot-looking FBI agent woman comes into the store. Bridget brought her over to me after the woman spent a lot of time in her office.”
I could believe that. The woman’s visit to my apartment was also my first encounter with a real FBI agent. Still. “What I say to you about my social life, or lack thereof, stays with you. No chattering with our coworkers on what you said to the FBI woman. Agreed?”
“Sure, Jeff,” he said, looking relieved. “But why the hell do you think the FBI is snooping into employment records for this store and lots of other REI stores? Kinda weird to me.”
I knew but could not say. “Yeah, it is kinda weird. Maybe someone high up in corporate is playing games with stock speculation. Or maybe we have a Russian spy working in the yoga gear section.”
Billy laughed. “That’s fine if it’s Melody Jenkins. She’s on shift today and boy, is she hot!”
My friend was entirely too focused on turning his bar dates into bedtime romps. While I could learn his record of success by dropping my shield and scanning the Top level of his mind, I didn’t. Long years spent around crowds of people had taught me that dropping my shield when surrounded by dozens of people hurt. It hurt a lot. And the flood of thoughts and feelings from so many people made me feel like I was mentally drowning. Plus, I did not need to see the mind picture of Billy in bed with some hot date. I had a hard enough time pushing my own hormones into the background without having a Billy porn movie cycling through my mind.
“Good luck with Melody,” I said, then noticed the muted TV image had changed from a group of morning show women to a Breaking News banner. “What’s happening now?” I said, pointing at the screen.
Billy turned, looked up, then grabbed the TV control off the top of the microwave. “Let’s find out.”
Once more I saw the image of Leslee Howden, who I had listened to last night as she and her buddies had reported on the FBI raids in San Francisco and Chicago. It had been rewarding to learn that my zapping of the two thugs inside the Gateway observation room had turned up info on fellow jihadists. What had not been so fine was learning that one bastard had used a suicide vest to blow himself up in a Chicago suburb, thereby killing an FBI agent and wounding two local cops. Still, there were more FBI agents and local cops than me and I couldn’t be everywhere a terrorist might show up. For one thing, I had not visited every big city in America. For another, I needed to eat, sleep and hold down a job that paid my rent. But the image that flashed onto a screen behind Howden was not American. Instead, it showed the brown spire of the Eiffel Tower, rising against a reddish sunset.
“Nine minutes ago terrorists took control of the Top level of the Eiffel Tower, using AK-47 rifles to herd captive tourists onto the eastern side of the outside observation level,” Howden said, her blond hair looking a bit scattered, as it might be if the woman had been up most of the night. “A spokeswoman for the director general of the French national police, the Gendarmerie Nationale, says four men are involved in this hostage taking. At least twenty people are being held captive.” She frowned, touched her right earbud, then spoke. “We are going now to a live link with CNN’s senior European correspondent Astrid Magnuson, who is standing on the Champ de Mars, just across the street from the tower. Astrid?”
A tall and curvy woman now showed in another image behind Howden. The cameraperson had lowered down so the upward angled shot caught the reporter from her waist up, with the Eiffel Tower rising behind her. The woman was holding a smartphone in one hand. She looked up from it at some signal.
“Hello Leslee. I’m here on the Avenue de Gustave Eiffel, at the southern end of the Eiffel Tower. A source of mine who works in the Jules Verne restaurant on the Second level of the tower tells me there are dozens of white-shirted French gendarmes filling that level, with some French Army troops guarding the stairs that go down to the First level of the tower.” She looked down at her phone, then back up as, in the background, what looked to be fifty or more white-shirted police formed a cordon line around the leg that was the main access point to the tower’s three levels. Other clusters of French cops surrounded the other legs. In part of the live image behind the reporter were six vans that were unloading both troops and more gendarmes. Two armored vehicles with top-mounted machine guns rolled up from the other side of the street. The reporter glanced to her rear, then back. “I recognize units from the Force d’intervention de la police nationale and from the Groupe d’intervention de la Gendarmerie nationale. Both the FIPN and the GIGN are heavily armed with automatic weapons, flash-bangs, grenades and sniper rifles.”
“Astrid, what is the status of the
hostages and other tourists?” Howden asked.
