《Abby's Gift》


 The Bus

    In stories, the heroine with lightning-fast reflexes would have instantly analyzed the situation, dropped flat to the ground and let the bus simply roll right over her with barely a quarter inch to spare. It¡¯s even possible that this fictional heroine would have jumped back diagonally and avoided the impact. Maybe. But I¡¯m not a heroine and that¡¯s not what happened. I¡¯m strong and I¡¯ve got good stamina, but fast as lightning isn¡¯t my thing. I just did what any regular girl would have done. I froze in terror and waited for the bus to hit me. Or at least that¡¯s what should have happened.


    I had taken a shortcut home from the university library and I was coming out of the alley between the laundromat and Tiny¡¯s Fitness Center on General Avenue with my arms full of books and my mind full of plans for the day. I needed to eat lunch before Uncle Magnum got to the house for our Kung Fu lesson and then I really needed to sit down and read a few chapters of the Stock Picking for Dummies book I¡¯d just gotten from the library. I knew that it was way early to start working on the Junior Year stock market competition, since I¡¯m still a Sophomore, but my friend James was determined to win next year, and I wasn¡¯t going to let him down. James, Eva and I were going to spend some time over the summer learning about stocks and planning our investment strategies.


    The sound of squealing tires focused my attention back to the present and I saw the bus narrowly missing a very surprised girl wearing earbuds and holding a cellphone in her hand. She had zombied herself past a parked truck and out in front of the oncoming bus. As I watched the bus veer sharply to the right and miss the girl by less than a foot, I could see the bus driver¡¯s head turn to see if the girl was ok. Unfortunately for me, his turned head didn¡¯t let him see that his course change put me right in his new path.


    In the movies, a dashing hunk would have come out of nowhere and tackled me to safety, skillfully twisting us both in midair so that his body absorbed the impact with the ground. In the comics, Superman would have arrived just in time to stop the bus one-handed, saving the terrified young girl, who had frozen in terror at the sight of a bus bearing down on her. That would have been nice. In real life though, I was about to go splat.


    Rooted to the ground with a city bus about to plow into me, my life did not flash before my eyes. Instead, my perception of everything around me sped up and I had time to notice the bus¡¯s number (161) and that the bus was nearly empty (only 8 passengers). More importantly, I was able to watch as the bus driver faded away, along with all his passengers. First, they lost all color, becoming a grey version of themselves, quickly fading into a dim outline of their former selves before disappearing completely. Just before the bus was supposed to hit me, it too greyed out and passed through me. The ghosted bus kept going and I was watching the interior of the bus pass by. Rows of empty seats passed through me and before I was halfway to the end, the bus faded out completely leaving me undamaged on the sidewalk. That¡¯s when the buildings around me started greying out. In a few short seconds, I was standing in a wide-open area, with no people or cars or buildings in sight. Just emptiness all around me.


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    My heart was hammering in my chest and my whole body felt like jello. I should be dead or severely injured at least, but I hadn¡¯t been touched. Was I dreaming? Had I been hit and this was my mind¡¯s way of coping? Studying my surroundings for any clues that I wasn¡¯t in the waking world, I expected to see a bunny hop out of nowhere and tell that it was late. No bunnies appeared. Nothing stirred. All I saw was a vast open area, with no trees or grass, just bare dirt as far as the eye could see. Only rectangular holes, marking the foundations and basements of the buildings that used to exist marred the evenness of the landscape.


    Living in a city, even a small one like Spring Fort, North Carolina, there are always sounds. People talking, footfalls, cars passing by, dogs barking, insects buzzing, the hum of air conditioners or heaters. Even wind can be noisy. But there was nothing here. No noise at all. No wind. No insects. No birds. Just utter quiet.


    ¡°Hello?!¡±, I called out. Relief thrummed within my mind as I heard my own voice. I could still hear. I let out a breath. I heard that too! I hadn¡¯t realized that I was holding my breath before.


    I took a step forward and my stomach cramped up in pain. I doubled over and a pulling sensation started in my stomach and quickly spread to my whole body. The feeling intensified and I was sure that I was going to fall over.  I felt like I was at the end of a rubber band that had been pulled to the end of it¡¯s stretchiness and I was about the snap back. Without a sound, I felt the snap and I was back on General Avenue. The buildings were back, just the way they were before, and there was noise. Beautiful noise. And people. People running? Oh yeah, the bus. It had only been a few seconds since I was(n¡¯t) hit by the bus, but it seemed much longer.


    Turning around, I saw the back end of the bus. Moving a few feet to the side showed me that the front end was wedged about two feet into the front fa?ade of the real estate agency next to the laundromat. People were running towards the bus to see if anyone was hurt. I joined the growing crowd and could see several people had their phones out filming the scene. One idiot zombie was taking a selfie with the crashed bus in the background. I hoped that at least one of these people had the brains to call 911.


    Making my way to the front of the bus, I saw the front door, now situated just outside the crashed in agency facade, open and a passenger staggered out, looking disheveled and relieved. Some thoughtful people took her away from the bus to sit down on a nearby bench and made sure she was ok. Within a few minutes, the seven other passengers and the driver were all accounted for. Thankfully, no one was injured, only shaken up.


    Now that things were settling down, I kept expecting someone to come up to me and say,¡± Hey! I thought I saw the bus hit you. How come you¡¯re not dead?¡± or ¡°Holy Shit! You popped out of nowhere after the bus hit the building.¡± I looked around and didn¡¯t see anyone staring at me with bulging eyes. Not a single strange look was coming my way. No one was taking any notice of me at all.  I realized that no one had seen me not get hit by the bus and my sudden appearance behind the bus had also gone unnoticed. I smiled in relief. What had happened was already weird enough and I didn¡¯t need to add public scrutiny to my list of troubles.


    The bus driver was on his cell, talking to someone from the bus company, as I slowly backed away from the scene. I didn¡¯t want to eavesdrop on his conversation, and I definitely didn¡¯t want to wait for the police to arrive. It was time to make myself scarce and I quietly made my way home.


    My house was in sight by the time it occurred to me to wonder if there were street cameras that had recorded the whole incident.

 Figuring out what the hell just happened

    Ten minutes later, I was sitting in my kitchen, eating Rice Krispy cereal sprinkled heavily with Reese¡¯s Peanut Butter Puffs, wondering if the whole bus thing had actually happened. Everything seemed so normal. It was a typical Sunday and the house was quiet, dad was still busy at the university, and Uncle Magnum would be here in less than an hour. Nothing had changed, yet it felt like everything was different. Something had happened to me, or I made something happen. I wasn¡¯t going crazy. I¡¯d read too many books and seen too many movies where the main character convinced themselves that they were misremembering something incredible that just happened to them. Denying your observations of reality doesn¡¯t make sense. If you don¡¯t trust your own mind, you¡¯ll go crazy and if your mind is playing tricks on you, then you are crazy. Better to start with the assumption that you¡¯re not crazy and see where it gets you. That is, until it brings you to a point where you¡¯re about to do yourself any harm. Besides, I clearly remember that bus greying out. I remember the quiet and I definitely remembered the pain of snapping back.


    I took my dishes to the sink, rinsed them off and put them in the dishwasher. Having been to my friends¡¯ houses, I¡¯m aware that this is not normal teenage behavior, but since it¡¯s just dad and me here, if I didn¡¯t do it now, I¡¯d just end up doing it later. Dad¡¯s pretty neat and he expects me to be too. At work he cleans his tools and put them away at the end of each day and he¡¯s the same at home. He doesn¡¯t clean up after me and I don¡¯t clean up after him. We split the cooking chores and the laundry and Stella comes in twice a week to do the cleaning and change the sheets. It¡¯s been that way since I turned ten. Before that dad would help me clean up and do chores and before that mom used to split the housework with him. Mom hasn¡¯t been around since I was four.


    While I¡¯m semi-distracted with my thoughts on what I¡¯m already mentally calling ¡°The Bus Incident¡±, I go to my room and change into my Kung Fu clothes; loose black pants, a sports bra and a white t-shirt. When I go to Uncle Magnum¡¯s Kung Fu studio, I also put on white socks and slippers, and I wear the traditional button up jacket as well. Here, at home, we practice informally. We just need to wear clothing that won¡¯t rip when we do the splits or crouch in horse-stance.


    I hate horse-stance. Imagine sitting on a chair, with your legs spread at around 90 degrees, and then removing the chair and staying steady. Now do that for four or five minutes, without moving. It really sucks. But wait, there¡¯s more, if you sign up now you can also make sure that your back is straight, your hips are thrust forward and that your arms are bent at your sides with your elbows trying to touch behind your back. Did I mention that I hate horse-stance?


    The weather is nice out today, so we¡¯ll practice in the backyard. On cooler days, we work out in The Parlor. At least that¡¯s what Uncle Magnum calls it and he always says it in a snooty British accent that makes you see the capitals in your mind. Dad and I just call it the den. It all goes back to when we were first being shown the house. Dad, Uncle Magnum and I were getting a tour from the university¡¯s real estate agent lady and she was going on and on about all the features of the house and when we got to the den she explained how large the parlor was and how we¡¯d have such a good time entertaining guests there. I was only 6 years old then, but even I knew that wasn¡¯t going to happen. Dad doesn¡¯t entertain. I remember seeing Uncle Magnum look over at dad and they both smiled. Uncle Magnum¡¯s smile was laced with irony, as he knew dad too, but dad¡¯s smile was wistful, and I could almost see him reliving old memories. Mom was the entertainer in the family. She would have loved this room. She would have filled it with life and people, and even though I was only six, I knew right then that we were going to take the house. Dad would take it because mom would have loved it.


    Warm up consisted of ten minutes of meditation, five minutes of horse-stance (Uggh!), fifteen minutes of various muscle stretching exercises, and five minutes of straight-arm plank on my knuckles. Plank isn¡¯t as bad as horse-stance, since you can get used to plank. It takes a long time, but it eventually gets easier. I set the timer on my phone and got started.


    During mediation, your mind isn¡¯t supposed to focus on anything; clearing away all thought was the goal. You¡¯re supposed to simply feel the energy in your body and try to focus it towards your core. It wasn¡¯t working for me today. My mind needed to go over The Bus Incident; to examine each second that I could remember. I needed to be methodical about it. I knew from my Kung Fu training that if I could break down a move into its individual parts, then I¡¯d be able to do it, with enough practice. Uncle Magnum says that it takes over 10,000 repetitions of a move in order to perfect it. In this case, figuring out what move I needed to make was the real challenge.


    Ok. Relax. Concentrate on your breathing. The bus was going to hit me, and it didn¡¯t. I went through the bus. Wait. Did I go through it or did it go through me? Shit! I hate philosophy. I like things black or white. Shades of grey piss me off. The glass is half full. Yes, the tree makes a sound. 42 angels can dance on the head of a pin. Ok. Focus. The bus. It veered away from the idiot girl on her cellphone and not watching where she was going as she wandered into the path of the bus. The bus swerves into my path and turns into a ghost bus.


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    Nooo¡­, that¡¯s not right. The bus didn¡¯t turn into a ghost. It kept going and hit the building. I turned into a ghost. From my perspective, the bus greyed out, but for the bus, I wasn¡¯t there. No one on the bus saw my upper body coming out of the floor of the bus. To them, I wasn¡¯t there. Well, actually, they had all disappeared before I ghosted out, so they couldn¡¯t have seen me. So the first weird thing that happened was that the people went away, then it was the bus, and later it was the buildings.


    Why wouldn¡¯t they all go away at once? What did the stages represent? Light to heavy? Little to big? Levels of mobility? Lifespan? Damn. This isn¡¯t getting me anywhere. I¡¯m trying to figure out the theory behind something that has only occurred once. I need more points of reference. I need to figure out how to do it again, make some new observations and then I can try to come up with a theory.


    So, what else happened? After the buildings were gone, I ended up in an empty town, bare dirt all around me. I heard the quiet, took a step forward and got that major cramp feeling. Then my whole body felt a pulling and I was back from wherever it was that I went to. It¡¯s weird how that almost elastic pull was only one way. I didn¡¯t feel any stretching when I ghosted out. Maybe, as I ghosted out farther and farther out, I was stretching the elastic and when I went too far, I got pulled back. That¡¯s great, but I still need to initiate the stretch.


    How did I do it the first time? All I did was freeze up. I didn¡¯t move at all. Humph. If that was a requirement, I¡¯d be ghosting right now in my meditation. Could it be that I was scared out of my mind? I¡¯ve been scared before, though. Terrified, in fact. But I didn¡¯t ghost out then. I almost wish I had. Focus! Danger? Maybe my subconscious recognized that I about to die and activated a previously unknown ability. That sounded neat but wouldn¡¯t help me much. I wasn¡¯t about to go around risking my life to test out a theory. I had to find a way to kickstart my ability without putting myself in mortal danger. I suppose a good scare might do it, but how do you scare yourself?


    I heard a questioning ¡°Hello?¡± coming from the house.


    ¡°Out here, Uncle Magnum! You¡¯re early. I haven¡¯t warmed up yet.¡±


    ¡°Perfect! We can warm up together. I¡¯ll get you a staff for horse-stance¡±. I groaned out loud as he walked into the yard. He gave me an innocent smile. He knows how much I despise horse stance and he enjoyed my pain. I think that all Kung Fu master¡¯s are sadists at heart.


    ¡°Why are you complaining? Your horse-stance is excellent. You¡¯ve been doing it since you were four. Besides, maybe if you called me by my real name, I wouldn¡¯t want to torture you so much.¡± Now it was my turn to smile. Uncle Magnum¡¯s real name is Paul Metzstein. He¡¯s my mom¡¯s older brother. He¡¯s 5¡¯11¡±, bald as a cue ball (by choice), and very fit. However, the giant 1970¡¯s mustache plastered on this upper lip is his most noticeable feature. From the first time that I saw Tom Selleck playing Magnum P.I. on dvd, I changed Uncle Paul¡¯s name to Uncle Magnum. I even made the ¡®mistake¡¯ of referring to him as Uncle Magnum in class once. Somehow it caught on and now he¡¯s Sifu Magnum to all of his students. It¡¯s way better than Sifu Paul and I¡¯ve been trying to get him to change the name of school to Magnum¡¯s Kung Fu. I think that he only pretends to be offended by it. He does give you extra push-ups to do during plank if you call him Sifu Magnum, but he¡¯ll find any excuse to give you extra push-ups, so I don¡¯t take that seriously.


    We did our stretching and soon started in on forms. Forms are like little dances with specific moves. Each move is a strike or a block, or both at once. Each form is named after an animal and has a different style of striking. We went through Tiger, Leopard, Crane, Dragon, and Serpent forms. I was all sweaty by the time we started sparring. Sparring is my favorite part of Kung Fu. While a lot of Kung Fu is endless repetition to drill in muscle memory, sparring is always different, and you have to think quickly. You have to watch for openings and think about the best way to get in, all while making sure that your defense is strong, because getting kicked in the face really sucks. Also, I love attacking people. You don¡¯t get to do that in everyday life.


    After class, Uncle Magnum and I went inside. He went in for a quick shower and told me to do 15 minutes of work with the dummy as a cool down. A Kung Fu dummy is a round cylinder of wood that simulates an opponent. It has two wooden arms sticking out from the top, one from the middle, and one wooden leg coming out of the bottom. You can practice all of your strikes and blocks and kicks on it. The fact that you¡¯re hitting a block of wood also helps your arm bones get used to taking punishment. We named our dummy Ed. I can¡¯t remember why, but it fit. Ed was special, in that he¡¯s a moving dummy; meaning you can set it up so that when you hit an arm it could rotate in a circle and hit you from the other side. When we changed from a stationary dummy to the moving one, I got whacked a lot by that arm. I kept forgetting that Ed could move, and that arm kept surprising the hell out of me. I wonder if there was a way for me to forget about it again.  That would be a perfect way to test out the theory. When Uncle Magnum leaves, I¡¯ll be trying that out.

 Working with Ed

    ¡°Don¡¯t forget to get to class a bit early this Tuesday. We have two new students trying us out with the free lesson. I¡¯ll want you to show them the salutes and go over what they should expect.¡±, Uncle Magnum reminded me.


    ¡°Ok. There¡¯s only about a week left of school and then I only have my math and English finals to do. I should be able to come most nights after that.¡± I¡¯d been working as an assistant instructor at Uncle¡¯s school for around three years. I¡¯m a fifth dan level student, which means that I¡¯m one test away from getting my red belt. A red belt would make me a Kung Fu master and I¡¯d be able to take on my own students, but Uncle Magnum says that I¡¯m not ready to take the test yet. He says that I need to have more striking power and that it¡¯s extremely rare for someone my age to have enough strength to pass the red belt test. I don¡¯t mind waiting though. I¡¯ve been doing Kung Fu for 11 years, but I feel like I¡¯m too young to take on the responsibility of being a teacher. I¡¯m happy to help out Uncle Magnum for now.


    ¡°Great! I¡¯ll see then. I¡¯m off. Say hi to your dad from me.¡± Uncle Magnum was almost out the door.


    ¡°What¡¯s the big rush? You usually stay for a snack and a show. We need to start the third season of Knight Rider.¡± Don¡¯t judge. Uncle Magnum has a thing for the 80¡¯s and 90¡¯s and he¡¯s been my entertainment director since mom¡¯s been gone. We¡¯ve been making our way though tv shows, music and movies from that era. I¡¯ve binge watched stuff like Silver Spoons, Different Strokes, The Incredible Hulk, Highway to Heaven, Back to the Future and Rocky. Uncle Magnum grew up with those shows and he never lost his taste for them. I think he likes the simplicity and dependability of it. If you watch shows today, so much changes from episode to episode. In the 80¡¯s, you could miss half a season and pick up where you left off. There were very few changes to the characters. The good guys were good, the bad guys were bad. In shows today, a good guy can become a traitor for five shows and then he¡¯s a hero again or it could be that he¡¯s always been good but was undercover for the good guys and the group he was with before was actually evil. It¡¯s all very confusing and stressful. The 80¡¯s and 90¡¯s had sweet romantic comedies where the nerd ends up with the prom queen or a lonely man finds a lonely woman to talk to online. Movies today seem to want to impress you with their CGI or complicated storylines.


    ¡°Got a hot date, little one!¡±, he said with a smirk. Calling me that is his sad attempt to get on my nerves. It¡¯s not going to work.


    ¡°Another Barbie wannabe?¡± Shapely, full of plastic and nothing between her ears.


    ¡°No way! This one¡¯s a kindergarten teacher. You¡¯ll like her. She¡¯s very sweet.¡±


    ¡°If that¡¯s true, then why is she interested in you? How did you even meet her?¡±


    ¡°Online! Where else? We¡¯ve been writing to each other for weeks now. She finally convinced me to meet her in real life.¡±


    ¡°Seriously? She could be a 60-year-old, overweight, serial killer who lives in her mom¡¯s basement. If she¡¯s even a woman at all. You and dad have been on my case for years not to take any stranger online at face value and now you¡¯re going to do what you¡¯ve warned against?¡± I was more than slightly indignant. I¡¯ve long lost count of how many lectures I¡¯d been given about the dangers of meeting people online.


    ¡°Relax, Abby. I¡¯m joking. I was just testing you. I met her through Jeremy.¡± Jeremy is this really cute kid in Magnum¡¯s four o¡¯clock, 8-12-year-old, class. ¡°She¡¯s his aunt. She came to pick him up a few weeks ago and we talked for a bit. She really is nice and not hard on the eyes at all. She started picking him up regularly since then and last week I asked her out. We¡¯re going out for pizza and a movie.¡±


    ¡°You¡¯re really going all out. Pizza. Wow. And a movie. Gonna be hard to top that if there¡¯s a second date.¡± I let the sarcasm flow. Some people say that it¡¯s the lowest form of humor, but I disagree. Besides, I learned it from him.


    ¡°First, I like pizza. Second, it was her idea. Third, how about you judge me after you¡¯ve gone out on your first date.¡±


    ¡°Ouch! That¡¯s low. Besides, I¡¯m only 15. Are you really trying to pressure me into a relationship before I¡¯m ready for one just so I can have an opinion on your dating life?¡±


    ¡°You¡¯re almost 16 and no, take your time.¡± Uncle Magnum backtracked quickly. ¡°No need to rush on my account. Boys are bad.¡± He made a sign of the cross with his fingers, as if warding off vampires. ¡°Wait ¡®til you¡¯re 20 or 25 before you start dating. Besides, I don¡¯t know how your father will react to you having a boyfriend. It¡¯ll either go really well or the boy¡¯s going to need a fresh pair of pants to change into.¡±


    ¡°Eeww! I really didn¡¯t need that image in my head. At least now I know not to bring any boy I date home. We¡¯ll just sneak around for months and not tell you guys anything.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s my Abigail! Always willing to twist my words around and not get my point at all. For that, you¡¯ll have extra push-ups on Tuesday, during plank.¡± With those words, he smiled, waved goodbye and headed off. I wondered if I¡¯d turn into a sadist when I finally took on my own students.


    Closing the door behind him, I set off back to The Parlor, where Ed the dummy waited patiently for me. I stood in hour-glass stance in front of it and hit Ed¡¯s left arm. It swung around and I blocked it before it could hit me. I did it a few more times, trying to figure out how to let it catch me off guard. I tried varying the speed of my hits and I tried looking away, but I ended up just blocking faster or a bit early. In both cases, it hurt a bit more. Everything I tried ended up with me blocking it at the last second or simply moving away. I always knew it was coming. It was like when someone tells you not to think about a pink elephant. After they say that, you can¡¯t not think about pink elephants. In the same way that I couldn¡¯t tickle myself, I also couldn¡¯t surprise myself.  I knew the hit was coming.


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    As a last resort, I decided to see if I could get in ¡°the zone¡±. That¡¯s what I call it when I practice form moves on Ed in a quick succession, just going from form to form without thought. If I do it right, it¡¯s very much like meditation, as I don¡¯t think about any of the moves. I¡¯ve been doing this for so many years that it¡¯s second nature and my muscle memory moves me along.


    I was running out of ideas and starting to think that maybe jumping in front of another bus wouldn¡¯t be so bad, when dad shouted by name from the front door. All the noise from me repeatedly hitting Ed had masked his coming into the house and his yell startled me out of ¡°the zone¡±. I turned my head towards him, just for an instant, and lost focus as Ed¡¯s arm came around to him me. I was out of position and I turned back just in time to see the room grey out around me and the wooden arm pass through my arm as it came around from my hit. Immediately, the room returned to normal. Yes!! I¡¯d done it. It¡¯s real. I wasn¡¯t going crazy.


    Dad walked into the Parlor, ¡°Hi Abby! Is everything Ok?¡± I could hear the concern in his voice.


    I turned towards him; my face flushed with excitement. ¡°Sure dad. Why do you ask?¡±


    ¡°I don¡¯t know. I come home and find you so immersed in your Karate that you didn¡¯t even notice me come in and you were pounding that Ed thing so hard and fast that I thought you¡¯d taken up the drums. I just figured that you must be upset about something.¡±


    ¡°I was just in ¡°the zone¡± dad. Everything¡¯s ok. And it¡¯s Kung Fu; not Karate! Also, it¡¯s not ¡®that Ed thing¡¯, it¡¯s just Ed. You shouldn¡¯t pick on him. He¡¯s like a member of the family by now and he has feelings, you know.¡±


    ¡°So you can punch and kick him and that¡¯s ok, but if I call him a thing, then I¡¯m the one hurting him?¡±


    ¡°He¡¯s made of wood. He barely feels the physical hits, but his feelings can be hurt with mere words. He¡¯s a sensitive soul, dad.¡± To emphasize the point, I patted Ed¡¯s right arm.


    ¡°Oy Vey. Vat is dis vorld coming to?¡±, dad turned his head and his arms towards the heavens and continued in a really bad imitation of an old man with a Yiddish accent, ¡°In my day we vould send out our golems to destroy other cities. Kids today leaf deirs lying around da house and smack dem for fun.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s truly awful, dad. I¡¯m offended on behalf of all old Yiddish speaking men.¡±


    ¡°Is there anything that doesn¡¯t offend your generation? Your generation has taken being offended to such a level that you can even be offended on behalf of others. Next, you¡¯ll be offended by someone sneezing, on behalf of people with no noses and who can¡¯t sneeze properly. After that, hiccups and farting will be banned.¡±


    ¡°I like hiccups! But farting can be rather offensive.¡±


    Dad smiled and came over to give me a hug and kiss hello. ¡°How come you¡¯re home so early, dad? I didn¡¯t expect you home until seven.¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s already a quarter past six. I think that you were in your zone for too long. I¡¯m only a little early. I just finished a part of my latest piece and it seemed like a good place to stop. Otherwise, I might have been a few hours late. Also, with this being the end of the school year, I was the only one there. I figured I¡¯d give the cleaning staff a little extra time to freshen up the shop.¡±


    I followed him into the kitchen, and we started to prepare dinner together. Nothing fancy tonight. Just salad and noodles. I got out the ingredients while dad put some water up.


    ¡°How was your day, Abigail?¡± He started ripping and chopping up vegetables and stuffing them in a bowl. Neither of us were Gordon Ramsey. We like food but we¡¯re not foodies.


    ¡°Not bad. I slept in, went to the library, I didn¡¯t get hit by bus, and then Uncle Magnum came by. He says hi.¡± I summed up my day without actually lying or leaving anything out. It¡¯s not that I didn¡¯t want to tell my dad, or I was worried that he would blab to anyone. That man never lost a quiet game in his life. It¡¯s just that I wanted to figure this out by myself. In the same way that he never discussed his art until it was finished, I didn¡¯t want to present my ability until I had some measure of control over it. At his point, I didn¡¯t think that I had anything to show him. He couldn¡¯t help me learn to use my ability, if I couldn¡¯t even turn it on to use it.


    ¡°I too did not get hit by bus today. I am glad for the both of us. Why didn¡¯t Paul stay for dinner? You two usually watch old shows after practice.¡± Dad never called him Magnum. He was always Paul. I don¡¯t know why and I¡¯ve never asked him. Dad would probably have a reason that would make me stop calling him Magnum and I didn¡¯t want to stop, so I didn¡¯t ask.


    ¡°He said that he had a hot date.¡± I proceeded to fill him in on Magnum¡¯s latest conquest.


    I set the table for two while we talked and then headed for a quick shower while the noodles cooked. I was back in time to watch dad pour the sauce on the noodles and to take our plates to the table.


    After dinner, we cleaned up the mess, and settled into our routines. Dad went out back to his home shop to tinker and I checked to see what work I had for school this week, chat with my friends or read a book. There wasn¡¯t anything to do for school, except practice for my two finals. Not much I could do to study English. I¡¯d read the required books and knew the characters and the rest of the test would be answering questions on a short story that we¡¯d only get to read during the test. Math, my other exam, was based on the whole year. James, Eva and I had already studied and tested each other on the material. James is really good at math and he helped Eva and I understand anything that we were having issues with.


    With nothing to do for school, I made plans with Eva to meet up at lunch by the fountain. There was no need to invite James. He¡¯d be wherever Eva was. Those two were really dedicated to each other. Thank God that neither of them was prone to public displays of affection! (PDA). That would have been really awkward, since the three of us hung out together so often.


    I swiped out of my conversation with Eva and opened by Kindle app. I was reading a great book by Alan Black, one of my favorite authors, but I couldn¡¯t concentrate. I kept going back to my session with Ed before dinner. My idea had worked, but I couldn¡¯t count on dad surprising me every few minutes until I figured things out. At least I know knew that the level of danger required to set off my ability wasn¡¯t mortal; even the potential of slight injury could trigger it.


    I also realized that I had another problem. If the bus had awakened by ability, and a flinch could now activate it again, then would the ability simply trigger unexpectedly in the school hallway when someone was about to bump me? What if my ability activated while I was sparring in class? Shit. I really needed to get control of this ability right now.

 Getting Control

    I went back to work with Ed. This time, I needed to find a way to startle myself. Well, if an alarm could wake me up every morning, startling me out of sleep, then why couldn¡¯t I set an alarm that would go off every few minutes. Checking my alarm app on my phone, I found the settings for how often the alarm would go off, but there wasn¡¯t a random alarm setting that would let me pre-set a recurring alarm to go off at random within a two-minute interval. A quick check of the app store and I had a choice of over a dozen random timers. I have no idea why someone else would need one, but I wasn¡¯t going to complain.


    With the alarm set at it¡¯s highest volume, I started a standard pattern. Making noise wasn¡¯t a problem, as dad was busy in his shop, hammering away and making lots of his own noise. There was no way he¡¯d hear my alarm. I quickly fell into a rhythm of hit, block, pivot, send the arm around, duck, punch, and block the arm. Rinse and repeat. The first time the alarm went off, I jumped, but I had just done a hit, and nothing greyed out. Damn, that was loud. I kept going, hoping that the alarm would eventually synchronize with the blocking of the arm. It was like playing a game of Perfection, where you weren¡¯t sure how much time you had left to put the pieces in their proper place before the timer ran out and causing the whole board to jump up at you.


    Five more failures and my nerves were shot. The ¡°Pop Goes the Weasel¡± song was running through my brain, but I was the damned weasel that kept popping whenever the alarm went off. Each time the alarm sounded it jarred me slightly out of position and took my focus off of Ed¡¯s rotating arm. I kept at it though and was finally rewarded on the seventh try. The alarm caught me off guard again just before I was supposed to block the arm. I jolted slightly up from my proper position and overcorrected down and would have only taken the hit on my wrist, but the room greyed out and the arm passed through me. This time, I noticed a very slight stretching feeling, like you get when someone very gently pulls your arm, except that I felt it over my entire body. It also wasn¡¯t a pull in any one direction. The outwards pulling sensation came from all directions; almost like my body was generating a field around it. I had a mental image of the force field created by the Invisible Woman from the Fantastic Four, but my field didn¡¯t project a repelling force. My field was somehow causing me to pass through solid objects. The idea of a field made sense since my clothes stayed with me when I shifted. Wow! Reappearing naked after the bus almost hit me would have been so embarrassing.


    The blaring alarm went off again, snapping me out of my thoughts. Son of a¡­I quickly turned the alarm off, took a breath to calm myself, and started to think things through some more. What did I learn from these experiments? First, I have the ability to pass through objects. (Yay! I¡¯m really not crazy, or at least not completely crazy.) Second, I think that the ability is activated by a field that surrounds my body. Third, I don¡¯t know if the field is actually a circle, like a force field, or if it¡¯s skin-tight, following the contours of my body, or somewhere between the two. Four, the first time I used my abilities was very different from the other two times. It not only lasted longer that first time, but from my perspective everything disappeared. The other times, there was only a greying around me as I passed through objects. Five, I¡¯ve used the ability several times today and it seems to be getting easier, in that less danger was required to activate the ability each time that I used it. The first time, I was going to be killed by a bus. The next time, Ed¡¯s attack could have hurt my arm, maybe even given me a slight fracture. The last time, I maybe would have gotten a tiny bruise.


    Now that I didn¡¯t have to use Ed, my bedroom was the best place to continue these experiments. I was going to lie down on my bed and see if I could picture the field in my mind and make it work, but what if I shifted right through the bed. Even worse, what if I shifted through the bed and shifted back immediately, would I then be embedded in the bed? Hmm, that would give a whole new meaning to the term embedded.


    Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author.


    The floor was my next choice, but again I had to question that choice. Even though my house is a ranch-style home and has only the one floor, the floor itself isn¡¯t directly on the ground. Would I pass through the floor? Well, I didn¡¯t pass through the floor that last two times, so I figured that I was safe. I sat cross-legged on the floor next to my bed, as if I were meditating, and tried to feel my skin. I wanted to be able to compare how I felt when things were normal versus how the pulling sensation felt when I ghosted. Next, I visualized a field surrounding my skin. I expected to have to pretend that it was there, and I was stunned to actually feel something surrounding me.


    Holy Shit! How had I never noticed it before? Who doesn¡¯t notice a blanket wrapped around them? Sure, it was an invisible blanket that had no actual physical properties, but it was there. It had no weight to it at all it didn¡¯t glow, like you hear that people¡¯s aura¡¯s do, but it had a presence to it. I wonder if I¡¯d always had it and had now just developed the ability to feel it. Maybe it was always there, and I had never looked.


    Just to be certain, I pretended that there was a field surrounding me in a bubble shape. I sensed nothing beyond me. It seemed like my field was only at skin level, projecting out a little bit to include my clothes. The next question to figure out was how to turn the field on and off. I relaxed again and started breathing evenly, focusing on the field. I had a few ideas that I wanted to try out. First, I closed my eyes and visualized a bus heading in my direction. As the bus drew nearer, I tried to feel for any changes in the field. With a few feet left before collision, I couldn¡¯t feel any changes in the field. I let the imaginary bus hit me and send my virtual avatar flying twenty feet into the air, before coming down in a broken heap of broken bones, ripped skin and blood. It was a lovely image and I was quite proud of the level of detail that I¡¯d managed, but it failed to turn on my ability. However, even failure can teach you things. In this case, I managed to cross out the possibility that the field responded to my imagination. It wasn¡¯t quite a silver lining; more like a tarnished chrome lining.


    Keeping my breathing steady, I tried again, this time attempting to recreate the stretching feeling that I had when I ghosted out. I focused on the field and tried to gently pull it outwards in all directions at once. Since nothing happened, I tried increasing the pressure that I was applying, and I received the same results. Well, if pulling doesn¡¯t work, why not try pushing? This time I felt a change in the field. It only lasted an instant and I don¡¯t know what the change did, but something was different for that little bit of time. If the change were a sound, I¡¯d say that the field revved softly, like a car engine. It was like a slight gust of wind over the corn stalks. The stalks would rustle and then became still again. I envisioned another push, a little harder this time and with my eyes opened. I saw the room become grey and then it changed back.


    I did it! Relief flooded through me. I hadn¡¯t realized how nervous I was that I wouldn¡¯t be able to get control of this. I still had a lot of work to do, but now I had a starting point. An ¡®on¡¯ switch.


    Over the next two hours, I practiced turning the power on and seeing how long I could keep it going for. At first, I could only hold the field on for two seconds, but with practice I got it up to seven seconds. It took more effort that I expected; both mental and physical. Concentrating on anything for a period of time isn¡¯t easy, as your mind gets distracted a lot. I really hoped that using this power was like using a muscle and that over time I could work that muscle out so that holding the field on wouldn¡¯t be such a chore.


    By the time I got the field to stay on for those seven seconds, I was sweaty and tired and ready for a quick shower and sleep. There was just one last thing to try. I turned on the field and after two seconds I switched from pushing out to pulling in. Before, when I let the field go, or when I couldn¡¯t hold it anymore, the room took about a second or two to go back to normal, with the greyness slowly ebbing away with the last of my strength. This time, the room seemed to pop back to full color instantly. I had found my ¡®off¡¯ switch. If I found my field turning itself on at a bad moment, I could pull back from the grey, if I wanted to.


    Now that I wasn¡¯t scared of going to school tomorrow morning and disappearing in front of everyone, I thought that sleep would come quickly. It didn¡¯t. Instead, I ended up staying up for another half hour as I debated with myself whether to tell Eva and James about my new abilities.

 School

    Biking to school the next day, I met up with Eva and James in the parking lot, just as they were being dropped off by Eva¡¯s mom. Eva and James had been neighbors all their lives and they usually came to school together. They lived about five miles from the school, in the Royal Oaks community. I¡¯m not sure how royal it was, but it did actually have some nice oak trees. I lived two miles from school, in the opposite direction, in the Aspen Ridge community. No aspens, no ridge. It did sound nice though; always made me want to go skiing. Not that I¡¯ve ever skied before, but it was fun to daydream about it in August, when the heat was melting you into a puddle and just breathing made you sweat.


    We said our hello¡¯s and talked about our weekends. I was dying to tell them about yesterday and my new ability, but I didn¡¯t. Before finally falling asleep last night, I decided that I was going to keep it a secret for now. Of course, that decision didn¡¯t mean that keeping quiet would be easy. Except for two topics, Eva and I shared our lives freely with each other. We never discussed any intimate details of her relationship with James and we never discussed my mother. The former because I didn¡¯t want to know the details and the latter because mom¡¯s disappearance was a sore spot for me.


    With exams coming up, most of the classes this week were review classes or designated study sessions, where you study whatever you wanted, as long as you kept quiet, and the teacher was available to answer any question. I spent my time reading my book and texting with Eva. Lunch came and went and then we were all in History class. Mr. Chandler was a pretty decent teacher. He couldn¡¯t make history fun, but he did try to connect it to present day if he could. I really liked his lesson explaining how colonialism and triangle trade let to the creation of suburban malls or how McDonald¡¯s, with a little help from President Ronald Reagan, totally destroyed the old Soviet Republic.


    With 15 minutes left in class, Mr. Chandler cleared his throat to get our attention. ¡°As this is our last class together this year, I just wanted to take a few minutes to talk about next year¡¯s Economics class. For some of you, I¡¯ll be your teacher for Economics. Others will have Mrs. Dawson or Mr. Rigel. However, all of you will be participating in the Junior Stock-picking competition.¡± James, Eva and I turned to look at each other and nodded affirmation. This was not new to us. James told us all about it a few months ago.


    ¡°In the past, students have told me that this contest was the highlight of their year.¡± Laughter from the class caused him to backtrack, ¡°Well, one student told me that, but I¡¯m sure that others felt the same way. In any case, it can be a lot of fun, if you take it seriously. Many of you complain that much of what you learn in school doesn¡¯t have any use for you in real life. This competition will help prepare you for real life. You¡¯ll all be starting with a budget, you¡¯ll set goals, you¡¯ll research companies and you¡¯ll purchase stock, from the teacher, and you¡¯ll keep track of your portfolio to see how you¡¯re doing. The contest runs all year and trades can be made on Monday to Friday when the American markets are open. You¡¯ll make trades by emailing your teacher a trade order and the trade will be recorded as having taken place 15 minutes after time of the email. To make things interesting, the top ten students with the most amount of money at the end of May will get to drop their lowest test score of the year and the top three students will get cash prizes. O¡¯Donnell and Sons Financial Services has graciously agreed to donate a total of $6,000 to our grand prize winners. First place gets $3000, second $2000 and third $1000. They¡¯ll also be providing the tracking software that you¡¯ll be using to track your trades.¡±


    Mr. Chandler let that sink in and continued, ¡°We¡¯ve been having this competition for 22 years now and I¡¯ve seen students try all sorts of strategies. Some students barely put any energy into it, choosing to pick some blue-chip stocks and sit on them all year. Some students decide to trust to luck and get into penny stocks, where they can win or lose big very quickly. However, the ones who have consistently excelled at this competition are those who not only spend a few hours a week doing research on the companies that they invest in, but also look at history to better understand where that company¡¯s industry has been and where it seems to be going. At the very least, those students that put in real effort into this competition will learn a lot in an environment where they have nothing to lose. On that note, I hope you all have a wonderful summer. I¡¯ll be fishing! Class dismissed.¡±


    We packed up our books and filed out of class. ¡°What do we have next?¡±, I asked James. ¡°Nothing! Mrs. Pataski sent an email a few minutes ago. Free study period in the library. I think she¡¯s taking the rest of the week off. We had our Biology test last week and she knows there¡¯s no point in having any more classes. Everyone¡¯s in summer mode already. Are we still meeting up at Conrad¡¯s after school?¡±


    Conrad¡¯s was short for Conrad¡¯s Comix, our local purveyor of all things superhero. I liked comics and I knew all the mainstream heroes, but James and Eva were super-nerds. They would have long arguments about which superhero would win in a fight and they would spend hours hunting down and reading rare comic books from all over the world. Although they were both ¡®purists¡¯ and insisted that physical comic books were the best, comic book torrent sites and comic book apps had let them seriously up their game. James was working on finalizing his archive of every comic book ever created by both Marvel and DC, as well as a bunch of other lesser-known publishers.


    ¡°Sure! I¡¯ll take the batmo-bike there.¡±, I answered. James groaned, ¡°That was lame, Abby.¡± I grinned. It was fun teasing James about comic related stuff. He took it all so seriously. Then again, he took most things seriously. He had a sense of humor but felt that there was a time and place for it. I never could figure out exactly when he made time for it though.


