Search For Reason (State Of Reason Mystery, Book 2)

by Miles A. Maxwell

  But he could feel Rani staring at his face. What does the cut look like? How bad is it? Everon sighed. Rani wasn’t going to let it go.

  “As far as Turban can tell,” he began, “there’s absolutely no damage to Mercer.” He fished out the printout Hunt had given him and handed it to Rani. “Mercer’s computer log.”

  He told them about the phase imbalance and Junior’s near shutdown. The group of unknown men that had chased him through the woods. The hundreds of bullets they’d fired at him.

  “What!” Rani said.

  “No shit!” Holmes whistled over the intercom.

  “Mercer was completely disconnected from the grid when the New York bomb went off,” Everon explained. “But not only were the lines disconnected — you can see it on the log there,” he nodded at the paper Rani held, “but the Mercer telephone lines were cut too.”

  “Who would have done that?” Holmes asked.

  “That’s what I’d like to know. Lama’s not going to have any trouble getting me interested now.” He cocked his head at the paper. “What that log doesn’t explain is why Mercer was taken offline — right before the first bomb.”

  “And with the load the Williams system was carrying Monday night!” Rani added, glancing at Everon’s cheek doubtfully, frown lines growing deeper in the terribly scarred face. “What does it mean, E?”

  “I don’t know exactly. But it’s got something to do with powering that building back in the woods. Those assholes nearly shut down Mercer this morning. Truth is, there’s not a lot of time to look into it right now. But as soon as we’ve got power to the hospital, you can bet I’m going back there.”

  They were silent. The blades whipped overhead.

  “And next time, I’ll be armed for bear.”

  Over The Edge — Charlie Regal

  “Hi Charlie!” Franklin greeted the boy here for his nine-thirty appointment.

  “I didn’t want to come,” the kid replied. “My mom said I had to.”

  Franklin could still see Charlie’s eyes staring back from the corner of the park last night. “Where is your mom, Charlie?” Franklin asked.

  The kid looked defiant and didn’t answer. The front office door was still closing.

  Charlie Regal was fourteen years old. Tall for his age, extraordinarily thin. He picked at a pimple just left of the center of his chin, one of a dozen or so on his elfin face. He wore black jeans, an olive green winter parka with a fur-lined hood. The front was unzipped exposing a black T-shirt with a picture of a snarling skinhead band holding neck-crossed guitars. Would the bomber snarl like that while he sat in some foreign country planning his next attack?

  “She said she’d be back for Charlie in half an hour, Reverend,” Marjorie explained.

  She just leaves her son here and runs? Franklin thought about chasing the woman down.

  Before Franklin could reply, Charlie said, “I don’t want to hear any of that God crap!”

  Marjorie’s eyes opened like saucers.

  “My office is at the end of the hall, Charlie,” Franklin said softly. “Go ahead. I’ll be right there —”

  “I know where. I been here with my mom and dad last year.”

  He started down the hallway. Franklin turned to Marjorie.

  “What did his mom say?”

  Marj shook her head. “It’s nothing to do with the bombing,” she whispered. “Drugs. It’s something to do with drugs!” She put a soft hand on Franklin’s arm. “By the way, Reverend Maples doesn’t seem too thrilled with having Harry here.”

  Franklin walked over. Lifted Harry’s cage off the corner table. “Okay. I’ll put him in my office.”

  Despite Ralph Maples’ orders, Franklin couldn’t imagine how he could use the Bible to help Charlie out, if that God crap, as Charlie put it, wasn’t going to cut it.

  Franklin carried Harry down the hall and a thought percolated: It’s no good trying to work with anything that’s under his parents’ strict control and discipline. Charlie’s interest runs to some kind of punk music. Guitars and screaming?

  Franklin closed his door. Set Harry on the floor in the corner.

  “Cool bird,” Charlie said.

  “Thanks. His name’s Harry. I’d like to try to help you, Charlie . . . if — if you would give me your permission?”

  “Permission?” Charlie scoffed, “I meant what I said about that God — God stuff!”