Magnuson paused, looked down at her phone, then back up. “My other inside source is texting me now. That source says tourists who were present on the lower floor of the Top level are now heading down the emergency stairs that wrap around the central elevator shaft. Those stairs lead down to the Second level, which includes two restaurants.” The reporter jumped when a siren went off behind her. “My source tells me the four terrorists have chained the door of the elevator that transports tourists down to the Second level, thereby preventing any normal access to the Top level. The Top observation level consists of two floors, with the bottom floor fully enclosed but with large windows that allow a view outside, while the floor above it contains small offices. That floor is encircled by a fenced in open walkway that wraps around the tower’s four sides. My source says the hostages are being held on the upper floor of the Top level, on the east side of the tower where a window sells glasses of champagne to the tourists on the walkway.” The woman looked to one side. “Leslee, my van driver is signaling me to look up.” Which she did. “A helicopter from the French TV station France 24 is flying toward the tower. I see that it is passing to one side and aiming to get a view of the east side walkway, where the hostages are being held. Maybe your producer can grab the feed from whatever the helicopter is transmitting?”
I looked away from the TV and over to my friend. “Billy, tell Bridget I feel sick. I’m heading into the bathroom. I may puke. If you don’t see me on the floor in a few minutes, I’ve headed back to my place. I’ll call later if I feel up to working.”
Billy looked surprised. “Oh, sure Jeff, I’ll tell Queen Boss Bridget you’re sick. Hope you get to feeling better.”
“Thanks,” I said as I headed into the bathroom.
No one was inside, thank goodness. Standing before one of the sinks I brought to mind the image of my living room and thought “I wish to be there.”
And I was standing there.
As usual the air that had filled the spot of my arrival whooshed away as my solidity filled what had been an open space.
The Eiffel Tower hostage taking was something I could act on. I’d visited the tower’s two top floors years ago during a trip to Paris with my parents. More importantly, the elevator conductor had allowed me to enter the small office room that Gustave Eiffel had constructed for himself. The room was where he had met with Thomas Edison when the inventor had traveled to Paris and then ridden up the hydraulic lifts to reach the Top level. When I visited the office there had been wax mannequins of Eiffel and Edison sitting in the chairs where once the real people had sat, with his daughter Claire standing to one side and watching. I had thought it kind of eerie, years ago, to see floral fabric on the office walls along with prints from the late 1800s. A few pieces of furniture occupied the room. A slanting iron beam partly cut through the room. It had a clear view of one side of the fenced walkway and was lighted by a small ceiling lamp. I knew that if I teleported there no one would be in the room as the office was normally locked to the public. But I could see the walkway through the clear plastic panels that covered one side of the room. That view would show me if the walkway was clear of the four men. If it was clear, I could walk out to it, or teleport myself out to the walkway. From there I could port to any spot I could see. And once I had a direct view of the four terrorists, I could act against them.
I looked over to the flatscreen above my fireplace. With my thoughts I reached out, found the switch mechanism inside the TV, thought “come together” and with a buzz of power the TV came on. Its image held Howden and, behind her, jerky views of the east side of the tower that showed the upper floor of Top level. Clearly this was a live shot from the French news helicopter. From what I could see, the twenty-one hostages were gathered in front of the champagne bar near one end of the platform, with three guys holding AK-47 rifles pointed at them. The men stood at either corner of that side of the platform, with the hostages between them. The fourth man was not visible. Damn.
“A source at the French Ministry of the Interior has told our reporter Astrid Magnuson the terms demanded by the four terrorists,” Howden said, glancing down at her table top, then up. “And one of the terrorists is live streaming the hostage taking onto YouTube. The ministry source says the terrorists are demanding the departure of all French military forces from the Middle East, the approval of Sharia law in all French neighborhoods where Islamic believers now live and a reversal of the French law that prohibits the wearing of full face veils in public by Muslim women.” Howden paused. “The face coverings prohibited by French law are called niqabs or burkas, coverings that either partly or fully cover a woman’s face.” She looked to one side. “Joining me now is an expert on Islamic law. He is Sunni and—”
My mind shut off the power to the TV. I had seen enough.