    Going to Conrad¡¯s meant that I was in for at least an hour of geek time with the super-duo, but sometimes you have to make some sacrifices for your friends. Besides, I don¡¯t know if I would have even met James and Eva if it weren¡¯t for comics, so I figured I was just paying back a debt to comics in general.


    In our first week of middle school, I sat down in the cafeteria in the table next to theirs. I had just transferred to Edmund¡¯s from across town and I was still getting used to the new school. I was alone, trying to read my book, but their insistent voices kept distracting me. They were having a heated discussion and I stopped trying to read and looked at them. Eva was a pretty girl, with her long brown hair up in a ponytail and was dressed in track pants, a t-shirt and sneakers. She looked ready to go play soccer. James didn¡¯t look sporty at all. He was dressed in slacker casual; jeans and a hoodie, with shaggy black hair and although he didn¡¯t look like he had an ounce of fat on him, he didn¡¯t seem to have an ounce of muscle either. He was cute, in a geeky kind of way. Suddenly, Eva turned around to me and asked, ¡°I need your help to settle an argument. Can you please tell James here that Wonder Woman is a way better hero than Batman?!¡±.


    This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.


    Despite being taken completely off guard by the topic, my comic book education at the hands of Uncle Magnum finally came in handy. ¡°Well, I guess it depends on what you mean by better. They¡¯re very different. Batman doesn¡¯t really have any powers at all, yet he keeps up with everyone else who does. He uses his brain, and his money, to make up for his lack of powers and he¡¯s incredibly focused. Sometimes you see him leading the team, even though he¡¯s the physically weakest member, because he¡¯s organized and has the planning and resources that they need to win. But he¡¯s not fun. He¡¯s not someone you want to hang around with. He¡¯s kind of scary really. Meanwhile, Wonder Woman is like a force of nature. She¡¯s super strong and she kicks ass. She doesn¡¯t take any shit from anyone. At the same time, she¡¯s genuine and caring and someone that you¡¯d love to meet. She¡¯s a real role model for women everywhere. She inspires people. But she¡¯s not subtle. She won¡¯t knock you out from behind. She attacks head on.¡± I took a breath and finished, ¡°So it depends on what kind of hero you want, really. One that sneaks up on the enemy from behind or one that will bust down the enemy¡¯s door?¡±


    I remember Eva and James just staring at me for a bit and then Eva turned to James and said, ¡°See, I told you that Wonder Woman was better!¡± and then she invited me to join them and we talked about superheroes for the rest of lunch. Neither Eva nor James ever won their debates, but we all had a good time anyways.


    A few week after that first meeting, sitting with the two of them at lunch again, I reached into my schoolbag and gave them each a wrapped gift. ¡°What this for?¡±, Eva asked me as she ripped open her gift. She pulled out two matching metal arm bracers. Each bracer was about six inches long and was embossed with the Wonder Woman logo. ¡°Oh my God! These are beautiful. Where did you find them?¡± She put the bracers on and started pretending to block bullets. ¡°I didn¡¯t. I made them. Open up yours James.¡± James was busy staring at Eva being Wonder Woman. ¡°James? Hello?¡±, I called him back to reality and he opened up his present. ¡°I wanted to make you something that you could wear, like I did for Eva, but I couldn¡¯t think of anything as cool as the bracers, so I decided to make two things for you. It¡¯s fair, I suppose, because Eva did get two bracers.¡± James wasn¡¯t saying anything. He was looking at the metal belt buckle with the embossed Batman design that I¡¯d made him and then he picked up the Batarang. He was just quietly staring at them and so I blathered on, ¡°The Batarang can actually be thrown. It¡¯s weighted evenly so that it¡¯ll spin properly while in the air and I can sharpen up the sides, if you want to try it on a target.¡± I wound down and James said, ¡°These are incredible! Thank you.¡±


    ¡°Seriously, Abby. These really are awesome.¡± Eva agreed, ¡°How did you make these and why?¡±.


    ¡°Well, my dad¡¯s a blacksmith and I¡¯ve been helping him since I was little. He mostly works on big art pieces these days, when he¡¯s not teaching, but he¡¯s taught me a lot over the years. I don¡¯t think that I¡¯ll ever be the artist that he is, but I can make some decent jewelry pieces and even knives. I got the designs from the internet and dad helped me with some of the trickier parts of the bracers and the Batarang. Anyways, I had some time in the shop and I wanted to make you guys something. I didn¡¯t know anyone at this school when I got here, and you guys included me as if we¡¯d been friends forever. This is my thank you to you.¡±


    ¡°So, you¡¯re an actual smith, like your last name suggests? It¡¯s not just an alias? You¡¯re not in witness protection?¡± James asked slyly. I think he wanted to diffuse the mushiness of the moment.


    ¡°Yes, my last name really is Smith. My dad¡¯s parents were farmers, but his great grandfather was a real blacksmith. That¡¯s where the name comes from. My dad never liked farming, but he liked fixing things around the farm. One day he needed a new door hinge for the barn door and my grandmother insisted that it match the ones already there. The hinge was a custom-made part so he drove over 150 miles to the closest blacksmith he could find and he fell in love with the trade. He apprenticed with the blacksmith, Ted Robertson, for several years before he came back here and started his own shop.¡±


    ¡°Well, these gifts are great. I¡¯m going to wear the belt buckle every day and I will ask you to sharpen this Batarang. I just need to figure out where I can start practicing¡±. James and Eva started talking about the best places in the backyard to set up. We¡¯ve been best friends ever since.


    James still wore his belt buckle every day. Eva wore her bracers on special occasions, like when James took her out. Over the years, I¡¯d re-sharpened the Batarang dozens of times for James. I¡¯d even made him a few more so that he could make several throws before he had to get them from the target. He was getting really good with them. He could hit what he was aiming almost every time and usually withing an inch of his chosen target.


    At Conrad¡¯s, I curled up on the comic couch reading my book, while James and Eva checked out the latest arrivals. Apparently, there wasn¡¯t much to get excited about, and 30 minutes later we were sharing a pizza at Big Julie¡¯s Pizzeria just down the street. With Mr. Chandler¡¯s earlier talk of the Stock picking competition, it was no big surprise that James was talking about his ¡®Justice Foundation¡¯. A year before I met James, his uncle had some lands that he wanted to develop stolen from him by the state. His life savings had been tied up in that land, but the city council was trying to get some grants from the state and they had agreed to build a low income housing project as part of the deal. When James¡¯ uncle refused to sell the land, the city had the state appropriate the land under ¡®eminent domain¡¯ laws and totally shafted him. He ended up with a fraction of the value of the land and he couldn¡¯t afford the lawyers to fight against the state. The only ones that offered to help James¡¯ uncle were a group of non-profit lawyers. They filed some paperwork for him, but with their low level of experience and massive workload, there wasn¡¯t much they could do for him. James¡¯ ¡®Foundation¡¯ idea came out of the experience of watching his uncle get run over by the system. James had no interest in becoming a lawyer, but he wanted to help people like his uncle fight the system. His dream was to create a foundation that would review cases like his uncles¡¯ and fight for them. The foundation would have experience lawyers who were well paid and had the resources they needed to win. For that, James needed a lot of money.


    Initially, James was planning on starting his own non-profit charity, but after taking a look at other charities he realized that it would be a tough sell to many philanthropists. After all, his charity wouldn¡¯t be curing infants of disease or feeding the hungry. The people that he wanted to fight for often lost their life savings, but they were still healthy and so they didn¡¯t get the same level of sympathy. James simply wanted some justice for those stepped on by the government and to do that he realized that he¡¯d have to self fund his foundation or gain the trust of many high-net-worth individuals whom he could convince to fund this dream.


    Looking at his interests, math and computers, James managed to narrow his career path to the financial services sector. He wasn¡¯t sure exactly how it would play out, but he was convinced that¡¯s what he needed to focus on. That¡¯s why this competition was so important. For him, it was a trial balloon for his future.

 Almost Amber

    It¡¯s funny how dreams can be infectious; how someone else¡¯s dream can help clarify your own desires and give your life purpose and direction. That¡¯s how it was for me. James¡¯s dream resonated strongly within me. His need to help others, people like his uncle, awoke the same desire in me. I had lived through my own injustice and although there wasn¡¯t anything that I could do for myself, I knew that there were plenty of other people that could be helped. I would create my own foundation, one that would help victims of human traffickers reclaim their lives. I would help families like mine.


    I was four when mom and I were kidnapped. We had left the mall, after shopping for some new clothes at Gap Kids, and we were walking to our car. Mom was telling me about somebody she met at work, she was a social worker and she worked out of a community center in Dell¡¯s County, when two men approached us.  One was really big; even bigger than dad, and the other was smaller but fat. The fat one said something to my mother, I don¡¯t know what because I wasn¡¯t paying attention yet, and he showed her something under his coat. I now know that it was a gun, but four-year-old me had no idea. Mom looked around and the man said, ¡°Now!¡±. She dropped our bag and picked me up and headed straight to our car. One man walked ahead of us and the other followed us. I didn¡¯t know what was happening. I just clung to her. When we got to the car, the fat man said, ¡°Keys!¡± and my mother handed him the keys. The big man got in front and started the car, while the fat one got in the back with my mother and me. My mother held onto me the whole time. She didn¡¯t put me in the car seat like she always did. She didn¡¯t even put on a seatbelt. I don¡¯t remember anything of the incident after that.


    They found me on the side of the road, sitting and crying. Fifty feet away, our car was a total wreck. The fat man was dead in the backseat. The big man had been knocked out by the impact and he ended up in a coma for months before going to jail. Mom was gone. I never saw her again.


    John Buckler was the hero of the day. A police officer on his day off and just leaving the mall, John saw mom drop the bag and walk off, holding me, towards the car. From the way mom just abandoned her bag and quickly scooped me up in terror, John suspected that the kidnappers had threatened her with guns, and he didn¡¯t want to endanger us. He raced to his car and as our car drove away, he followed and called in a possible abduction. Not having his gun, a pair of handcuffs, or any way to stop the kidnappers, John stayed a few cars back, making sure not to lose us and kept a running commentary for the police about our position. Everything was going well, and the police were converging on us, when the driver of our car raced through a yellow light and John got left behind. He wasn¡¯t too worried, because there weren¡¯t many options up ahead. By the time he caught up to us, it was all over but the cleanup. A few miles up the road he saw what was left of our car after our driver ran a red light, got sideswiped by a truck and crashed into a traffic light.


    John was sure that we¡¯d all died in the crash. He was the first one on the scene and he raced to check out what was left of the car. He saw the bodies of the kidnappers but couldn¡¯t find mom or me. Thinking that we¡¯d gotten thrown from the car, he started looking all around. It took him awhile to find me, because I was so far from the crash site and well before it.


    My memories only restart after dad came to get me at the police station. It took some time because dad was in his shop working at the time and it was so noisy that he didn¡¯t hear the phone when the police called. A nearby police car had to be sent to find him and they brought him back.


    My dad was holding me and John was soon filling him in on what had happened. When he finished, dad asked, ¡°How did they get out of the car? Where¡¯s Hannah? Why was Abby all alone on the side of the road?¡±


    ¡°We can¡¯t answer those questions yet. The only thing that we can think of is that shortly after I lost sight of them, they met up with another car and transferred your wife and Abby to that car. Somehow, Abby got away and it was too public an area to chase after her. Both cars took off. The one with your wife got away. The one with the original two kidnappers ran the red light in their rush and got hit by a truck.¡±


    ¡°How do you know there was another car? You said that you lost sight of them for a minute.¡±, dad asked.


    ¡°The kidnappers were at the mall and we haven¡¯t found any cars there that can be traced to them. It¡¯s possible that they used public transportation to get there, but with your wife¡¯s disappearance, we think it¡¯s more likely that another car was involved. I know it leaves a lot of unanswered questions, but it¡¯s the best we could do so far with the facts we have.¡±, John continued, ¡°We¡¯ve set up roadblocks within a 10-mile radius of the crash site, and we¡¯re looking for anyone that fits Hannah¡¯s description, but we¡¯ve gotten no hits so far. We¡¯ve alerted police departments across the state and the picture that you brought in will be circulated to all of them.¡±


    We spent the rest of the day at the police station. Dad sat me down and asked about what I could remember. I told him about the big man, who was even bigger than he was, and about the fat man. I told them that mom held me in the car and that I wasn¡¯t in a car seat. And that was all I could remember.


    Life didn¡¯t go back to normal after that. Mom wasn¡¯t there anymore, but Mom¡¯s parents, Bubbie Brandy and Zaidie Steven, were there everyday for the next several weeks. They helped take care of me, while dad worked on trying to find mom. John Buckler really took the case to heart and made sure to keep dad updated on anything that came up. Unfortunately, there wasn¡¯t much to tell. In the first few weeks, there were a few reported sightings of mom, but no one could really be sure, and the trails let nowhere. The only real lead that we had were the kidnappers themselves. Len Johnson, the big one, and Karl Snow, the fat one, had been arrested previously on human trafficking charges. Unfortunately, they were released when their accuser disappeared. John was trying to find some connection to an organized crime ring or even to any associates, but the two had left no other trails to follow. John never gave up on my mom and he eventually became a family friend. He¡¯s retired now, but we still keep in touch and have him over for supper two or three times a year, even though we don¡¯t talk about mom anymore.


    Uncle Magnum was there for us too. He moved in with us for three months afterwards and he¡¯s been a huge part of my life ever since. It was his idea to get me started in Kung Fu. He was almost a Kung Fu master by then and was already planning to open his own school as soon as he could. I didn¡¯t want to try it at first, but he explained that if I tired really hard and learned Kung Fu, then if someone tried to take me again, I¡¯d be better able to protect myself. He made sure that I understood that it would take a very long time to get good enough. I don¡¯t know if it was his plan, but the idea of being able to do something lit a flame within me. I had been pretty sad since mom was taken and I just wanted to stay safe in my room all the time. The idea that I could fight back was a totally new to me. I was so little compared to those men. Even mom couldn¡¯t do anything. Uncle Magnum explained that the Kung Fu that he would teach me was created by a woman and it was a special form of Kung Fu designed for smaller fighters. I agreed to try it and with daily lessons, I started to come out of my shell again and life began to take on a new normal.


    New normal was Kung Fu lessons, kindergarten, helping dad in the shop, movies with Uncle Magnum, and weekends spent looking for mom. Dad knew that searching for mom was nearly hopeless, but nearly hopeless was slightly hopeful. Dad and I visited every hospital within a half a day¡¯s drive of our house and some even further out. He¡¯d stand outside where the doctors, nurses and orderlies would take their smoking breaks and talk with them about mom. He had a stack of pictures of mom with our home number on them and he would hand them out to whoever would take them. He asked them to post the ¡°Have you seen this woman?¡± picture on their bulletin board and he would shake their hands and thank them for helping.


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    When we finished with all the hospitals, we visited churches and soup kitchens and bingo halls. Anywhere a diverse group of people would congregate, we would show up.


    For two years dad and I made our weekend trips and for two years we heard nothing. The police came up empty handed as well. Nobody had seen her and there were no more clues to chase. On the second anniversary of her abduction Harry Kronin came to visit with dad. Harry was mom¡¯s old boss at the community center. He was always really nice to me, but I could tell that I never wanted to get on his bad side. He had an air of authority about him that you just didn¡¯t want to challenge. It was strange because he wasn¡¯t physically imposing. He didn¡¯t tower over you like dad did. He was of average height and medium build, with slightly greying temples and he was just starting to get soft around the middle. It took me awhile to pin it down, but it was his eyes. There was a focus behind those eyes, a drive. He had things to get done and you didn¡¯t want to stand in his way. I imagine that he usually got what he wanted.


    Dad and Harry greeted each other like old friends. They talked a bit about old times and a bit about mom; each telling the other stories that they already knew. It was comforting to them. Harry had been more that just mom¡¯s boss. He had been her mentor and before she was taken from us, he had been guiding her career so that she would take over for him one day. I liked knowing that mom was good at her job and that she loved what she was doing.


    After the stories and the small talk, dad brought Harry a drink and asked, ¡°What brings you by, Harry? I know it wasn¡¯t to get me to come back to the center. I was only there because of Hannah.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m not at the center anymore either, Josh. I got an offer last year that I couldn¡¯t turn down. I took the dean¡¯s position out at Galt University.¡±, Harry answered.


    ¡°I¡¯m not familiar with Galt. Duke and UNC, I know. What¡¯s so special about Galt that you left the center for it?¡± Dad leaned forward, genuinely interested in Harry¡¯s answer.


    ¡°Galt is a small to medium sized university by those standards. It¡¯s not really a university like most people think about universities. It¡¯s more like a glorified trade school. It was started 40 years ago by an ex-miner millionaire, Matthew Choler, who wanted to set up a mining school that actually produced miners and mining managers who knew what they were doing. He was a frugal, no-nonsense guy and he wanted his school to shed the useless frills that universities were getting known for. He had no patience for soft courses. He saw what the west coast universities were turning out as graduates and he didn¡¯t think very highly of them. He felt that those universities were producing, and these are his exact words, ¡°human bullshit factories¡±; graduates that could spout pretty words but little else. His wife, Margaret, convinced him to expand on his idea and have several different specialty schools within the university, as mining was too specialized. He relented, but he chose those schools carefully and he set them up differently than other schools did. Galt University has no English department, no Philosophy department and no Humanities courses. There are no gender studies courses and no sports departments, although we have a very nice gym for our staff and students. Each school has to be about a career, a job, a life earning and being productive. The arts were ok, if they were used to produce something. He insisted that there would be no modern art taught. ¡°Graduates could learn to sneeze on a canvas at someone else¡¯s school¡±, he was fond of saying. The schools have changed with the times a bit, but they¡¯ve mostly true to his original vision. We have mining, architecture, business, engineering, chemistry, and computer science. Every school at Galt exists to ensure that our students can work in their chosen profession. We don¡¯t turn out many CEO¡¯s at Galt, nor many upper management types, but our graduates are some of the finest floor managers and supervisors around. They know their trades and they get the job done properly.¡±


    ¡°That sounds right up your alley, Harry. I can see why you took the job. It¡¯s the next evolution from what you were doing at the center. So, why are you telling me about it?¡±


    ¡°Josh, I need you to come work at Galt¡¯s mining department.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m a blacksmith, Harry. How does that even fit in to a mining department?¡±


    ¡°Josh. Don¡¯t play games with me. In the old days, most mining resources went to the blacksmith for processing into useful products. I¡¯m aware that times have changed, but our students still benefit greatly from the material science knowledge side. They gain insight into the real-world applications of their knowledge and they learn a new skill. You should also know that each of our departments needs to be self-sufficient from an operational budget perspective. The school provides for capital expenditures, such as facilities and equipment, and for overall administration, but each department must cover its own operating costs. Mostly this is done by hiring out their students to work on projects for companies all over the world. All their work is overseen by the teachers and so the companies are getting quality work for apprentice prices. In your case, you and your students can sell your works to generate revenues. These revenues would pay for the materials that you use to produce your goods.¡±


    ¡°So, I¡¯d have all of the headaches of running a business, as well as a ton of work teaching and overseeing the work of dozens of apprentices? Really Harry, stop sugar-coating the job. You had me at the ¡®less freedom to live my life the way I want to¡¯ part. Where do I sign up?¡± Dad isn¡¯t usually the sarcastic sort, but when he does, it effective.


    ¡°You wouldn¡¯t be head of the mining school, Josh. You would be teaching the advanced classes of blacksmithing. All your classes would be taught in our blacksmith workshop. Every student has his or her own hearth and anvil to use. As a teacher, you would have your own shop in the working area. An assistant will also be provided. Ten percent of anything you create and sell would go to the school. The rest is yours. The split for students is 75% for the school, 25% for the student, after expenses.¡± Harry stopped to take a sip of his drink. He thought for a bit and continued, ¡°You loved working with the kids at the center. I know you did, so don¡¯t deny it. I know Hannah convinced you to try it, when all the times I asked before failed, but she told me how you¡¯d talk about the sense of accomplishment that you ignited in the kids. You are one of the best at what you do, and you enjoy passing on that knowledge. Why not start that again?¡±


    ¡°The kids at the center were underprivileged kids that had no future; no one paid any attention to them. A lot of them thrived when given a chance. Watching them create things and feel a sense of accomplishment for the first time in their lives was amazing. But I can¡¯t go back there, Harry. That center is tied too closely to Hannah, in my mind. I also don¡¯t want to teach a bunch of overprivileged college kids.¡±


    ¡°I know why you stopped going to the center, Josh, and I don¡¯t blame you. However, the students at Galt are not overprivileged kids. The spoiled kids go to other universities and waste their parent¡¯s money. Most of the students at Galt are there on working scholarships and are accepted based on recommendations from our alumni, from the companies that we work with, or from places like the center. We take students that want to learn. You should also be aware that our university has no unions, only one committee, which you will not be part of, and no student government that can interfere with how the school is run. Besides interpersonal issues, there are almost no politics to play at Galt. Everyone at the university is either there to work or learn or both. Anyone who is simply looking for a way to put off adulthood for a few more years is asked to leave.¡±


    ¡°My last card to play is housing.¡±, Harry continued, ¡°As a faculty member, you¡¯ll get to choose from our available housing. Our business department has a real estate division and a student agent can show you the options available.¡±


    That was how dad and I ended up moving to Briar County, over two hours away from Dell. Harry didn¡¯t convince dad that night to take the job, but he kept after him and eventually dad caved. We moved in time for the next school year and dad¡¯s been teaching there ever since. He loves his job and even agreed to teach a few beginner courses. He still has lots of time to work on his art pieces. Over the years, he¡¯s developed a very good reputation as an exceptional artist and the prices that he gets for this art has been growing. A few months ago, the University held an exhibition of his work and they sold out in a week.

 Home Again

    Walking home after the pizza, I couldn¡¯t help thinking about James¡¯ foundation idea and how I wanted my own foundation. If he could do it, why couldn¡¯t I. Sure, he had a plan and had been working on it for years now, but I had a new ability. If I could figure out what it did, maybe I could use it to make money. When I thought about my future, I¡¯d always assumed that I¡¯d work at Uncle Magnum¡¯s school until I could open my own or that I¡¯d make small art pieces or jewelry and sell them in my own shop. I¡¯d considered myself lucky that I had two interests to chose from and thought that I could even work at both. Most of the kids I knew had no clue what they wanted to do after school and didn¡¯t seem to really care. With this new ability though, I might have other options. I only needed to figure out what the ability was.


    After dinner, dad went back to his home forge out back to work some more and I headed upstairs to my room. I needed to practice more and find out more about what the field really did. I started out just repeating what I¡¯d done yesterday and tried to push up my time holding the field. After a good thirty minutes of effort, I was holding the field steady for ten seconds. This was encouraging. I had no issues with slow progress, as long as I was making some progress. I¡¯d spent years perfecting my forms in Kung Fu and patience and determination where no strangers to me. Kung Fu is a discipline that you work on with constancy and perseverance. You have to work hard, if you want to advance any skill. Even if you have a natural talent at something, such as sports, you still need to practice. You never see the great athletes of the world sitting on their asses. They practice for hours every day, they think about their performance and look for ways to improve. They try to come up with new ways to beat their opponents. What looks so effortless to us when we watch them actually took them hundreds or thousands of hours of painstaking effort to perfect. That¡¯s what makes them the best. Natural talent by itself is only the foundation that you build on.


    That¡¯s what I dislike the most about comic book superheroes. Besides Batman, you really don¡¯t see many of them training and trying to push themselves past their limits. They take their natural abilities for granted. Sure, most origin stories have the hero training to use their powers for a little while, but then that¡¯s it. They go on to fight for truth and justice and don¡¯t take their abilities to the next level. They do learn from experience, but that¡¯s not the same thing.


    I¡¯ve been having this argument with both Eva and James for years now. Eva defends Wonder Woman by explaining that she trained constantly at the Amazon Island, but to me it just seemed like she was working to keep up her edge; she was just maintaining. James brings up the X-men and their danger room and I try to explain to him that they¡¯re mostly working on their team skills, not actually pushing the limits of their abilities or finding new ways to use those abilities. Think about Superman for a moment. The greatest superhero of them all. Endowed with a ton of powers, he¡¯s the embodiment of natural talent. Now imagine Superman actually trying. Picture Superman using his super-speed, along with this heat-vision to do battlefield medicine. We often see Superman pulling people out of burning buildings or rubble strewn streets and handing them off to paramedics and he agonizes about those that he can¡¯t save. Why doesn¡¯t he take some time to learn to use his powers in new ways? Why couldn¡¯t he become a doctor? He could cauterize wounds and splint broken bones and restart hearts in seconds. For that matter, why can¡¯t he learn martial arts, for those times when he¡¯s weakened by kryptonite? He could be at least as good as Batman. These heroes have so much potential, but almost no imagination. Only Batman, maybe because he has no powers at all, pushes himself and looks for new solutions. He studies each of his opponents before he goes up against them. He plans ahead and he builds new gadgets to cover up each of his weaknesses. He even has files on all of his fellow heroes and for each one of them he has strategies for stopping them, should they ever get out of control.


    Don¡¯t get me wrong. I much prefer Superman, although I think his taste in women really sucks. Batman is too moody. But of the two of them, Batman is a much better role model. With all that in mind, it was time to see what else I could learn about my ability.


    I activated the field and everything in the room turned grey. Then I got up and walked around slowly. I put my hand on my desk and it went right through it. I quickly pulled it out. I wasn¡¯t sure how much time I had left before the field gave out and I wasn¡¯t sure what would happen if my hand was still in the desk when it did. I pulled in the field to shut it down and then turned it on again. This time I kept a count in my head as I walked through my bed and ran my hands though my bookshelves. At ten seconds, I made sure that I wasn¡¯t touching anything, but the field didn¡¯t go out. It stayed on another second. Maybe I had counted too fast or maybe actually using the field to pass through objects is better exercise than just keeping it on. I set up my timer and verified that I was up to eleven seconds. Looks like I¡¯ll have to spend some time passing through things.


    I was wondering if I could pass through walls but decided to try my closet door first. I remembered that there seemed to be an order to what I could pass through. First people disappeared, then the bus, and only then did the buildings fade away. If solidity was the key, then the I should be able to pass through a door, as it moved on hinges, but the wall would be too solid to pass through. Passing through the door was no problem. I turned the field on and walked through the door and right into my closet. I had left the light on last time I had gone in and I was able to see everything clearly. I wondered if I could see in the dark when I was in grey mode. Easy enough to check. I turned around and was about to flip on the switch when I noticed that I wasn¡¯t reflected in the mirror that hung on the back of the closet door.


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    I could still see me when I looked down at myself, but I wasn¡¯t reflected in the mirror at all. Great, now I¡¯m a vampire. I better not start sparkling in the sunlight. That would just be too embarrassing. Looking more closely, I could see the reflection of the clothes behind me. Then the field cut out and I was back in the mirror. I hastily put the field back up and disappeared from the mirror again. I wonder if it¡¯s just mirrors that don¡¯t reflect my image or if people couldn¡¯t see me when the field was on. I¡¯d have to check on that, but first I needed to reason this out. If I wasn¡¯t being reflected in the mirror, then I wasn¡¯t in normal reality. I suppose that the field could be some sort of an invisibility cloak like in the Harry Potter books, but I was also passing through objects so that wasn¡¯t the case. Harry¡¯s cloak only made him invisible; people could still hear him, and he could still bump into things. So along with checking to see if people could see me when the field was on, I¡¯d also need to check if they could hear me and smell me. I pictured not showering for a week after classes and then walking by people with the field on. I¡¯d need to think of a better way!


    I heard dad puttering in the house and went out to see him. I was thinking about trying out the field in front of him, but once it cut out, I¡¯d be caught. I had an idea of how to check it out discretely tomorrow at school. Dad was in the kitchen making lunches for tomorrow. I sat down and watched him work. "How are the gates going?¡±, I asked.


    At Harry¡¯s request, dad was remaking the entrance gates to the university this summer. The old gates were pretty plain and had rusted through. Harry decided that something stately, with the school crest on it, would be more impressive. Dad laughed at him and told it that it was a waste of time. First, those gates were never closed and second, Galt wasn¡¯t some stuck up, pretentious, ivy league university that needed fancy gates to make an impression. Harry agreed with dad but explained that it wasn¡¯t supposed to be impressive to outsiders, but for the students and their families. A lot of students took family pictures by those gates during family week and for graduation and they should have a nice background. Even if Galt was a no-frills type of university, the students still took pride in their school and posing for pictures with a rusted out ugly gate wasn¡¯t conducive to that.


    ¡°Not too bad, Abby. I have the designs pretty much finalized and approved by Harry and now I¡¯m just working on the specs for each part. Harry gave the ok for this to be the summer semester project, so I¡¯m breaking the project up by levels. Even our beginner students will be able to help out. Speaking of which, I got permission to hire you as a teaching assistant this summer. You haven¡¯t changed your mind about that, have you?


    ¡°No dad, I¡¯ll still be able to do that. I¡¯ve booked off every morning to work with your students and I¡¯m going to be working four nights a week with Uncle Magnum¡¯s students. Afternoons are reserved for reading and for research for the stock picking competition.¡±


    ¡°That sounds pretty packed. What about relaxing a little bit this summer?¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s not so bad. I like working in your shop and I like Kung Fu. It¡¯s much better than babysitting. Besides, Eva and James are going to be away for half the summer and the rest of my friends are going to be in camp. Terry and Jay are going on an organized trip all over Europe, so they won¡¯t be around either. At least I¡¯ll be making money this summer.¡±


    ¡°That you will. With your experience in smithing, I got you a pretty good rate, for someone your age. What are your plans for the money? Are you saving up for a car?¡±


    ¡°Almost everywhere I go is walking distance or a quick bike ride away. I don¡¯t need a car yet. I¡¯m going to bet it all on Red!¡±


    Dad turned to me and raised his eyebrows questioningly. I quickly explained, ¡°I¡¯m going to invest in the companies that I research for the competition. If I do well, I¡¯ll end up with more money. If I don¡¯t, then I¡¯ll have learned a valuable lesson.¡±


    ¡°Don¡¯t you need an account to trade?¡±, dad asked.


    ¡°I was going to talk to you about that sometime this summer. I hoped that you¡¯d open an account for me and let me trade on it. You could put a restriction on it so that I could only work with the money that I put in the account and that I couldn¡¯t buy anything on margin.¡±


    ¡°I don¡¯t see why not. I¡¯ll even go one better. When you¡¯re ready to start investing, I want to sit with you and Eva and James and I¡¯d like to hear your strategy for investing, as well as why you¡¯re investing in your chosen companies. If I like what I hear, then I¡¯ll invest some money with you and I¡¯ll pay you a fee of 10% of my profits, after expenses.¡±


    ¡°Wow. Thanks for the vote of confidence, dad, but you¡¯ve just upped the pressure big time. I¡¯m not sure that I want to be responsible for losing your money. I¡¯d feel terrible if that happened.¡±


    ¡°I believe in you, Abby. I know that if you really work hard at this, you¡¯ll succeed. I also know James a little bit by now and I know that he¡¯s not a big risk-taker. I think the worst that would happen is that I¡¯ll break even or maybe lose a little bit. I see much more upside potential than downside. Also, I¡¯m rarely scared of investing with someone who is investing right along with me. Our interests will be aligned, and we¡¯ll all have skin in the game. Besides, if my financial advisor was so great and knew so much, then shouldn¡¯t he be too rich to still be a financial advisor?¡±


    Dad had finished making lunch by then and he headed off to bed. I stayed up for awhile practicing with my field; quietly going though stuff all over the house. I don¡¯t think that walking through tables and furniture will ever get old. The only new thing that I found out was that I couldn¡¯t pass through walls. That was one more data point showing me that there was some sort of progression to this ability. I could pass through anything that could be moved around. I figured that with practice, I¡¯d eventually grow past this limitation, but for now, I would build on my success. I had an idea that I wanted to try, but I¡¯d need to be able to be strong enough to hold the field for at least a half an hour straight.

 School Ends

    TGIF! School is over, exams are done, and a bunch of my friends and I were having a celebratory lunch at Big Julie¡¯s. Summer had finally arrived, and everyone was excited. The summer camp people had to leave on Sunday for their councillor orientation, so we made plans to get together tonight and Josh announced that he¡¯d be having a party at his house on Saturday.


    I was starting work on Monday morning, with dad¡¯s ¡°Introduction to Blacksmithing¡± course. On Wednesday, James and Eva were leaving with their families on a five-week cross country RV trip. They were driving all the way to L.A and back, taking a kind of oval shaped track around the country. They had a travel guidebook all marked up with every interesting attraction along the way. They were even going to stop at a basket shaped building in Ohio.


    With so little time together, Eva and James came over to my house to plan for the summer. We usually go to one of their houses, but they didn¡¯t want to be exposed to all the last-minute packing stress that was going on there. We set up our chairs outside in the backyard, with Eva and I in the sun, starting on our summer tans, and James in the shade. James is an indoor person, and when forced to leave the comforts of his air conditioning, he insists that he not be subjected to ¡®harmful solar radiation¡¯. I didn¡¯t know how he¡¯ll survive their trip. Once we were all comfortable, our discussion focused on our tasks for the competition.


    ¡°Mr. Chandler gave me a copy of the software that we¡¯ll be using for all the trading. I¡¯ve already installed it on my computer, and I¡¯ll be playing around with it on trip.¡±, James began, ¡°I¡¯ve also gone over the rules for the competition and found that we¡¯re not limited to simple stock trades. I¡¯m going to start learning all about the different financial instruments that we¡¯re allowed to use. We can short stock and buy bonds and ETF¡¯s and derivatives. What¡¯s your plan, Abby?¡±


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    ¡°Well, I checked out a few basic books on stock-picking from the university library last Sunday morning. I¡¯ll start on those. Then I guess I¡¯ll start looking up information on various local publicly traded companies. I figure that I¡¯ll have more access to information on those companies and maybe I¡¯ll even be able to get a tour of their offices or facilities and talk to their managers to get a feel for how they¡¯re doing. I can also use my dad¡¯s University Lexis-Nexis account to look up information on any company that we plan on investing in.¡±


    ¡°What¡¯s Lexis-Nexis?¡±, Eva asked.


    ¡°It¡¯s a service that has tons of articles on different industries and companies. It¡¯s great for research.¡±


    ¡°Can I use it too? I was planning on learning more about a bunch of industries first and then trying to figure out which companies are dominant in those industries.¡±, Eva explained.


    ¡°Sure. I don¡¯t think that dad has ever really used his access. I only found out about it because he brought home an employee brochure for me when he got me the summer job. As a part-time teaching assistant, I don¡¯t have access, but dad does, so it all works out.¡±


    Eva and James left at around four to get ready for tonight and maybe do a little packing. I went inside and read my book for awhile and practiced with my field some more. Using the field to go through things was really strengthening my ability to hold the field on for longer amounts of time. I was over the 30 second mark already and I didn¡¯t feel nearly as drained as I used to get when I first started. Was the ¡®bus incident¡¯ less than a week ago? It felt like much longer. So much had changed from me. Anyone looking at my life wouldn¡¯t see any real difference, but my perspective on everything had been heavily skewed. Using the field would change my life. I didn¡¯t know how, but I knew that it would. Whatever plans I had before from my future would have to make room for this ability.

 Summer Starts

    Having taken the weekend to properly say goodbye to my friends, I joined my dad on Monday morning for a quick breakfast and we rode in to work. Dad was teaching three courses this summer; Introduction to Blacksmithing, Materials Management, and The Art of Blacksmithing. Each of the courses was designed for a different level of experience and although I knew most of the material for all three, dad only needed my help with the introductory course.


    We walked into the work area where the class was to take place. I couldn¡¯t really call it a classroom as it was a big area with a bunch of furnaces lined up on either side with racks of tools between them. Unlike some classes, this one was a hand-on type of class. None of the furnaces were lit now and no one was working, so it was pretty quiet. That would change once we got going.


    I looked around and saw that all 14 of the enrolled students were already waiting. That was a good sign. People who care show up early. Dad started his class with his usual spiel about the how vital blacksmithing was in the old days and why it was still relevant these days. I watched the students and tried to figure out which three or four of them would actually enjoy the class enough to keep learning blacksmithing. There are always a few students for which blacksmithing satisfies something creative deep inside and they tend to make smithing a part of their lives.


    Dad explained how the course would proceed and how it would be graded and then he introduced me. He moved on to explaining the various tools that they would use, and I dutifully pulled each tool off of the wall and brought it around to the students to see them and hold them. From there dad showed them how to light the furnace and then we focused on safety. Pretty standard stuff. The class passed by quickly and dad took questions at the end for about a half an hour.


    After class dad asked me for my first impressions of the class and the students.


    ¡°Tyler¡¯s very cute!¡±


    ¡°Which one was Tyler?¡±, he asked.


    ¡°He was the tall guy at the back of the group. Blue t-shirt and jeans. Really good muscle definition. He probably has six-pack abs.¡±


    ¡°Should I fail him now or should I make him suffer until the course is done?¡±


    ¡°I just think that he¡¯s cute. I¡¯m not dating him or anything.¡±


    ¡°I should hope not. He¡¯s at least 19 years old. How old are you again? Twelve?¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m almost 16, dad. Which means that you should be thinking about what to get me for my birthday this month. Besides, a girl can look. No harm in that. It¡¯s not like I¡¯m going to get his number from the student list and call him and ask him if he wants to go out for pizza and a movie.¡± I liked teasing dad about boys. I don¡¯t think that he quite knew what to do about them. I knew that he was dreading the day that I got a boyfriend.


    Dad took the teasing in stride, ¡°University policy forbids employees from getting involved with students in any way. Why do you think I insisted that you become an employee? This way, you won¡¯t be tempted by cute boys.¡± Dad gave me an innocent smile, then waved goodbye as he went to get ready for his next class. That was a higher-level class and he¡¯s going to start them on some of the more complex pieces for the university entrance gates.


    I walked home and took the same route as I did on the day of the ¡®bus incident¡¯. While I was talking to Eva and James the other day, I realized that I hadn¡¯t seen my library books in awhile and when I looked from them, I couldn¡¯t find them anywhere in the house. I thought back to when I had them last and remembered looking through one right before the bus came at me, but I had no memories of the book after that. I looked all around the crash site for my ¡°Stock-Picking for Dummies¡± and ¡°Everything You Ever Wanted to Know About Trading Stocks But Were Afraid to Ask¡± books, but I didn¡¯t find them. I¡¯d have to check to see if anyone found them and given them back to the library. I¡¯d hate to have to buy replacement books.


    Lunch was followed by more field practice. Today I decided to do some testing outside. Our house isn¡¯t on a very busy street, but we get our share of cars, joggers and dog walkers. I sat on the side of our front lawn, mostly hidden by bushes, and listened for someone to walk by. As a woman pushing a stroller got close, I turned on my field and stood up. The world around me went grey, including the woman, and I walked towards her. She didn¡¯t react to me at all. I paced her for a few of my precious seconds and then I took the plunge and put my hand through her stroller, near the handles. I didn¡¯t feel a thing, just like always. The big test was next. Would the woman feel anything if I put my hand through her? Not wanting to cause any damage, in case something went wrong, I just touched her arm. No reaction at all. Knowing that my time was going to run out very soon, I went ahead and walked right though her. It didn¡¯t feel like anything to me. I quickly headed back to the bushes and turned off the field.


    I spent the next little while not being run over repeatedly by a car, two trucks, and a bicycle. I walked through many more people and I had a football thrown through my head. Even dogs couldn¡¯t sense or smell me. I had a great time scaring my neighbor¡¯s cat by shutting down my field just a few feet away from him and popping into existence out of nowhere. I¡¯ve never seen a cat jump backwards and race off so fast.