  “I know what you mean.” Franklin nodded at Charlie’s T-shirt, “It’s not like seeing your favorite band on stage, is it? What band is that?”

  Charlie’s eyes jerked downward, having forgotten what he had on, for a moment forgetting where he was. He spread the front of his jacket so he could see for himself. “Deadmetal Heads,” he mumbled.

  “Weren’t they down in Pittsburgh last month?” Franklin asked.

  “Yeah, they were,” Charlie answered, surprised.

  “Deadmetal, deadmetalheads,” Franklin laughed lightly. “Funny the way their name bounces like that,” his voice dropped slightly, “Dead metal heads — headsdeadmetal . . .”

  For a split second, Charlie’s eyes went out of focus. It was all Franklin wanted to see. “Dead metal, heads dead metal. What’s their music like — like?” Franklin asked suddenly.

  Charlie’s eyes looked up and to his right. “It’s —

  “Runge-grunge, is it not?” Franklin interrupted Charlie’s process.

  “Uh — yeah — how do you —”

  Franklin wasn’t a fan by any means. But he found the new words of the ever-changing youth culture fascinating. “I guess that when I think of the name and the music and your shirt you can see them on stage —” Franklin’s breathing, his posture, mimicking Charlie’s, even the way the kid’s hands hung down loose over his knees.

  “The music’s energy,” Franklin said, “this feeling, can somehow be relaxing — as if you can just get away from yourself, from everything.” Charlie’s eyes glazed over, a tiny twitch at the right corner of his mouth.

  It took Franklin a long time — maybe ten minutes before Charlie’s eyes were ready to close — when Franklin finally made the suggestion that he didn’t mind . . . that “it would be okay” . . . if Charlie did just that. While Franklin went on talking . . . coaxing Charlie deeper . . .

  A bit later he asked, “If part of your mind, your creative part, could think of as many things as it would like to . . . what would be the most fun to do if it could do anything . . .”

  Minutes later he asked the rest of Charlie to “Consider these new ideas — these new options,” and if he wanted, “ . . . to sort through . . . to find the best one or two or three . . .”

  “ . . . and how exactly would someone do that?” he asked a bit later.

  The things Franklin did were in no way authoritarian. Only a type of positive directed permissiveness. Ultimately it was permission to find new ideas, utilize better options, heal oneself. Never once did Franklin mention church or Bible or Jesus or God. Facilitation, yes. Never control.

  Increasingly, Charlie’s own process would produce his own creative choices. It would be all Charlie.

  Charlie’s resources. Charlie’s goals.

  Thirty minutes and a couple of posthypnotic suggestions later, Franklin helped Charlie to consciousness. Lifting Charlie’s right elbow, together they stood up from the chairs they’d somehow settled into. The kid took a deep breath.

  Franklin stuck out a hand. “Call me Franklin, Charlie.”

  Charlie took the hand. “Thanks for uh —” He looked a little bewildered and smiled. “Uh — thanks, Franklin.”

  “Any time, Charlie!”

  They walked out front. Charlie waved at Marj. “See ya!” and went happily out the office door.

  Franklin knew, by itself, what he’d done wouldn’t last forever, unless Charlie got some positive reinforcement somewhere — at home, at school. Maybe even Charlie’s own self-generated success.

  But it was a start.

 
Surf’s Up!

  An American flag at half-mast, flapping loudly in the offshore wind, was the only visible indication the country had been attacked, that so many had died. The palms were one-sided, their wide green fronds all downwind.

  As if New York and Virginia had never happened, judges called out point decisions through the lifeguard tower’s loudspeaker. The final round of the famous 13th Annual Indialantic Beach Surf Classic was limited to three insanely brave, hot-looking wahinis — bikini-clad females in the surfer world — and seven of the toughest male surfers, all of whom risked the unusually large leftover surf of Hurricane Thomas, to gain bonus points in the final freestyle competition.

  Two days ago, officials declared: “There will be no event this year out of respect for those who died.”