Turning, I walked into my bedroom, opened the sliding door to my clothes closet, and grabbed the bullet resistant vest I’d bought earlier. I took off my blue hoodie and put the vest on top of my green UNM t-shirt, then put the hoodie back on. It was bound to be cold at 906 feet, which was the height of the Top level’s upper floor and outside platform. Turning to the nightstand by my bed I grabbed the box of green surgical gloves, put on a pair, then pulled out my .45 from the nightstand drawer. It went into my rear waistband. Finally I grabbed my green bandana from the top shelf of the closet and tied it over my face. The hood came up and covered my head. While I could generate a ball of flame to keep myself warm, I preferred to not be distracted by minor discomforts. My primary objective must be to disarm the terrorists and then get the hostages down from the platform, using either the elevator or the emergency stairs that wound down from under the lower floor of Top level.
I went out and into the bathroom. The mirror showed me a tall guy dressed in bluejeans, a blue hoodie, a green t-shirt and my black hair mostly covered by the hoodie. Only my eyes and forehead showed above the bandana. My upper body looked bulkier than usual, thanks to the vest. Standing there I closed my eyes and brought up memory images of the rooms on the Top level of the Eiffel Tower. There was the small enclosure of the elevator in the middle of the room that gave access to the outer platform walkways. Then there was a bathroom on one side and a door leading to the small alcove of the champagne bar that served people standing on the walkway. I had to assume the champagne worker was one of the hostages, along with the people who had been standing outside on the platform at six p.m. Paris time. Bringing to mind the image of Gustave Eiffel’s office and the spot between his chair and Edison’s, where I had once stood years ago, I thought “I wish to be there”.
And I was.
Stepping back to be covered by the slanting iron beam, I leaned forward a little and looked through the plastic window. The part of the outside platform and walkway that I could see was empty. But where was terror guy four? He could be inside, guarding the elevator that had been chained to a ceiling beam. Best not to take a chance of running into him. Focusing on the platform walkway that lay just six feet from me, I thought “I wish to be there”.
It was cold outside. Frigidly cold. And it was dusky, but there was still some daylight as the Sun had not yet fully set to the west of Paris. Looking right and left I saw that the platform walkway on this side of the Top floor was empty of people. Which made sense as I stood on what was the south side of the tower. Below me was the green swath of the Champ de Mars open field, where military parades had been held in the past. Now, only the black dots of some tourists were visible far, far below. Along with lots of white gendarmerie vans, Army trucks and some TV news vans. To my left I heard the whooshing sound of a helicopter’s blades. That must be the French 24 copter that was livecasting the gathering of hostages on the east side of the tower. Giving thanks for the softness of my tennis shoes, I turned left and walked toward the corner of the platform.
My memory of the copter image said two of the terrorists would be standing just around the corner I was heading for, with thei
r rifles aimed at the hostages. Taking care of the rifles was the first order of business. And that included the rifle of the man at the other end of the east side platform, who was aiming at the cluster of people gathered in front of the champagne service window. Reminding myself that the east side of the platform was just 50 feet long, I moved close to the metal wall of the inside room as I neared the corner of the platform. My ears heard the shuffle of many people, a few moans from some women, a guttural “fermé la bouche!” from what I assumed was a jihadist, and the smell of fear sweat. Despite the openness of the platform and the soft wind that blew in from the west, the odor put off by scared people was distinct. It was different from exercise sweat. Ordering my mind, I stepped around the corner.
Two black-coated men stood with their backs to me.
They had rifles pointed at a group of people, nearly all of whom were looking out at the copter as it hovered.
Beyond the crowd of hostages stood jihadist number three. He took was looking toward the copter, though his rifle was aimed at the people.
I gave thanks that three was not looking at his fellows, which would have allowed him to see my arrival.
Fixing my vision on the two nearby rifles and on the AK-47 held by number three, I thought “Come to me.”
The three rifles pulled loose from the hands of the jihadists, lifted up in the air and flew back to me.
I grabbed them, though the impact made me step back a bit.
“Merde!” yelled one man in front of me, turning to look back to where his rifle had gone. His nearby fellow did the same. Beyond them jihadist three followed the flight of his rifle across the space above the heads of the hostages and into my arms. Fury showed on his face. As it showed on the faces of the two nearby jihadists.
Superpowers 1: Superguy Page 17