    All that practice made me tired and I went inside to take a nap before I went to Uncle Magnum¡¯s school. I woke up to the sound of my phone alarm buzzing and I got out of bed. I felt refreshed and hungry. A quick snack fixed the latter problem, and I got dressed for Kung Fu. It wasn¡¯t far to class, only about a mile or so, and the late afternoon walk warmed my muscles up. I always enjoyed my walk to Uncle Magnum¡¯s. I¡¯d gone back and forth so often that I could simply let my mind wander, without noticing the change from residential neighborhood to commercial streets. I passed by shops and waved to a few people that I recognized, but my mind was still on my abilities and what to do next. I seemed to be doing two things with it right now. I was trying to hold onto the field for longer periods of time and I was testing to see what it could do. The former just needed lots of practice, and so wasn¡¯t an issue, while the latter needed thought. What was the next step? I needed to use my imagination and think up different things to try. Even failures taught me something. What were the rules of this ability? What were the limits of the field? Well, let¡¯s start with limits. I knew that the field surrounded me and my clothes, but what if I was holding something or if I had on a coat? How many layers of clothing would go with me? What if I had a backpack on? What if I was simply holding a gym bag? Does the field surround those things when I phase into the grayness? Could I take someone with me? Some of this would be easy to test out later tonight or tomorrow and I set a few vague reminders on my phone. I never got too specific on anything on my phone that I didn¡¯t want anyone else to find out about. James was a bit of a conspiracy guy and he got me all paranoid about how phones are a lot less secure than you might think. Since I didn¡¯t want anyone to know about my ability, I was making sure to only refer to it in extremely mundane fashion. My notes consisted of ¡°try on backpack¡± and ¡°try on coat¡± and ¡°take a walk with dad¡±. I wasn¡¯t actually going to try taking dad into the field, but his name was a good placeholder for the reminder. I didn¡¯t think that I¡¯d be taking anyone ¡®for a walk¡¯ for quite awhile.


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    Having made my notes, I continued coming up with more things to check. It was important to me to explore this new ability. About a year ago, I read a sci-fi book about a guy that developed the power to read other people¡¯s thoughts. I looked forward to seeing what he would do with it, what funny things could happen, how he would grow into the ability. Unfortunately, the author didn¡¯t go in that direction. He had the character become a miserable wreck because he couldn¡¯t stand all the noise and he had the sadz because he didn¡¯t like what his friends were thinking about. What a waste! In the entire book, the author didn¡¯t have his character spend even one line about trying to learn to use his ability and control it. I think that the character eventually passed away in an overdose of the drugs that he used to suppress his ability. I remember being so disappointed with the story. What kind of a person gets an unusual ability and then squanders the opportunity? I spent weeks thinking about what I would have done differently. I would have learned to control it; practiced until I could shut it out whenever I wanted. That way, I wouldn¡¯t listen in to my friend¡¯s thoughts, if they bothered me. Then I would have started experimenting with how far I could listen in and how deep into people¡¯s thought I could go. Learning to fixate on who I wanted to listen to would be important too. Once I¡¯d figured out the power, I would have listed out the possible careers that I could go into and make the best use of my mind reading abilities. Detective, psychologist, negotiator, diplomat, spy, mystic. There were so many options, yet the character in that book did nothing. I felt nothing for him, except scorn. I knew that I would never be so stupid and now that I had an ability, there was no way that I wasn¡¯t going to use it.


    Uncle Magnum¡¯s school was a two story, stand-alone building one block off of Fleming Street, our main commercial center, and just on the outskirts of the industrial park. Uncle Magnum owned the building and he was the only tenant. The lower floor of the building had four main rooms; two were classrooms, one training and conditioning room and the last was a gym. There were also bathrooms and changing rooms for each of the classrooms and small store to purchase uniforms and practice weapons. The upper floor was Uncle Magnum¡¯s home and I had my own small room there for when I stayed over.


    Tonight¡¯s first class was with the 8-12-year-olds. With camp having started, the class only had ten students and Uncle Magnum had me warm them up, while he spoke with a walk-in who wanted some information on the adult classes. Warm up for the kids was similar to that of the adults, but horse-stance was only one minute, and plank was for two minutes. At least that was how I ran the class. I actually looked at the clock on the wall and followed the time. Uncle Magnum has a habit of ¡®going by the feel of his muscles¡¯ and one minute always seemed to magically become two or three minutes. I¡¯d never grown to appreciate some of Uncle Magnum¡¯s humor. I led the class in forms once everyone was warmed up and I stopped by each student correcting one aspect of their form. Uncle Magnum joined us and we started working on kicking drills, followed by punching drills.


    After class, I made sure to keep a close eye on the waiting room. Sure enough, Jeremy¡¯s aunt had shown up to pick him up after class and Uncle Magnum casually strolled over to talk with her. I smirked and made my way over to the next class; this one was the 5-8-year-old class. It looked like Uncle Magnum would be showing up late to this class as well. I would definitely tease him about it, especially since Jeremy¡¯s aunt was gorgeous. He had mentioned last week that he had a ¡®hot date¡¯, but he didn¡¯t emphasis the hot part enough. Based on Uncle Magnum¡¯s height, I¡¯d estimate her to be around 5¡¯8¡± with brown hair to the middle of her back. She wore a knee length pale pink skirt with a white blouse. She wasn¡¯t wearing much make-up, as she didn¡¯t need it. My guess would be that she¡¯s in her late 20¡¯s or early 30¡¯s, which puts her at least 10 years younger than Uncle Magnum. Her face lit up when she saw Uncle Magnum and I could tell that the attraction was mutual. I really hoped it worked out for them. Uncle Magnum deserved to find someone to share his life with and he was getting on in years. I liked to tease him and tell him that he needed to find someone fast because he was no ¡®spring chicken¡¯.


    The evening passed quickly, and we were just finishing the last class before Uncle Magnum and I had a chance to talk. The final class was the advanced class and I got to participate more as a student in this one as there were only seven students tonight and Uncle Magnum took over all the teaching. After a half-hour of forms, we spent the rest of the class sparring. With most of the students being at a lower level than I was, that meant that I was focusing mostly on staying relaxed, keeping my movements as small as possible, and going slow so that they wouldn¡¯t tense up. The point wasn¡¯t to hit them hard and fast, rather it was to let them work on their techniques and gain fighting instincts. They needed to see the hits and get used to blocking them.


    Uncle Magnum closed up for the night and I went upstairs for a quick shower, after which he drove me home. It wasn¡¯t a long way and I could have walked home, but Uncle Magnum always insisted on driving me. Since the abduction, almost twelve years ago, he¡¯s been especially protective of me. Sometimes it bothers me a bit, but not tonight. Tonight, it gives me a little time to tease him.


    ¡°Jeremy¡¯s aunt picked him up again today. I guess pizza and a movie did the trick.¡±


    ¡°Her name is Margaret. Maggie for short. We had a lovely time, thank you very much.¡±


    ¡°What movie did you see?¡±


    ¡°Something with a guy and a girl and there was talking, and they had a dog.¡±


    ¡°Well. That¡¯s pretty specific. Must have been really good. I¡¯m sure it¡¯ll win an Oscar.¡±


    ¡°Smart ass. We only stayed for half an hour and then we went out for coffee instead.¡±


    ¡°She¡¯s not just a pretty face then?¡±


    ¡°It doesn¡¯t hurt that she¡¯s pretty. Don¡¯t judge. A good book can have a cool cover, you know.¡±


    ¡°Oh my, Uncle Magnum, I think you¡¯ve finally been caught. Are you seeing her again? Besides at pick-up?¡±


    ¡°I already saw her again. We went mini-golfing this past Saturday and on Sunday we met up for brunch.¡±


    ¡°I like weddings in early fall; when the leaves change color and it¡¯s not too hot.¡±


    ¡°You¡¯re a little snot, you know that, right?¡±


    ¡°Payback for the horse-stance, that¡¯s all it is. When should I expect to see Marge in the beginner class?¡±


    ¡°Maggie, never Marge. She says that she¡¯s not Homer¡¯s wife. As to class, she might try the introductory class sometime this summer. I¡¯ll let you know, because either you or Charles will have to teach her. I don¡¯t think it would be a smart idea for me to teach her.¡±


    We said our goodbyes as he dropped me off and I walked into the house, changed, brushed my teeth and fell asleep within minutes of laying down on my bed. It had been a long, but satisfying, day and I couldn¡¯t wait to see what wonders I could do with my new ability this summer.

 Application

    The week passed by quickly. Every morning started at the University with dad and every evening ended with a ride home from Uncle Magnum. In between those two jobs, I either practiced with my field or I was thinking of new ways to test the field. It turned out that anything I wore would be encompassed by the field; even if I put on two jackets and wore snow-pants over my jeans. Anything that I held would also come with me. If I dropped something or took it off and let it go, then it would leave the field and go back to what I was starting to simply call ¡®Reality¡¯. With reality being the everyday world around us, I decided to call the place inside the field as ¡®Reality 1¡± or R1 for short.


    That would have to do for now, but I knew that there was a lot more to the field. There was a way to go much deeper. I had seen that during the bus incident when I had gone through various layers of reality. One layer was without people, another layer was without the bus and the final layer was without buildings. What I was doing now with the field didn¡¯t match up with that experience. I was in a reality where there were people, cars and buildings, only they were greyed out and I could go through them. Why couldn¡¯t I go through the buildings?


    I was hoping that as I got stronger at holding the field, I¡¯d be able to do new things with it, including walking through walls. In the meantime, I could now hold the field for over ten minutes before the strain became too much. I¡¯d need at least an hour of continuous field time for what I had planned and so I continued to practice for hours each day. Besides, it was a ton of fun. With the longer field time I was able to go out to busier places, like the mall, and run through people and stores and racks of clothing and food court tables. I also followed people and listened in on their conversations, I watched them put their passwords into their phones, I read their email and texts over their shoulders. I¡¯m quite nosy it seems, but I did learn that most people have really boring conversations. I suppose I should have known that, given my own useless texting, but knowing something in concept is not the same as facing the reality of it.


    When I couldn¡¯t hold the field for much longer, I usually took a break in the bathroom. Not wanting anyone to see me appear and disappear, it only made sense to go into my own stall. As long as there weren¡¯t too many people in the bathroom, no one would notice my comings and goings. I would just leave the door locked when I left the stall and it was still locked when I returned. When I got tired of holding the field and needed a break, I just walked out of the stall and sat in the food court for a bit. Then I went to the bathroom to disappear again. I learned something else during these practices. Way too many people weren¡¯t washing their hands after going to the bathroom. Ick!


    Another way that I really enjoyed practicing with the field was to play in traffic. I started off by crossing the street without looking both ways. It¡¯s harder than you think, even when you know that you won¡¯t get hit by anything. Looking both ways is something that we were all taught at an early age and it¡¯s a very difficult habit to break. I even look both ways when I¡¯m crossing a one-way street. I ended up just closing my eyes and running into the middle of the street. After doing that a few times, I upped my game by running out into the middle of an intersection and dodging around incoming traffic. Sometimes it worked and sometimes the car would slam through me and I would get a quick second glimpse into the interior of the car. Who knew that so many people left their trash in the backseat?


    Saturday I finally got to sleep in. It was glorious. Uncle Magnum had some afternoon classes, but he didn¡¯t need my help, so I lounged around, ate brunch and spent some quality time binging Netflix. Hours later, feeling antsy from having done nothing all day, I found myself sitting on the floor of my room and turning on the field. I wanted to try something new, something that was based on what I had learned this week. The field expanded to encompass what I was wearing or holding, but it did it without my conscious thought. Could I expand the field on purpose? Could I expand it in any shape that I wanted? I don¡¯t see why is shouldn¡¯t be possible. As usually, the trick would be to figure out how.


    Being able to hold the field on for longer had given me a much better sense of it. I had more time to really examine its capabilities. Last time that I experimented like this, I¡¯d turned the field on and off by pushing and pulling against the field. Now the goal was to see if I could feel what was going on when I added something to the field. I leaned over and tried to pick up my book from the nightstand. Oops! My hand went right through the book and the nightstand, I overbalanced and fell onto the floor.


    Sitting upright again, I turned off the field, grabbed the book and turned the field back on. I carefully examined the sensation of the field where the book and hand met and I found two surprises. First, the book was in its own field that was connected to mine. Where my hand field met the book field, the two fields merged into one. I wonder if the two fields could separate or if the book field grew out of the field that surrounded me. I took a few seconds to examine my pajamas. Were they in their own separate, but connected, fields as well? They were! I was realizing that I was missing clues because I wasn¡¯t asking the right questions or not paying enough attention to the details.


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    The second surprise was that I could feel the pressure of my fingers and palm on the book. This might seem normal enough, but I was feeling the pressure from both sides; from my fingers and from the book. If you press your finger against the floor, you feel the floor from your fingertip. If you press two fingers together, then you feel the pressure from each of the fingers as they press against each other. This feeling from the book side was similar to that. I realized that I was getting a slight sensation from the pressure that I was applying to the field surrounding the book. The field was giving me sensory inputs. That was so cool. I¡¯d need to think about what I could use that for and I made a mental note to look into that later.


    Part of the problem was that I was already holding the book, or wearing clothes, before I put on the field. That made sense, because I would otherwise just go pass through them, as had just happened a few minutes ago. But, if I couldn¡¯t feel or sense a change from a state of not holding something to a state of holding something, then maybe I could do it the other way around. Grasping the book in my right hand, I focused on the fields that surrounded the book and my hand and then I slowly released the book.


    The book hit the floor while I was trying to puzzle out if I had felt anything at all. I tried it again. And then again. It took what felt like hundreds of tries, but I was eventually able to feel that was happening. As the book left my fingers, the field surrounding the book would get absorbed into the field around me. It felt like the main field was sucking in the little field. I did it a few more times, really making an effort to capture the feeling of absorption that was occurring. I suppose that reversing the process would result in being able to extend the field around an object that I wasn¡¯t touching. It seemed like every time that I got the answer to a question, more questions would just pop up. I really, really wanted an instruction manual for this field.


    Knowing what reabsorbing the field felt like, I tried to do it on my own. I shut off the field, again, picked up the book, again, and turned the field on, again. Even though I has slept in and not done much today, I could tell that I was getting tired because my frustration level was notching up quickly. I¡¯d stop after this and get a snack or two and take a short nap. This time I held the book on the palm of my hand and concentrated on my field and the field surrounding the book. Then, I applied that absorbing feeling to the field surrounding the book. It was kind of like what I had done to turn on and off the field, but this was more like drinking from a straw. I even found myself acting out the process by puckering up my lips and inhaling through a non-existent tube.


    The field retracted from the book and the book fell trough my hand and onto the floor. Despite my intention to call it quits for awhile, I practiced that for another half hour, just to be sure that I had a handle on it. By the time I stopped, I wasn¡¯t using the non-existent straw and my facial muscles weren¡¯t even twitching. Later I¡¯d have to try pushing out the smaller field. Break first.


    It was snack time and I had a hankering for cookies. Cookies are my favorite snack and white chocolate chip cookies are my favorite cookie. For some reason, every single store-bought white chocolate chip cookie has to have macadamia nuts in it. I don¡¯t know why. I have nothing against macadamia nuts, but they just don¡¯t belong in my white chocolate chip cookie! That¡¯s why I¡¯m forced to make my own and when I do, I usually make lots of extra and keep a container of ready to bake cookies in the freezer. A quick check of the freezer informed me that I had already eaten the last of the ready to bake cookies and so I started taking out all the ingredients that I would need. Dad came by just as the first batch was coming out of the oven.


    ¡°How do you do that?¡±, I asked him.


    ¡°Do what?¡±, he asked me right back. He knew what.


    ¡°Show up just as the cookies are ready. You¡¯ve been in the smithy all day, banging away, with barely a bathroom break. What are the odds that you¡¯d come into the house just when the oven dings?¡±


    ¡°Pretty high actually. I have the entire place wired for video and the surveillance service that I hired has specific instruction to call me whenever you¡¯re making cookies.¡±


    ¡°All so you could get freshly baked cookies? That seems a bit extreme. Especially since I was going to bring a plate over to you in a few minutes. You could have saved all that money and used it to buy me a car.¡±


    ¡°I though that you didn¡¯t want a car. You said that your bike got you everywhere you needed to go in five minutes. Also, no drivers license.¡±


    ¡°Good points. Cookie?¡± I handed him a cookie via a spatula, and we bonded over the savory goodness of cookies. After eating a few, we added some milk and left our cares behind.

 The Plan

    Having ignored the stock-picking competition for my first week of work, I spent most of Sunday at the university library. No one had returned the book that I lost, and I made a note on my phone to pick up new ones for the library. I found another book similar to the one that I lost and spent some time getting informed on how public companies worked and how they reported to the public.


    Public companies were required to post quarterly reports showing how they¡¯d done over the previous three months. They were also required to publish annual reports. The book explained that there was usually a lot of market activity in the weeks leading up to the reports being published, as investors would use any clues they could find to guess at the company results before the report came out. Once the report was published, those investors would buy or sell the stock based on the actual results. This was called the ¡°buy on rumor, sell on news¡± strategy. It was like talking to your friend as she gets ready for a blind date and guessing as to how it will go and comparing notes afterwards to see how it actually went.


    It was these clues and rumor part that interested me the most. I read some more about that and found analysts and journalists to be the main purveyors of wisdom. The analysts studied an industry and its key players. They looked at trends in the industry, such as what other companies had already reported, new challenges to the industry or new regulations or new innovations that could cause any upheaval in the industry. Then they went out and met with senior managers at top companies in that industry and asked them lots of questions. Finally, the analysts looked at the suppliers to those top companies to see how they were doing. For example, if the suppliers were hiring people, then they were probably expanding, and it could be due to large orders from their clients. The analysts themselves usually worked for large financial institutions and these in turn would sell the analyses to their clients or feed small tidbits to the financial journalists, who in turn wrote these insights into their columns. On and on it went, everyone seeming to know so much, but it was all built on educated guesses.


    Sometimes the guesses weren¡¯t very educated. Sometimes the guesses were spiteful, because someone didn¡¯t like the company or the industry and wanted their stock price to plummet. Sometimes a disgruntled employee wanted to leave a parting jab to the company by exaggerating problems within the company. Sometimes politics played a role and true analysis was set aside in order to create a narrative. Experts would be brought in to show how an industry was harming the environment and explained why shareholders should divest themselves of their shares in that industry.


    The real problem was that even if you were able to sift through the real from the fake news, you¡¯re still faced with the issue that two people can look at the same set of facts and come to entirely different conclusions, even without either of them having any personal stake in the company or any biases for or against the company. It was just human nature. Their own personal experiences and quirks would lead them to different conclusions.


    The only people who knew the truth were the upper management of those companies and they were required to divulge that truth every three months. Although they were allowed to spin the truth with their comments and projections for the future, you could still get a solid understanding of the short-term situation of the company.


    After a few hours, my brains started to melt. There was so much to take in and it wasn¡¯t very interesting to me. I discovered very quickly that becoming a financial analyst was not in my future. But I still needed to participate in the competition and I still wanted to help James. Even my own foundation would eventually need to invest its money. With so much information out there, both factual and guesswork, how was I going to make money by picking stocks? People made their careers studying the stock market, and most of them didn¡¯t become rich.


    Maybe that was the question that I should be asking. Who¡¯s making money by picking stocks? At first glance, it seems like an easy question to answer. Financial institutions made a ton of money, that¡¯s their whole reason for existence, after all. But they made most of their money from charging their clients fees or from lending out other people¡¯s money at a higher rate than they borrowed it, not from buying and selling stock. Financial advisors or money managers often made a very good living, but like dad said, if they were that good at it, they be too rich to bother working for someone else.


    Big institutions, like pension funds and university endowment funds, often grew their funds by huge amounts, but they had at least three advantages that I didn¡¯t have. They were long term investors and had years to achieve results, while I only had around eight or nine months. They had large diversified portfolios, meaning that they were invested in so many industries that it wouldn¡¯t have much of an effect on them if a few had a bad year, because there would always be a few industries that would offset that by having a good year. While I could diversify a bit, I didn¡¯t have the funds to diversify to the extent that they did, even if I bought an index fund like the Dow or the S&P 500. Finally, ¡®It takes money to make money¡¯ is an old but very true saying and they mostly started off with a lot of other people¡¯s money. I only had my own, and maybe some of dads¡¯ money to work with. The institutions were so big that their trades could affect the course of a company or even an entire industry and they were often courted by financial institutions with special access to investment opportunities that the little Abby sized investors couldn¡¯t get and weren¡¯t even aware existed.


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    Upper management made a lot money from trading their own stock, but they were required to report the stock they bought or sold to an online, searchable, database within two days of the trade. That information then becomes public knowledge. Those trades were watched very closely, not just by the analysts who would wonder why the managers of the company were buying or selling their own company stock, but by the Securities and Exchange Commission that regulated such trades. Since I wasn¡¯t upper management at a publicly traded company, I couldn¡¯t make money that way.


    The last group of people that made huge sums of money from stock-picking were those that practiced insider trading. Insider trading consisted of using information that wasn¡¯t available to the public to make your trades. For instance, if Uncle Magnum were the CEO of a large company and he told me about a new secret breakthrough at his company and I used that knowledge to buy stock before it was announced to the public, then I¡¯d be trading on knowledge that was only available to insiders of the company. Insider trading is illegal. Marth Stewart, a woman who started her own company and became a billionaire, went to jail in 2001 for using insider information to save herself a $50,000 loss. The authorities take insider trading very seriously and they made an example of her. I thought that putting her in jail was silly. She wasn¡¯t a danger to society and a different penalty could have been more useful.


    There are exceptions to every rule and sometimes insider trading is allowed. Members of the US Congress are basically exempt from insider trading laws. They get a pass on using non-public information, that they obtain in their committees, to make trades. If a congressman sits on a committee to overhaul healthcare, they can place trades on companies that will be affected by the changes that they¡¯re helping to make. However, in 2012, when the Stock Act was passed, Congress was no longer exempt from insider trading laws. Unfortunately, a year later Congress quietly passed legislation that considerably watered down the Stock Act and instead of having the same rules of disclosure as upper-management types had, they changed the ¡®public disclosure¡¯ from an online database to a paper report filed in the basement of a building in Washington DC, that you had to visit in person and pay to get a copy of. The reporting was also changed from two days to 45 days. The new rules also didn¡¯t seem to carry a stated penalty for congressional insider trading, nor does congress have to comply with an investigation into insider trading by the SEC.


    I thought about that for some time. One of the founding principles of the United States is that no one is above the law. Yet here was a clear example of rules for thee, but not for me. They wrote the rules, exempted themselves from those same rules, and they made millions of dollars off of it.


    The politicians got a free pass, upper-management gets a free pass with disclosure, large institutional investors get special deals because of their size, and the financial institutions make money whether stocks go up or down because they charge fees on the stocks that they manage for others.


    Realizing all this, I started to get upset about the whole situation. The game was rigged. How was I supposed to succeed when the big guys had all the advantages? Then I realized how whiny I sounded in my head. So, life isn¡¯t fair. Big deal. This wasn¡¯t news to me. I volunteered at the hospital and seen accident victims and four-year-old cancer patients. I¡¯d worked at a soup kitchen with dad for awhile and talked with people who lost their homes to flooding and to drug addicted mothers trying to feed their babies. My mother had been taken by human traffickers and I haven¡¯t seen her in almost 12 years. You could sit and cry in your cornflakes or you could keep living your life and do the best you can with the hand that you¡¯re dealt. It¡¯s clich¨¦, but it¡¯s true.


    If they used their advantages to get what they want, then I¡¯d use mine to get what I wanted. Maybe it wasn¡¯t the most ethical decision that I¡¯d ever made, but I comforted myself that at least I¡¯d be doing it to help other people and not just to enrich myself. I was pretty sure that James wouldn¡¯t approve, nor dad, but I wasn¡¯t them and if there were any consequences, then I¡¯d deal with them.


    With that decision made, I used my phone to look up which public companies were within a few hours drive. I planned on paying them a visit and seeing if I could get some of my own insider information.

 Preparation

    The key to getting useful information for trading is timing. Quarterly reports came out around 35 days after the end of the quarter and during that time a lot of market speculation would take place. The second quarter of the year would be over next week and then companies would be preparing their reports. This reporting period was too early for the stock-picking competition, but it wasn¡¯t too early for me to get in a trial run. Luckily, there were some publicly traded companies here in town and I planned on visiting five of them over the next two weeks. If there was any interesting information, I¡¯d have just enough time before the reports came out to open a trading account and place some trades.


    With this goal settled, I needed to prepare. I didn¡¯t expect to simply stroll into the company¡¯s headquarters and find an advance copy of the quarterly report sitting on the president¡¯s desk. Although, I figured that there was actually a slight possibility of that happening, since the president did need to review the report before approving it for printing, but I didn¡¯t know when they started working on it, how long it took, or if they even bothered with a paper copy.


    My goal for my first try would be to get a glimpse of the president¡¯s schedule for the next few weeks and see if there was a meeting with the quarterly numbers breakdown. Then, I¡¯d just sit in on the meeting and listen until I couldn¡¯t hold the field anymore. I also wanted to check out their security office and see a plan of the building and what cameras they had, in case I needed to stay longer than I could hold the field for. I could always just go their washrooms and hide out for awhile, but it never hurts to know what other options are available.


    Preparing consisted mostly of more training and experimentation. Training to hold the field for longer and experimenting to see how and what I could bring with me. Holding the field for half an hour was about my limit right now. I¡¯d need time to get into the building and find my way around. Then I¡¯d need to find the president¡¯s secretary and wait until she pulled up his or her schedule. I had no idea how long that would take, but I had to assume that it was at least an hour. I knew that if I kept at, I could eventually hold the field all day long, but I only had a week or two, so I set my goal for one hour. If I needed more time, I¡¯d just have to take a break for a bit in the bathroom.


    I would need to bring a notepad and a pen, as well a camera. Oh hell! Would a camera even work in the field? Can a camera take a picture of another reality? I can see the other reality, but I¡¯m not part of it. I¡¯d need to test that. I also needed to test out using a backpack. I¡¯d tested holding a bag with me when I go into the field, but it was empty. Would the field just encompass the backpack, leaving behind everything in it or would does the field envelope the contents as well? Does each item get its own small field? So many questions, so little time. Let¡¯s get started getting those answers.


    Taking out my phone, I brought up the camera app and turned on the field. Checking to make sure that there was a field around the phone, I snapped a picture of my bed and then I took a quick video of my room. Back in reality, I opened up the picture and looked at it closely. My bed showed up, but the colors were muted, and the image was slightly blurred. It seems that the camera was capturing a bit of the field and the field acted like a filter over the lens. The blurriness was slightly more pronounced in the video, as the blurring effect was magnified by the shifting of the field while the video was being taken. None of this mattered at this point though, as the picture quality was more than enough for me to see and read anything that I took a picture or video of, as long as I didn''t pan too quickly.


    Next, I tested out the backpack. There wasn¡¯t much to it, as all I had to do was grab my schoolbag, which I still hadn¡¯t emptied from the end of school, and move it into R1. When the field came on, I focused on the it and saw that the bag was enveloped in my field. Holding the bag with one arm and unzipping it with the other, I took out one of my binders and examined the field around it. It seemed to be the same as the field surrounding the bag. I put the binder down on my desk and the field retracted as I let it go. One by one, I removed everything from the bag. I counted twenty individual objects, including a few loose pens and pencils, my pencil case, two quarters, a dime and a paperclip. Each item had a field around it before I let it settle on the desk. How many things could the field envelope? Could I extend the field over a car or a bus? How about a building? Did it take more strength to use the field on something bigger? Was it harder to use the field on more things at once? So many questions!


    Before going to bed for the night, I tested out two other ways to use the field. Last night, I had practiced reabsorbing the field that surrounded a book that I held and watched it shift back into reality. Now I tried to do the opposite of that. While in R1, I wanted to see if I could have the field surround something that was in reality and bring it into R1. I took a few minutes to practice reabsorbing the field from a book that I was holding in R1 and after the fifth time that I dropped the book on my desk, I left the field on and reached to pick up the book. As my hand neared the book, I concentrated on the part of the field near my hand and instead of sucking it in to reabsorb it, I sent it out to surround the book.


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    At first, nothing happened, but as my hand got about half an inch away, I felt the field flow out and encompass the book. Before I could grab it, the book fell through the desk and landed on the floor. I bent down and picked it up. Sweet! Now I wouldn¡¯t have to blink back into reality to grab something that I forgot. Putting the book down, I turned to the bed and approached it. Let¡¯s see how big an object I could take with me. I placed my hand just over the bed and extended the field. The field quickly enveloped the bedspread and it fell through the bed and onto the floor. Huh! I¡¯d have to find a way to be more specific. I wonder what would happen if I didn¡¯t pull the bedspread out from under the bed. How long would it stay in R1? If the field stopped working while the blanket was enmeshed with the feet of the bed, would the blanket have holes in it when it phased back into reality? I¡¯d have to experiment later on, with something that didn¡¯t keep me warm and cozy at night.


    With the bedspread back in its proper place, I decided to try my desk instead. The bed was composed of too many separate pieces that were heavy. I didn¡¯t want to have to haul the mattress back up onto the frame if I made another mistake. I cleared everything off the desk and placed my hand just above the it. Again, I sent out the field from my hand and started to surround the desk with my field. It was working, but as soon as the desk was in the field, the field shut down; not only from around the desk, but from around me. I guess I¡¯d pushed too far for now. I¡¯d need more practice. A wave or tiredness swept over me and I closed the lights and fell asleep as my head touched the pillow.


    The next morning, my alarm woke me up for work. Despite being so tired the night before, I woke up quickly and felt great. I did my morning rituals in the bathroom and got dressed. I never wore anything nice to work at the university. There were simply too many opportunities to get your clothes singed and somehow, even when I was wearing all the necessary safety gear, I still managed to ruin a top every now and then. Simple jeans and a t-shirt for me. Easy to wash and easy to replace.


    Passing by my backpack on the way to breakfast, I had an idea. What if I could practice all day and still do my job? I¡¯d be able to get strong enough to hold the field for more than an hour much quicker that way. I filled the backpack with a change of clothes, a notebook, a pen and my old digital camera. I put the backpack on and shifted to R1. Then I tried to shift back to reality while leaving the backpack in R1. I wasn¡¯t sure what to expect. Would the backpack fall to the ground or would it stay on my shoulders? After all, I always had the field around me, even when I turned it off, and I was hoping that the backpack would anchor itself to my field, even if it was in standby mode. I didn¡¯t find out, because when I turned my field off, it turned off the field for the backpack. I wasn¡¯t good enough yet to differentiate between the two fields and turn one off while leaving the other one on.


    Leaving the backpack on, but the field off, I felt the field around by body and extended it to include the backpack. I focused on this extended field around the backpack, specifically where it connected to the field surrounding me, and I sent a push out for the backpack field to turn on. The weight of the backpack suddenly disappeared from my shoulders and I was worried that it had fallen to the ground. However, as I explored my field, I could tell that the backpack was still there. The places where the two fields joined felt different. It wasn¡¯t a tugging sensation, more like a just a subtle change in thickness of the field. It didn¡¯t feel weird though, so I left it like that for a bit while I checked my reflection in the closet mirror. I couldn¡¯t tell that I was wearing a backpack at all. My t-shirt hung loosely around my shoulders and back and even billowed out a bit when I shook it. There was nothing pressing down on my t-shirt, yet the backpack was there in R1. I could even take off my shirt and put it back on without any effect on the backpack. It was there, but it wasn''t. This was so cool.


    If I could hold the field long enough, I¡¯d never have to worry about anyone trying to rip off my backpack. They¡¯d never even know that I had it on. I could go hiking without having to feel the weight of my gear or having the gear get wet in the rain. Travelling would be tons easier. I could take a large bottle of shampoo or water on a plane. Not that I travelled much by plane, but it was nice to know. Come to think of it, I¡¯d be the world¡¯s best smuggler. Customs agents couldn¡¯t search a backpack that wasn¡¯t quite in our reality.


    With all these possibilities running through my brain, I practiced turning the backpack field on and off a few times, just to be sure that I could do it again easily, before joining dad for breakfast. I really hoped that the field wouldn¡¯t cut out in front of anyone today. It might be a little awkward to explain.

 At the Forge

    The backpack field held for the entire morning and it felt like I could hold it all day without straining. Whether it was the difference in weight or size, I didn¡¯t know. Maybe I¡¯d experiment with that later. For now though, I was just happy for the chance to use the field all day long. If my guess was correct, this kind of practice should seriously increase the time that I could hold myself in R1.


    The workday with the students was rather typical. Dad had them working on simple shapes using the different tools available. The pieces themselves weren¡¯t the point, rather it was just getting used to the tools, the heat of the forge and the safety precautions. You have to start small, just like in Kung Fu. You don¡¯t put a beginner into a sparring match in their first month. They need to learn how to punch and kick properly first. So, I spent the morning reminding students that were at least three years older than I am to put on their safety glasses or to put on their heat resistant gloves before they use the forge. I showed them how to hold their tools properly so that they didn¡¯t drop what they were working on and when they found that they couldn¡¯t pound their metal into the shapes that they wanted, I reminded them about the importance of knowing the temperature at which different metals became malleable. I also reminded them to stay hydrated. Most of them took my help in stride, but I could see that a few of them didn¡¯t appreciate being schooled by a ¡®little girl¡¯. I wasn¡¯t worried about it though. I¡¯d see this often in Kung Fu and I¡¯d learned not to take it personally. Some people just had preconceived notions that they couldn¡¯t get past. Eventually, people either come around or they ignore my warnings and do something stupid. Part of my job was making sure that they didn¡¯t get hurt while doing something stupid.


    Usually, it¡¯s the bigger men, those that liked to preen in front of the mirror and admire their muscles, that have an issue with me instructing them. I don¡¯t even blame them really. Their size advantage has other men listening to them with respect, while women see them as alpha males and want to attach themselves to the top dog. They¡¯re just not used to listening to others, especially not high school girls. In Kung Fu, this attitude is easy to correct. I simply make them hold a pad while I show them the proper technique for a kick, and I make sure to put a lot of power into my kick. They get the message very quickly.


    In the classroom, things aren¡¯t so easy, and I need to have much more patience. In this class, I had two students that didn¡¯t take me seriously. One was a pretty hotel management student and the other was Tyler, the cute boy that I mentioned to dad. I guess pretty or cute didn¡¯t equal smart. Big shocker there.


    Neither of them fell under the ¡®big strong man¡¯ category though. Rebecca, the management student, seemed to be a teacher¡¯s pet type that looked down on lowly teaching assistants. Since the first day of class, she had staked out the closest furnace to dad¡¯s and she hung onto his every word. Normally that would be a good thing, as you would expect her to soak up his teachings. In this case, she seemed to hear his voice, but not take in what he was saying. Dad and I had discussed her failings and he had asked me to keep a close eye on her, as she was likely to burn herself or hurt others. If dad still felt the same way towards the end of course, he wouldn¡¯t pass her. Dad is a big believer in safety and if a student couldn¡¯t be trusted, he made sure that they didn¡¯t continue in blacksmithing.


    Tyler was a different story altogether. He was smart, but he was too confident in his own abilities. I think that he saw me as an annoying little sister type, and he tended to ignore me because of it. When I¡¯d come around and offer suggestions, he¡¯d cut me off with an ¡®I got it¡¯ and continue to do what he was doing. Maybe his past had given him good reason to be so confident, but I¡¯d found that the voice of experience was ignored at your own risk. I didn¡¯t think that he was a danger to anyone, but I was certain that he¡¯d make many mistakes that he could have avoided, if he¡¯d simply listen. Then again, maybe I was wrong. Maybe he was just an asshole who didn¡¯t respect women or believe that they had worthwhile opinions.


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    ¡°Hey Tyler. Where¡¯d you get that iron ingot from?¡± I could see that he was getting ready to place the piece of iron in the forge. I looked him over to make sure he had all his safety gear on.


    ¡°The back table on the left. The one with all the other ingots on it.¡± Tyler kept working, without even looking at me.


    ¡°Are you sure? Because it has a blue mark on the side. I put aside a few ingots this morning and marked them with blue to indicate that they had too many impurities in them. They¡¯re going to be returned to the supplier or maybe used by the higher-level students for learning purposes. I also made sure to place them on the table on the right and I mentioned it at the start of class.¡± Ok, I was a bit pissed off with him. He¡¯d completely ignored me. What a jerk!


    ¡°Well if the higher-level students can learn from it, why can¡¯t I?¡±


    ¡°For starters, they can recognize the impurities while they¡¯re working and adjust their temperatures accordingly. They¡¯ve also learned different techniques that can remove the impurities or lessen their impact on the final product. Impurities when you¡¯re forging a sword can result in a weak sword that will break the first time that you use it. Too many impurities can turn the metal brittle. The best option is to not use the impure metal in the first place.¡±


    ¡°Uh huh. And how do you even know that it has too many impurities in it? It looks like all the other ingots.¡±


    ¡°I just do. Some people have a feel for the metal.¡±


    ¡°Seriously? A ¡®feel¡¯ for the metal. So you¡¯re just guessing?¡±


    ¡°No. That ingot has too many impurities in it. Maybe it¡¯s a difference in the weight that I can notice. Who know? I¡¯m usually right.¡±


    ¡°Ok. Whatever.¡± Tyler turned away from me and placed the iron in the forge.


    ¡°Actually Mr. Walker, Abby¡¯s judgements about impurities have always been accurate.¡± My dad had walked by during the conversation. ¡°Even our supplier has stopped testing any batch that she sends back. However, she is the teaching assistant for this course, and you have chosen to ignore her warning. Feel free to continue your lesson, but you will be billed for that ingot. It¡¯s not very expensive, but the school shouldn¡¯t have to pay for your waste.¡±


    ¡°What if she¡¯s wrong? What if I complete the lesson properly with this ingot?¡±


    ¡°In that case, Mr. Walker, you will not be charged, and I will give you a perfect score on the assignment. It goes both ways though. If she¡¯s right and you don¡¯t complete the lesson because of the impurities, you will get a zero on the assignment. Your choice Mr. Walker.¡±


    During the discussion, we had gathered a few onlookers from nearby forges and the noise level had decreased considerably. Tyler looked around quickly at his classmates and looked at dad.


    ¡°I¡¯ll take the chance, sir.¡±


    ¡°Very well, Mr. Walker. Good luck to you. Although I have to wonder why you¡¯re taking this course, if you have so little faith in me.¡± Dad didn¡¯t look upset, only a little sad.


    ¡°It¡¯s not you, sir. You¡¯re an excellent teacher and I admire your work. However, your teaching assistant hasn¡¯t earned my respect. Getting a job based on family connections has never impressed me.¡±


    ¡°Do you really believe that I would entrust beginner-level students to an inexperienced assistant? Do you think that the President of the University, who personally approved her hiring, would let me get away with providing someone who is inadequate to the job of ensuring the safety of his charges, just so I can have some extra daddy-daughter time? Really, Mr. Walker. You need to re-examine your basic assumptions. Miss Smith has over seven years of experience at the forge and is at least the equal of almost every blacksmithing student at this university. Now, please tend to your forge, Mr. Walker, and we¡¯ll see how you do.¡± With that, dad went off to oversee the progress being made by his students.


    I looked over at Tyler, who seemed to have wilted under dad¡¯s rebuke. I was pretty sure that offering suggestions at this time wouldn¡¯t be helpful, so I left him to his own, only passing by occasionally to make sure that he wasn¡¯t doing anything dangerous.


    As the class was winding down, dad went over to inspect Tyler¡¯s work. Tyler didn¡¯t look happy. I could tell that the impurities had made his object brittle and when dad tapped it with the hammer, it crumbled. Tyler would get a zero on this assignment and he¡¯d have to pay for the ingot. I just hoped that he learned something from this and didn¡¯t end up hating me more.

 The Test

    By Friday things were going very well. I could hold my field for over an hour and 15 minutes and I was finally ready to do some scouting. Carrying the backpack field had really helped and I walked around everywhere with it now. It was kind of neat having everything that I needed, but not have to lug it around.


    After class, where Tyler wasn¡¯t friendly but also not acting surly or ignoring my suggestion anymore, I got on the bus and headed downtown. I rarely traveled to the financial district, choosing to spend my time shopping instead. This time, I used the Waze app on my phone to find my way to my first objective, Sun Energy Systems. I was initially drawn to this solar technology company because of some articles written about them in the local paper. In general, I liked energy companies, as it was something that everyone needed, and I liked their environmentally conscious approach. Energy from the sun was free and it was only the ¡®small¡¯ matter of storing that energy that was the problem. Sun Energy Systems had some patents on new solar panels that were supposed to be a 10% improvement on their competitors, at a 20% discount. There were also hints in the article about how their R&D department had just had a breakthrough. I hoped that they could live up to the hype. I¡¯d read about a lot of solar companies going bust lately.