  Eighteen top surfers had gone first to the media, then stood before the officials to declare there definitely would be a contest — with or without judges or sponsors. “What are we supposed to do — stay home? The attackers would not shut down their lives or their own natural joy of living. “Terrorists be damned!”

  So today, it was on! And the surf was way, way up!

  While the beach crowd watched, two boys, grinning like maniacs, cut back along the front of the swell, letting the curling water fold over their heads. As two of the youngest kids in the meet, most of the older guys razzed them for a couple of shrimps.

  From the beach, it was easy for officials to tell them apart. The boy in the lead, white-blond hair streaming back with running water, wore red-and-yellow knee-length California-style trunks. The boy following, whose spiky red-brown hair reflected brilliant sparks from random sunbeams beginning to poke through the dark sky, wore green. Several young wahinis near the judge’s stand found it necessary to argue over which suit more nicely set off the boys’ startling sea-green eyes.

  Unlike the other finalists, the boys didn’t care about points or the competition. They had entered to hang out with their friends, and to get away from an old tragic loss of their own. Five feet apart, they faded back into the dangerous ten-foot pipe of crashing water, and disappeared from view.

  Hidden inside the folding water, the blond boy in red-and-yellow cut his board up tight while the brown-haired boy in green flew down the flowing ramp and shot forward, passing underneath. The blond slashed back down and followed after.

  Together they shot forward out of the pipe.

  To the screaming crowd, as to the judges, it was obvious. The green trunks were now in the lead, followed closely by the boy wearing red-and-yellow. Though the boys couldn’t hear it over the roaring water, the beach audience, upon seeing them reappear in different order, began jumping up and down, cheering wildly.

  A tall, beautiful auburn-haired woman watched with somber satisfaction.

  “Anyone know who they are?” a man wearing a press badge asked.

  Mary Williams smiled. “They’re mine, I’m afraid.” She sighed, “And I suppose you’ll want to talk with them. The blond is Ray. His younger, dark-haired brother is Jacob.”

  These days, Mary worried about her sons more than ever. Each morning after that first miserable week two years ago, she looked at them and asked herself, Are they okay? Until at last she was able to answer: They’ve gotten past the damn thing better than I have. Two years ago she’d lost the boys’ father — her partner in life of sixteen years.

  Faster and faster the boys moved down the open face until they left the folding torrent behind. Like two tree leaves, Jacob, then Ray, hammered their boards up — and blew seaward, over the water’s lip, allowing the tremendous swell to pass by.

  “Wahoo!” dark-haired Jacob shouted, pulling himself onto his board and sitting upright.

  “Wahoo!” echoed blond-haired Ray, high-fiving his brother, “Nailed that one!”

  “Let’s go grab the kites.” Jacob, a year younger and more aggressive, was always pushing the limits.

  “Swell’s pretty big,” Ray replied.

  “True. But if we move up that way,” Jacob pointed north, “we’ll be beyond the main break. In this wind we can lift right over!”

  Not to be outdone by his younger brother, Ray grinned. “I’m game if you are.”

  The boys waited until another swell passed, then lay down on their boards and paddled in fast.

  Mary had not heard from her father until yesterday by satellite phone. Sounds like a real mess up there, she thought. At least the local power is on here again. She felt sad for Hunt, losing so many of his people. Some of whom she’d met and liked.

  She stood waiting at water’s edge when they ran out of the surf. “Great ride, boys!”

  “Thanks, Mom!” they echoed, both wearing the same manic grins they’d worn entering the pipe.

  “I had to throw some more sand on your kites to keep them on the ground.” The two kites lay with their leading edges partially inflated, piles of wet sand preventing them from blowing away. “I let some of the air out of the bladders. They were trying to take off without you.”

  “Good move . . . Mom . . .” Ray answered absently — his attention drawn to something out beyond the break.

  “I’ll get the pump and harnesses from the truck!” Jacob said, running up the sand.

  “Hey Mom,” Ray said in a puzzled voice. “Let me look through the binocs, will you?” he held out a hand to Mary on his left, eyes still on the surf.

  Jacob returned. Ray dropped the binoculars from his eyes and pointed. “You see that?” he said lightly.

  Jacob and Mary looked into the distant swells.

  “Lifeboat,” Jacob answered.

  “I know,” Ray said. “But does it look like something’s following it?”

  “Let me look,” Jacob said, taking the binoculars from his brother.

  “You’re right! I count two — no, three fins! I’m guessing maybe bulls or tigers. Could be blacktips. Hard to tell.”

  “I wonder what the sharks are following,” Ray said.

  “Looks like they’re attracted to something hanging from the stern.”

  Trail Of Blood

  Then Jacob recognized what they were looking at.

  A head lolled back against the boat’s small motor. On either side of the stern, what was left of two bloody arms slapped the water with each swell. From the fingertips to halfway up the forearms, they’d been chewed to the bone. Several fingers on the right hand were completely missing. Following the scent trail of bloody water, the number of fins was growing.

  “Those waves are pushing pretty fast,” Ray said, “probably reach the surfer pack in about ten minutes.”

  “Less than that!” Jacob yelled, running for the car.

  Mary and her boys weren’t the only ones who’d noticed fins following the little boat. Up in the tower, judges began frantically attempting to alert the remaining contestants to the closing danger. The cheering crowd’s enthusiasm quickly turned to horror as they too realized the loudspeaker was not able to overcome the sound produced by the huge surf. Spectators joined in, jumping up and down, yelling, waving.

  The boat drifted closer. One of the surfing wahini girls noticed the beach crowd’s strange antics and called to the others sitting in the swell on their boards.

  “Does anyone know what’s going on?” she seemed to be asking.

  Hands went to shade eyes. Several of the surfers pointed toward the lifeboat. Before anyone could move, a giant fin appeared behind the smaller ones. A great white, its huge pointed face full of broad red gums and long white teeth, surfaced with a gigantic smile.

  And they reacted. Get the hell out of here!

  With the lifeboat now less than fifty yards from the frantic, paddling surfers, the sharks seemed to realize there was something more interesting to eat nearby — eight splashing objects.

  Feeding time!

  The carrion of the corpse’s hands and forearms had been hors d’oeuvres. Eight unlucky surfers were about to become a full-course meal.

  Query To Hunt
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  When they landed back at N-J, Everon got Holmes to start refueling the MD-900 right away. “You know this is the last of it, E,” Holmes said. “Probably only get the tank to three-quarters.”

  “Put in every drop.”

  It was fuel that could have gone to the hospital or the prison or Mercer Junior. But the MD-900 was a time machine, the amount of fuel relatively small compared to those other needs. And Everon had to know right now what was happening at Thomas.

  To Rani he said, “Take the bucket truck with the fullest gas tank and go back to Mercer. Replace Gib. I want to know you’re the one setting Mercer’s switches when we get ready to go here. Let Gib take the truck. He’s going to want to get in on re-energizing the hospital’s local lines. His sister’s there.”

  Right Deters was in the transformer yard. Woodie wasn’t, which Everon was happy to see. The big transformer was in.

  “A few major cable connections and we’re done, E,” Right called out as Everon hurried past.

  It didn’t look like anything would hold up Nicola. Everon would drop Holmes off at Thomas to make sure the smaller substation’s repairs were completed on time too. They would leave in a few minutes.

  In the control room, Everon asked, “Has anyone seen Mr. Williams?”

  “I’m looking for him too,” Scrounge steamed in. Dumped two cases of energy drink, and a white plastic garbage sack with a roll of paper towels — all onto the right side of the wide U-shaped console.

  “He was here a minute ago,” Lama said.

  “Oh, no, not more caffeine,” Sam said. “I don’t feel too good as it is.” The control engineer’s hands shook a little as he pried a can from the pack. “I’ve drunk too many of these already. Don’t you have any water?”

  “Melt some snow,” Scrounge said over his shoulder.

  “What’s this?” Everon called at the purchasing manager’s back as he pulled the sack over.