    I ducked into an alley one block over from the office tower where Sun Energy Systems head offices were located. They also had a research division, but that was out in the suburbs. Once I made sure that no one was looking my way, I turned on my field and shifted to R1. I felt the weight of the backpack return and I set a vibrating alarm on my phone to remind me when an hour had passed.


    Making my way to the building, I walked through the front doors and past security. Sun Energy had their offices on the 5<sup>th</sup> floor and I climbed there using the stairs. I didn¡¯t want to chance the elevators. As they were mobile, I was pretty sure that I¡¯d fall through the floor if I was in R1. The stairs were safer, and I was in good enough shape that wasn¡¯t even winded when I reached their offices.


    Finding the presidents¡¯ office wasn¡¯t hard. It had to be in one of the corners and it had to have the best view. His secretary was busy on the phone and I walked behind her to peer at her computer. It looked like the call had interrupted her while writing an email. I waited for awhile, but she was very chatty, and I got bored. I wandered around the offices looking for anything interesting. There were no cameras anywhere that I could see, and I peeked into every office and closet just to be sure that there wasn¡¯t a security system that I missed. As I reconnoitered the place, I listened to some of the employees talk about their plans for the weekend and I heard some salespeople trying to land new clients for their solar panels. It all seemed so ordinary. I eventually made my way back to the president¡¯s office and checked out his computer. His schedule was open, and it only took a little while to see that their quarterly review meeting was happening next Tuesday. The finance and marketing departments were scheduled to give presentations, followed by the R&D department. Damn. The meeting was scheduled last four hours. There was no way that I could stay in the field for the whole thing.


    With over 30 minutes left in my self-allotted hour of field time, I decided to check out the marketing department. If the meeting was next week, they had to have at least a sample quarterly report ready.


    Marketing was a beehive of activity. You could tell at a glance that this was crunch time for them. I counted ten employees plus the division head. The name plate on his office read Peter Sweitz. Peter looked calm, but he was speaking very quickly to his assistant and with a lot of urgency in his voice. Apparently, their printing company had a machine breakdown, and everyone was scrambling to find an alternative supplier, just in case that company couldn¡¯t print out their company report in time to mail it out to their shareholders.


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    The confusion worked in my favor, as I was able to find the draft report and bring it into R1 with me. After verifying the date of the draft and seeing that it was printed out yesterday, I took out my digital camera and started taking pictures. I didn¡¯t bother wasting time reading anything. Reading was for later.


    Leaving the marking offices, I walked past the IT department and had a thought. If I was going to track this company going forward, it would be much easier if I didn¡¯t have to come in every three months to see what was going on. Maybe there was a way to hack into their system and read their emails. I¡¯m not talented when it comes to computers and hacking, but I could watch some people put in their passwords. If the company stored their files on the cloud, then it was possible that I could access their files from anywhere. All I would need was a username and password.


    I spent my remaining time watching the IT people working on their computers. I had no idea what they were doing, but they certainly weren¡¯t putting in any passwords. I was just about to leave, as my hour was up and I was into the ¡®last 15-minutes¡¯ buffer to get out of the building, when someone new came in and sat down at an empty desk. He must have been on a break or in the bathroom and now he was logging back into they system. I had my camera ready and set to video. I managed to record his finger flying across the keyboard, as well as the results on the screen. I just hoped that the recording would be useful, considering the slight distortion created by the field and the normal distortion you get when recording computer screens. Without checking to see if everything recorded properly, I quickly left the offices and the building. I had eaten quite a bit into my safety margin and there wasn''t enough time to double-check my work.


    Back outside, I made my way to the alley that I had disappeared from. Again making sure that no one was around, I shifted back to reality and took the bus back to the university. I was in possession of confidential corporate information that I had obtained in a manner that would most likely be considered illegal. I didn¡¯t want to be caught with that information or leave any evidence on my computer at home and I also had to erase and then over-write the pictures and video that were on my camera¡¯s hard disk. The university library and its computers seemed like the best solution. I could review the material on the camera and make notes, then delete everything. Best of all, the library had very few cameras and the ones they did have were mostly at the entrance of the library and at the all the emergency exits. I bypassed those by slipping into R1 and reappearing in an empty nook near the sociology books.


    I spent the next hour taking notes on the quarterly report and figuring out what was important in the material. There was a lot of corporate jargon and spin to make the company look good. I¡¯d have to find out what the financial analysts were projecting for the Sun Energy Systems in order to see which way to bet. Then I painstakingly went over my video of the IT guy putting in his password. I had to advance the video frame by frame because he typed so fast. By the time I was done, I was pretty sure of his password, but I had to put down two or three options for a few characters, as the field distortion messed up several frames.


    I finished erasing the pictures and video, as well as formatting the camera¡¯s hard disk and clearing the cache of the library computer and headed out to Uncle Magnum¡¯s for evening classes. I had just enough time to grab a sandwich upstairs and do some stretching without being late.


    Next week would be a killer week. I had to go through the whole thing with four more companies.

 Meet-Up

    Eva and James were finally coming back. I can¡¯t believe that they¡¯ve been gone for over a month. They were driving in early this afternoon, and I was going to meet them at Eva¡¯s house. I got there a bit early, locked up my bike to their backyard fence and came around to sit down to wait on their front porch swing.


    While I waited, Eva texted to say that they¡¯re almost there. I was so excited. I didn¡¯t realize how much I¡¯d missed having them around. Sure, we¡¯d texted and chatted some while they were away, but it wasn¡¯t the same as having someone to hang around with. I¡¯d spent the summer mostly working or learning to use my field and although that was good, it still felt kind of lonely.


    Sitting on the swing, I wasn¡¯t very visible from the street, so I figured that I¡¯d get some practice time in. I shifted to R1 and immediately fell trough the swing. Ahhh! Was I ever going to get used to this? I picked myself up and looked around to make sure no one was looking before shifting back and sitting down again. At least I was shifting back and forth between reality and R1 without having to consciously think about the backpack that I was always wearing. Sometimes I even had two backpacks on at the same time. One in R1 and one in reality. As long as I didn¡¯t travel into R1 with the second backpack, I was fine. I even wore the backpack in R1 while I was sleeping. It seemed like the only way to shut off the backpack field was to either turn it off on purpose or to run out of enough strength to hold it.


    I heard a car coming down the street and stood up to see if it was Eva. It was and I walked down the porch steps to wait for them to pull in and greet them. We hugged and laughed, and I helped her unpack the car and bring her things to her room. James and his family had stopped for lunch and were running a half hour behind. He''d catch up with us soon and in the meantime Eva sat me down in her room and I got a play by play of her summer in the traveling RV caravan. She showed me pictures and videos that they took all over the country, including state fairs, scenic wonders, malls, campgrounds. It really is a great country.


    When she was done, I gave her a quick rundown of my summer, most of which she already knew about, but this time I told her about Tyler and dad¡¯s epic takedown of the jerk. She literally cheered when I told her how he ended up with a zero for the assignment.


    ¡°Is he behaving himself now?¡±, she asked.


    ¡°He¡¯s ok, I guess. He listens when I give him advice and he¡¯s unfailingly polite, calling me Ms. Smith instead of Abby, but he never says more than he has to and I can see that he¡¯s trying to stay away from me. I think he feels bad about how he treated me, but if he can¡¯t bring himself to apologize and move on, then there¡¯s nothing much I can do. I won¡¯t pretend it didn¡¯t happen.¡±


    ¡°A cute coward? Oh well. They can¡¯t all be like James!¡±


    I rolled my eyes. ¡°So, you still like each other? Even after spending so much time together traveling?¡±


    ¡°Yup! We¡¯re special that way.¡± Eva made googly eyes at me as she said this.


    ¡°Well you guys are special, and I¡¯ve missed you both. I¡¯m glad that you¡¯re back. Now, what classes have you signed us up for? You remembered to only sign me up for classes in the afternoon?¡±


    ¡°Of course. I got us into a one o¡¯clock hot yoga class on Mondays and Wednesdays and a Zumba class at three o¡¯clock on Tuesdays and Thursdays. Friday is some sort of bootcamp class that¡¯s supposed to be really challenging.¡±


    ¡°And James is ok with all this?¡±


    ¡°Absolutely.¡±


    ¡°Really?¡±, I asked with raised eyebrows.


    ¡°Well¡­kinda ok with it. Maybe more like he¡¯s resigned to it. He said not to sign him up, but that he¡¯d try one class of each. I used you as guilt. I told him that you were working extra this summer to prepare for the competition that¡¯s so important to him and that he should do something nice for you.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s sweet of him.¡±


    ¡°Not really. That argument didn¡¯t work. I had to tell him that the alternative was going to your Kung Fu class. Then he was on board to try the other classes.¡±


    ¡°You¡¯ve come to the classes a bunch of times. You seem to enjoy it. Why won¡¯t he even try? It¡¯d be great to have you both there.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m not sure why, but he just says that it¡¯s not for him. Anyways, I¡¯ll be coming to some Kung Fu classes. Which ones are best for me this week and next?¡±


    I gave her a rundown of the class times and then I told her about Uncle Magnum¡¯s new girlfriend. We gossiped for a bit until James showed up. I got the summer rundown from his perspective, along with a few stories that Eva left out because they didn¡¯t cast her in a flattering light. She had mentioned their time at the state fair in Montana, but failed to tell me how she had insisted on going on the Flying Cars ride after eating one of those giant fried drumstick dipped in honey and ended up throwing up behind the ride seconds after she got off. I¡¯d also seen pictures of them at the Grand Canyon, but she forgot to tell me about her almost going over the edge because she was being chased by a bee.


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    James and I laughed at her expense, while she pretend pouted. She tried to give James a stern look, but it just made him laugh even harder. Once we all calmed down, I gave them a rundown of what I¡¯d learned from my stock market studies in the library and then I told them that I had investigated five local public companies. I didn¡¯t mention my actual snooping inside those companies. I still didn¡¯t want to share my secret ability with anyone, and I also wasn¡¯t sure if they would approve. Actually, I knew that Eva would wholeheartedly approve, and I was also sure that James wouldn¡¯t. He¡¯s a boyscout type, like dad. They tend to follow the rules. My view runs more along the lines that rules can be bent sometimes.


    ¡°Anyways guys, I think that I¡¯m ready to have my dad open up a trading account for me. That $4 a trade company that you told me about looks good, James. Dad also looked into it and he says we can set it up tonight. In the next few days I¡¯m going to put together my findings on the five companies and then I¡¯m going to need your help James. I have two sets of information that I want you to look at. One set is what I found from reputable sources; magazine articles about the company, previous financial statements, the free analyses that I¡¯ve found online. The other set is rumors and speculation and my assessment as to how believable those sources are. I¡¯ll give you fair warning though, I intend on using both sets of information to make my picks and I won¡¯t be able to give you a good reason why. Anything that I do, I¡¯ll tell you guys about and you can decide if you want to make the same trades. I¡¯ll understand completely if you choose to ignore my choices.¡±


    ¡°Ok Abby, that sounds good. I¡¯m happy to see that you¡¯re taking this so seriously. And don¡¯t worry about using hunches or gut feelings to make your decisions. In the end, no matter how much information you have, it all boils down to that. I¡¯ll have my parents open an account for me too. There¡¯s no point in waiting for the competition to start. If we¡¯re going to be putting in real money, now¡¯s as good a time as any to start.¡± James turned to Eva and asked, ¡°What about you? Did you talk to your parents about opening an account for you?¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m all set. Mom¡¯s has her own account and she said that she could set me up anytime I¡¯m ready¡±, Eva answered.


    Later on that night, Dad and I set up the trading account and I transferred five thousand dollars from my account into it. Between working for the university and for Uncle Magnum, I¡¯d made some decent money so far this summer. I put all of that into the account, as well as money I¡¯d saved from babysitting and a little of the money that mom left me in her will. Dad suggested putting in $50,000 from his money into the account as well, but I freaked out and told him that I wasn¡¯t ready for that level of responsibility yet. We agreed on him putting in $20,000 for now and if things went well, he¡¯d add in more. He took the time to explain that the money was what he¡¯d been paid from the university when they sold his last few art pieces. Even if I lost it, we¡¯d be fine. He also reminded me that it was unlikely that I¡¯d lose the entire amount. If I made bad picks, then we could talk about it and decide to cut our loses at any time, unless the company I invested in went bankrupt.


    I knew that dad made good money from selling his art, but it was still a bit of a shock. I suppose I shouldn¡¯t have been surprised really. Dad¡¯s art had always been well received and his job at the university included a good salary, as well as our house. Between the two of us, we spent very little, so most of what dad made got invested.


    With the quarterly reports coming out in just a few weeks, I spent an hour organizing my findings for dad and for James. I set up five file folders, one for each company that I¡¯d investigated, and put all the relevant public information into them. Each had printouts from magazine articles about the companies, as well as summaries of their previous quarterly reports, a quick summary page regarding the state of the industry they were in and an analysis of their place in it. I also added a SWOT analysis for each company. That refers to the Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats that the company had or was facing in the future. Most of this I found using dad¡¯s university Lexis-Nexis account, the corporate news site I¡¯d talked to Eva about. I¡¯d seen that they also had a big law section, but I¡¯d never looked at it. With the initial investigation work done for each company, I¡¯d only need to update the information before I was ready to make a trade.


    To the inside front cover of each folder, I attached my rumor and speculation pages. This page typically started off with the company¡¯s own projection for the upcoming quarter, followed by the wall street ¡®consensus¡¯ showing how the financial analysts thought the company would do. After that, I added in pieces of information that I found relevant. It could be bad online reviews for the company¡¯s products, quotes from employees that had left the company, or how often the company or its products were referred to in popular culture references. I put in any rumors about new technology that could affect the industry. While this would usually go in the Threats category, I reserved that section for technology that had already been announced publicly and been shown to work.


    Finally, I added in the information from my own personal on-site visits. I labelled that section ¡°Internet Comment Section Speculation¡±. With a label like that, I wouldn¡¯t have to provide a source and anyone looking at it would discount it. The comment sections were where the crazy, conspiracy creating, basement-dwelling, keyboard warriors hung out.


    To avoid being too accurate in my predictions, I made sure to shift the numbers a little form my actual findings, so that they wouldn¡¯t be spot on with the actual company results when they come out. I couldn¡¯t risk making James too suspicious. Being right so often would already be making James question where I was getting my information and if he knew that I was accessing insider information, then he¡¯d probably see it as cheating and refuse to use the information or to help me make my trades.


    I had decided that using insider information was ok, but was it fair for me to cheat on James¡¯ behalf? Was I messing with his experiment? I wasn¡¯t sure and the possibility of hurting James made me more nervous than breaking the insider trading law.

 More Training

    With the report finalized, it was time to see what else I could learn about my field. From my experience with the bedspread falling through the bed, I was curious to find out what happened to objects that re-entered reality from R1 in the exact same place as an object that was already there. Would the two objects fuse together, would one be forced to move aside, or would the object simply not re-enter reality? This was important to know, because I didn¡¯t feel like losing and arm or a leg if I came back into reality inside of a wall or a car.


    Luckily, it wasn¡¯t hard to test out. I took two of my notebooks from last year that I was going to throw out and I moved one into R1. I placed the R1 notebook on top of the notebook that was in reality and it settled into the reality notebook. With the R1 notebook superimposed over the reality notebook, and I removed the field from the R1 notebook and it returned to reality. The two notebooks now shared the same space and had fused together. I picked them up and found that I couldn¡¯t flip through them anymore. The molecules of the two notebooks were enmeshed together and I couldn¡¯t pull them apart. I tried to create a field around just one of the books, to see if I could separate them, but my field now saw them as one object. This was terrifying. This is what could happen to me, if I didn¡¯t watch out. I¡¯d need to be extra careful whenever I came back to reality from R1.


    Holding the fused notebooks, I realized that something bothered me about my test and the results. I couldn¡¯t place what it was and so I just relaxed and mediated for awhile.  I focused on my breathing and made each part of my body relax one part at a time. After a few minutes, I asked myself what it was about the experiment that bothered me. What had I missed?


    My mind flashed back to the day I tested out the field on the front lawn. I¡¯d gone back and forth between reality and R1 dozens of times. I wasn¡¯t being careful, yet I¡¯d never fused with anything. Shouldn¡¯t my shoes have bonded with some blades of grass? I was near the bushes. Wouldn¡¯t I have returned to reality into a small branch even once, by mistake?


    I went to the front hall and looked at my shoes. Nothing. No embedded grass. Something else was going on. Something was stopping me from fusing with objects upon my return to reality. The only thing that made sense is that my field surrounds me all the time, even when it¡¯s off. When I had done the test with the notebook, I removed the field from the book entirely. I hadn¡¯t simply turned the field off.


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    I leaned over and grabbed two other used notebooks and tried the experiment again, this time I only switched the field off, instead of removing it from the book. The result was very different this time. The notebook with the field on it floated up through the other notebook and came to rest on top of it. I tried it again, but this time I only overlapped the corner of the fielded notebook with the notebook in reality. This time it moved up and to the side to get away from the other notebook. It seemed that when two objects overlapped and the field on one was turned off, then the field repelled itself away from the other object by the shortest possible distance.


    Maybe I wouldn¡¯t have to be so careful after all. That was good, but I wasn¡¯t going to trust to the field to save me without testing it out first. If my theorizing was wrong, I¡¯d rather know now, when I could control what was going to get fused.


    I started off small. I placed a pencil sticking out from the edge of the desk. Then, I entered R1 and placed the sleeve of my hoodie through the pencil. Making sure that the pencil wasn¡¯t touching my skin, I shifted back to reality and felt the field nudge my hoodie over a bit. If I wasn¡¯t thinking about it, I wouldn¡¯t have even noticed the gentle push.


    Time for stage two. Back to the pencil, this time placing the outer edge of my hand through the pencil tip. Closing my eyes and bracing for the pain of having a pencil tip jam in my hand, I shifted back to reality. Again, the soft nudge and my hand was safe. No pain. I tried a few other times with different objects and soon found myself plunging my arm through the desk and turning off my field.


    I don¡¯t know what I was thinking. I¡¯d lose my arm if I was wrong, but I guess I got caught up in the excitement. Somehow, I  just knew that I¡¯d be fine.


    I felt more than a simply push. This time my arm was ejected from the desk. Forcefully. I stumbled back and carefully examined my arm. I felt a rush of relief as I counted all of my fingers and noted the lack of wood anywhere in my arm.


    After my heart rate slowed down, I stopped to think about my tests and wondered why the field moved my arm, which was pretty heavy, and not the pencil, which was pretty light. I supposed that it was because the field was around me and could affect me, but not things outside the field. That made sense, except that my feet hadn¡¯t been moved over to avoid the grass when I¡¯d shifted back to reality. I thought about this for awhile and the only theory I could come up with was that for the times where shoving me over wasn¡¯t practical, the field would surround the other object and shift it to R1 until I moved away. That was something else that I¡¯d have to test out.


    But not today. I was done with testing for today. Maybe for the week. I also made a promise to myself that I¡¯d never do anything so stupid again. That was a promise that I¡¯d end up breaking.

 Summer

    ¡°What are you doing?¡±


    The question startled me out of my trance-like state. I was sitting on the floor of the forge classroom with a piece of iron ingot in each hand. Dad and I had arrived early to class this morning and I was seeing what information I could get from the field.


    ¡°Good morning, Tyler. How was your weekend?¡± He hadn¡¯t really said anything to me in more than a week and his sudden grilling, without so much as a polite greeting, grated on my nerves. I focused on being calm and polite.


    ¡°It was fine. Why are you sitting on the floor with an ingot in each hand?¡±


    ¡°My weekend was great, thank you for asking. Some of my friends got back into town and we had a good time catching up.¡± I wonder if that was enough of a hint for him. He was being an ass again. What kind of a person couldn¡¯t even reciprocate a friendly greeting?


    ¡°Oh.¡± I could tell that he was a bit thrown off. ¡°I¡¯m¡­uhm¡­glad you had a nice weekend.¡± Wow, he wasn¡¯t a complete social misfit. Let¡¯s see what he would follow it up with. ¡°I was just wondering if you were ok. I¡¯ve never seen you sitting on the floor holding metals.¡± Hmmm, not too bad. He phrased his question in a way that suggested that he was worried about me. Time to let him off the hook.


    ¡°I¡¯m ok, thank you. I was just experimenting. As you know, I can usually tell if an ingot has impurities in it. I¡¯ve never really thought about how I know it. I¡¯m trying to see if I¡¯m unconsciously feeling a difference in weight between two ingots or if there¡¯s something else to it.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s smart. You can¡¯t get better at something if you don¡¯t know how you do it in the first place.¡± Damn, he sounds like me! ¡°Did you discover anything yet?¡±


    ¡°Not really. The weight feels about the same to me.¡± I was lying like a cheap rug. Using the field, I could easily tell the difference in weight between the two ingots and I could feel which ingot had too many impurities in it.


    ¡°Maybe those two ingots are both good or both bad.¡±


    ¡°Nope, this one¡±, I extended my right arm out a bit, ¡°has too many impurities in it. It¡¯s one of the ones that I took out a few weeks ago. We don¡¯t get too many of them and we only return any every few months.¡±


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    ¡°Can I try?¡±


    ¡°Sure.¡± I handed him the ingots and he weighed them carefully in each hand.


    ¡°I can¡¯t tell any difference. The seem exactly the same to me. Are you sure one is bad?¡±


    ¡°Well, if you¡¯d like to bet on it, again, I¡¯m sure that I can talk Professor Smith into giving you double or nothing odds on the last bet you made.¡±


    He handed me back the ingots quickly and said, ¡°I don¡¯t think so. I¡¯ve learned my lesson. I¡¯ll happily take your word on it. I¡¯m sorry that I ever doubted you in the first place.¡± I laughed.


    With a contrite look on his face he continued, ¡°I¡¯m also sorry about how I treated you before. I made assumptions about you that I shouldn¡¯t have. I hope that you can forgive me.¡± Well. That was unexpected and sincere. How could I say no?


    ¡°Ok. You¡¯re forgiven.¡± I held out my hand and we shook on it.


    ¡°That¡¯s it?¡±


    ¡°Yup.¡± I put the ingots away and walked to his forge with him and we talked about his final project for the semester. The course would end in a week and every student had to hand in two project pieces. One piece was based on specific guidelines set by dad and would be used in the new university gates project and the other piece was up to each student. As long as the students showed understanding and mastery of basic blacksmithing skills, they would do well. The better the piece, the better the grade. Some students were making crude household items, such as coasters or bottle-openers, but Tyler was an over-achiever and was trying to make a knife. I thought that it was too ambitions for a beginner course, and I told him so. It required a finesse that he just didn¡¯t have, yet. I suggested that he try making a hammer and I walked him through the required steps.


    After class, I hung around and helped a few students clean up their work areas, getting the spaces ready for the advanced class later on. With that done, I walked to the inventory room and started handling different metals. The field could tell the difference between each of the metals. That was how I knew about the impurities. Now I just needed to interpret what the field was already telling me. Simply knowing that something ¡®felt different¡¯ wasn¡¯t enough. As I held each one, I focused on the information that I was getting about it from the field. Each metal was different and had its own feel to it.


    It took a bit of time but I was soon able to tell the difference between them with my eyes closed and I was able to identify which one was which. I had no idea how this could ever be very useful to me but getting used to processing information from the field couldn¡¯t hurt. As the old saying goes, ¡°The more you know, the more you know¡±. Well, maybe that wasn¡¯t an old saying. I¡¯ve been binge watching ¡®The Office¡¯ too much.


    I continued until I could distinguish and identify each metal in inventory without even looking at it and then I had to run off to the university fitness center or I¡¯d be late for Hot Yoga.

 Protection

    James and Eva were waiting for me when I got there, and we went inside to change. With a few minutes to spare, we found a space for all three of us at the back, James and I taking positions to either side of Eva. She was the fitness guru and had been doing Yoga for years. She looked relaxed and started doing a few stretching exercises. James, on the other hand, looked completely out of place. He was stiff and uncomfortable and looked like he¡¯d rather be anywhere else. I had an advantage over James, in that I had been doing almost daily stretching exercises since I was four, and so I wasn¡¯t dreading the class. I was very flexible, and I could hold a kick at face level. I just hoped that the muscles that I¡¯d developed doing Kung Fu would be helpful in Yoga.


    The results from the class were entirely predictable. Eva loved it, I liked it, and James hated it. I thought that it was ok, but all that stretching and bending without the payoff of hitting someone was a real negative for me. For his part, James rediscovered that he is not flexible. At all. There are trees with more give than James.


    ¡°It¡¯s one thing to know intellectually that you¡¯re not very flexible. It¡¯s quite another thing to have it rammed down your throat.¡±, James complained as we made our way out after having showered and changed. ¡°I¡¯ve never even been able to touch my toes without bending my knees and the rest of you go past your toes by over a foot.¡± James continued to rail against the injustice of his inflexibility, and how it was physically impossible for him to bend his body in half at the waist. Eva and I largely ignored him, only make the appropriate sympathy noises every now and then.


    ¡°Did you speak to your parents about getting you a trading account?¡±, I asked Eva.


    ¡°Sure did. Mom set me up last night. I¡¯m ready to trade some stocks and rake in the cash. All that¡¯s stopping me is that I need to start my share of the research. I¡¯m heading to the library with James now.¡±


    I gave Eva my dad¡¯s Lexis-Nexis username and passcode and we parted ways, after setting up a meeting for after class on Wednesday to go over all of our findings. James would not be joining us for Yoga on Wednesday, or ever, despite our urging him to keep at it and improve.


    I got on a bus and headed for Uncle Magnum¡¯s. With no urgent or pressing matters to occupy me, I though up new ways to use my reality shifting field.


    Going over last night¡¯s experiments and my idiotic ¡®arm through the desk¡¯ move, I realized that the fact that the field knew that there was something in its way was very interesting. The field had to be sensing anything than overlapped with it, even when that anything existed in a different reality, and it acted accordingly to protect me. But it only protected me from phasing back into something solid. It had no issues with me being hit, as was evidenced in my many bruises from my sparring sessions with Uncle Magnum. The one time it did protect me was with the bus, but in that situation, I had somehow, subconsciously, turned the field on.


    Could I set up the field to automatically protect me from other dangers? Is there a way to set up the field so that it turns on automatically when something penetrates it, like a knife or a bullet? That would be incredible. I could use the field to fight crime! Oh wait. When the field goes on, I disappear. That would give away the secret. I¡¯d need to consider this some more.


    Could I reverse it and have the field immediately surround any object that passed through it with a field and then turn that secondary field on so that the object passed through me while I still stayed in reality? My head was starting to hurt with all the possibilities.


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    Back to the field turning itself on automatically in certain situations. How could I go about that? The field was controlled to some extent by my mind. I pushed and pulled on it, and I absorbed and sent out sub-fields from it, all with my thoughts. So, I needed to train my mind to do certain things automatically and those things would be in response to information that my mind would get from the field.


    The first step would be to see what information I could get from the field. After that, I¡¯d see what it took to penetrate the field. Also, if the field was going to stop bullets from hitting me, it would be better if it did it farther away from me. Was there a way to expand outwards?


    Planning out a series of experiments, I listed out the things I¡¯d need; a steak knife, a book, and a batting cage. The knife and the book were readily available, the batting cage I¡¯d have to look up and see if I could make it there next Saturday morning.


    I arrived at Uncle Magnums early for my class and I went upstairs to my room. I had enough time to start a few of my experiments. Examining my shelves, I found a book that I¡¯d read years ago for school and really didn¡¯t like. I couldn¡¯t identify with Holden and found him to be too whiny for words, but I could finally put his book to good use. Getting a steak knife from the kitchen, I took it to my room. I sat down, placed the book on the floor in front of me and enveloped it in a field. I made sure not to turn the field on. It was just there, in a passive state. Then, I stabbed the book.


    I actually felt the stab as a strong pressure on the field. It wasn¡¯t painful to me, but I was very aware of it. Surprisingly, the field itself hadn¡¯t been penetrated. The pressure had caused the field to change shape along with the book. The book now had a hole in it and the field coated the interior of it. The field hadn¡¯t stopped the knife at all. If I were stabbed, the passive field would do nothing to protect me. It would simply reshape itself to my punctured body. That wasn''t good.


    I tried cutting the book¡¯s edge and the same thing happened, only without the strong feeling of pressure. The knife cut into the book, but the field wasn¡¯t broken at any time. It seemed that the field, having no substance, was pushed back by the knife until it touched the book and then the field was pushed under the cover when the knife sliced into it.


    This was unexpected and forced me to rethink my idea of how to use the field as a protection device. My initial idea had been to find a way to make the field automatically surround anything that penetrated it and send that object into R1, where it couldn¡¯t hurt anyone. Without the penetration, I needed an new concept. Maybe I could use the amount of pressure as a trigger for the field, but that would only work on a stab or a hard blow and might not work with a slicing motion. I¡¯d start with pressure for now though, since I had no other ideas.


    I pressed the knife hard into the book again and felt the pressure on the field. Keeping that feeling, I sent out the field to surround the knife and shift it to R1. The knife disappeared and my now-empty clenched fist hit the book before I could stop applying pressure to the non-existent knife. Oops and Ow!


    I shifted the knife back to reality and I stabbed the book repeatedly over the next 15 minutes. I got very good at putting a field on the knife and sending it into R1 as soon as I felt the pressure. The problem was that it wasn¡¯t instantaneous. If I were stabbed in real life, then I¡¯d only be getting rid of the knife once it was buried at least partially inside me. That was a bit too late for my tastes.


    I needed to find a way to extend the field out from my body, so that I¡¯d feel the pressure earlier and be able to send a knife or bullet into R1 before it hit my body. That would be my assignment for later, since I¡¯d run out time. Right now, I needed to get downstairs in time to see if Margaret was dropping off Jeremy for class. I wasn¡¯t teaching that age group today, but I wouldn¡¯t mind have a quick chat with Margaret, if the chance presented itself.

 A Close Call

    The chance didn¡¯t present itself, as Jeremy¡¯s mother dropped him off and left right away, and I ended up helping Uncle Magnum with the class. I liked working with the kids and so did Uncle Magnum. He always tried to make it fun for them, except when they got too rowdy and then he would lay down the law. All of his classes were like that. You could joke around and complain all you wanted, but you had to follow his instruction and you had to give your best effort.


    After assisting him with a few classes and running another on my own, I joined the advanced class to get in my own training. Uncle Magnum continued my instruction in armed combat and we sparred with staves. I¡¯d always enjoyed all of the weapons, but the staff was the first one that I learned, and I still loved it. While the other students were working on improving their Dragon form, Uncle Magnum and I donned some safety gear and tried to bash each other with big sticks.


    We started off slowly, getting a feel for the rhythm of the battle before Uncle Magnum launched his attack. I¡¯d practiced with him all of my life and I was ready for this sudden shift. I blocked and parried and dodged and twisted like Daffy Duck, only without hitting myself in the face, and soon I counter attacked. Each blow and block sends vibrations up your arms to your shoulders and it takes some getting used to. You have to hold the staff correctly for it not to get to be too much. In a very short time, I tuned out everything but the battle and got lost in the rhythm of attacking and counterattacking. Every move we made set up the next move and we flowed from one attack to another, neither getting an advantage. To anyone watching, it would look like a choreographed dance.


    We went on like that for awhile before Uncle Magnum overextended himself and I saw an opening. Without thinking about it, I went in for the leg sweep and only realized that I¡¯d been set up when his leg wasn¡¯t there. What I¡¯d seen as an over-extension was actually an intentional lunge that would bring him past me as I went for his leg. He was now behind me and could attack me anywhere along my back or my legs. As I turned to try to block, knowing there was almost no chance, I tensed for a blow and instinctively sent my field outwards a few feet out from my body. I felt the staff pass through my extended field at shoulder height and I adjusted the angle of my staff up just in time for the block. With the field about twenty-four inches from my body, I¡¯d had enough warning, without actually seeing the staff approaching me.


    After the block, Uncle Magnum really was off balance. He had been positive that he was going to get a hit in and he relaxed a bit in his overconfidence, leaving his arms in his final blow position for a second too long. I took advantage of his surprise and gave him a quick jab to the side.


    My hit ended the fight and we saluted each other. That¡¯s when the cheering started. I was so caught up in the moment that I hadn¡¯t realized that everyone in the class had stopped their forms to watch us.


    ¡°Way to go Abby! That was awesome.¡± That was from Francis, one of the 5<sup>th</sup> Dan¡¯s.


    ¡°Good job, Abby.¡± Uncle Magnum gave me a quick hug. ¡°I have no idea how you managed to block my hit without even seeing it, but it was well done.¡±


    ¡°I just got lucky.¡± I hated lying to Uncle Magnum, especially because I knew that he would really love knowing about the field and he¡¯d be a great help in getting me to develop it.


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    He gave me a skeptical look. He wasn¡¯t buying my ¡®luck¡¯ excuse, and he wasn¡¯t going to let me off of the hook so easily. ¡°Well, it looked completely intentional. Your block wasn¡¯t hesitant at all and your follow through for the hit shows that you were anticipating making the block.¡±


    With no better explanation, I just shrugged and went to put away my staff. Looking at the clock, I was surprised to see that our fight had gone on for longer than I though and that class was just about over. Uncle Magnum led us in our sit-ups and we did our final salute.


    The ride home was quiet. I was thinking about how I¡¯d instinctively expanded the field and was planning on trying it again as soon as I got home. I didn¡¯t know what Uncle Magnum was thinking so hard about, until we got home and he let me know.


    ¡°I keep thinking about your block, Abby. I¡¯ve seen people make blocks like that before, but not in the same way. You can see that they¡¯re guessing. It¡¯s in their eyes. They know that they¡¯ve been caught out of position and they panic a bit and they¡¯re scrambling to do something. If they manage to make a successful block it¡¯s clumsy or weak. Even if it¡¯s a good block there¡¯s always surprise or shock in their eyes and they pause for a second. Kind of like I did when you made the block that you shouldn¡¯t have been able to. But you weren¡¯t shocked or surprised Abby. I saw it in your eyes. You knew where that staff was going to hit you. You weren¡¯t guessing. Your movement started unsure and then it solidified with knowledge. I¡¯ve been your Uncle for your whole life and your teacher for the past 12 years. I know how you fight. I know all of your moves.  I set you up and knew that you¡¯d take the bait when it looked like I¡¯d overextended myself. At your level, you shouldn¡¯t have been able to do what you did. I realize that it may not seem like a lot to go on, two moves, but imagine how it would look to you if you were sparring with Jeremy and he suddenly hit you with a perfect spinning roundhouse kick to the head. You¡¯d know that something was up. That kick would be way above his level and his ability. So what gives, Abby?¡±


    Shit. I¡¯d only had my abilities for a few months and I was already being found out. And it wasn¡¯t as if I¡¯d disappeared into R1 or anything. Uncle Magnum had picked up on the very smallest of clues and found me out. Superman puts on a suit and a pair of glasses and he¡¯s not recognized as Superman for over 50 years. I block one hit and the Kung Fu detective is breathing down my neck. What the hell? I know that life isn¡¯t a comic book, but this was seriously messed up.


    I wasn¡¯t going to tell him the truth. That was not going to happen. Maybe at some future date, but definitely not now. That left me with a few options. I could pretend not to know what he¡¯s talking about and stick with the whole ¡®luck¡¯ thing, but he didn¡¯t buy that excuse last time.


    I thought about going on the attack and accusing him of not giving me enough credit and then getting all huffy with him, but he didn¡¯t deserve that kind of treatment. No. There was only one way to make this go away pleasantly. Uncle Magnum may know me very well, but that goes both ways. I knew his weaknesses too. He couldn¡¯t resist a good laugh.


    ¡°It wasn¡¯t me.¡±, I blurted out while smiling.


    Uncle Magnum just looked at me. Totally stunned.


    ¡°What?¡±


    ¡°It wasn¡¯t me!¡±, I repeated.


    ¡°Really? That¡¯s your answer. I pour out a masterful observation of deductive reasoning and you¡¯re seriously going to go with the Shaggy defense?¡± Uncle Magnum finally smiled back. ¡°Fine.¡±, he sighed.


    ¡°I saw the block to your shoulder.¡±, he sang.


    ¡°It wasn¡¯t me.¡±


    ¡°I felt the swing with your power.¡±


    ¡°It wasn¡¯t me.¡±


    ¡°I even caught you on camera.¡±


    ¡°It wasn¡¯t me.¡±


    ¡°Abby came in and she caught me flatfooted just when I had her beat¡­¡±, he improvised.


    We both laughed and he shook his head. ¡°I never should have introduced you to that song. Anyways, get inside. Nice deflection for tonight. We WILL talk about this again, but I¡¯ll give you some time. It¡¯s obvious you don¡¯t want to talk about it yet.¡±


    Breathing out an audible sigh of relief, which I supposed didn''t help my case much, I bade him goodnight, and went inside. That was close. I¡¯d almost been found out, but would it be so bad? Why wasn¡¯t I telling him about my abilities? Why wasn¡¯t I telling Dad?

 Two fields?

    Hard work, practice, repetition, and experimentation were the best ways to improve your abilities. But sometimes, it was really nice to not have to overthink things and just have the solution fall into your lap. Extending the field was like that. Having done it once by mistake, I was now able to do it again. It wasn¡¯t like pushing on the field to turn it on or pulling on it to turn it off. Expanding it felt more like taking a breath and expanding my lungs. I practiced expanding and contracting the field and I spend some time turning the field on while it was expanded. Whatever was inside the field when I turned it on went into R1 with me, just like normal, except that now I could take my entire bed with me at once if I wanted to. No more enveloping only one thing at a time. What a time saver!


    Another nice bonus was that if something wasn¡¯t totally enveloped by the field, then it didn¡¯t go into R1 with me. That was good, because I didn¡¯t want to have to explain to dad why I only had half my bed or only a bit of my lamp. I did some experimenting to see if I could further extend a portion of the field to include objects that were only partially inside the field. It wasn¡¯t easy, but I found that I could do it by holding the expanded field and following that up by using a very similar technique to the one I used when I send out a field to encompass something. The difference here was that I wasn¡¯t creating another field, but rather I was pushing out a portion of the existing field and encompassing the object.


    For the next hour I practiced sending out the field to different distances from my body. A foot away was easy to do, but I felt a lot of strain at two feet and I could barely hold the field out to two and a half feet. I suppose that it had something to do with the volume inside the field, but I didn¡¯t have the math or the patience to figure it out. Instead, I worked on placing the field at different distances from my body that were easier to handle and making sure that I could do it quickly and without much thought. I¡¯d get to increasing the distances over time.


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    Despite almost outing myself to Uncle Magnum, it was a great night. I¡¯d had an epic battle and I¡¯d discovered another feature of the field. I was extremely tired and ready to call it a night as I walked into the bathroom to get ready for bed. I looked in the mirror and I saw that I wasn¡¯t there. Oh man, I really was tired. I¡¯d forgotten to turn off the field. I¡¯d left it expanded about three inches from my body and I was about to turn it off and draw it in when I noticed something strange. I had two fields surrounding me. One was three inches from my body and the other was against my skin. Had the two fields been on all this time and I hadn¡¯t noticed?


    I left the bathroom, turned off the field and contracted it to my body again. Then I expanded it to be around one foot from my body. I did have two fields around me. The one around my body never moved; it merely send out a second field to surround me. Just like I could make another field to surround an object and bring it into R1, I could send out another field around me. I wonder what would happen if I had two fields around me and I turned only one on or I turned them both on. I tried it right away and found out that if the outer one was on and the inner one wasn¡¯t, then I went into R1 and so did everything inside of the outer field. If the inner one was on and the outer one wasn¡¯t, I still went into R1, but nothing else in the outer field did. I couldn¡¯t turn on both fields at once, though. I don¡¯t know if I was a matter of not being strong enough to do it or if it couldn¡¯t be done.


    The extended field was perfect for the protective field that I had in mind, but I¡¯d need to be strong enough to hold it much farther from my body before I was ready to try it out. For now, it was time to go to sleep.

 Summer II

    I woke up late the next day and had to hurry to not make dad late. We got to work with only a few minutes to spare. With the term ending on Friday, I didn¡¯t have much to do except go around to each student and offer suggestions. Since dad was already doing just that, I used my time to re-organize the metals storage room and to sort out the scrap pile into reusable and non-reusable material piles. It was good practice.


    After work I went home for lunch and caught up on my sleep. My alarm woke me up at two o¡¯clock and I made my way to meet Eva and James for our Zumba class. As expected, Zumba was a lot of fun for Eva and for me, and not so much fun for James. I loved the constant motion and the music and the colorful outfits. It was just so alive. James¡¯ opinion of Zumba would be censored if it was on TV. Like with Hot Yoga, he would be taking a pass on Zumba for the rest of his life. He was going to stick with his running regiment and leave it at that.


    Like always, I finished off the day at Uncle Magnum¡¯s school, followed by practice with holding the extended field. The great thing about this type of practice was that I could read or watch Netflix while I was doing it. I¡¯d set up the outer field and turn it on, extending it to include the entire bed inside. That way I wouldn¡¯t fall through the bed. If I was reading, I¡¯d bring the book into R1 with me. If I was Netflixing, I¡¯d leave the computer nearby in reality while I was in R1 so that I wouldn¡¯t lose the wi-fi, which was cut off by the field for some reason. (Light and sound make it though, why not wi-fi?) When I got tired, I¡¯d release the fields for 10-15 minutes before starting again, until I drifted off to sleep.


    James met Eva and I the next day at the library after Hot Yoga. We had reserved a break-out room and we each walked the other two through our research and our conclusions. Eva started us off with a discussion of two industries, healthcare and transportation, that had been trending up and down for the past decade and in which directions analysts were expecting them to go. She also highlighted the top local companies in each industry and mentioned some interesting newcomers who were disrupting their industries with new technologies.


    After Eva finished, I produced my five folders and discussed the five locally based publicly traded companies that I¡¯d researched. I ended my presentation with a summary of the rumor section of each company and how I thought they¡¯d do in the upcoming quarterly report. As I went through my recommendations, I could see James¡¯ raised eyebrows, but he didn¡¯t say anything or ask any questions when I was done. Instead, he launched into an explanation of how the trading software that we¡¯re going to use worked and how we needed to record our trades. He showed us how the system ignored taxes for the competition, but also explained the real-life consequences of being profitable. He finished by showing us the some of the different types of trades and that was where he lost me. Looking over at Eva, I could see that her eyes had glazed over as well.


    ¡°Hold on there, James. That last bit went way over my head. I understood basic trading and short selling, but you lost me when you started talking about options and derivatives.¡± I could see that he was about to start explaining, so I held up a placating hand and continued quickly, ¡°It¡¯s not your explanation. I get that they¡¯re like an insurance policy and that they can be used to stretch out our available funds. It¡¯s the strategy behind their use that confuses me. With all these choices of ways to purchase stock, I wouldn¡¯t know what was best to use in which situation and I can see that Eva feels the same way.¡± Eva nodded in emphatically in agreement. ¡°How about if Eva and I gather the information on the various companies and industries, we meet and agree on which direction we think the stock will go in, and then you pick the best type of trade to make the most out of our predictions?¡±


    James gave it some thought and agreed with my suggestion. ¡°With that settled, I have a few questions about your recommendations.¡±


    It was my turn to raise my eyebrows. ¡°Sure. What do you want to know?¡±


    ¡°I understood your position on four of the companies that you chose. For three of them you have the right in line with expectations and for one you have them beating expectations. All that is supported by your research and journal articles and your conclusions makes sense. But the last one, Sun Energy Systems, doesn¡¯t fit. Nothing in their press releases and in the analysts reports that you¡¯ve found would suggest that they¡¯re going to miss their targets by around 10%. You referred to a few rumors about their new technology being a little behind schedule, but where did you get the 10% number and why do you trust the rumors?¡±


    I was pretty sure that I¡¯d get pushback from James about using the rumors and so I was prepared. ¡°The 10% is my conservative number. If the rumors are true, I actually think that they¡¯ll miss their numbers by more, maybe in the 12-15% range.¡± I didn¡¯t think it, I knew it. 13.9% to be exact. ¡°As to why I trust the rumors, a lot of it is obviously a gut feel, but I think that it¡¯s an educated gut feel. The rumors that I¡¯ve read mostly come from comment threads about the company, but some of the comments that talked about the delays were well thought out. Not the usual ravings and crank that you find in comment sections. They talked about the difficulties with that type of technology and how many companies had failed with it I the past. They also knew the principal scientists involved, their past work experience and how often they¡¯d been late in achieving results.¡± That last part I¡¯d actually seen in a comment thread, but I probably would have ignored it if I wasn¡¯t looking for some support to justify my downgrade recommendation. It¡¯s much easier to justify something when you know the outcome from the start.


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    ¡°Ok. I understand your recommendation better now. But what happens if I still disagree with you? How do we decide what trade should be made?¡±, James asked.


    ¡°If any of us don¡¯t agree, we¡¯re each free to make or not make the trade. We all have our own trading accounts and we¡¯ll each have our own competition accounts. We¡¯re pooling our resources as a team, but we invest individually. For my part, I¡¯ll always tell you exactly how I¡¯m going to invest. What you do with that information is your choice. I can tell you that sometimes my choices won¡¯t make sense to you. Sometimes, I¡¯ll read something or maybe I¡¯ll visit the company and get a bad feeling and I¡¯ll base my trade on that, even if all the analysts are talking up the company. All I ask is that even if you don¡¯t plan on joining me in my trade, that you help me find the best way to trade the stock given my recommendation.¡±


    Eva spoke up, ¡°That¡¯s totally reasonable. I¡¯m in.¡±


    James nodded his assent as well. ¡°I¡¯ll give it some thought over the next few days and figure out how we can get the most out of these recommendations. With reporting season coming up, we should plan to make our trades on Thursday or Friday at the latest.¡±


    ¡°There is one more thing that you need to be careful of.¡±, James said. ¡°Even if you¡¯re right about a company and they¡¯re going to either beat or miss their quarterly numbers, the market may react much differently to that information from what you would expect. Sometimes a company can report a loss and their stock actually goes up or it could go the other way and they beat expectations and their stock drops like crazy. There are always other factors that need to be considered, such as future expectations or loss of key personnel. I know that we¡¯ve talked about it. I just wanted to bring it up again.¡±


    Our meeting broke up shortly after that and we parted ways. Me to Uncle Magnum¡¯s, Eva to another fitness class that she¡¯d signed up for and James was off for an afternoon run.


    True to his word, on Thursday James send us instructions on how to make the trades through our trade accounts. Most were reasonably straight-forward, with only the Sun Energy one being a bit complicated, in that he had us short-selling it. He also sent over a spreadsheet that would help us plan how we intended to allocate our money to the various stocks. That was another way that our choices would differ. Even if we all chose the same stocks to buy, and bet the same way, each of us would be making a different sized bet on those stocks, depending on the size of our trading account and on the degree of confidence that we had in the prediction.


    I used his spreadsheet to make my choices and then I printed it out and showed it to dad that evening over a late dinner. I walked him through my folders and Eva¡¯s research, and he asked a few questions. One of those questions was very similar to James¡¯ question about Sun Energy and I gave him the same answer. After that we went over the spreadsheet of how I was allocating our money and he signed it at the bottom to make it official. At the end, he shook my hand and said, ¡°Thank you, Ms. Stockbroker. That was actually more explanation than I¡¯ve ever gotten from my financial advisor, and I suspect that you put more thought and research into your choices than he ever did. It¡¯ll be very interesting to see how your results compare to his.¡±


    We said our goodnights and I returned to my room to practice with my extended field.


    The next morning was my last as a teaching assistant for dad. The term was ending, and he wouldn¡¯t need me for the next summer session. He only had eight students signed up for his intro course and he could oversee them himself. With only a month and half left before fall classes started, even those students taking summer classes wanted a break or to travel a bit and so the smaller class size was standard for second term.


    Throughout the class, I made sure to speak with each of dad¡¯s students. To some I gave some last-minute advice on their projects and to others I merely gave them my best wishes. The hotel management student had managed not to burn herself or anyone else all semester long, but it was clear that she wouldn¡¯t be pursuing blacksmithing any further. Her project pieces were barely adequate, and she should consider herself lucky if she managed a passing grade. Dad was not an easy grader. You had to earn your grade.


    My last goodbye was to Tyler. Now that he wasn¡¯t being a snot, he was back in my good graces and I was free to fully appreciate how good looking he was. I wished him well and we shook hands.


    ¡°Too bad that you¡¯re not a teaching assistant for your dad¡¯s other courses. I¡¯m signed up for his 201 class in the fall. Who¡¯s going to tell me if I¡¯m using bad materials?¡±


    ¡°I¡¯ll be back in high school for my Junior year in the fall. I wouldn¡¯t worry about the materials though. I usually spend a few hours here every week working on a few pieces and I always check the inventory and put any bad material aside. It¡¯s actually isn¡¯t all that common to get metals with a lot of impurities. You¡¯d be pretty safe even if I wasn¡¯t checking. My usual workstation is over there in the corner. Make sure to stop by and say hi if you see me working.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯ll be sure to do that.¡±, he answered and walked away.


    I stayed for a bit after class and gave dad my notes on each of his students, along with my opinion of their project pieces, and then I was done. I¡¯d enjoyed being a teaching assistant and I hoped that dad could get me the same job next summer, but I was really looking forward to spending more time sleeping in until school started.

 Summer Ends

    The rest of the summer flew by. Having my friends around cheered me up and I felt less lonely. I had more to look forward to each day, besides work and teaching Kung Fu.  I did get to sleep in most days, but I made a point to go in to work with dad at least two times a week to work on my own projects. I made James another couple of Batarangs and I decided to make myself a more conventional set of throwing knives. I also made a set for Eva. Now we could all practice together and it never hurt to have another skill. Besides the knives, I designed and made a few pieces of jewelry. When I had enough pieces, I would bring them to a local artist that I knew and she would sell them for me, in exchange for a commission on each sale.


    In preparation for the upcoming school year, I spent a few afternoons researching another five local publicly traded companies and visited them to see what information I could get. I made sure to keep any confidential information and lists of passwords that I obtained from these trips in the backpack that I always kept in R1. Towards the end of the summer, I also revisited the first five companies to see if there was anything new and exciting going on.


    Throughout the summer, I¡¯d been keeping up with daily field training. I didn¡¯t try to discover anything new with the field, as I wanted to get much stronger with what I could do first. Practice consisted mainly of holding two fields at once, with one of them turned on, and trying to hold the two fields for longer each day and farther out each day. I¡¯d started out with being able to hold the extended field out to a maximum range of two and half feet for only a few seconds and over the rest of the summer I¡¯d been able to increase that maximum distance to over ten feet for half an hour. I was spending over four hours a day holding the two fields and I usually took short naps in between practice sessions. The best thing about practicing with the two fields was that holding only one field turned on was now a simple matter and didn¡¯t require any concentration at all. When I¡¯d taken that first trip out to Sun Energy Systems, I had to hurry because I was only able to hold the field for a little over an hour. When I took trips out now, I didn¡¯t have to consider the time at all. I¡¯d could hold that single field on for over eight hours now without feeling any strain.


    Another way that I practiced was by integrating the field into my Kung Fu training. This training wasn¡¯t about increasing my strength in holding the field. Instead it focused on coordinating the field into my attacks and my defense. It had more to do with timing and control. For instance, I practiced coming out of R1 into reality just in time to kick the punching bag. I had to drop the field at just right moment for the kick to hit the bag with maximum force. If I turned off the field too early, an opponent could see and block the kick. If I turned it off too late, then I¡¯d be solidifying inside the punching bag and the field would push me out. When I mastered that, I started working on multiple hits, going into R1 after each hit as quickly as I could. I wanted a potential opponent to only see a flicker of a person between each hit.


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    One of my favorite things to practice was hitting the bag, shifting to R1, moving over and then coming back into reality to deliver an attack from behind my opponent.


    When I got better at that, I started again, but with weapons. This is where things got really interesting. Just as I was able to keep my backpack, in R1, on my body, I could hold a weapon in R1, while my body was in reality. That means that with proper timing, I could knock out an opponent from a few feet away with an invisible staff or I could slice an opponent with an invisible sword. Of course, the opponent would be able to see the weapon at the last second, as I brought it into reality, but by then it would be way too late.


    I felt kind of stupid that it took me almost a month to realize that if I could be in reality and hold a weapon in R1, then I should be able to be in R1 and hold a weapon in reality. I took a staff with me into R1 and then I turned off the staff¡¯s field, instead of turning off my field. It was surreal watching in the mirror as a staff appeared out of thin air and proceeded to move in complex patterns all by itself. I soon started turning the staff¡¯s field on and off, coinciding with each hit, and all I saw in the mirror were flashes of the staff. I liked this technique much better, because no one could touch me in R1 or identify me and they couldn¡¯t tell where the next hit was coming from. In a real fight, this would devastate an opponent.


    Of course, I did all this when Uncle Magnum wasn¡¯t around. Previously, it would have been much harder to get alone time in the studio, but with the advent of Maggie, Uncle Magnum was leading a much more exciting social life. When the summer ended, their afternoon dates would disappear, and I would only get time on the weekends to practice alone. It was nice while it lasted and I took full advantage of the it, even ditching the Monday/Wednesday Yoga class to have the extra training time. I kept the Zumba though. It was too much fun to stop.

 School Starts

    Saying goodbye to summer was hard. I had really gotten used to setting my own schedule and doing things that I wanted to do all day. Now I would be stuck behind a little desk for six to eight hours a day, listening to teachers drone on and on about things that I couldn¡¯t care less about and that I was pretty sure wouldn¡¯t affect my life in any way besides me being able to ask a Jeopardy question every now and then.


    James, Eva and I went to a pre-start-of-school party on the Saturday before classes started. We caught up with what our friends had been up to all summer. Those that were camp councilors told us of their horrible campers and those that traveled with family traded favorite places stories with James and Eva. Some of them had gotten their Limited Provisional Licenses now and could drive on their own. No one had crashed their parents¡¯ cars, yet, and no speeding tickets, yet, although Terry had a close call. He¡¯d been stopped for speeding, but he¡¯d been let off with a warning. The police officer was an old family friend though and his parents found out all about it. I think that he¡¯d rather have gotten the ticket. We had a great time teasing him about it.


    The one sour note to the evening came about halfway into the party. I found Eva sitting on the couch, by herself, looking thoughtful and a little sad. I sat down next to her.


    ¡°A horse walks into a bar. The bartender asks, ¡°Why the long face?¡±¡±


    Eva groaned. ¡°That was bad. What did I do to deserve that?¡±


    ¡°Well, I find you here all by yourself, looking kind of sad and I have to ask, ¡°Why the long face?¡±¡±


    ¡°Oh. It¡¯s nothing really. James is downstairs playing a videogame with Matt, so I was chatting with a few people when Bobby came in. I said hi and he nodded back, but then he walked away without another word.¡±


    ¡°So, Bobby sort of snubbed you and that makes you sad? I didn¡¯t realize that you even knew Bobby.¡± Robert Draker, or Bobby as everyone called him, was by all accounts a very nice guy. Unlike the typical stereotype of a football jock, he was good in school and he didn¡¯t bully anyone. He was bigger than a lot of the guys, but nothing huge, and he had short straight brown hair and blue eyes. He was a good-looking guy, but not hot. Everybody seemed to like him. He was like the Troy Bolton of our school. Good at lots of things though he never let it go to his head.


    ¡°Yeah. James, Bobby and I used to be close. Kind of like how you and James and I are close now. Something changed the summer before our second year of middle school though. We separated for the summer, with James¡¯s family and mine going on a trip, and Bobby going to camp. When we all got back Bobby stopped hanging around with us. I don¡¯t know what happened. Anyways, sometimes I just think about the way things used to be and I get sad. I hate losing friends, especially when I don¡¯t know why.¡±


    ¡°Did you try asking him?¡±


    ¡°Of course, I did. He just blew me off. He kept saying that everything was fine and that he was busy and that we¡¯d get together later. Only later never came and here we are three years later.¡±


    ¡°Well, the night isn¡¯t over yet and we still haven¡¯t danced. Do you think that we can convince DJ Linda to play a few Zumba songs?¡±


    Eva¡¯s face lit up with excitement. ¡°That is an awesome idea!¡±, she said, and we were off to go twist Linda¡¯s arm and cajole as many people as we could to join us in an impromptu Zumba class.


    The next Monday, we were all back at school. It was depressing, but unavoidable. It was our second to last year in high school and many of my friends were excited to take the PSATs and start taking courses that would either help prepare them for or get them into college. The college chatter started almost right away and even though it was the first day of it, I was already sick of it. I hadn¡¯t spoken to my dad about college in awhile, but I wasn¡¯t sure that I would be going at all. I¡¯d felt this way for over a year now, but when I got my ability, I became even more sure that college wasn¡¯t in my future anytime soon. I didn¡¯t know what I wanted to do with my life, so what was the point of going to college? College was there to prepare you for your career. For those who had a calling or direction to their life, then college made perfect sense. They could learn useful things. But for those of us that were still unsure or had no clue, college would be a place where we¡¯d be trying out different options, learning a bit about this and a bit about that, and just gaining general knowledge. While that may be a laudable goal, I didn¡¯t see any reason to go into debt for it. I could just as easily take online courses to sample different subjects and see what interested me or I could just take entry level jobs in various industries, until something caught my attention. At least I¡¯d earn some money that way and I could go to college later on with some experience under my belt.


    Besides, I already had two potential fall-back trades, blacksmithing and Kung Fu instruction, that I could see myself doing and I didn¡¯t need college for either. Now that I had my new abilities though, a whole new range of possibilities had opened up for me.


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    With these thoughts in mind, I barely noticed that everyone in English class was leaving. Didn¡¯t we just sit down? Had I spaced out the entire class?


    ¡°Hey Abby! You¡¯re coming?¡±, Eva asked.


    ¡°Where to? What happened to class?¡± By this time, we were the only ones left in the classroom.


    ¡°Where has your mind been the last few minutes? Mrs. Shelby had to leave on some urgent personal business, and we have a study period. Since it¡¯s the first day and only our third class, there¡¯s nothing to study. Everyone is going for an early lunch. I was thinking that we should go sit in the park and enjoy this beautiful day sitting under that shady elm tree by the picnic benches.¡±


    ¡°Oh. I hope everything is ok with Mrs. Shelby. She¡¯s nice. Uhm¡­I¡¯m going to sit here and work out some things in my brain for a bit. How about I join you soon?¡±


    ¡°Suits me fine. If you come by and I¡¯m asleep, don¡¯t wake me until halfway through lunch period.¡±


    I waved goodbye to her and looked around the class. I had the place all to myself, so I figured that I might as well get in some practice time with the field and I shifted into R1. Of course, I was a bit distracted and I forgot to take my desk with me. I ended up on the floor. Dammit! I sighed and decided to that I might as well stay on the floor.


    I took a second to bring my schoolbag into R1 as well and then I took out a notebook and pen and started writing out possible jobs or careers where I could make good use my new ability. The first was easy.


    Stock Analyst. I was already doing it and my ability to get inside information would make me a star in no time.


    What else could I do with my abilities? As I asked the question, a flood of ideas came to mind.


    Paid assassin. No one would ever be able to see me, and I could get into just about any building.


    Bank Robber. I could walk through the safe door and take as much money as I wanted.


    Robin Hood Thief. Steeling from criminals and giving most of it to charities.


    Private Investigator. I could follow cheating husbands and wives and catch them in the act.


    Wow! What did it say about me that most of the ideas that I thought of first were either illegal or immoral or just plain wrong? Could I really see myself killing someone? How could I use my powers for good? I loved super-heroes and that¡¯s what they did every day. How can I help people?


    Police Officer. I liked the idea, in theory, but in practice police officers usually work with partners and I¡¯d end up showing my ability to someone all the time and that was off the table.


    The more I thought about it, the more I realized that unless I wanted to show the world what I could do, there weren¡¯t very many options for me to do good with my ability. At least none that I could think of right now. I wasn¡¯t giving up yet. I also hadn¡¯t developed my powers to their fullest. There might be things that I learn about my powers that will let me use them for good.


    I decided that a change in scenery might help me come up with new ideas and I put my notebook and pen away in my bag. As I got up to leave, the classroom door opened, and three boys walked in. One of them I had just seen last night, Bobby Draker. The other two looked familiar, but I didn¡¯t know them. From their size, I¡¯d guess them to be on the school football team. One was blonde and trim, with well defined upper arms showing out of his tank top, while the other was dark haired and bulky. Bobby sat down in the teacher¡¯s chair and the other two sat on the desks right in front.


    ¡°Why are we in here, Bobby?¡±, asked blondie.


    ¡°It¡¯s an empty classroom. We need to talk about the Northfield High game. This is a good place to do it.¡±, Bobby answered.


    ¡°Mr. Becket gave us an early lunch. I¡¯m hungry. Why don¡¯t we talk about it while we eat?¡± This was from bulky boy.


    ¡°Because I don¡¯t want anyone to listen in. Northfield kicked our asses in the exhibition game last week and we all know why.¡±


    ¡°Yeah. Jimmy Traiger copied our playbook when he switched schools at the last minute. That rat must have used it to get a position on their team. Most coaches wouldn¡¯t have taken him on after their team had been practicing together for so many weeks, but with Northfield¡¯s record against us being so bad, there was no way that Coach Thorpe could turn him down.¡± Bulky boy did not look happy as he said this, and I was glad that I wasn¡¯t Jimmy.


    ¡°Coach will just have to come up with new plays. It¡¯ll suck, because we just spent all those weeks learning and practicing our plays, but what else can we do?¡± Blondie shrugged hopelessly.


    ¡°No way, Art. We don¡¯t have time for that. Sure, we could learn a few new plays. Coach always makes some changes, but to redo the whole playbook isn¡¯t an option. The season starts next week. We need to even the playing field. We need to find a way to get their playbook. If we could do that, then at least our teams would be more evenly matched. Both of you used to go to Northfield Middle school before you moved. Do either of you know anyone there who would help us get their playbook? Maybe you have an older brother that knows someone? Anyone or anything that you could think of?¡±, Bobby said.


    Blondie, or rather Art, answered, ¡°No way Bobby. All my old friends at Northfield had a great time riding my ass when we lost last week. They¡¯re looking forward to teasing me all season and they won¡¯t help. I probably shouldn¡¯t have stuffed all of our wins in their faces last year.


    Bobby turned to bulky boy. ¡°How about you, Skip? Anyone?¡±.


    ¡°Nope. Once I changed schools, I lost touch with everyone there. My older sister used to date the quarterback, but they¡¯re not there anymore and he was an only child.¡±, Skip said. Skip? Was that a nickname or was it short for Skippy? What kind of parents would name their child after peanut butter?


    ¡°Shit! You guys were my last hope. I¡¯ve tried all of my contacts and no one can help. I¡¯m almost ready to try breaking into the school to get a copy, but if I get caught then I¡¯ll get expelled and I¡¯ll be off the team. Better to lose to a bunch of cheaters than to get kicked off the team. Alright, thanks guys. Let¡¯s get to lunch.¡± With that, Bobby led Art and Skip out of the classroom.


    I waited a few minutes before shifting back to reality and joining Eva under a tree. A plan was forming in my mind. I was going to help Bobby get that playbook.

 A Trip to Northfield

    After lunch we had Economics with Mr. Chandler. He brought up the stock-picking competition and explained it as if he hadn¡¯t given us all the same information at the end of the last school year. I suppose that not everyone was as into it as James, Eva and I were. The only difference in his spiel was that today he showed us how to log onto the online software that we¡¯d be using and walked us through its basic features. Most of the students were looking at the software in confusion. Thanks to James, Eva and I already knew everything that Mr. Chandler showed us and a lot more. It really wasn¡¯t that complicated, but when you looked at the screen for the first time you were likely to experience information overload; especially when you didn¡¯t know what all of it meant.


    The rest of the class was a complete waste of time for me. Mr. Chandler went through the basics of trading stocks and gave us different strategies for investing. At this point, nothing that he explained was news to me and I¡¯d already had a very successful first foray into trading stocks. In the month and half since my first trades, my portfolio of stocks had already jumped up by eight percent. Most of that came from my ¡®guess¡¯ about Sun Energy Systems, but almost all of our picks had been doing well. Only one of Eva¡¯s picks and one of mine were duds, each having lost a few percent, even though they reported decent results. Just like James warned us, good results didn¡¯t always translate into a higher stock price. James and Eva were only up 3% and 4% respectively, as they hadn¡¯t bet as big on Sun Energy as I did. I don¡¯t blame them. I would have been skeptical too. James was taking Eva¡¯s good natured ribbing with grace and talking about the tortoise and the hare. ¡°It¡¯s a marathon, not a sprint¡±, seemed to be his mantra these days.


    When school let out, I checked the bus routes on my phone and hopped on the one heading closest to Northfield High School. With football season only lasting about two months, I couldn¡¯t any waste time if I was going to help Bobby get his hands on Northfield¡¯s playbook.


    I¡¯d never been to Northfield High before, but Waze took me right to the front entrance. They had a lovely campus and even though classes had finished for the day, there were still quite a few students milling around outside, enjoying the sunshine. I walked along to the side of their main building until I was out of everyone¡¯s sight and activated the field to get into R1. I didn¡¯t try holding two fields this time, because I didn¡¯t know how long I¡¯d be here for and I didn¡¯t want to get too tired. With just one field, I could take my time. If all went well, I¡¯d practice with the expanded field on the way out.


    Going back to the main building entrance, I walked through the door and started poking around. In the administration office I found the school directory and map. Coach Thorpe¡¯s office was located just off of the main gymnasium, not too far from the outdoor football field and the locker rooms. Memorizing the path that I needed to use to get there, I left the administration offices and walked to his office. On the way, I peeked into classrooms and closets and the staff lounge. Nice place. Given the technology that I was seeing, this school had a healthy budget. Even the staff lounge had new computers.


    After a brief stop to admire the Northfield High library, I finally found Coach Thorpe¡¯s office. The lights were off, and the door was closed, but I just kept walking and passed through it. With the blinds having been left open, I had plenty of light to see by. Looking around, one thing quickly became very clear. Coach Thorpe had no organizational skills whatsoever. I¡¯m no neat freak, but even I had to wonder how he could live in this mess. He had papers all over the place, as if he¡¯d never heard of a computer. Binders were stacked in piles on the floor, the desk, the credenza and his filing cabinets. He even had stacks of vcr video tapes. Did they still make those? I didn¡¯t even know where to start my search. A huge calendar on the wall showed that the team was having a practice for the next few hours, so I would have plenty of uninterrupted time to go through this mess.


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    Taking the measure of the room, I figured that anything in use or in recent use would be on the top layer. I started taking binders into R1, one by one, and looking to see what was in them. Some piles were player rosters and notes from years before. Other piles had information on opposing teams from previous years. Budgets, gala fundraising information, baseball and basketball schedules. I guess head coach was a busy job. Not being much into sports, I¡¯d never really thought about it.


    Twenty minutes in I had nothing to show for my efforts in the mess and I moved on to the desk drawers. This was tricky in that I had to choose to bring myself back to reality for a bit and risk possible exposure or I could bring the desk into R1. I chose the latter option. Three drawers were full of junk and the fourth, the one on the bottom right, was locked. I was trying to think of how I could use my field to bring the contents into R1 and have them fall to the floor, when I realized that using my powers were not necessary in this case. The drawer above it was unlocked and I slid it out and unclipped it to remove it from the desk. Sometimes the normal solutions were best. I''d need to remember that.


    With the top drawer gone, I could see the contents inside the locked drawer. On top was a copy of our football playbook that Bobby had mentioned. It was good to know that Bobby had been right about their using our playbook to cheat. I debated taking it with me and decided against it for a few reasons. First, I doubted it was their only copy. Second, I didn¡¯t want to alert anyone that I¡¯d been here. Third, if I succeeded in ¡®borrowing¡¯ Northfield¡¯s playbook, then the two sides would be in the same situation. I was merely balancing the scales. I could see the justice in doing that. However, if I were to take back the book, and if it was their only copy, then I¡¯d be tipping the scales in our school¡¯s favor. Honestly, I had no moral qualms about doing that, but I just didn¡¯t care enough about it. I had a different reason for doing this and balancing the scales was good enough for me.


    Leaving the playbook where it was and putting back the drawer, I shifted the desk to reality and left Coach Thorpe¡¯s office. I headed out to the field to see if the team was using some playbooks and I hit paydirt right away. I found several copies on the sidelines and while the team was working on their physical conditioning, I snagged one into R1.


    I took my digital camera from my backpack and started taking pictures. I took a lot of pictures. I had no idea that there were so many plays in football. Did the team really have to memorize all of these? Every season? I¡¯d need to re-evaluate my assumptions about the game and its players.


    As I finished the last page, I shifted the binder back into reality and spent a few minutes watching the practice. The boys certainly looked fit. I sighed and went to the Galt university library to print out my own binder. Bobby better appreciate all this hard work.

 A Deal with Bobby

    The next day I caught up with Bobby heading to the cafeteria for lunch.


    ¡°Gotta minute for me, Bobby?¡±, I asked.


    ¡°Uhm¡­sure.¡± He looked confused.


    ¡°I¡¯m Abby Smith. We have English and World History together this year.¡± I¡¯m so helpful it¡¯s incredible.


    ¡°I know who you are Abby. I was just a bit surprised. We¡¯ve never really spoken.¡±


    ¡°Well, that¡¯s all in the past now. Here we are. Talking.¡± I paused there. I wasn¡¯t sure how to go on.


    ¡°Ok. I¡¯m on my way to lunch. Would you like to join me?¡±, he asked.


    ¡°It¡¯s very nice of you to offer, but I need to speak with you privately. How about we walk out to the elm across the street in the park?¡±, I suggested.


    ¡°This sounds serious.¡±


    ¡°It is. For you at least. For me it¡¯s merely an interesting possibility.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m hooked. Let¡¯s go.¡±


    We turned towards the exit and he gallantly held out his arm for me to link up with him. I looked at it, raised my left eyebrow and said, ¡°This is not a date, big boy. We¡¯ve got business to discuss. Get out there and show some hustle.¡± I¡¯d heard that in while watching the practice yesterday. It worked then and in worked now. Bobby smiled at me and got a move on.


    When we reached the elm, I was glad to see that no one else was there. I should have thought of that, but I was kind of just improvising.


    Bobby broke the ice and asked, ¡°So, do you come here often?¡±.


    I groaned. ¡°I hear that you¡¯re looking for a certain binder from Northfield.¡±, I blurted out.


    Bobby¡¯s eyes bulged out like in cartoon. Well, that¡¯s an exaggeration, but they did get bigger as his face showed his surprise. ¡°Why do you say that?¡± He looked guilty. Not much of a poker face on our boy Bobby.


    ¡°I hear things and you¡¯ve let word get out that you want the Northfield High football playbook. Eventually I was bound to hear about it and here we are. Please don¡¯t insult me by denying it. I¡¯m here to help you get what you want, but I¡¯ll walk if you piss me off.¡± I am so tough! Look at me sounding like a bad movie.


    ¡°Do you know someone at Northfield?¡±, Bobby looked excited.


    ¡°Not a single person.¡±


    ¡°Then how can you help? Are you planning to break in and get the playbook? I can tell you now that the binders are watched closely. They¡¯re not just lying around.¡± I almost burst out laughing. Well, they kind of are.You just need to be in a position to grab one.


    ¡°I¡¯m not planning a break in,¡± because I already did that, ¡°and even if I was, I certainly wouldn¡¯t tell you about it. Loose lips sink ships. What I want to know is what I can get in return, if I can get you that binder.¡±


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    ¡°What do you want?¡±, he asked in a lecherous way, as he raised his arms and flexed his biceps. He was so over the top that I almost laughed again. Bobby had a good sense of humor.


    Instead, I played up the valley girl in me, ¡°Eww! Not you. That¡¯s like SO gross!¡±.


    He lol¡¯d. ¡°Fine. If you¡¯re not looking to get a piece of this awesomeness, then what do you want? You obviously have something in mind, or you wouldn¡¯t be here offering a trade. I don¡¯t know you well enough, or at all really, to guess what you want.¡±


    ¡°If I get you the binder, I want to know why you stopped being friends with Eva Silver and once I hear the story, I might want you to be friends with her again.¡± I got that out in one breath, rushing so that I wouldn¡¯t change my mind. It was a very strange request and I knew it.


    ¡°What?¡± Bobby looked stunned by the request.


    ¡°You heard me. Eva is one of my best friends. She feels bad that you guys aren¡¯t friends anymore and she doesn¡¯t even know why. She said that you used to be one of her best friends. I want to know how you can simply ditch such a wonderful person. If your story sucks and it¡¯s something stupid about you wanting to break away from her so you can be more popular, I won¡¯t ask you to be her friend again. If you had a better reason, like aliens abducted you and erased her from your mind, then I have the option of asking you to start being friends with her again.¡±


    Bobby wasn¡¯t saying anything. He was just looking at the ground. I got the feeling that he was embarrassed about something. When he finally looked up, I could tell that he was. His face was red. I hoped that I wasn¡¯t misreading him, and the red was because he was angry.


    ¡°You can¡¯t simply choose to become someone¡¯s friend again. It¡¯s not that simple. Ask for something else.¡±


    ¡°Bobby, we been in the same school for two years and had at least half a dozen classes together and today is the first time we¡¯re even saying hi to each other. I could easily have gone to the end of high school without speaking to you. There is nothing else that I need or want from you. Eva told me the story the other day and she looked sad about losing your friendship. I have no idea why. The way she told it, you come off as a dick. But I trust Eva and she wouldn¡¯t miss you if you were a bad guy. There¡¯s something more to all this. My price for the binder is the story of that something more and you trying to be her friend again, if she¡¯ll let you. Take it or leave it.¡± I really hoped he¡¯d take it. I already had the binder.


    Bobby turned his body like he was going to walk away. I held my breath. Please take the deal. Please take the deal!


    ¡°IF you get me the binder, it¡¯s a deal. But this deal is only good for the next two weeks. We need time to study the binder for it to be useful.¡±


    ¡°Deal.¡± I held out my hand to shake on it and he took it. Then I opened my bag and held out the binder to him.


    ¡°You¡¯re shitting me. That¡¯s it? You already have it?¡±.


    ¡°Take a look.¡± I handed it to him, and he started going through it.


    ¡°Holy shit! This is the real thing. How the hell did you get this?¡± I was starting to get bored of Bobby¡¯s stunned look.


    ¡°A girl¡¯s gotta have her secrets. Keeps the boys on their toes.¡±


    Bobby gave me an appraising look. ¡°You¡¯ve held up your end of the deal and I¡¯ll hold up mine, but what would you have done if I¡¯d just taken the binder and walked away?¡±


    ¡°I¡¯d have dropped you like a rock and taken it back. It¡¯s not like you can complain to anyone that I took Northfield¡¯s playbook, the one you¡¯re not supposed to have, from you and you definitely wouldn¡¯t want to admit getting your ass kicked by a girl. That wouldn¡¯t help your reputation any.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯ll keep that in mind.¡± By his slight smirk, I could tell that he was humoring me. I¡¯d seen that look before. In this case, it didn¡¯t matter much anyways. I had nothing to prove to him.


    ¡°Let¡¯s sit at the picnic table and you can tell me the story.¡± Without waiting for him, I took the few strides to the table and sat down. He was still standing where he¡¯d been when I left. He was hesitating because he didn¡¯t want to tell me the story. He hadn''t thought that I¡¯d deliver on the binder and he certainly didn¡¯t think that would I do it so quickly.


    He let out a breath and came over to sit at the table across from me.

 Bobby鈥檚 Story

    ¡°There isn¡¯t that much to tell really. Eva, James and I had been best friends since kindergarten. Like the three musketeers. I lived down the street from them, so we were always together. The only time we separated was their yearly family vacation trip or for my family vacations. My parents can¡¯t take off that much time from work and we usually go visit my mom¡¯s family in Florida for winter vacation.


    Eva and James each have an older brother and an older sister. They¡¯re both the youngest by at least four years, but they still had that family connection. I was an only child and to me, Eva and James were my family. Sometimes I¡¯d spend entire weeks at one or the other of their houses. James¡¯ father used to joke that he was filling out adoption papers for me. Eva¡¯s mother knew my favorite meals and snacks and she usually served those when I was there. James, Eva and I would spend our summers riding our bikes and hiking and playing games and reading comic books. Eva was into Wonder Woman. James was all about Batman. I loved Superman. Even our favorite superheroes were a team.¡±


    Bobby paused here and I waited for him to continue. I suspected where this was going, and I knew that it was a hard story for him to tell.


    ¡°Then, towards the end of elementary school things changed for me. I guess I hit puberty early, but one day I realized that Eva wasn¡¯t my sister and that I couldn¡¯t stop thinking about her. I agonized from months, trying to decide if I should say anything or even what I should say. I wasn¡¯t being noble and wondering if saying anything would ruin our friendship, I just didn¡¯t have the nerve. I was scared that she didn¡¯t feel that way about me; that she would reject me and then I wouldn¡¯t be able to hang out with her anymore. I kept quiet until the end of the school year and I decided that I¡¯d tell her just as soon as she got back from her family trip. That year their families were doing a tour of the beaches along the east coast. I had it all planned out for when she got back. I was going to ask her to go biking with me and I¡¯d tell her how I felt about her and ask her on a date. Just the two of us.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m guessing that you never took that bike ride.¡±, I prompted after he¡¯s been silent for a little bit.


    ¡°Do you know how Eva and James got together? Did they ever tell you?¡±, he asked me. He wasn¡¯t bitter, just resigned.


    ¡°Yes. They were on a beach somewhere on vacation and Eva had gone in the water to cool off and jump the waves. She strayed out too far and she was heading back when she got caught in an undercurrent. She panicked. She tried to call for help but went under the water and swallowed a lot of it. She was pulled under again and didn¡¯t know which way was up, when James grabbed her arm and swam her towards shore. They were met shortly after by a lifeguard and Eva¡¯s father. James had been watching her and when she went under the first time, he raced in after her, yelling that she was in trouble.


    Eva describes it as the moment when she really saw James for the first time, and she liked what she saw. James says that he¡¯d been having feeling for her since the start of that vacation and that¡¯s why he was watching her. He was wondering if he¡¯d have the courage to say anything to her about it when she went under and he just took off. He doesn¡¯t remember yelling for help or much of anything until he grabbed her arm. It¡¯s a very sweet story.¡±


    ¡°Yeah. It really is. But it sucked for me.¡±, continued Bobby. ¡°They got back, and I could see right away that I¡¯d missed my chance. They were holding hands and standing closer to each other all the time. They still do that now. There¡¯s a bond between them. I couldn¡¯t compete with that. I didn¡¯t even want to really. He was my brother and he had saved her life. I had to be happy for them. It should have been easy too. They never shoved their relationship in my face. They always included me, and I¡¯d even get together with only one of them regularly. In their eyes, I wasn¡¯t treated like a third wheel, but sure I felt like one.


    I tried to pretend that I didn¡¯t have feelings for her, but it didn¡¯t work. I couldn¡¯t turn my feelings off. After a year, I gave up. Seeing her everyday hurt too much and not being able to be happy for James hurt too much. I resolved that once they came back from their next vacation trip, I wouldn¡¯t be around anymore. This time I was able to follow through. I haven¡¯t really spoken to either of them since.¡±


    Bobby finished his story and just sat there, as if waiting in judgement. Maybe he was. I had told him that depending on his story, he might have to try to be friends with Eva again.


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    ¡°Well Bobby, you¡¯re not a dick.¡±


    That got a laugh out of him and broke his somber mood.


    I continued, ¡°Maybe a bit of a drama queen, but not a dick.¡± He chuckled this time and shook his head.


    ¡°Come on Abby. Don¡¯t sugar coat it. Tell me how you really feel and don¡¯t forget to laugh at my pain.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m just wondering something, Bobby. All this happened over three years ago, and I know that you¡¯ve had at least one girlfriend since then. Yes, I know that you dated Cheryl Thompson last year. Your breakup was epic and the drama that ensued was mentioned in the school bulletin.¡± He had the decency to look chagrined at this. ¡°You¡¯ve obviously stopped pining away for Eva. You¡¯ve moved on and I¡¯m happy for you. Your heart was dashed upon the rocks, but you¡¯ve survived and come through it. Why haven¡¯t you tried to make up with Eva and James?¡±


    ¡°I blew them off. After being like family, I just cut them off without a reason. I knew that what I was doing could never be taken back. Why would they want to be friends with me now? In their shoes, I wouldn¡¯t ever talk to me again.¡±


    ¡°So, you wanted to but chickened out?¡±


    ¡°Actually, yes. How¡¯d you know?¡±


    ¡°Because I hear the regret in your voice and chickening out seems to be a pattern for you.¡±


    ¡°Fuck you too, Abby. Are you always this harsh with people or do you just dislike me that much?¡±


    ¡°I don¡¯t know you well enough to dislike you. I¡¯m just not sugar-coating the truth, because we¡¯re not friends. I¡¯ve always considered something to be a pattern when I see it three or more times. You didn¡¯t take your chance to tell Eva how you felt about her before her vacation, you let your pain push you away from your friends after moping for a year, and you chickened out from trying to get James and Eva back as friends.¡±


    ¡°I agree with you for the first and the last, but what was I supposed to do after a year of trying?¡±, he was practically pleading with me. He thought he had done the right thing, the noble thing, in walking away from his friends. I had to let him know that he was wrong, and I wouldn¡¯t pull any punches while doing it.


    ¡°Bobby, I lost my mother when I was four. We were kidnapped and I was left on the side of the road and I haven¡¯t seen her for 12 years. My dad hasn¡¯t seen her in 12 years. He spent years looking for her. We visited hospitals and shelters for years looking for her. He even went to the morgue a few times when they had a Jane Doe with similar physical characteristics. He''s felt pain every day for years, but he never let me feel his pain. I had to figure it out, as I got older. He was always there for me. He didn¡¯t shut me out or bury himself in his work and leave me alone. He could have and I wouldn¡¯t have blamed him, because I look so much like her. Every day he has to see her face in me and be reminded that she¡¯s gone. He hurts every time he looks at me, but it doesn¡¯t phase him. He puts it aside because he loves me and wants the best for me.¡± I hoped he could make the connection without my spelling it out for him. He really did seem like a good guy, even if I was totally making him feel like shit.


    ¡°Do you think that his pain faded over time?¡±, Bobby asked in a quiet voice.


    ¡°Yes, I think it did. It took a long time, but it did. He¡¯s even dated a few women over the years.¡±


    ¡°You¡¯re saying I gave up too quickly on my friendship with Eva and James. I couldn¡¯t take the pain, so I cut them out of my life. Your assessment of me before was wrong, I am a dick. I gave up on my family.¡± Now I really felt bad for being so blunt with Bobby. He looked so dejected. Time to turn it around.


    ¡°Bobby, you were 12 or 13 years old. You made the wrong choice, but you had no way of knowing that then. I¡¯ll give you a pass on that one and you should too. You¡¯re older now though and I can tell that you miss them. You have a chance to put things right. Why not take it? What¡¯s your downside? If they reject you this time, then at least you tried and you¡¯re no worse off than now. If they take you back, you have your family back. You literally have nothing to lose. You also need to break your habit of chickening out. You¡¯ll be a better person for it.¡±


    ¡°I can see that you¡¯re not wrong, but how do you just go up to two people that you¡¯ve ignored for years and say that you¡¯re sorry? And what do I tell them about why I ditched them? I can¡¯t just say to James, ¡°Sorry I ditched you, but I was totally into your girlfriend and couldn¡¯t get over her but now I¡¯m over her and I want to be friends again.¡±¡±


    ¡°I suppose you could work on that to soften it up a bit. Maybe change ¡°totally into your girlfriend¡± to ¡°had feelings for Eva and I needed time alone to work them out and move on.¡± Something like that. James will understand and I think he¡¯ll forgive you. I¡¯ve never seen him hold a grudge against anyone.¡±


    ¡°What about Eva? You don¡¯t think she¡¯ll hate me?¡±


    ¡°Nope. I started off this conversation saying that she misses you. She might be pissed at you, but she won¡¯t hate you.¡±


    ¡°Ok. How soon do I have to talk to them?¡±


    ¡°Don¡¯t worry about that. I¡¯ll arrange the time and place. You just get your words ready and make sure that you don¡¯t blow it. Also, if you start and don¡¯t go through with it, I¡¯ll be telling them the whole story. It¡¯s better if it comes from you.¡± I smiled wickedly to make him think that I was kidding, but I wasn¡¯t sure if I was. I¡¯d have to see how things played out.

 A Brief Encounter at The University

    Saturday afternoon found James, Eva and I leaving the university library, heading home. Eva had just finished a fitness class and James and I had been using the Lexis-Nexis account to gather more information about some companies that we were interested in. The first week of the fall session at the university was about to start and it was Family Weekend. The university grounds were full of families getting tours, moving furniture and taking pictures. Dad¡¯s new entrance gates looked spectacular and there were lines of families formed up on either side to take pictures with them in the background. There was even a small plaque on the side attributing the new gates to dad and the students at Galt¡¯s Blacksmithing school.


    I recognized the parts that had been made by the students in the intro course this summer and I spotted the decorative latches that dad had asked me to make for the gates. Passing by the gates, we walked through the large student quad. I used to think that it was weird to walk out the entrance gates of the university and find yourself in the main quad which was a part of the university, but dad had explained that as the university had expanded, they¡¯d decided to leave the gates where they were as a historical reminder of how far they¡¯d come, much in the same way that a parent marks off a child¡¯s height on the kitchen doorway.


    Taking advantage of the Family Weekend, many of the SIGs, student interest groups, had set up information and sign-up tables around the quad. These groups had no official standing with the university, but they brought together students with similar interests for extracurricular activities. This was their best time of year to sign up new members. There were quite a few sports related SIGs, including popular sports such as football, baseball, basketball and hockey, along with lesser sports, like Ultimate Frisbee, darts, foosball, and Quidditch. Each of the main political parties was represented, along with the Libertarians, the Greenies and the Weed party. That last one seemed to have quite a bit of interest. Given the fact that over five percent of North Carolina was allocated to the military in the form of military bases across the state, it was no surprise that each of the branches of the military were represented as well. Chess, drama, and glee SIGs were there, and I even saw some Karate and Tae Kwon Do tables. Sadly, Kung Fu was not represented. Rounding out the group were the various Fraternities and Sororities that you find at most universities.


    Eva and I had a good time, chatting up some of the students at the tables and pretending that we were college girls. James stayed behind us and kept to himself. I think he was preoccupied with planning on how best to make trades with the information that we¡¯d just gathered. We had just stopped at one of the last tables to listen to the Glee SIG sing an interesting version of Bad Guy, when I heard a raised voice saying, ¡°You don¡¯t care that we¡¯re ruining our planet? You can¡¯t even be bothered to sign our petition. It¡¯s your planet too. You should do your part.¡±


    I turned away from the singing group and looked behind me. James was being towered over by a guy that looked like he belonged in the Football SIG and the guy was seriously invading James¡¯ personal space. From a different angle, I wouldn¡¯t have even seen James. For his part, James seemed more annoyed than scared and he wasn¡¯t stepping back.


    ¡°I didn¡¯t say that I don¡¯t care about the planet. I just don¡¯t want to sign your petition. Now please get out of my way.¡±


    Mr. Big didn¡¯t move away. I saw him dart a quick glance over to some girls at the Save the Planet SIG table and then he said, ¡°Don¡¯t you understand how important this is? How can you go on ignoring this?¡±


    I made my way over the James¡¯ side. Eva walked around to his other side. James didn¡¯t look away from Mr. Big, but I could tell that he knew we were there to back him up, if he needed it.


    ¡°I¡¯m not ignoring anything, except for your petition. It¡¯s just a waste of time.¡± James was raising his voice now, to match Mr. Big, and a crowd of spectators was forming. I noticed a few cell phones coming out and I really hoped that this wouldn¡¯t degenerate into something that could go viral.


    ¡°How is saving the planet a waste of time?¡± Mr. Big was playing this up. I was pretty sure that he was either posturing for the girls at the table, or that this was a setup and they picked James because they thought that a loud confrontation would attract more students to their table.


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    ¡°Come off it. You¡¯re not saving the planet. Getting people to sign a petition for the university to divest of all of its fossil fuel stock is a joke. If it¡¯s a good investment, then the university should have it. It¡¯s not like there¡¯s anything to replace oil yet. Besides, for them to divest of the stock, they have to sell it to someone else. How does that change anything, except make it so the university can¡¯t even propose or vote for changes at the annual stockholder¡¯s meetings. The more stock you hold, the more power you have. Seriously, have you guys given your strategy any thought at all?¡± Yeah, this wasn¡¯t going to end well. Mr. Big was turning beat red. He glanced again at the girls and he also noticed the cameras. I could almost see the calculation in his eyes. He could either go big or go home and with his size, go big was his go-to option. He couldn¡¯t just let James walk away now.


    ¡°We¡¯re out here trying. We¡¯re here and we¡¯re raising awareness about climate change. We¡¯re talking to people about making small changes that can create huge differences. We¡¯re showing people that they can make a difference, because if we don¡¯t do something now, then there won¡¯t be a later.¡±


    James laughed, ¡°Raising awareness? Who isn¡¯t aware of climate change? It¡¯s been in the news and in our classrooms for our entire lives. You¡¯d have to actually be a rock to not have heard about how we¡¯ve destroyed our planet. I couldn¡¯t have been made more aware over my 16 years on this planet. And you know what you get with small changes? You get small differences. In California, they¡¯ve banned plastic straws. They¡¯ve banned plastic bags in half the country. Are we safe now? Not from what I¡¯ve been told. We¡¯re told that every storm is due to climate change and that there are more of them than ever before. It seems to me that nothing we do will ever be enough and do you know why? Because of the fact that over 85% of all greenhouse gasses are not being produced here. Almost 40% of those gasses are being produced in China and in India and the rest of Asia and their numbers are increasing every year, while ours have been decreasing. If you¡¯re really interested in raising awareness, then that is where you need to put your little table. Instead, you¡¯re here, standing around flirting with the girls and pretending that you have some higher purpose. And if you really cared about the planet and it was an all consuming goal of yours to help out, then you¡¯d be studying sciences to learn how to make microbes that clean our air and water or how to make better and cheaper solar batteries so that we can have electric cars that make sense. You could be studying business so you can learn how to build a company that will create some new innovation that will actually make a difference. So how about it, huh? What are you studying? How are you planning on making a real difference for the planet or are you just here to get a job and live your life and pretend that you did your part? Because raising awareness isn¡¯t going to get the job done anymore.¡± As James finished, the small crowd around us erupted in cheers and applause and James started blushing.


    Mr. Big was not happy. I had a feeling that he knew that he no longer had much of a chance with the save the planet girls. He¡¯d also been stood up to in front of a crowd, but I could tell that he didn¡¯t want to let it go. Leaning forward, he was that close, I quietly said to him, ¡°He mentioned his 16 years on this planet. Think about it, big guy. High school Junior. You won¡¯t just get expelled; you¡¯ll go to jail.¡±


    I leaned back and watched the anger drain away from his expression. He was big, but he wasn¡¯t dumb. He stuck out his hand to James and said, ¡°You¡¯re right and I¡¯m sorry if I got too intense there for a bit.¡± James shook his hand and the crowd cheered again and started to disperse. I noticed that none of them went to the Save the Planet table. Mr. Big went back to the Save the Planet girls with his shoulders slumped, but I was surprised at the warm welcome he received. Maybe things weren¡¯t as bleak for him as I thought they were.


    We walked on past the last tables and out of the quad. Eva was babbling a mile a minute and practically hopping up and down. She had been expecting trouble and her body was all geared up for it. When Mr. Big backed down, all her nervous energy needed to go somewhere. James, on the other hand, was his usual self. I don¡¯t think that he even saw the danger in what he did. He wasn¡¯t an idiot, rather he merely saw the episode as a passionate debate, and he believed that society¡¯s norms would keep it from getting out of hand. He was right, in the end, but I knew that he was only just barely right.


    A block past the quad found us in a residential area of the university containing a mixture of dorms, faculty and employee housing, and fraternity houses. I stopped and smelled the air. A scent had taken me out of my conversation with Eva. I smelled smoke and I looked around for visible signs of a fire. Eva said, ¡°Over there. There¡¯s smoke rising over that house.¡±

 A Fire

    We all ran to our left, where Eva had pointed, and down the street. We turned left again and on the next block were five houses facing a park. The fourth house was on fire. The house, like all the others on the block was two stories tall and had a long front lawn. Combined with the park across the street, it felt like the houses had their own quad. Flames were curling up out of a broken lower window at the front of the house and was spreading up and over to the rest of the house. I hoped that no one was in there. I could see a few people coming out of the surrounding houses to see what was going on and the people at the park were on their phones or talking to each other and pointing to the house. As we made our way to the front yard, a middle-aged man in a jogging outfit was leading a coughing younger man, probably a student, down the walkway from the house.


    The jogger was asking the student if there was anyone else in the house. Between hacking coughs, the student said, ¡°Mark¡¯s still in there. I think that he was sleeping. I couldn¡¯t get to him. The house filled up with smoke so quickly.¡±


    I took off at a run for the front door and I heard Eva and James calling my name. I didn¡¯t have time to talk to them and I hoped that they wouldn¡¯t follow me. The house was old and made of bricks and wood. I could tell that it would be completely engulfed in flames in just a few minutes. I just needed to get inside before the way was blocked by the fire. I reached the front door; smoke poring out of it. The top of the doorframe was already burning but the sides of the frame and the floor were still free from flames. Pulling my shirt over my mouth and nose, I ducked and ran into the house.


    As soon as I was a few feet in, I shifted to R1 and looked behind me to make sure that no one had followed me in. Through the haze of smoke, I could see Eva holding onto James and yelling at him. Satisfied that they¡¯d be ok, I looked around. The fire was spreading quickly all over the first floor and most of the ceiling that I could see was in flames. I needed to hurry before the house collapsed.


    The fire couldn¡¯t touch me, but I was worried about the smoke. I didn¡¯t know if it existed in R1. I¡¯d been holding my breath since running into the house and now I took at tentative breath. My air was clean, and I lowered my shirt from my face, as my eyes scanned for the stairs. Finding them towards the back of the house, I raced through the greyed out fire and up to the second floor. The corridor carpet at the top of the stairs was smoldering and the corridor itself was filling with smoke.


    Through the haze I could make out five doors, three of which were closed. The first door I came to was open. I looked inside to see a very messy, but empty bedroom. No one would need to clean it up ever again. The next door was closed, and I poked my head through it to see another bedroom, this one much neater, but just as empty. The next two doors let do a bathroom and a linen closet. I found Mark in the final room, at the end of the hallway. Luckily for him, he had collapsed on his bed and not on the floor. His head was near the end of the bed and I figured that he must have woken up from the smoke and succumbed to it shortly after. I reached his bed, covered him in a field and brought him into R1.


    I¡¯d never brought another person into R1 with me and my head started buzzing, but otherwise, it was no different than usual. No different, in that Mark fell through the bed and hit the floor. Shit! The house was on fire, Mark and I were going to die in here if the house collapsed, and I could feel the strain start to give me a headache. I didn¡¯t have time for this. I leaned through the bed until I could see him and grabbed his arms to pull him out from under it. He was heavy. At 5¡¯7¡±, I¡¯m not small, but Mark had to be at least 6¡¯2¡± and probably weighted over 190 pounds. It wasn¡¯t going to be easy getting him out of this house. I was going to have to drag him most of the way out.


    Mark had passed out from smoke inhalation and was about as animate as a rock. I checked his heartrate and saw that¡¯d I¡¯d need to hurry. He wasn¡¯t doing well at all. From volunteering that the hospital, I knew that smoke inhalation killed more people than the actual fires did. I grabbed his wrists and dragged him to the stairs. Once there, I turned him over, walked down a few stairs and pulled him until I could get my shoulder under his stomach and lift him up fireman carry style. From years of Kung Fu, I had powerful legs muscles, and my arms and shoulders were strong from years of blacksmithing, but even so, I wouldn¡¯t be able to carry him for long. Feeling his weight with each step I took, I made my way down the stairs and out the back door. I paused only long enough to be sure that no one was watching and then I brought us both back into reality.


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    I felt the intense heat as soon as I was back in reality and I moved away from the house as quickly as I could, down the back-porch steps. With the fire having started in the front of the house, the back porch wasn¡¯t fully engulfed in flames yet, but it was a close thing. Ignoring the pain in my shoulder, my back, and my legs, I turned left and made my way around the house towards the front, where I hoped an ambulance would be waiting. Mark needed to get on a respirator right away. My whole body hurt, and my skin was roasting. I¡¯d purposely turned left so that I was able to keep as much of Mark I could manage as far away as possible from the fire. It didn''t do much, but it was all I could do.


    I came around the house from the side with barely any strength left to carry Mark. I was hunched over, watching my feet and forcing them to move just one more step when I heard Eva scream out my name and suddenly I didn¡¯t have to move anymore. Firemen were rushing towards me and when they took Mark from me, I collapsed. I didn¡¯t make it to the ground though. Another fireman caught me mid-fall and he lifted me up. He carried me to the street where an ambulance was just arriving. One firetruck was parked in front and another was arriving just after the ambulance. A few firefighters were putting a breathing mask over Mark¡¯s face and I remembered that I was supposed to have been in the house as well so I coughed as deeply as I could and kept it up for a bit. I knew that I¡¯d have enough trouble explaining not getting soot stained and singed from the fire. There was no way I as going to explain away not having inhaled any smoke.


    Withing seconds there was a mask over my face, and I eased up on the coughing. I hated lying to them, but there really wasn¡¯t any other choice. The fireman was checking my vitals, while I watched the ambulance load Mark up and race away with its lights strobing and its sirens screaming. Other firemen were already spraying water on the surrounding houses to make sure that the fire didn¡¯t spread.


    Once the fireman was sure that I was ok, he gave a hand signal and Eva and James were at my sides. I could tell that they¡¯d both been crying. Eva hugged me tightly and didn¡¯t let go. I hugged her back and I could feel that she was crying again. James stood there awkwardly for a second and then he hugged us both.


    ¡°What the hell did you think you were doing, Abby??!¡±, James yelled at me after a few moments. It¡¯s kind of funny how many people would ask me that question in the next few days and in exactly those words. ¡°You could have been killed!¡±.


    ¡°You¡¯re one to talk, James. You almost ran in after her. I could have lost you both.¡± Eva looked pissed off at both of us, as she angrily wiped tears from her eyes. James had the decency to look abashed, but I didn¡¯t. I knew I could get Mark out, as long as the house didn¡¯t collapse before I could get to him. Eva and James didn¡¯t know that though, so, muffled a little by the mask, I just said, ¡°I¡¯m fine, Eva. Not a scratch on me. I got in just before things got too bad in front. It wasn¡¯t so bad in the back of the house.¡±


    As if to put the lie to my words, a huge groan sounded from the house and the middle of the house fell in on itself. The influx of air to the newly opened areas of the house send the blaze roaring higher and causing the firefighters to move back from the intense heat.


    ¡°Holy shit! You were in there, Abby. Just a few minutes ago. You were in there.¡± Eva was starting to freak out, and I just held her and told her that I was fine until the second ambulance came and took me to the hospital. Eva was allowed to stay with me, while James raced off to find my dad in his workshop. I could have called him or asked James to call, but I asked James to go in person. I knew my dad. He¡¯d already lost me once and this news would hit him hard. James telling him in person that I was fine was way better than hearing it on the phone. Besides, this way James could ride with him to the hospital and dad could ask him questions on the way. Maybe by the time he got there, he¡¯s be calm enough not to kill me for running into a burning building. Maybe.

 A Hero

    Being brought into the hospital on a gurney was a totally different experience that my usual entry as a volunteer. It was kind of disorienting and confusing. I don¡¯t usually watch the ceiling tiles pass by and have nurses that I know checking my vitals. Pierce greeted me with a worried smile. He gripped my hand and asked if I was ok. I nodded and then he whispered in my ear, ¡°Your dad is going to flip out over this, you know that, right?¡± I nodded again and we shared a commiserating glance. We both remembered how panicked dad had been when I was nine and got the flu. My fever had spiked and wouldn¡¯t go down, so dad brought me in to see Pierce. Dad was not patient and methodical when it came to my health. He wanted to know everything, and he wanted answers right away. There was no ¡°the doctor knows best¡± attitude in him.


    ¡°Don¡¯t remind me. He¡¯s on his way. If you see him first, tell him I¡¯m ok, Pierce. I¡¯m just really tired.¡±


    To help calm dad down, I¡¯d had Eva call Uncle Magnum while we were still in the ambulance and ask him to come to the hospital as soon as he could. She¡¯d stressed that I was fine, but that dad wouldn¡¯t be. I heard him laugh at that, even though Eva didn¡¯t have him on speaker. When she¡¯d hung up, she said that he would be right over.


    ¡°I¡¯ll see if I can get you a private room. Maybe in the basement. That way the yelling won¡¯t disturb the other patients too much.¡± He smirked at me and I groaned, which caused him to laugh at me some more.


    ¡°I think that you¡¯re enjoying this too much, Pierce.¡±


    ¡°Yes I am, Abby. You did something wonderful, but really, really, stupid. You deserve to get yelled at and I¡¯m going to be there to watch the fireworks and enjoy every minute of it. Besides, this means that you won¡¯t be available for your shift tomorrow and I¡¯ll need to arrange for someone to replace you. I hope Eva can still come though.¡±


    ¡°Why can¡¯t I do my shift tomorrow? I¡¯ll be fine once I¡¯ve slept for a few hours.¡± I tried to cover my mouth as I yawned, only to be stopped by the breathing mask.


    With a dubious look on his face, he answered, ¡°We¡¯ll see how you¡¯re doing in the morning. In the meantime, let¡¯s get the rest of your vitals and have you checked over to be sure that nothing was missed on the way.¡±


    After that I was poked and prodded and asked to open my mouth and cough. They drew blood and even asked for me to pee in a cup. They were very thorough, but they were done by the time dad showed up and so there wasn¡¯t anyone there to distract him or calm him down. Well, Eva was there, but when she caught sight of him, she made for the door. Some friend. I saw James in the open doorway behind dad and he gave me a thumbs up gesture before taking Eva¡¯s hand and walking away. I really needed new friends. These two weren¡¯t any help at all.


    Dad stood there for a moment looking at me, making sure that I really was all in one piece. I looked up at him and then away. I couldn¡¯t look at him. He loved me so much and was worried about me. I almost felt like I¡¯d let him down, but he came over and hugged me and everything felt so much better. I started tearing up a little but managed to hold myself back from crying. That would only make him more worried.


    He slowly released me from his embrace and in a not too quiet voice asked, ¡°What the hell did you think you were doing, Abby??! Running into a burning building? Who does that? You know who does that? Firefighters do that! It¡¯s their job. It¡¯s what they train for and they go in with full protective gear and there¡¯s a team of them to help out if things go wrong. You¡¯re sixteen-year-old with no training at all and you went into a burning building alone and with no protective gear. What were you thinking? How can you put so little value on your own life?¡±


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    It only got worse from there. He brought up what my death would do to him and to Uncle Magnum, my grandparents, even to my friends. The guilt kept piling up. I wished that I could just sink into the bed and disappear and realized that I could. I could be in R1 in less than a second, but I held back. This was the price of keeping my abilities a secret from everyone and I was just going to have to pay it.


    A knock at the door saved me. I was expecting to see Uncle Magnum there and was surprised to see a stranger instead. He was tall, with broad shoulders, well dressed and looked to be in his mid-fifties. As I stared at him, I realized that he looked slightly familiar, but I couldn¡¯t place him.


    Dad had also turned around to see who was disturbing his tirade. He had been working himself up into quite a rant and the stranger threw him off.


    ¡°Hi. I¡¯m very sorry to disturb you. My name is Andrew McKenzie. I couldn¡¯t help but overhear your discussion.¡± Discussion. That was one word for it, but I¡¯d always felt that a discussion had at least two participants. He was interrupting a monologue or more correctly a rant. ¡°I wouldn¡¯t normally interrupt, but I just needed to thank Abby for saving my son¡¯s life.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s why you looked so familiar. You look just like Mark!¡±, I blurted out.


    He smiled like I¡¯d just complimented him. I suppose that I did. ¡°He¡¯s my eldest. How did you know his name? Are you his friend?¡±


    ¡°No. My friends and I saw smoke and we ran to see what was going on. When we got there, we saw someone being led out of the house and he said that Mark was still inside the house. That¡¯s why I know his name.¡±


    ¡°Oh, that¡¯s what he said. The video didn¡¯t pick that up.¡±


    ¡°The video?¡±, my dad and I asked in unison. Both of us were shocked. I suppose that I shouldn¡¯t have been, because I could remember seeing people with their phones out when I got to the burning house.


    ¡°Yes. There are quite a few of them up by now. Most are from the park across the street. The one I¡¯m referring to shows Jerry being led out and saying something and then a girl runs into the house. You Abby. You ran in and then there¡¯s nothing except the burning house. If I didn¡¯t know how it all ended, I¡¯d have sworn that there was no way you could survive that. A few minutes later, it shows you stumbling out from the side of the house with Mark over your shoulder. You looked too small to be able to carry him.¡±


    ¡°I know that you need your rest, so I won¡¯t keep you from it. I wanted to say thank you. Mark is doing fine. He¡¯s inhaled a lot of smoke and he¡¯s being treated for that, but the doctors say that he should be much better in a week. Given the fire, they¡¯re amazed that he wasn¡¯t burned. I hope that I can come visit you later with my wife. She¡¯s with him now. I¡¯m supposed to give you her thanks as well, for now.¡±


    Before he left, he shook dad¡¯s hand and thanked him too. I wanted to thank him for interrupting Dad¡¯s tirade, but I didn¡¯t think that it would be a good idea just now.


    Uncle Magnum walked in just as Mr. McKenzie was leaving. ¡°I¡¯d have been here earlier, but when I came in everyone was watching a video and I had to see what all the fuss was about.¡± He calmly said hi to dad and walked over to give me a hug. Then he let go and quietly asked, ¡°What the hell did you think you were doing, Abby??! That video was the scariest thing that I¡¯ve ever seen. I knew you were ok, but I was still sweating just from watching it.¡±


    ¡°Excuse me. I need to go watch a video.¡± Dad walked out the door and I knew that I¡¯d be grounded for at least a month when he got back. Pierce walked in as dad left and asked, ¡°It¡¯s over already? I was only away for ten minutes and I missed all the yelling?¡±.


    ¡°Stick around for a bit. Josh just stepped out to watch the video. Round two is about to start.¡± Uncle Magnum was not being very helpful.


    ¡°There¡¯s video? No way! I¡¯ll be right back.¡±, and then Pierce was gone as well.

 Back to Normal

    ¡°Uncle Magnum, I did a good thing. Why am I getting so much shit for it and why is everyone enjoying my pain?¡±.


    ¡°Because we love you and don¡¯t want to lose you.¡±


    ¡°Mark¡¯s parents felt that way about him. Wouldn¡¯t you want someone to come save me if I were in trouble. John helped save me years ago and he¡¯s a hero.¡±


    ¡°John was doing what he was trained for and he had backup. Also, I¡¯m pretty sure that he¡¯d get reamed out by his family for doing what you did.¡±


    I sighed and leaned back in my bed.


    ¡°Don¡¯t worry Abby. Once we all get past our fear of having almost lost you again, you¡¯ll see how proud we all are of you. I¡¯ll try to calm him down for round two.¡± He gave my hand a squeeze to reassure me.


    Another knock at the door and Eva and James came in, followed by Margaret. Uncle Magnum made quick introductions and explained that he was with Maggie when he got the call from Eva. My escapade had interrupted their picnic in the park.


    We avoided talking about the fire and instead talked for a bit about Maggie¡¯s upcoming trial Kung Fu class. Eva said that Maggie was going to love it while James shook his head and predicted that the only way she¡¯d enjoy it is if she was a masochist. Eva and I both laughed in agreement and Uncle Magnum scowled at all of us. We all agreed that I would teach her classes in the beginning. Uncle Magnum and Charles were too tough on new students. Their philosophy was that you should let new students get the real Kung Fu class experience. I believed that you should ease them into the true torture that is Kung Fu. Kind of like hooking someone on drugs. You start with the small stuff first. You don¡¯t start with Heroine. Hmmm. That¡¯s a truly awful comparison. I¡¯ll need to work on it.


    Somewhere the middle of our discussion, I fell asleep. Eva later told me how they all slipped quietly out of the room and were sitting outside when dad and Pierce came back. She said that they both looked shell-shocked from the video. Apparently, the house collapsing only two or three minutes after we got out really scared them.


    Falling asleep saved me from round two of yelling and by the time I woke up later that evening, the tension had eased. The nurse checked me over and the doctor came by to say that everything looked fine and they were only keeping me overnight for observation, as smoke inhalation symptoms could manifest over the next day or two. If I was still good in the morning, they¡¯d tell us what to watch out for and release me. The only thing wrong with me now was exhaustion and the doctor explained that I shouldn¡¯t exert myself for the next week and get plenty of sleep.


    Having just slept for hours, I expected to be up for half the night, but I fell asleep right after eating dinner and I didn¡¯t wake up until the next morning. Trying to get out of bed and go to the bathroom showed me that moving was not a good idea. My muscles were extremely sore from the strain of yesterday and I had to force myself to get up.


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    After using the bathroom, I eased my sore muscles with a good half hour of stretching. Dad and the doctor came in as I was finishing, and it took me five minutes to convince them that I felt fine now. With a deep sigh and a comment about youth being wasted on the young, the doctor signed my release forms and I went home to shower and change. My shift at the hospital started at one o''clock and I planned on making it in.


    Dad wasn¡¯t happy that I was going back to the hospital to do my shift, but he couldn¡¯t argue when I explained that if anything were to happen to me, then the hospital was the best place to be. He did insist on driving Eva and I over there, so we were a bit early and I had a chance to look in on Mark.


    As I walked to Mark¡¯s room, I was greeted by Mr. McKenzie. ¡°Abby! We tried to come see you last night, but you were asleep and then when we tried this morning, you were already gone. We were wondering how we were going to find you.¡± Mr. McKenzie gave me a quick hug and then introduced me to his wife Stacey and to his other children Connor and Rose.


    Stacey was a tall woman, at least 5¡¯10, and was as well dressed as her husband. Physically, they made a good match. She gave me a long embrace and thanked me with tears in her eyes. ¡°You saved Mark and I¡¯ll forever be grateful to you for that, but I watched that video and I feel very sorry for your parents. It was the bravest and the stupidest thing that I¡¯ve ever seen. Thank you!¡± She wiped her eyes and realized that her mascara had run on her. ¡°Oh damn. I keep doing that. I think I¡¯ll leave off the mascara for now.¡±


    Connor came up and shook my hand. I pegged him at 13 years old, by the peach fuzz on his face, but he was already taller than I was. He took after his mother in looks. When he spoke, his voice broke in places. ¡°Thanks for saving Mark. He¡¯s a good big brother. How¡¯d you manage to pick him up and walk with him. I saw it, but I couldn¡¯t believe it.¡± He looked awestruck.


    ¡°He was very heavy to carry, but there wasn¡¯t any choice. I¡¯ve got strong legs from my Kung Fu and my shoulders and arms have been strengthened by my blacksmithing.¡±


    Connor looked like he was going to ask a follow up question, but Rose stepped up at her father¡¯s urging and gave me a shy thank you before moving back to her father¡¯s side. She, at least, was normal sized, so far. At eight or nine years old, she hadn¡¯t hit her growth spurt yet.


    ¡°How¡¯s Mark doing today?¡±, I asked them. Mr. McKenzie said, ¡°The doctor says that he¡¯s doing well. He slept the night and he was alert. He didn¡¯t remember anything from the fire, except coughing himself awake and then blacking out. He watched the video and he really wants to meet you and thank you. Right now, though, he¡¯s asleep again. He gets tired quicker because breathing is still difficult for him.¡±


    ¡°Well, I can come back after my shift. I start in a few minutes and I¡¯ll be done at around six o¡¯clock.¡±


    ¡°I didn¡¯t know you worked here. What do you do?¡±, Stacey asked.


    ¡°My friend Eva and I volunteer here twice a month. We work with the pediatric cancer patients. We play games with them, or read them books, and try to keep up their spirits. Mostly we help their parents have an afternoon to run errands or spend time with their other children. Most Sundays, Eva runs a small fitness class for them. Very low impact, but it gets them moving. The kids seem to love it. She¡¯s really good with them.¡± Eva beamed at the praise and we left the family to continue with their waiting for Mark to get up.

 Magic

    Eva¡¯s fitness class was a big hit, as usual. The kids that participated had more color in their cheeks and seemed to be energized. When she¡¯d first suggested it last year, there was a lot of skepticism about it from the parents, but when Dr. Hodges showed them studies indicating that there were real benefits to the kids, even if they were varied, most of the parents signed their kids up.


    Afterwards, we played some group games like ¡®I spy¡¯ and Math Challenge. The hospital employees had chipped in to set up a prize box for the kids and we gave out prizes to the game winners. Sometimes we made up a contest, like Best Lyer-Downer or Most Somber, just to be able to give a kid a prize and cheer him or her up.


    Today, Evan, a seven-year-old boy that I¡¯d made friends with over the past few months, showed me his new magic set. He¡¯d won it from the prize box last week for Best Hair. The Mohawk wig that he¡¯d worn had us all in hysterics. The magic set had a top hat, cups, balls, string and an instruction booklet. Evan had been practicing all week and he showed me his tricks. He wasn¡¯t bad at all and I applauded every trick. When he asked me if I wanted to try it out, I stopped for a few seconds and thought about it. I could use my field to do things that professional magicians could only dream of, but I couldn¡¯t show that to anyone. However, nothing was stopping me from doing small magic. Stuff that the kids and the parents could explain away in their minds.


    ¡°I used to do some magic tricks when I was your age, Evan.¡±, I began. ¡°I can show you, if you¡¯d like.¡±


    He indicated that he¡¯d like with a vigorous nod of his head.


    ¡°Ok, but this magic was taught to me by my grandfather who learned it from his grandfather who learned it from an old swami that lived on the top of a mountain in Tibet and my grandfather made me promise to never tell anyone how I did the magic. I can show you the magic, but I can¡¯t teach it to you. Is that ok?¡± It was mysterious so of course it was.


    Sitting down on the floor in the play area, I said, ¡°Let¡¯s start with something simple. I¡¯ll need that top hat and a ball.¡± Both were supplied to me and I put the ball on the floor in front of me. ¡°Now, Evan I¡¯m going to ask you to put the hat over the ball.¡± He did it. ¡°Now stand back while I say the magic words, ¡°I Love Chocolate Chip Cookies!¡± and presto!¡±


    ¡°You didn¡¯t do anything, Abby.¡±, Evan complained.


    ¡°Sure I did. Look under the hat.¡± He did and the ball wasn¡¯t there. I had put a field around it and sent it into R1. The look of complete awe on his face was priceless.


    ¡°You didn¡¯t even touch the ball or the hat. How¡¯d you do that?¡±


    ¡°Remember, I promised my grandfather that I would never tell anyone the secrets of the swami from Tibet.¡±


    ¡°Can you make it come back?¡±, he asked, and I told him to put the hat back on the floor where it was before. I walked around the hat and pretended to think. I asked him to move the hat over a bit to the right and then back an inch to the left. When it was just over where the ball was I told him to stop and I said the magic words again and brought the ball back to reality with a lot of hand waving and finger flourishes.


    Evan¡¯s delight at seeing the ball when he lifted the hat was something that I¡¯ll always treasure. I spent the next hour doing all sorts of tricks for him and for the other kids. I had quite the crowd by the time the parents started coming back and the shift ended. Eva joined me and we both signed out of the ward.


    ¡°Abby, I¡¯ve never seen you do magic before. Where did you learn to do that?¡±, Eva asked me with genuine curiosity.


    ¡°Well, my grandfather¡¯s grandfather met a swami in Tibet.¡±


    ¡°Don¡¯t give me that bull. I¡¯m not seven. Those tricks you did were amazing. I can¡¯t figure out how you did any of them. Most of the time you weren¡¯t even near the trick. You should go on America¡¯s Got Talent. If you could make the tricks bigger, you¡¯d win the million dollars for sure.¡±


    ¡°Nah, Simon doesn¡¯t like magicians. If only I could sing. Then he¡¯d love me.¡± Using my best southern drawl, I broke out into ¡°Buy me a Boat¡± by Chris Janson. She joined me at the chorus, and we sang all the way to Mark¡¯s room.


    Connor was waiting outside Mark¡¯s door when we got to his floor and he saw us coming down the hall. He ran over to us and gave us the rundown on Mark. He was awake and doing great. Everyone was in the room and it was boring, so he decided to sit outside for a bit. There wasn¡¯t cell phone coverage in this area, so he was stuck playing off-line games that he had on his phone, like Crossy Road. As usual with 13-year-old boys, you either got too much information or not enough. This was definitely the former.


    When we got to the room, Connor barged in without knocking and formally announced us. ¡°Mark! Abby¡¯s here with her friend from the video.¡± Turning back to Eva, he asked, ¡°What¡¯s your name?¡± The room felt like it was packed with people, but there were only five people in it besides Mark and us. Mr. and Mrs. McKenzie were there with Rose and two other men that looked to be Mark¡¯s age.


    ¡°Connor, this is Eva. Eva this is Connor, Mark¡¯s brother.¡± I introduced her to Mark¡¯s parents and got introduced to Jerry and Steven, Mark¡¯s now ex-roommates. As Stacey took a step away after giving me a quick embrace, I saw Mark and gave him a little wave.


    ¡°And I¡¯m Mark. It¡¯s really great to meet you, Abby. Thank you for saving me.¡± With him not being unconscious this time, I could see his blue eyes and his ready smile.


    ¡°No problem. Although, I would have preferred if you¡¯d supplied a wagon or a cart to carry you in. You¡¯re very heavy.¡±


    Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.


    Everyone laughed and spent a few minutes talking about the fire. They weren¡¯t sure exactly what caused it yet, but it definitely started in the kitchen where Jerry was cooking lunch. Right now, they suspected some sort of electrical fault. With the house being so old and made of mostly wood, the small fire spread too quickly to be contained. Jerry told us that the house had burned almost completely to the ground and there didn¡¯t seem to be anything to salvage.


    Mr. McKenzie, who insisted that I call him Andrew, said, ¡°I¡¯ll got have a look tomorrow anyways, if the university and their insurance company will let me. I¡¯m still hopeful that we can find Grandma Nancy¡¯s pendant. The setting might be damaged, but the diamond would only need to be polished.¡±


    Stacey explained that Jake, Mark¡¯s grandfather, was in mining and he put the first diamond that he ever mined in a pendant for his wife, Nancy, and she wore it for over 40 years before she passed away last year. Mark was supposed to take the pendant to a local jeweler to have it set in a bracelet and they were going to present it to Jake next month for his birthday.


    ¡°Well, if you¡¯d like some help, I¡¯d be happy to meet you there after school tomorrow.¡±, I offered.


    ¡°That¡¯s very kind of you, Abby, but I¡¯m not even sure if I¡¯ll be allowed to yet. I have to contact the university first and figure out who to speak with. Even if I do get permission, I can¡¯t ask you to come help after all you¡¯ve already done.¡±


    ¡°You didn¡¯t ask. I offered. As to permission, give me a minute.¡± I pulled out my phone and searched my contacts for Harry. Dad and I usually saw Harry once a month for dinner and I rarely spoke to him on the phone. Lately though, he¡¯s called me a few times regarding my ¡®post secondary educational career¡¯. I hadn¡¯t had the heart to tell him that I wasn¡¯t really interested in going to college anymore and even if I did, the idea of school as a career was not for me. I was forming other plans.


    ¡°Hi Harry, it¡¯s Abby.¡±


    Harry¡¯s, ¡°What the hell did you think you were doing, Abby?¡± could easily be heard by everyone in the room, even though I didn¡¯t have him on speaker. I held the phone a bit farther from my ear as he launched into his own version of dad¡¯s rant. I looked around and saw that most everyone in the room was covering up smiles and trying hard not to laugh. Connor failed miserably.


    I broke into Harry¡¯s harangue, ¡°Harry. Dad already gave me the speech and you can give it to me again later. I called because I¡¯m with the McKenzie¡¯s right now and Mr. McKenzie wants to go to Mark¡¯s place tomorrow to look through it for something. Is that possible to arrange?¡±


    I listened to Harry and then handed my phone to Andrew. ¡°He wants to speak with you.¡± Andrew took the phone with a puzzled expression on his face and walked out of the room to speak with Harry.


    Mark asked, ¡°Who¡¯s Harry?¡±


    Eva piped up, a wicked grin on her face, ¡°You should know him Mark. Although you would usually refer to him as Mr. Kronin or Dean Kronin.¡±


    ¡°You know Dean Kronin? That man is intense. He does some of the interviews with likely incoming applicants. I¡¯ve never been so terrified in my life. I was sweating like I¡¯d just run a marathon.¡± Jerry shuddered at the memory.


    ¡°Harry and my dad have known each other for years. When he became the dean, he came over and offered dad a job.¡± I didn¡¯t want to get into how Harry had been mom¡¯s boss because then there¡¯d be all those questions about mom.


    Andrew came back in and handed me back my phone. ¡°Well, we¡¯re all set for tomorrow afternoon, if you¡¯re still game to go. The fire department has already cleared the site as safe to inspect, since there''s not much left, and the insurance people should be out of there by tomorrow morning. Campus security will be informed that it¡¯s ok for us to look around for a bit. Harry said that he¡¯d take care of everything.¡±


    Stacey looked at her husband skeptically and asked, ¡°Harry, huh? You¡¯re on a first name basis with the Dean of the university now?¡±.


    Andrew gave her a bewildered look. ¡°Harry¡¯s not the dean of the university. The dean is Mr. Kronin. Dad¡¯s known him for years, but I¡¯ve never met him. I think Harry¡¯s one of their building supervisors.¡±


    Eva sputtered and I turned red in embarrassment. ¡°I¡¯m sorry Andrew. I should have introduced you properly before I handed you the phone. That was Harry Kronin, the dean.¡±


    Andrew paused for a few seconds and then turned back to his wife and said, ¡°Oh. In that case Stacey, I guess I am on a first name basis with the dean of the university.¡±


    Shortly after that a nurse came in and kicked everyone out. I set up a meeting time with Andrew for tomorrow and Eva and I made our farewells.


    As we rode down the elevator, Eva commented, ¡°Mark¡¯s hot. You didn¡¯t happen to notice that did you? I¡¯m only asking because you left that part out when you gave me play by play of the rescue.¡±


    ¡°He¡¯s kind of cute, I guess.¡± Disinterested nonchalance was what I was going for. I think I pulled it off.


    ¡°Uh huh. Right. You¡¯re not pulling off the indifference very well.¡±


    Ok. I didn¡¯t pull it off. ¡°How did you know I was thinking that?¡±, I asked.


    ¡°Because I know you. He¡¯s your type.¡±


    ¡°I have a type?¡± We got off the elevator and walked towards the exit.


    ¡°Yes. Tall, dark hair, blue eyes. Kind of like that guy over there in the black hoodie.¡± Eva indicated with her chin and I turned my head to look at the guy just as he saw me and said, ¡°Hi Abby! How are you feeling?¡±.


    Eva gave me a ¡®How the hell do you know this guy?¡¯ look.


    ¡°Hey Tyler! I¡¯m fine, thanks. How about you?¡± I could see Eva¡¯s eyebrows rise as she connected Tyler with the stories that I told her this summer.


    ¡°I¡¯m not the one running into burning buildings and saving random strangers. I was shocked when I came to see you this morning that you had already been released. Seriously, what the hell did you think you were doing?¡±


    ¡°Why does everyone keep asking me that question? I thought that helping people was a socially acceptable activity, but when you actually do it, you get yelled at.¡± I sighed dramatically and tried to look put out by the whole affair. They didn¡¯t buy it. They just laughed at me.


    ¡°If you came this morning, why are you back now?¡±, Eva asked him once I¡¯d introduced them.


    ¡°One of the nurses said that Abby would probably be back for her regular volunteering shift and that she got off right around now. I wanted to make sure that she was ok.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m ok. Really. Not a scratch on me.¡± I pirouetted around so he¡¯d see that I had no injuries anywhere. ¡°But I really do appreciate that you cared enough to come check up on me. Twice.¡±


    ¡°Well, it was either catch you here or ask your dad about you in class and I really didn¡¯t want to do that. I don¡¯t think he likes me very much. Not that I blame him, after how I treated you.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s all in the past. You apologized. I¡¯m sure that he¡¯s forgotten all about it.¡±


    ¡°I guess I¡¯ll find out tomorrow when classes start.¡± He looked at his watch and said, ¡°I¡¯m glad you¡¯re alright, Abby. What you did was amazing, but please don¡¯t do it again. It was nice to meet you, Eva.¡±


    ¡°Where are you off too? Big family goodbye dinner?¡±, Eva asked.


    ¡°I¡¯m just off on my run. I like to keep to a set schedule, if I can.¡± He¡¯d ignored the question about his family, but I wasn¡¯t going to press him. I know that family questions can sometimes be hard to answer.


    ¡°You¡¯re on fire today, Abby. First Mark and now Tyler. Hot and hotter. Did you notice Tyler¡¯s muscles?¡± Eva was enjoying herself and I decided to join her in the fun.


    ¡°I did mention to you that Tyler was cute.¡±


    ¡°If that¡¯s cute, I¡¯d really like to see the guy you think is hot.¡± Eva continued to point out Tyler¡¯s interesting features as we made our way home.

 Diamond Hunting

    Tyler¡¯s comment about dad not liking him reminded me about the day that Tyler had challenged dad about my qualifications to work as a teaching assistant and how it all came about because of my ability to use the field to detect metals. Besides looking for impurities in the metals for dad¡¯s forges, I hadn¡¯t really thought about what other positive uses this ability could be put to. Now I had an idea.


    A few years ago, dad had presented me with mom¡¯s jewelry box. She was never into wearing much jewelry, but over the years she¡¯d collected quite a few pieces as gifts. I¡¯m not sure if dad gave me the jewelry box because he always intended to when I go old enough or because he finally came to terms with the fact that mom wasn¡¯t coming back. Either way, the box was in my dresser and I went there to find mom¡¯s engagement ring. Mom always wore her wedding band and it disappeared along with her, but her diamond engagement ring was only put on for social occasions with friends or family and so it was in the box when she disappeared.


    Taking out the ring from its resting place in the box, I held it in my hand and admired it for awhile. I¡¯d always loved this ring and it brought back one of my few memories of mom; both of us lying down on her bed after a big family dinner, with her telling me a story and me leaning on her and playing with her hand, twisting the rings around her fingers. I¡¯d felt so happy; so secure. Mom and I were taken not long after that.


    I sent out a field to surround the ring and took in the information that it sent to me. The gold was a new metal for me, as the inventory room at the school didn¡¯t have any in it. The really expensive metals were used sparingly and were kept locked up tightly in a safe somewhere. I focused on the gold and made sure that I could recognize it easily before moving on to the diamond. The diamond had a different feel from the metals. My mind interpreted it as a smoothness. It was very easy to recognize.


    Wrapping a field around the whole jewelry box, I looked to see what metals I could recognize. I wanted to see I could find other diamonds, without using my eyes. Not all of mom¡¯s jewelry was real and I detected some iron, copper, bronze and brass, along with more gold. I could feel mom¡¯s diamond earrings in the right-hand corner of the bottom drawer of the jewelry box. The earrings were a high-school graduation present from her parents.


    There were also materials that I didn¡¯t recognize, so I brought the box down to my floor and took out all of the pieces, laying them out neatly side by side. I examined each carefully with my eyes and the field. Some of the stones, I recognized, like a ruby and an emerald, but others I had to look up on my phone. Only when I looked up the other stones, I found that what I thought were a ruby and an emerald might not actually be those stones. It seemed like a red gemstone could also be a sapphire or a garnet. A green one could also be something called a chrome diopside. Using the app, I could see that were dozens of gemstones that I¡¯d never even heard of.


    I made a mental note to see if the mineralogy department at the school had a collection of gemstones that I could study. I was also curious to see if the field could tell the difference between good and bad quality gemstones. If they didn¡¯t have a good enough collection, I had a few artist friends who could point me in the right direction.


    Before putting the box away, I added silver to my detection list, along with pearls, freshwater pearls and what I was pretty sure was colored glass.


    Dad and I watched an old movie on Netflix after dinner that night and I went to bed right after. Movies weren¡¯t dad¡¯s thing, but Dad was in extra protective mode because of the fire. I was still tired and a bit achy from the day before and I didn¡¯t have any trouble falling asleep.


    School the next day was awful. I woke up feeling good, the soreness from the day before was gone and I felt energized. It had been one hell of a weekend and I was looking forward to the soothing drone of the teachers¡¯ voices lulling me to sleep and to quietly hanging out with Eva and James at lunch. With school only just having started last week, there was nothing to stress out about.


    The problem started almost as soon as I finished locking up my bike and it didn¡¯t stop all day. Everywhere I went, people were there telling me how brave I was or how stupid I¡¯d been or wanting a detailed accounting of what happened inside the house. Even the teachers couldn¡¯t let it go. Every single one of them brought it up in class and talked about my heroism being an example to blah blah blah. A little praise is nice. A lot of praise can be mortifying. I was sure that everyone would be sick of me by the end of the day. Hell, even I was sick of me. But they weren¡¯t and I got the full hero treatment even as I rode off to meet Andrew. I really hoped that things calmed down by tomorrow. I couldn¡¯t take much more of this. Note to self: If you ever feel the need to save someone, made damn sure that it¡¯s not caught on camera.


    I pulled up in front of Mark¡¯s burned-out house. It wasn¡¯t really a house anymore, more like a heap of ashes and debris. The whole yard had been cordoned off and I could see one lonely figure walking around, sifting through the remnants. I called out my greeting and asked him how it was going. As I got closer, it was obvious that it wasn¡¯t going well. Andrew was filthy. He had come ready to get dirty in a pair of old jeans and an oversized blue t-shirt, but it seemed that he had underestimated the task.


    You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.


    ¡°Hi Abby. As you can see, it¡¯s not going well. I thought I¡¯d get here early and get a head start, but I haven¡¯t made much progress.¡± He looked dejected. ¡°I brought some old sifting equipment that I had at home and I¡¯ve been using it, but it¡¯s slow going. I haven¡¯t done any real mining, surface or otherwise, since I was Mark¡¯s age. I remember it being more fun and exciting that this.¡±


    As he spoke, we moved back to the area where he¡¯d been working. He was being methodical and had make a grid pattern to differentiate between places that had been searched already and those still not searched yet. He was being too critical of his efforts. He¡¯d already gone through quite a lot of debris. Unfortunately, what he¡¯d done was only a small portion of the house.


    ¡°Are you sure that you¡¯ve been looking in the right area?¡±


    ¡°Actually, I¡¯m not sure at all. I hadn¡¯t been to Mark¡¯s place before. Last year he was in the dorms when I visited him. He only moved into this house a few weeks ago. I asked Mark where his room had been and I worked it out from his instructions.¡±


    ¡°Hmm. The front door was right in front of the path and once I was inside the stairs going up were most of the way to the back and to the left.¡± I talked as I retraced my steps from Saturday. ¡°I went up the steps and checked out the three bedrooms before I passed the bathroom and the closet and got to Mark¡¯s door. His room was the last one on the end and it faced the back of the house.¡± I stood in the middle of what would have Mark¡¯s room one floor above and asked Andrew, ¡°Did Mark mention where he kept the pendant.¡±


    ¡°He says that he left it on his nightstand, closer to the window.¡±


    I moved to where I pictured the middle of the bed would have been and extended my field out in a bubble around me. I gathered in all the information from the field and tried to find the diamond in the pendant. Hah! There it was, about five and a half feet away from me and buried under the debris from what I assumed was the roof. It was only about two feet from where the nightstand would have been. It must have hit something or slid down off of the nightstand when the floor collapsed. Now the hard part was figuring out how to find the diamond quickly without making Andrew suspicious. I needed some logical reasoning for looking there.


    ¡°I¡¯m standing around where the bed was. If I walk two steps forward and to the left, I should be where the nightstand was.¡± I took the steps, but I cheated a bit and brought myself closer to the pendant¡¯s location. Now I was only a foot away. ¡°If you¡¯ll pass me the sifter, I¡¯d like to try this area. It should be right around here.¡±


    Andrew handed me the sifter and a trowel, a small gardening shovel. As I bend down, I cheated again and moved myself a few inches closer to the ring and started scooping right next to it. I sifted through the first few trowelfuls and scooped up some more. This time I nabbed the pendant. I had intended to take at least fifteen minutes to find it, but this was really dirty work and I didn¡¯t want to ruin my clothes.


    ¡°Is this it, Andrew?¡±, I was going for innocent naivete. I held up the pendant for him to see. The silver had been charred by the fire. I had expected it to have melted, but I guess the fire wasn¡¯t hot enough for that. Well, it seemed plenty hot to me, so maybe something had protected it. Regardless, the diamond looked fine, if in need of some polishing.


    ¡°Yes!¡±, he shouted excitedly. He came over and took the pendant from me. He held it up to the light to check it for damage. ¡°That¡¯s incredible. You found it in two minutes. I¡¯ve been here for hours, digging in the wrong place.¡±


    ¡°Well, I¡¯d seen the room before, so I had a better idea of where to look.¡±


    Andrew was shaking his head in wonder. ¡°I should have waited for you. I¡¯d have saved all that time and I wouldn¡¯t need a two-hour shower now. Thank you, Abby. You¡¯re amazing.¡±


    I didn¡¯t know what to say to that so I just thanked him and changed the subject, ¡°If you haven¡¯t chosen a place to take it to be reset, I can recommend a few local artists that I work with. They make all sort of jewelry, most of it silver, but they work with other metals too. They can work fast, if you need it.¡±


    ¡°That would be great, Abby. I only need the bracelet in about three weeks. Jake is out of town, touring our mining interests in Europe. He¡¯d have been here to see Mark otherwise. Those two are very close. They share a love of mining that I never seemed to find. I guess it skipped a generation. Jake sees Mark as the future of the company.¡± I could tell that Andrew wasn¡¯t rueful when he said it. He was proud of this son and he was genuinely happy for him.


    Andrew grabbed his sifting equipment and we walked out of the house remains. My head was feeling funny and I had trouble focusing properly, but I managed to send Andrew Angela Fiori¡¯s contact number and gave him two backup artists, in case she was too busy to make the bracelet in time. The disorientation was getting worse by the second.


    What was wrong with me all of a sudden? I was fine a few minutes ago and now I was feeling disoriented. I took a deep breath and concentrated on the feeling. What was causing it? My brain was getting overloaded with strange information that I didn¡¯t understand, and it was trying unsuccessfully to make sense of it. I reached my bike and got on it, my brain trying to puzzle out what was happening. Andrew continued walking towards his car and the information seemed to move with him. That¡¯s when I realized that I still had the extended field around me and that it had been reading Andrew this whole time. Holy crap. I brought the field in and the information flow stopped, and the feeling of disorientation disappeared immediately. I¡¯d never had the field extended with people around, except for a few minutes around Mark during the fire and I doubt that I would have noticed any information coming in right then, as I was a tad busy. I remembered getting a headache when I brought him into R1 with me. I thought that it was just the strain of having another person in R1 with me or the pressure of being in the middle of a burning house. It seemed like the field could get a lot of information about a person, but it was like someone was yelling at me in a foreign language and I¡¯d need to learn how to interpret that language, or it would drive me nuts.


    Andrew didn¡¯t notice my brain freeze and he packed his car and drove off with a smile and a wave. I stayed sitting on my bike for another minute, considering the implications of being able to read people. What did that even mean? With metals I could feel what they were composed of. Would I start getting a sense of what people were made of? Would the field interpret people¡¯s thoughts as well?

 New Abilities

    Over the next week everyone at school calmed down with the whole hero madness and things went back to normal. Dad and I had turned down dozens of interview requests from news organization all over the country. The late-night talk shows were the pushiest but invoking my status as a minor really helped in getting them all to back off. I just wanted all the attention to go away.


    People were still noticing me more than I liked, but even that would fade away with time. I was really hoping that the Friday night football game against Northfield would put some new people in the limelight and let me fade away completely. I was tempted to ask Bobby if he¡¯d managed to get the playbook to his coach and if they were going to use it, but I had enough to deal with. They¡¯d either work with it or they wouldn¡¯t. I already had the information that I wanted from Bobby and I should be able to put my plan with him in motion next week, after the big game.


    In the meantime, I¡¯d made a lot of progress over the past months in terms of how long I could hold the field and in extending the field to other objects, but I know knew that it could do a lot more. There were other levels to this ability and now that I was much better with it, it was time to find out if I was good enough to get into those levels.


    The ¡®bus incident¡¯ showed me that I could go to a place without people, a place without people or cars and to a place without people or cars or buildings. These places weren¡¯t just places where I could go through things, rather these were places where those people or things didn¡¯t even exist. Each of these places was like a different layer of reality. Each time you peeled back a layer, something disappeared.


    From what I could piece together, when I moved into R1, I wasn¡¯t really going into any of those layers. I was kind of at a half-way point between reality and that layer. For example, R1 connected me to the place where there were no people and no cars or buses, but I wasn¡¯t actually there since I could still see those things, only greyed out. It was more like the field created a bubble of that level in normal reality. That was why I could pass right through people and moving objects, but not buildings. In the level I was accessing, buildings still exist, so I couldn¡¯t go through them. If I was right about this and I could find a way to access the other levels, then I¡¯d probably have to rename R1 to R2. The level without people would be R1. The level without buildings would be R3.


    Damn, it was actually even more complicated than that, since I wasn¡¯t going into those realities, but only a bubble of those realities or a sub-reality. In that case, I was going into Sub Reality 2 (SR2). If I found a way to go to R1 where there are no people, but I was still in reality, then I¡¯d be in SR1.


    This was entirely too confusing and complicated. I¡¯d figure out the naming of things later. Right now, I wanted to see if I could move into different bubbles of reality. The really important one for me was to get into the place with no people, but where cars or buses still existed. If I could do that, then I could ride in cars or even planes, completely unseen and without falling through them. I could sit in chairs or lie down on a bed because they existed in both reality and in R1.


    Sitting on floor of my room, I picked up the book that I was currently reading, Blue Moon by Lee Child. I had considered doing the test by sitting in a chair, but every mistake would mean that I fell to the floor. It was much simpler to have the book fall through me to the floor if my experiments failed. I placed a field around the book and turned on both my field and the book¡¯s field. Now we were both in what I was hoping I¡¯d be able to call R2 shortly, namely no people and no moving objects. I wanted to get to just the ¡®no people¡¯ layer.


    A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.


    It seemed weird to me that although there seemed to be a progression from one layer to the next, I had apparently started off by skipping layer one and going straight to layer two. I decided that I was using too much power to get into the first sub-layer and not enough to get into the third sub-layer. It would take more finesse to get into the first sub-layer. I was guessing that I had to dial down the power, almost like a dimmer for a light switch. A second possibility was that I was on a specific channel of power to get into R2 and that I needed to switch channels to get to R1 and R3. I was betting that the dimmer switch theory was the one that would prove to be true, since it matched up better with what happened during the ¡®bus incident¡¯, where I saw a gradual transition from one layer to the next, without any pauses or abrupt channel changes.


    With a dimmer switch in mind, I focused on the field surrounding the book and concentrated on what I felt from the book field as I turned it off. The transition was too fast for me to get any useful information or feelings and the book fell through my hand and tumbled on the floor. Next, I tried it the other way to see if I could catch what was happening when I turned it on. Still nothing. It was too fast. The field was either on or off and it happened at the speed of thought. There was no way to feel what was happening. This was a dead end. What else could I try? How could I turn the field on with less power?


    I thought about the different things that I could do with my field. I could turn it on or off to get me into R2. I could create other fields to take things or people with me into R2. The field gave me information about things inside the field and about pressure on the field itself. Finally, I could create a second field around me. This field could be expanded outwards or contracted inwards. So far, this aspect was the only thing that I was doing that called for a change in power. I needed more power to expand the field and I used less when I contracted it. How was I doing that? Maybe I could do the same thing with my field to change between the sub-layers of reality.


    For the next half hour, I expanded and contracted a second field around me, concentrating on what I was doing as I pushed out more power to make the field bigger and pulled back power to make it smaller. I worked on pulling the second field closer and closer to the first, in minute increments, until they were almost touching. The exercise let me re-master this technique, with more understanding this time.


    I turned my own field on, shifted to R2, and then scaled back the power that I was feeding it to stay turned on. I was only able to scale it back once. As I tried to scale it back a second time, the field turned off. I turned the field back on and scaled it back just once. It felt lighter, but not in a physical sense. The smaller power requirement just seemed to make the field easier to hold. I walked over to the chair and put my hand on it and it didn¡¯t pass through the chair. Success! This was so exciting that I jumped up on my bed and I didn¡¯t fall through. My bed was in reality, but it also existed in wherever R1 was, so I didn¡¯t fall through it. Since I was in (the newly renamed) R1, I was being held up by the R1 bed. I was surprised though that the bed didn¡¯t move at all. I couldn¡¯t bounce on it. It, and the blankets and pillows, were as solid as rocks and I couldn¡¯t move them. I returned to reality and lay on my soft, comfortable bed. I¡¯d worry about the rock-hard bed later. Future me would need to figure it out. Right now, I was just going to enjoy the moment.


    This was one of the last three obstacles to my goal for my new foundation. Being able to travel without being detected was a key point. Access the new R1 meant that I could get on a plane and not fall through it. It meant that I could take the bus or the train, without having to even buy a ticket. Technically, I wasn¡¯t taking a seat so there was no need to buy a ticket. I could show up at the airport and board any plane, going anywhere. I could bypass security and I didn¡¯t have to show anyone my passport. No one could track where I went. This would make traveling so much easier.

 At the Batting Cage

    The next morning, I shifted into R1 and left the house to catch the bus to school. It was surreal walking right through people as I got on the bus and sitting down in a seat that was already occupied by a woman wearing a business suit and headphones. As the bus moved along, I found that I liked the idea of occupying the same space as someone else less and less. Her constant movement, slight though they were, kept distracting my thoughts. I decided that I would try to avoid sitting ¡®with¡¯ someone again, unless there were no other chairs available.


    When my stop came, I stood up, shifted to R2 and fell right through the bus. This time, I had planned for it by bracing my legs like I was coming down from a jump and my knees flexed to absorb the shock. Not falling on my butt really made me feel like I was finally getting a real handle on my abilities.


    The bus moved away, and I made my way to school, where I shifted back to reality in one of the girl¡¯s bathroom stalls.


    Today was Friday and tonight was the big game against Northfield High. Everyone was talking about it and I was virtually ignored. It was wonderful. Fame was way overrated. At lunch I sat with Eva and James, as usual, and we discussed some minor stock trades that James wanted to do. I wasn¡¯t going to join in for this series of trades, as I hadn¡¯t been paying much attention to the stock market this week. Besides, I wanted to wait for the next quarterly report season to get back into it and that was still a month away.


    Before lunch ended, I did manage to get Eva and James to agree to join me at Uncle Magnum¡¯s next Wednesday for a Kung Fu class. James didn¡¯t want to, but I told him that there¡¯d be a surprise for him if he gave it shot. Under pressure from both Eva and I, he had no chance and he grudgingly agreed. Eva pushed him extra hard, because I told her that the surprise would only be there if they both showed up. I knew that Eva would hound me for the next six days to try to find out what it was, but there was no way that she¡¯d get anything out of me this time.


    Saturday morning, I was up early. After leaving a note for dad about going out for a bike ride, I grabbed my bike, shifted both myself and the bike into R1, and made my way to the bus stop. I¡¯d timed it well and got there just in time for the bus to show up. Unfortunately, no one else was at the stop and the bus just kept going. Shit! I hadn¡¯t thought of that. The driver wouldn¡¯t stop if he didn¡¯t see anyone waiting. I quickly shifted the bike and myself into R2 and chased after the bus. The bus was faster, but I didn¡¯t have to stop for cars or for traffic lights, so I was able to catch up two stops later. That stop had two people waiting and I had enough time to shift back to R1 and carry the bike onto the bus.


    I rode the bus to its closest stop to the edge of the park that had the batting cage and I biked the rest of the way. It was still a five-minute bike ride to get there because the batting cage was at the other end of the park.


    It wasn¡¯t even seven in the morning and, as I¡¯d planned, I was the only one there. I definitely didn¡¯t want anyone to see the things that I wanted to try out. Hopefully, my morning experiments would be done by the time someone else showed up. With that in mind, I quickly entered the batting cage and fed my coins into the pitching machine controller. I stood watching the first few pitches and tried to envision what I wanted to do with my fields.


    I was here to continue to work on my automatic defenses. I¡¯d worked on them weeks ago, right before I¡¯d accidentally sent out my first extended field to protect myself from Uncle Magnum¡¯s hit. I¡¯d stabbed a book and tried to make the field automatically shift the knife into R2 when a certain amount of pressure was applied to the field surrounding the book. I never did get it right and I¡¯d succeeded only in so far as I¡¯d been able to envelope the knife, but only after it pierced the book. Getting stabbed wasn¡¯t my idea of a great defense.


    I¡¯d thought about the problem for weeks and couldn¡¯t come up with a plan on how to turn a field on automatically. Eventually, it occurred to me that maybe I wasn¡¯t being clear enough with what needed in terms of defense. What was I really trying to accomplish? I wanted a field that could protect me from unexpected violence, whether it was from a bullet or a knife. The field had to protect me automatically, because even if I was aware that a bullet was heading towards me, I wasn¡¯t fast enough to stop it. There didn¡¯t seem to be a way that I could instruct the field in what I wanted. It wasn¡¯t a computer program where I could create an ¡°if/then¡± statement such as, ¡®if the field senses something coming at me very fast or it that something is sharp, then surround whatever it is in a field and send it into R2¡¯. I could do a lot of things with the field, but I instructing it to act on its own wasn¡¯t one of them.


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    If I needed the field to act as a shield, I¡¯d need to turn it into shield and hold it up. All the time. How to do that was the problem. My original thought was to use multiple fields, with the inner field turning on once the outer field felt enough pressure. That wasn¡¯t going to happen, since the field couldn¡¯t decide on how much pressure was ¡®enough¡¯. Also, an object entering the field didn¡¯t create any actual pressure, only information that I interpreted as such. But what if I could create some sort of a trap? Once set, a trap would just sit there until it was tripped. It didn¡¯t require any thought or further action. That¡¯s what I needed for my shield. All I needed to do was set it up and hold it. The rest would happen on its own.


    One key aspect to all this was that I needed to stay in reality while all this was going on. Keeping my ability a secret was paramount, so I couldn¡¯t be seen disappearing into thin air whenever I was attacked. Another reason to stay in reality when I¡¯m unexpectedly attacked was that it would also really suck if I were to send the bullet into R2 while at the same time sending myself there as well.


    My solution was to use multiple fields and create an R2 zone between them. Anything passing through that field would automatically be sent into R2.


    Layering those fields was the tricky part. I¡¯d worked with two fields before, the one that always surrounds me, my ¡®base field¡¯ and another that I projected away from my body, my ¡®projected field¡¯. However, to make my shield work, I reasoned that I¡¯d need an additional field, my ¡®second projected field¡¯. I had two reasons for this. First, I wasn¡¯t able to turn on my personal field at the same time as my extended field. I think that I¡¯d be able to once I got stronger, but to date I hadn¡¯t succeeded at it. Second, due to not being able to turn on both fields at once, turning the outer field on to R2 would also send me into R2 and that was a big no-no. I reasoned that a third field would need to be set up about a foot inside the second field. This third field would be set to reality. What I was hoping would happen is that I¡¯d create a reality sandwich with a creamy R2 filling.


    Here''s what was supposed to happen. A bullet would be screaming towards me in reality. It would enter my outermost field that was set to R2 and shift to R2. My innermost field, set to reality, would not exist in R2 and so the bullet couldn¡¯t come back into reality. That innermost field would also ensure that I stayed in reality, despite the outermost field being set to R2.


    If this worked, then I¡¯d only have two worries. One, holding two projected fields was going to be tough. Two, how does this help me with a knife attack? In addition, I needed to see if I could even have two projected fields on at the same time. One base field and one projected field didn''t work, but I was hoping that the projected field was sufficiently different than the base field.


    I suppose that the first worry would take care of itself with practice. It would probably take months or even a year to be able to hold the shield for all the time, but I wasn¡¯t in a rush. The second worry I didn¡¯t know how to resolve, but I figured that once the shield was up, it would give me a warning of anyone trying to sneak up on me. That would have to be good enough for now.


    With the worries put aside, it was time to see if my shield idea would work.


    I stepped up to the plate, as if I was actually going to hit the ball. That wasn¡¯t in my plans for today. I didn¡¯t even bring a bat. However, I figured that holding a third shield would be difficult and keeping it closer to my body would allow me to keep it going for longer. I set up the outer field easily enough and then added the inner field. Finally, I turned the two fields on so that I had my R2 layer.


    As expected, the strain was significant. I didn¡¯t think that I could hold them both for more than ten seconds. I¡¯d need to work on that. Eventually, I hoped that I could get good enough to create the shield as a whole and project both fields simultaneously and already turned on.


    The pitching machine did its job and I saw the ball coming towards me. I watched the ball disappear at the same time as I felt the ball enter the R2 field. The ball sailed past me and without a cage in R2, it kept going and going. Yes! My shield worked, but also, Ugh!! I was going to have to chase down the ball later and bring it back. With another pitch about to come, I changed my R2 field to and R1 field, so that the cage in R1 would stop the ball.


    I kept at it, working to extend the shield further and further from my body. Ideally, I¡¯d be able to keep the shield at least a few feet from my body and be able to hold it all day. For now, I was just happy that I could keep it a foot away and keep it up for twelve seconds. The only drawback was that those pitches would coming in awfully close to my body and I flinched at every pitch, expecting it to hit me. It took me longer than I¡¯d like to admit to get over that instinct.


    Twenty minutes later, the next batter showed up and it was time for me to leave. The boy, dressed in his team uniform, looked to be about twelve years old and he gave me a curious look. I guess my lack of baseball bat hadn¡¯t gone unnoticed. His eyebrows rose even higher when I left the cage, only to return a minute later with one of the balls. Given that the cage was a completely enclosed area, that shouldn¡¯t have been possible. I simply shrugged at his questioning look, got on my bike and rode for home. Not being in a rush this time, I didn¡¯t need to take the bus. I had a full day ahead of me and I was already exhausted.

 At the Hospital

    I got home in time for a late breakfast with dad. He offered to make me some eggs, but I felt the need for a sugar-packed bowl of cereal. While he busied himself at the stove, I got out my Cinnamon Toast Crunch, along with a bowl and some milk, and dug in.


    ¡°What are your plans for the rest of the day?¡±, dad asked as he used the spatula to turn over his omelet.


    ¡°I¡¯m going to start off with a nap. That bike ride took a lot out of me. This afternoon I figured to head out to the hospital and check in on Mark. I think he¡¯s being released today or tomorrow.¡±


    Dad smiled, ¡°It¡¯s tomorrow morning and his parents have invited us to have dinner with them tomorrow night before they go back home. Do you want to go?¡± From his tone, I got the impression that he was looking for a reason not to go. Since mom disappeared, Dad was never eager to go out on any social outings with strangers. He¡¯d go for my sake, but I knew that it would be a chore for him, so I gave him an out.


    ¡°I¡¯d love to go, but you don¡¯t have to babysit me, if you¡¯d rather not go. I get along well with the whole family.¡± I could see the relief on his face. He really didn¡¯t want to go.


    ¡°Ok, then I¡¯ll let them know that you¡¯ll be there. I was hoping to finish my latest creation this weekend. It¡¯s almost done.¡± Sometimes dad discussed his artworks with me and sometimes he liked to surprise me. This piece was the latter and I knew that asking him what it was would be a waste of time.


    ¡°I can¡¯t wait to see it. Whatever it is.¡± I really couldn¡¯t. He hadn¡¯t let much slip about this one, but I knew that it was really intricate and that he¡¯s spent months working to get it just right.


    After rinsing out my bowl and putting it in the dishwasher, I headed to bed. I had no trouble falling asleep and I didn¡¯t wake up until my alarm did its job around two in the afternoon. I woke up and got ready to go to the hospital. I checked my phone for any messages and saw that I¡¯d forgotten to turn it back on after closing it this morning. I hadn¡¯t wanted anyone to be able to track where I was.


    There were a two of messages from Bobby, thanking me for my ¡®help¡¯. Northfield went down hard, 49-14. I¡¯d call him back later. Eva had also texted me to see what I was up to today. I wrote her a quick note that I was heading to the hospital to see Mark, but that I had no plans for tonight. Before leaving the house, Eva had already remedied the ¡®no plans¡¯ situation. Pizza at Big Julie¡¯s with a bunch of friends.


    Getting back on my bike didn¡¯t thrill me, but with several destinations to get to, I wanted the freedom of going where I wanted to and not being restricted to bus routes. As I was leaving the house, I made a last-minute decision to shift to R2. In R2, I wouldn¡¯t have to deal with cars or traffic lights.


    It was truly a joy to have the roads to myself. Sure, there were ghost cars everywhere, but those could be ignored. I didn¡¯t have to stop at all getting to the hospital and I was able to stay in the middle of the road the whole time. No sidewalks for me! I tried to image how awesome it would be to drive a car in R2. No stop signs, no lousy drivers, no traffic lights, no traffic jams, no worrying about getting a ticket for speeding. I¡¯d only need to worry about hitting buildings or driving into a ditch. Suddenly, I couldn¡¯t wait to get my driver¡¯s license and I made a mental note to start classes as soon as I could.


    I locked my bike at the stand and made sure that no one was watching when I turned off its field and it reappeared. I stayed in R2. I wasn¡¯t here just to see Mark. He was mostly just my excuse to go to the hospital.


    The real reason was my strange experience with Andrew earlier in the week. My field had scanned him, like it did the metals at the forge, but I couldn¡¯t understand what the field was telling me. I needed more data in order to interpret what the field was telling me and I hoped that the hospital could help me out. After all, the hospital had charts describing each patient¡¯s condition and maybe I could use that as a manual. The hospital also had a lot of people with a variety of ailments and problems that could be compared to those that did not have those issues. The difference shown in these side-by-side comparison could help me to interpret the information that I was getting from the field.


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    My first stop was the Orthopedics department. While I didn¡¯t know much about the internal organs of the human body, I thought that the bones would be easy enough to understand and so it was a good place to begin. Following the signs, I arrived at the waiting room and looked around.


    The most obvious person to start with was the guy sitting in the corner with a cast on his arm. The fact that he was mildly attractive had nothing whatsoever to do with my decision. Well, maybe a little, but he was sitting by himself and that meant that I could restrict the field the cover only him. Having one person in the field would limit the amount of information that I would get and prevent confusion.


    I shifted to R1 and sat down next to him. He was busy on his phone and I was tempted to peak at what he was doing. I controlled my curiosity and instead surrounded him in a field. Immediately, my mind was inundated with information, none of which I could make sense of. It was like watching a Star Trek episode where the Enterprise is under attack and lights are blinking all over the bridge and consoles are beeping and you have no idea what any of those lights and sounds mean. On tv those sounds stop after 15 seconds, but with the field they just kept going. It was disorienting and annoying.


    In the hopes of making some sense of the information, I tried to focus on this arm, but the overall noise of information kept breaking my concentration. I turned off the field surrounding the guy and blissful quiet entered my mind. I needed to find a way to limit the information further or find a way to make it quieter. I sighed. This is how Superman must have felt when he tried to use his super-hearing. He had to learn to listen only for what he wanted. When he just opened up his senses, he was overloaded with voices and sounds from everywhere. He had to train himself to listen for certain sounds, voices and phrases. Now I needed to do it too and it wasn¡¯t as much fun as I thought it would be.


    I was feeling overwhelmed and frustrated and I was starting to doubt whether I could do this. This wasn¡¯t like me. Having some sort of superpower, something to make me special, had always been my dream. While I¡¯d never expected it to happen, here I was with an incredible power and I should be ecstatic. Instead, I was literally whining to myself about how hard it was and how it wasn¡¯t as much fun as I thought it would be.


    Maybe I¡¯d been doing too much lately. In the past few days, I¡¯d discovered that I could separate R1 from R2, I¡¯d learned to create a shield, and now I was trying to learn how to scan people. Coming from a background of Kung Fu, where learning new techniques and forms took months or longer, I wasn¡¯t suited to this pace of learning. Slow and methodical was more my style. Also, this was my first time ever learning new skills on my own. I¡¯d always had teachers like dad or Uncle Magnum to show me the way.


    To be honest, I also think that keeping this ability to myself was starting to get to me. I wanted to tell someone about all this; to get advice or new ideas or to commiserate with. Every time I figured out how to do something new, I wanted to shout out with joy and talk about it, but there was only me and it felt that all I¡¯d accomplished was ticking off the next item on a ¡®to do¡¯ list. It was time to rethink keeping my abilities a secret from everyone. Even Superman was able to talk to his parents about his powers. Why couldn¡¯t I do the same?


    My internal debate was cut short when the guy that I¡¯d been scanning got up and walked into the doctor¡¯s office. I didn¡¯t follow him in. The distraction his departure caused let my mind get back on track and I started thinking up ways to lessen the overload. Could I scan only a part of a person? If so, which part? Would scanning a baby give me less information? Should I start with animals or birds and work my way up to humans? Could I create a field to block out the information? Why was scanning a lump of metal so different from scanning a person? Was it that the person was composed of so many parts? If so, would scanning a computer or a complex machine give me overload as well? Why didn¡¯t I get any information about myself from my field?


    Hold on a moment. Why didn¡¯t I get information about myself? My field was on all the time. I¡¯m a person. Why wasn¡¯t I scanning myself every second? It could be that I couldn¡¯t scan myself in the same way that I couldn¡¯t tickle myself, or it could be that my base field was different than my projected fields. My base field was there all the time after all. Maybe the scanning aspect of my field was muted or shut off? If that were true, then my next step was to see if and how my base field was different.

 Comparisons

    I got up and walked down the hall to the nearest bathroom. In this part of the hospital, the bathrooms were individual ones and I was able to lock the door and have the space to myself. Once I was secure, I shifted back to reality. It was possible that having the field in R1 would influence the test, so I brought the field back to baseline and concentrated on ¡®the feel¡¯ of my field. Its constant presence immediately became more noticeable, and I looked around for something that I could put a field around and compare it to. I remembered my backpack in R2 and I shifted it back to reality and hung it up on the coat hook on the back of the door.


    Initially, the two fields felt identical, but as I continued the examination, I did notice a slight difference. The field surrounding my backpack was sending me tiny bits of information about the contents of the bag. One camera, one notebook, one pen, two quarters. If I concentrated, I could get more information. Two quarters, mostly copper, some nickel iron. I was able to interpret what each item was by its shape and size and because I put the item in the bag and knew what it was. The surprising aspect of the information is that I had to actively search for it. I wasn¡¯t getting it unless I concentrated on it. This was very different from my scans of people where I got too much information without wanting it.


    What if there wasn¡¯t a difference between the scan of my bag and the scan of that guy earlier? What if the loudness was simply an alarm that something was wrong? I thought back to my unplanned scan of Andrew. I¡¯d gotten disoriented from the scan, but it wasn¡¯t nearly as loud and disturbing as the scan of the guy with the broken arm and it also took longer before it impaired my ability to function effectively. Likewise, the scan of my bag was whisper quiet to my senses, because nothing was wrong or broken within the bag. Come to think of it, whenever I¡¯d handled metals at dad¡¯s forge, I¡¯d always known right away when there was something wrong, even before I knew about the field. The metal just felt wrong. I didn¡¯t know it then, but as I picked up the metal, my field would enclose it and I¡¯d just know that the metal was impure.


    Of course, that opened up the door to ask how the field defined wrong or impure or broken. Especially since alloys, metals composed of several metals, were the very definition of impure. Did it take a certain percentage to set off the alarm? Did it do a comparison to all the other times that I¡¯d picked up similar ingots and determine that this one was different and ¡®wrong¡¯? I had no idea. Short of having a manual on how to use the field, I was winging it and spinning out theories on the fly.


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    If the field acted as an alarm for things that are wrong, and it determined ¡®wrongness¡¯ based on my interactions with other people over the course of my life, then the louder the field shouted the information at me, the more that was wrong with the person. I needed to test this theory out, but now I was doubting whether the hospital was the best place to try this out.


    However, I was already here, and I might as well try out my theory. I put my backpack back on, unlocked the door, and slipped into R2. Looking for healthy people in a hospital seemed counterintuitive, but I figured that the employees were my best bet.


    A short walk down the hall, I found a cleaning lady moping the floor. Bracing myself for the onslaught of information, I put a field around her and was pleasantly surprised. The information didn¡¯t overwhelm me at all. Yes, it felt much louder than the bag, but it was also much quieter than that guy with the broken arm. I wondered whether the alarm was detecting stress or pain or something else.


    I moved on to test several other hospital employees, including two doctors, a nurse and a secretary. All of them were similar to the cleaning lady in terms of quietness. I took that to mean that they were in reasonably good health and I set them as my baseline normal. By this time, I had wandered away from the orthopedics department and found myself close to the pediatric oncology department playroom where I volunteered. I walked in to see the kids busy at play, with their parents or family members watching over them.


    Evan, the boy who loved magic, was performing a trick for his father and I watched for a bit. Evan¡¯s dad looked worn out and tired. He tried to look upbeat for Evan, but I was sure that Evan saw it. I think Evan was trying to cheer his father up with the magic tricks. I¡¯d been spending time with Evan for several weeks now and I knew that he had a brain tumor. I went to his room to look at his chart and see if there was anything new there. There was. Evan¡¯s astrocytoma wasn¡¯t responding to the treatment. That¡¯s why Evan¡¯s dad looked like that.


    I returned to the playroom and sat down next to Evan. As he prepared his next trick, I put a field around him and prepared myself for the alarm. If I rated the baseline normal hospital staff at a 2 out of 10 in loudness and the broken arm guy at an 5 out of 10, then Evan was a solid 4. Now I was completely confused.


    Cancer was way worse than a broken arm. I was expecting Evan to feel like a 10 in terms of alarm volume, but he wasn¡¯t. Could it be that the break was a more obvious damage than a tumor and so it set off a louder alarm or did the guy with the broken arm have a lot more wrong with him that I¡¯d known about? I would need a lot more data before I could come up with any conclusions.


    I wasn¡¯t going to figure out how the scanning worked today, though. I had the impression that I¡¯d have to work at scanning every day for months, just like practicing with my new shield, before I could use it properly. When I did understand it and could use it properly, it was going to be awesome.

 A Conversation with Mark

    Mark was alone when I got to his room. It was late afternoon and I guessed that his family would come back after they¡¯d eaten dinner. Poor Mark was probably confined to hospital food. Working here had shown me how awful that could be. It¡¯s not that the food was bad. It was just bland and very limited so as not to upset the patient¡¯s stomachs. They also had to cater to all sorts of allergies and foods that interfered with medications. Still in R2, I peeked in on him and saw that he was reading from a geology textbook. It looked brand new and I suspect that his parents had to buy him all his textbooks again.


    I slipped out of the room, shifted back to reality in a quiet corner and made my way back. I knocked quietly and opened the door when I heard his, ¡°Come in¡±.


    Mark was engrossed in his book and didn¡¯t look up as I entered. I was impressed. I¡¯d certainly never found my textbooks so entertaining. A few seconds went by before Mark glanced up and then he did a double take. He¡¯d obviously been expecting someone from his family and not a guest. Mark smiled and put his book away.


    ¡°Abby! It¡¯s good to see you. I¡¯m glad you¡¯re here.¡±


    ¡°Hey Mark.¡± That¡¯s me. Suave and sophisticated. ¡°I just came by to see how you¡¯re doing.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m doing great. My breathing is almost back to normal and they¡¯re releasing me tomorrow morning. I have to take it easy for a few weeks, but otherwise I¡¯m all good. How about you? Any lingering effects?¡±


    ¡°Nope. I was exhausted that day and the next, but sleep and rest put me back to normal. I see that you¡¯re already getting back to your studies.¡±


    ¡°Yeah. Thanks to you, I¡¯ve only missed one week of school, instead of my entire life. Now that they¡¯re friends, my father called Harry to get a list of my classes and books and dad went to the bookstore to pick up a new set for me. I¡¯m not sure what¡¯s been assigned, so I¡¯m just reading the first few chapters in each of the books.¡± Damn. Despite almost dying in a fire, it sounded to me like Mark would be starting his classes ahead of most of his classmates. I¡¯d have milked the fire excuse for at least the first few weeks. Probably longer.


    ¡°Well, you seemed pretty interested in what you were reading when I came in. What are you studying?¡±


    ¡°Geology. I¡¯m at the Mining school. Grampa Jake started mining fifty years ago and he¡¯s built up his one-man outfit into a fairly large mining company with mines all over the world. When he saw that I was interested in mining, he insisted that I go to school at Galt. He said that there was no better place to learn about mining, besides actually being a miner. He was right. This semester I¡¯m taking a geology course, mining management, resource management, environmental remediation, and some basic required courses.¡±


    ¡°You sound like you love what you¡¯re learning.¡±


    ¡°I do. Almost everything that we use in our daily lives starts off being extracted from the Earth. Our entire civilization depends on mining. Someday I plan on running Grampa Jake¡¯s company and I want to make sure that I do it well.¡± He paused there and looked at me intently, ¡°What about you, Abby? I know that you¡¯re a Junior, but have you found your purpose yet? Do you know what you want to study in college?¡±


    Wow. Mark was certainly intense. Driven was probably a better word. Usually people with goals upset me. They¡¯ve found their purpose in life and they always made me feel like a slacker by comparison. The problem wasn¡¯t with them, but rather with my own feelings. Why didn¡¯t I know what I wanted to do with my life? Why couldn¡¯t I find something that drove me forward? Kung Fu and Blacksmithing were great, but if I was being honest with myself, neither of those would fulfill me. They were a part of my life, but if I based my life on either, then I would be living someone else¡¯s life; either dad¡¯s or Uncle Magnum¡¯s.


    Mark¡¯s question got to the heart of me pretty quickly. Had he asked me those questions a four months ago, I would have stammered something out about Kung Fu or Blacksmithing, just to avoid the topic. Today though, his question didn¡¯t bother me, because I had an answer.


    ¡°I have found my purpose, but I won¡¯t be going to college to study for it.¡± This was my first time saying that to anyone. ¡°Until recently, I didn¡¯t know how to go about my purpose or if I could even do it. Lately, I think that I may have found a way to do it.¡±


    ¡°That was a great build up and you¡¯ve got me really curious. What is it?¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m going to start a foundation or a charity that helps victims of human trafficking and their families.¡± I said it lightly, without the fanfare that I felt at saying it out loud for the first time. Shouldn¡¯t there be trumpets sounding off in the background or something?


    ¡°Ok. I wasn¡¯t expecting that. I was thinking firefighter or paramedic or bodyguard, but that¡¯s good too.¡±


    ¡°Seriously?! I run into one burning building and that defines me? There¡¯s a lot more to me than just fire-resistance.¡±


    ¡°I don¡¯t know that you should be discounting fire resistance. It¡¯s a pretty specialized skill and I can attest to how vital it can be.¡±


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    ¡°All kidding aside, are you serious about not going to college?¡±, Mark asked.


    ¡°Yes, I am. You¡¯re actually the first person I¡¯ve told. It¡¯s something that I¡¯ve been thinking about for awhile now. Dad and Harry are going to be disappointed. Harry¡¯s keeps bringing up college every time he comes over. I think he¡¯s hoping I¡¯ll enroll at Galt. If I were to go to college, Galt would be my first choice, but I just don¡¯t see the point.¡±


    ¡°Abby, running a charity requires just as much business knowledge as running any other type of business; maybe more. Most businesses sell you a product or service. A charity has to keep asking its donors for money every year and never gives the donor anything tangible in return. It¡¯s not easy. College can help you develop strategies for that, along with a ton of other useful information.¡± I liked that he wasn¡¯t being condescending. He was trying to be helpful and he thought that college would provide the tools that I needed to succeed.


    To avoid a fight, I pretended to be open minded and said, ¡°I¡¯ll keep that in mind¡±.


    ¡°If I wasn¡¯t convinced of your outstanding character, I¡¯d swear that you just politely told me to shut up.¡± I guess I wasn¡¯t good at pretending and hiding my true feelings. Note to self, don¡¯t play poker with anyone, ever.


    ¡°A lady would never say something like that!¡±, I said as I mocked being scandalized by the very thought.


    ¡°Uh huh. Yeah. I suppose that a lady wouldn¡¯t.¡±


    ¡°Are you implying that I¡¯m not a lady?¡±, shocked outrage bubbling up in my tone and I quickly ruined it by laughing.


    ¡°A lady didn¡¯t save me. A superhero did.¡± He laughed at that to make it seem like he was kidding, but I could see that he meant it. Then he asked me an unexpected question. ¡°Did you watch the video of the fire?¡±


    ¡°Nope. I figured I was there. Not much to see that I didn¡¯t already know.¡±


    ¡°You might want to watch it and read the comments.¡±


    ¡°You should never read the comments. Lots of crazies out there. Even worse, you get the keyboard warriors, all safe and snug in their parents¡¯ basement, attacking people while they dribble cheese-whiz over their onesie pjs.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s quite the picture you¡¯ve put in my brain. Thanks! Yes, you¡¯re right about the comments, but I was referring to a debate being waged in the comments. A few people, claiming to be firefighters, are saying that there¡¯s no way you could have survived that fire, much less been able to save me. They say that the fire was too widespread and that you should have been burned alive. The heat alone would have baked you. Other firefighters are saying it¡¯s possible, if the back of the house wasn¡¯t as bad as the front. Everyone agrees on one thing though. It¡¯s a miracle that you made it out of there with me.¡± He had a serious look on his face by the end of his explanation.


    Oh crap. I didn¡¯t like where this was going. I needed to bring back the conversation to cheery banter. ¡°Well, it all ended up ok. Anyways, where are you going to be staying, now that your house is gone?¡±.


    ¡°You¡¯re changing the subject. I just wanted to let you know that my saying thank you is not enough to make up for what you did. I owe you Abby. You risked your life to save me. If you ever need help with anything, I¡¯m here for you.¡± He looked at me until I nodded uncomfortably and he went on, ¡°It was too late to get into a dorm. They¡¯re all full. So, dad found me an apartment not to far away from school. It¡¯s only a mile away. Mom and dad have been rushing all over to get it furnished and I¡¯ll need to go clothes shopping tomorrow. I hear that you¡¯re coming to dinner tomorrow night.¡±


    ¡°Yup. I like your family and I''m very curious to see what you look like standing up. You¡¯re always lying down or draped over people when I see you. You might be one of those short men that tries to hide it by always sitting or lying down when people are around.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m 6¡¯1 and I don¡¯t have height issues.¡±


    ¡°Hmmm¡­maybe you¡¯re one of those guys that swoons when girls are around. You get nervous and tongue tied and finally pass out from embarrassment.¡±


    We continued our banter for a few more minutes, chatting comfortably about our plans for the week and before I left, we exchanged numbers. Lucky for him, his phone had been in his pocket when I carried him out of his house. On the way out of the hospital, I realized that I had forgotten to ask where we were going for dinner. I hoped it was to an Italian restaurant. I was in the mood for some ravioli.


    Later on that night, I thought about my revelation to Mark about my plans and about his comment about me being a superhero for saving him. With my abilities, I could do more than just help the trafficking victims regain their lives after they get free. I could find the traffickers and shut them down. I could even find the ones that took mom. I didn¡¯t believe that mom was alive anymore, but I could definitely make sure that those who were responsible for her death could be stopped for good.


    With these thoughts, my mental picture of the foundation started to change. The foundation would need to two parts to it. One out in the open and one hidden. Just like Asimov¡¯s books! The one in the open would be just what I had told Mark it would be. The foundation would offer financial and social assistance to people who¡¯s lives had been ripped apart by traffickers and any help that they or their families needed to rebuild their lives. I wanted the foundation to help the victims find new housing if they needed it or help them retrain to get back to work. If they needed legal assistance because they were brought to this country illegally, I wanted to help them get it. If they were hooked on drugs and needed time in rehab, the foundation would help with that. These people, through no fault of their own, had been uprooted and sold into economic, physical or sexual slavery and they deserved a second chance at life, a chance to rebuild. This part of the foundation, this open part, would be dedicated to the memory of my mother, Hannah, and it would be named after her.


    The hidden part of the foundation would be all about vengeance. I knew that there was no way to eradicate slavery, as it made too much money for the slavers and I had no doubt that the money was used to buy the protection of very influential people or it went directly into the pockets of those very influential people. However, just because I couldn¡¯t stop it entirely, didn¡¯t mean that I couldn¡¯t make a difference. I would start by hunting down those who¡¯d kidnapped my mom and I¡¯d continue to go after anyone else in that business.


    To get these foundations going I was going to need a lot of money and I had no idea how I would get it. That didn¡¯t matter for right now though. I had time to figure it out. These were long term plans. I was still in high school and I was still learning to use my new abilities. Besides, even without a foundation behind me, I had some ideas about how I could start going after my mother¡¯s kidnappers. That part didn¡¯t have to wait. It just needed careful planning. Short-term planning.

 A Night Out

    Dinner the next night with the McKenzie¡¯s was a lot of fun. Mark picked me up at home and we met his family at the Olive Garden nearby. Mark confided in me that Andrew had asked my dad where I like to eat and since Connor and Rose both loved the Olive Garden as well, it was an easy decision to make.


    Since everyone was familiar with the menu, we ordered quickly. I, of course, chose the ravioli. As we waited for our entrees, the talk around the table centered on the family¡¯s plans for the coming week. Mark would be starting up his classes again and the McKenzie¡¯s were heading home. They had a four-hour trip ahead of them, going back east. Connor and Rose had been pulled out of school for the family emergency and they¡¯d have to play catch-up like Mark was. Andrew was heading back to the corporate headquarters of the family mining corporation, McKenzie Resources, where he was the head of its US legal division, and Stacey looked forward to returning home to split her time between caring for the family and being a Regulatory and Environmental advisor to the company.


    Coming from a family of two, it all seemed so hectic and I mostly sat there, listening to their easy banter, learning about them from the clues that they left around as casual remarks. Assuming, I didn¡¯t misunderstand those clues, Mark was a lousy guitar player, Stacey¡¯s latest hobby was flower arranging, Connor was a soccer player, Andrew was all about the golf, and Rose danced.


    Throughout the dinner, one thing stood out as very strange. Not one of the McKenzie¡¯s pulled out a phone. They talked and teased and laughed and groaned at Andrew¡¯s bad jokes, but everyone¡¯s phones stayed in their pockets. Without needing to be told, I knew that the closeness that I saw between these family members was not an accident. Andrew and Stacey took their family seriously and were actively keeping it together. Looking around at the other diners, our table was the only one without at least one or two people busy tapping or swiping away.


    The family quizzed me about my life, and when the inevitable question about mom came up, I just told them that she had passed away when I was four and didn¡¯t go into any more detail. I told them about Kung Fu with Uncle Magnum and about working with dad. I was happily surprised when Rose took an interest in Kung Fu and started asking me all about it. With her dance background, I thought that would take to martial arts quite handily.


    Connor and Mark were both interested when I told them that I could make knives and swords. Connor may have drooled a bit when I mentioned the Batarang that I made for James. Somewhere in the discussion, I may have even convinced Mark to take dad¡¯s ¡®Into to Blacksmithing¡¯ course next semester.


    Over desert, Stacey asked me about the volunteer work that Eva and I did at the hospital and I told them more about it. Having just been there yesterday, Evan came to mind and I told them all about him doing magic to cheer up his father. Stacey got a little misty eyed at the story and the mood at the table had taken a somber turn until Andrew piped up with, ¡°I used to do magic tricks for the kids all the time!¡±, and all the kids groaned as one.


    ¡°Oh come on! You all used to love my magic tricks.¡±, Andrew said to a chorus of head shakes.


    ¡°They weren¡¯t magic tricks, dad. No magic was involved. They were just tricks or jokes.¡±, Rose explained.


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    ¡°Now I¡¯ve got to see one, Andrew. Maybe I can use it for with the kids next week.¡±, I said, as Mark did a facepalm and told me to stop encouraging his father and that I¡¯d soon regret it.


    Andrew, undeterred, fished out a quarter from his wallet and showed it to me. ¡°Now watch carefully, as I teleport this quarter from my left hand to my right hand.¡± As he said this, Andrew made a fist of his left hand around the quarter and made a fist of his right hand. He held the two fists away from each other and said, ¡°Here goes!¡± He stared intently at his left fist and started making a whistling sound. As the sound continued and rose in pitch, his head and eyes tracked an unseen quarter traveling from one fist to the other. When his eyes indicated that the quarter was in his right hand, he immediately reversed the process until the quarter was back in his left hand and with a loud ¡°Tah-dah¡± he opened his fist and brandished the quarter.


    I clapped enthusiastically! ¡°That¡¯s is so going to be part of my next magic act for the kids. It¡¯s brilliant!¡±


    ¡°No! Stop it, Abby. You¡¯re not the one that has to live with him. He¡¯s going to be insufferable for weeks now.¡±, Stacey said.


    ¡°Don¡¯t mind them, Abby. They just can¡¯t recognize true talent when they see it.¡±, Andrew said as he adjusted the collar of his shirt and then wiped off imaginary dust from his sleeves.


    ¡°You said ¡®next¡¯ magic act for the kids. Does that mean that you do magic for the kids?¡±, Mark asked.


    ¡°Yes. I just started to last weekend. The kids seemed to really like it.¡±


    ¡°This I¡¯ve got to see. Can you do a trick for us?¡±, Mark asked.


    ¡°If I had a small ball, I could.¡± I looked around at the table to see if there was anything else that I could use. Surprisingly, Stacey opened her purse and pulled out one of those super-balls that bounces like crazy when you drop it.


    ¡°I¡¯m not going to ask why you keep a super-ball in your purse. I¡¯m just going to pretend that it¡¯s completely normal and do a magic trick.¡± That earned me a few laughs from the table.


    ¡°Just to be clear, what I¡¯m about to do is real magic that was taught to me by my grandfather who learned it from his grandfather who learned it from an old swami that lived on the top of a mountain in Tibet and my grandfather made me promise to never tell anyone how I did the magic. I can show you the magic, but I can¡¯t teach it to you, no matter how much you beg and cry. Is that ok?¡± Once I had everyone¡¯s consent, I began.


    Taking my empty water glass, I turned it upside-down and then covered it with my cloth napkin. I placed the ball on top of the glass, over the napkin. I then rolled up my sleeve and covered the ball with my hand. With the ball unseen, I shifted it to R2 for a second and quickly to R1. The ball fell through the glass during the shift to R2 and then bounced on the table when it shifted to R1. The ball continued to bounce a bit within the glass, but it was unseen and unheard by anyone.


    ¡°Now I¡¯ll say the magic words, ¡°I Love Chocolate Chip Cookies!¡± and presto!¡± I slowly lifted my hand to show that the ball was gone and that it wasn¡¯t in my hand. As I watched the looks of wonder on the McKenzie¡¯s faces, I turned off the field around the ball and it reappeared under the glass.


    ¡°Rose? Would you please assist me by slowly pulling the napkin off of the glass?¡±, I asked dramatically.


    Rose took a corner and pulled on the napkin, exposing the upturned glass with the ball sitting calmly inside of it. The amazed silence was broken by Andrew¡¯s clapping.


    Connor was the first to speak. ¡°How¡¯d you do that?¡±


    ¡°You seriously forgot the whole swami story already? I promised not to tell, so I can¡¯t tell.¡±


    ¡°See dad? That¡¯s a magic trick with magic in it.¡±, Rose piped up.


    ¡°I won¡¯t dispute that, Rose. That was incredible. Abby, have you considered taking your act on the road. You could headline in Vegas if you had more tricks.¡±, Andrew replied.


    ¡°I do have a new teleporting quarter trick, Andrew. I just learned it recently and I think it¡¯s way better than the trick I just showed you.¡±

 A Surprise for Eva

    The next week I started my new shield training program. It was grueling. Every hour, I would extend the multi-field shield two feet from my body and hold it for as long as I could. I even set my phone to buzz every hour so that I wouldn¡¯t forget. The first few hours were ok, because I was just coming off a good night sleep, but by lunchtime I needed a nap. I managed to sleep for about 20 minutes leaning against the elm tree while Eva and James ate lunch and watched over me. The nap was a big help and I managed to get through to the end of the school day, but my holding time had dropped to a mere two seconds by the end. Even those seconds were tough.


    I eventually made the executive decision that I would change the new training program to stop when school ended. The rest of the day, I¡¯d just work on extending a single field out at least ten feet from my body. I was surprised at how easy it was to do that now, in comparison to the multi-field. I was pretty sure that I¡¯d be able to project the field out much farther in just a few days.


    Wednesday night Kung Fu class finally arrived. I¡¯d been so looking forward to it and I went to Uncle Magnum¡¯s studio right after school. Uncle M was working with the younger kids, so I just went upstairs to relax and have a snack before the adult beginner class.


    My special guest arrived early, as I¡¯d requested, and I showed him where to change and then I took him to wait in the conditioning room, as it was rarely used and was therefore the best place to hide him. Shortly after that, Margaret came in to pick up Jeremy and say a quick hello to Uncle Magnum. Given the I would probably lead the adult class tonight, they¡¯d have a bit longer than usual to talk.


    Margaret and I talked for a bit, planning her trial class for next week, and then Eva and James came in. Eva looked excited, as she was for any class, and James looked resigned to the fact that he was about to be tortured, again. Eva already knew the drill and she took them off to the changing rooms to get ready for class.


    Uncle Magnum finished off the kids¡¯ class with a few minutes of ¡®hit the kids with a pool noodle while they try to block it¡¯ followed by their ending salutes. As he said goodbye to the kids and went over to chat with Margaret, I got Bobby from the conditioning room and brought him in to start class.


    Eva and James were just lining up for the salutes and didn¡¯t notice him right away. With them being the two most junior students, they were at the end of the line and I brought Bobby just past them, as he was even below them in terms of seniority and rank. The rest of the class formed up according to rank and I led them through the salutes. Eva actually missed one of the salutes, when she saw Bobby in the mirror. James didn¡¯t react as much, but I could see his eyes were glued to Bobby¡¯s reflection. Bobby kept his whole focus on following the salutes and not making eye contact with Eva or Bobby.


    After the salutes, we went right into horse stance. The best part of leading a class with beginner students was that I didn¡¯t have to do it the exercises. I had to instruct them in how to do it. I have to admit that it¡¯s also always so much fun to watch them get into position, let them get comfortable, and then tell them that we¡¯ll be staying in that position for four minutes. They all get the same look of shock and assume that I¡¯m just joking. Watching their faces as they slowly realize that I¡¯m serious and that the pain is going to last a lot longer than they thought that it should always made me smile. I guess I did have a little of Uncle Magnum¡¯s sadistic streak in me.


    Bobby was no exception to the four-minute surprise. He gave an ¡®are you serious¡¯ expression and fought through the pain as best he could. He didn¡¯t do too badly. He lasted a whole minute before he had to stand up and shake out his legs. Of course, I immediately reminded him that the had to get back in position and he gave me the usual ¡®I hate you¡¯ look that I get from most new students. James wasn¡¯t having an easy time for it either, but I didn¡¯t pick on him.


    I walked around and corrected positions before getting into horse stance position for the remaining two minutes. The whole time, Eva was trying to catch my eyes. She wanted to know why Bobby was here. I just smiled at her and focused on my horse stance.


    With the first torture over, we did the rest of the warm-up and finished off with five minutes of straight-arm plank on the knuckles. I showed Bobby the proper technique and settled in between him and James.


    ¡°This is my favorite part¡±, James said sarcastically.


    ¡°Mine too.¡±, I said and then followed that up with, ¡°And since you like it so much, I think we should do a bit extra. How about two extra minutes?¡± I heard the groans throughout the class and Eva told James to shut up.


    Bobby was not enjoying himself at all. He was a very good football player and considered himself to be a fine physical specimen, but this class was kicking his ass so far and it was only the warmup. When I invited him to do a class as part of breaking the ice with Eva and James, he liked the idea. He hadn¡¯t considered that he¡¯d need to work out a different set of muscles than the ones he was used to working. He made it though plank, but he¡¯d gone on his knees quite a few times and he¡¯d only lasted 20 seconds on his knuckles.


    After the warm-up, Uncle Magnum rejoined the class and took over the training of the beginners, while I worked with the more advanced group. He showed Bobby and James the proper stances and how to punch and kick and spent most of the class working on that, interspersed with time on the punching bag and the dummies. Meanwhile, I led the rest of the students through the different forms, followed by sparring exercises, where I mostly offered advice and stance corrections.


    Throughout the class, I listened closely to the beginners talk and although it took longer than I thought it should, the moment that I¡¯d planned for finally came. It started when Bobby complained. Not in a whinny way, more like in a ¡®remind me again why I¡¯m here¡¯ sort of way. Bobby was sweating and out of breath and Uncle Magnum was asking for more effort out of him, and from Eva and James as well. It was normal. That was the reaction of most of the beginners. What got me excited was that James answered him.


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    ¡°It¡¯s all Abby¡¯s fault. She¡¯s the one that got us to come here.¡± And just like that, the ice was broken. The three of them spent the rest of class plotting their revenge. I didn¡¯t care. My job was mostly done. As a bonus, I had a feeling that Bobby would come back on his own after football season was over. Despite his complaining, I could see that he was enjoying himself and that he like the challenge of Kung Fu.


    When class ended, we split up to go to the changing rooms and Eva finally had a chance to talk to me.


    ¡°That was quite the surprise. Abby, you have some ¡®splaining to do?¡± Eva was leaning against the wall, with her arms crossed in front of her and staring right at me.


    I walked into the washroom and started washing my hands. ¡°Not much to it really. A few weeks ago, you told me how you and James and Bobby were all great friends and that you were sad about losing Bobby as a friend. I talked to him and found out that he was sad about it too. I set this up as a way for all of you to start talking again. Plus, I got you all to a Kung Fu class. It was a twofer!¡±.


    ¡°Just like that. You talked to Bobby and now we¡¯re all supposed to go back to how things used to be?¡±


    ¡°Eva, that ship has sailed. You can¡¯t undo the past. You can only move forward. If you want him as a friend again, you can be friends again. Both you and James will have to figure out if you can put what he did behind you. All I did was set up a situation where you guys can all talk to each other.¡± Eva was still standing there when I came out of the washroom and I started changing out of my uniform.


    ¡°How can I put it behind me when I don¡¯t even know what happened the last time?¡± Eva looked at me shrewdly. ¡°You know, don¡¯t you?¡±.


    ¡°I do.¡±


    ¡°Well? Spill it!¡±, Eva insisted.


    ¡°Nope. That¡¯s his story to tell. I can tell you that he knows that the only way that you guys have a chance to be friends again is if he tells you.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s very true. If you know his side and you still set this up, then you must think that we should be friends again.¡±


    ¡°Eva, I think he made a mistake, but I understand his reasons and for a twelve-year old boy they were good reasons. I¡¯m not involved though. To me it¡¯s just a story. You¡¯re the one that will have to decide what you want to do. I just thought that he should have a chance to talk to you.¡±


    ¡°Ok. I¡¯ll hear him out.¡±


    ¡°Great! Now get washed and changed. By the way, did you have a good time planning my demise during class?¡±


    ¡°Actually, yes. I¡¯d forgotten how inventive Bobby could be. He¡¯s a lot more vindictive than either James or me.¡± She had a Cheshire smile on her face as she said this.


    ¡°Hmmm. I think that I¡¯ll invite Bobby to come watch a sparring class. He might decide that revenge isn¡¯t worth it.¡±


    Eva washed up and changed and we found the boys watching the advanced class working through their forms. Uncle Magnum came over to say goodbye and I thanked him for making the class extra hard for the three newbies.


    ¡°Wait. You made the class harder than usual? Why?¡±, Bobby asked.


    ¡°Because Abby asked me too. I usually don¡¯t make new students do so many push-up and burpees, but Abby said that she needed you ready to revolt and to tell you the truth, I kind of enjoyed it.¡± Uncle Magnum was completely unapologetic.


    Bobby turned to me and said, ¡°I don¡¯t understand. Why make it harder?¡±


    I sighed like the answer was obvious, ¡°So you¡¯d complain, of course.¡±


    With that explanation, we all left the studio and made our way to Big Julie¡¯s. I had asked Bobby if he wanted me there when he spoke with Eva and James and he said that he did. I¡¯d have preferred to be just about anywhere else, but if I could help smooth things over, then I would.


    I expected the conversation to be awkward and stained and I was pleasantly surprised when it wasn¡¯t. James and Bobby started talking about comics and superheroes almost right away and Eva soon joined in. It turned out that Bobby had kept up his interest in all things super and hadn¡¯t had anyone to talk with about it for years. For the first time, I could see how these three had been such close friends and I had a feeling that Bobby wasn¡¯t going to have such a hard time with his explanation and apology.


    Taking a booth in a quiet corner of Big Julie¡¯s, we all placed our orders and Bobby started talking. He stumbled a bit when he confessed that he started having feelings for Eva, but he got past it and quickly went on. As he explained, I saw Eva blush with embarrassment and James merely raised his eyebrows a bit, in surprise, I think. Like a child about to be reprimanded, Bobby kept his eyes mostly on his hands, that were clasped together, almost in prayer, and resting on the table and rarely looked up at Eva or James. He only stopped talking when our orders arrived.


    Once the waitress left, Bobby finished with, ¡°So even though I don¡¯t have those feelings anymore, I honestly thought that you guys would never forgive me, and I was too scared and embarrassed to tell you guys the truth. I don¡¯t even know if I could have done this if Abby hadn¡¯t pushed me into it.¡±


    ¡°How did she push you into it?¡±, Eva asked. The mood at the table was tense. I could see that Eva was conflicted.


    Bobby looked at me for permission to tell and instead I asked Eva, ¡°Does it really matter or are you buying some time to think?¡±


    ¡°Buying time.¡±, she replied and then it got quiet.


    The silence had lasted well into the awkward stage when James glanced up with a serious look on his face and said, ¡°You know Bobby, you should have just said all this when we were twelve. We were all best friends. I¡¯m really hurt that you felt that you couldn¡¯t come to me with this. We could have found a solution. You were like a brother to me; I would have shared Eva.¡±


    Eva sputtered disbelievingly and Bobby¡¯s eyes bulged almost out of their sockets and I burst out laughing. I couldn¡¯t help it. James¡¯ deadpan delivery was perfect, and Eva and Bobby¡¯s reactions were priceless. You also had to know James. He¡¯s a quiet guy and in the few years that I¡¯ve known him, I¡¯ve never heard him talk about his feelings, except when we discussed Eva. There is no way in hell that he would share Eva with anyone, so I knew that he was joking around and if he was joking, then he had already forgiven Bobby.


    Despite getting caught off-guard by James¡¯ comment, Eva started laughing too. She tried to pretend that she was offended, but no one believed it. Bobby laughed along, mostly in relief, and we went back to our food. Bobby¡¯s apology had been accepted and it wasn¡¯t mentioned again except once. At the end of the night, Eva faced Bobby and said, ¡°I want your promise that you¡¯ll never ditch us again. No matter what, you can¡¯t ever do that to us.¡±


    Bobby promised and Eva continued, ¡°Good, because if you ever do, I¡¯m sending Abby to kick your ass.¡±

 Police Station

    A few weeks later it was time for another round of espionage. Quarterly reports were being prepared and it was time to check up on some of my investment choices. This time, I was also going to head out east and check out several companies in my old hometown, where we had lived with mom before she was taken. Originally, I hadn¡¯t planned to expand the list of companies that I was investing in, but since I¡¯d added vengeance to my to do list, I needed to get a copy of the police files on my kidnapping. Once I was heading to a city over two hours away, I figured that I¡¯d add a few companies to my list and fill up my day.


    I woke up really early and headed out to catch the first scheduled bus heading to Raleigh. I¡¯d left a note for dad that I¡¯d be doing research today for the stock competition and that I¡¯d check in with him later. It was a ped-day at school and so my absence would go unnoticed.


    I caught the bus just before it left and found my way to an empty seat. It didn¡¯t really matter if the seat was empty, as I was in R1, but I preferred not to have the distraction of a superimposed ghostly image around me. On the bus I reviewed the company research that I¡¯d downloaded to my phone the night before, as there was no wi-fi or cellular data in R1 or R2. This time I would be investigating three companies; one in mining, one in biotechnology, and one in technology devices. I¡¯d chosen the mining company, Ascendar Mines, mostly because of the McKenzie¡¯s, I was curious to learn more about their industry.


    Between the reading and taking notes for my files, the bus trip passed quickly, and I soon found myself in downtown Raleigh. I made my way to the financial district and found the first company¡¯s offices. The next few hours were very busy and productive, as I infiltrated each of the target companies and listened in on confidential briefings, took pictures of key financial reports, stole passwords and ensured that I could have remote access to their servers. That last part was important if I wanted to continue to find out what they were doing without having to make the trip out to Raleigh again.


    By lunchtime I was done with my corporate espionage and I moved back into reality for twenty minutes to grab a sandwich at Subways before I proceeded to break into a police station. Finding the right station wasn¡¯t hard. I just googled ¡®John Buckler police officer Raleigh¡¯ and his whole bio came up, including his precinct.


    It took me over half an hour to get to John¡¯s old station and it was a hive of activity. If I weren¡¯t in R1, I¡¯d be terrified even thinking about what I was about to do. Instead, I just strolled in right through an exiting police officer and into a waiting area that was overseen by an older officer sitting behind a raised desk. Police officers used their passes to open a door to the older officer¡¯s left. Everyone else waited to speak to the officer at the desk. I simply shifted from R1 to R2 for a few seconds and walked through the door.


    This is the part of my plan where I just penciled in ¡°Find old file¡± without any idea as to how to accomplish the task. From TV and books, I knew that older unsolved cases were kept in a cold-case file room, but I had no idea where that was or how old a case had to be to be put there. I supposed that 12 years would qualify as a cold case, but maybe it was different if the FBI was involved, as they were in mom''s case. It was also possible that the precinct had digitized all their files years ago and they didn¡¯t even have a cold-file room at all. I needed a map.


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    Luckily, fire regulations required that all emergency escape routes be posted with a ¡®You Are Here¡¯ designation. I found one such map in a nearby corridor and I oriented myself before spending 20 minutes wandering around getting to know where all the departments were. The fact that each department was labelled on the map and on the doors themselves really helped.


    This felt just like doing surveillance on one of the companies, except that it was a police station. Once I got my bearings, the first room I checked out held the internal camera monitoring station. Unsurprisingly, they only had four of them dedicated to the general office and work areas, and three of those cameras were watching corridors that led to exit doors. Nobody expected anything to happen in a room full of police officers. Most of their cameras focused on their holding cells, the interview rooms, the waiting rooms, the evidence locker and the exterior of the station. If I had a uniform and a pass, I could probably walk around this place unnoticed.


    The cold-case file room wasn¡¯t in the basement, like I thought it would be. Instead, it was in one of the windowless interior offices. I shifted to R2 again to get through the door and back to R1. The room was large, with several rows of racking holding file-storage boxes and each box was labelled with a year. There were over thirty years of cases in here and some years needed several boxes, either because they had a lot of unsolved cases that year or because some of those case files were really large. I crossed the room from end to end and checked behind all the stacks to make sure that there wasn¡¯t anyone taking an off-duty nap. It was clear of people.


    Knowing that there were no cameras in the cold-case file room gave me the confidence to shift back to reality and head to the boxes labelled 2008. There were three boxes and they were stacked next to each other on the bottom shelf of one of the stacks. At least I wouldn¡¯t have to climb a ladder to get them down. Slipping on a pair of latex gloves, I pulled out the first box and saw that it had a list taped to the lid. It was list of the cases inside the box. Someone at the station was either very organized or had a lot of time on their hands. Or both.


    I didn¡¯t recognize any of the names on the list, so I pushed the box back and took out the second box. A third of the way though the list I saw Metzstein-Smith. Metzstein was my mom¡¯s maiden name. Lifting the lid, I scanned through the tabs until I found the right file. It wasn¡¯t very big, only about half an inch thick. I wanted to start reading it right away, but this wasn¡¯t the right place to do that. A file this size would take at least an hour to study properly.


    The shift to R1 took less than a second and I got my camera out to take pictures of each page. In a few minutes, I was done and put the file back in the box and the box back on the shelf.


    Back in the safety of R1, I took a few minutes to gather myself. I hadn¡¯t read any of the material, but I¡¯d seen the pictures. My mom had smiled back at me from several different poses as I flipped the pages. I¡¯d seen most of those pictures in our family albums, one was even from her ¡®Have you seen this woman?¡¯ poster, but seeing those pictures in a police file was different. More tragic. Sadder. A family album is meant to remind you of the best of times, the times that you though worth remembering. Pictures in a police file never reminded you of good times.

 Arrangements

    The weekend after my Raleigh trip was full of more research, both in the library and at the local companies. Having already visited those companies, I knew where to look for the information and it was a simple matter to get the quarterly number. Updating those files took little time. Creating files for the three new companies, however, was very time consuming. With mid-term tests coming up though, this was my last chance to get this work done.


    As with the first time that I made trades, the tough part was getting enough information to justify my ¡®predictions¡¯. In a sense, I was working backwards from my conclusions. For instance, I knew that Sun Energy Systems would have another massive drop, as their new technology had failed and the rumors of a breakthrough, that had powered their stock price back up since their last quarter decline, were about to be shot down. They had missed their numbers again, by an even wider margin this time. So, I knew that I was going to short the stock yet again, but I had to find a credible reason for it or James would get even more suspicious. I had the same type of problem with the new biotechnology company that I found in Raleigh, except they¡¯d had successful trials and the news hadn¡¯t hit yet.


    I though about not telling James about either company, because it would make my life so much easier, but I couldn¡¯t do that to him. Instead, I spent hours on Lexis-Nexis, poring over articles and then more hours on the internet, searching out every rumor that I could find. It wasn¡¯t easy, but in the end, I found just enough in the articles and in the comment section to provide some measure of support for my recommendations. Thank goodness there were only two more quarters before the competition ended and then I could make my trades without having to justify them as rigorously.


    With all the research that I¡¯d had to do, I¡¯d declared the weekend to be a shield practice free time. The last few weeks of practice had been fruitful, but grueling. I could hold the shield easily now for about 25 seconds and for about 25 more with increasing difficulty. Once, I¡¯d even managed 57 seconds, but that had been right after I woke up and I was full of energy. The problem with the training was that I was always tired, and I had to hide that fact from everyone, or they would start asking questions that I didn¡¯t want to answer.


    Seeing as how I¡¯d finished working on my company files and still had some weekend left, I took out the printout of the police file and went over it again. Nothing had changed since the last time I¡¯d read it. It was a big disappointment. There wasn¡¯t anything of substance in there that I hadn¡¯t already known. The facts of the kidnapping were exactly how John had presented them. Over the years, John had also updated us on every angle of pursuit that the police were following, so even there the report was a letdown. There didn¡¯t seem to be anything I could do that the police hadn¡¯t done already.


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    The only lead the police really had were the kidnappers themselves and one was dead and the other was in jail. Dead men tell no tales and the jailbird wasn¡¯t singing.


    Len Johnson had been interviewed many times, once he woke up from the coma, and he¡¯d never said a word besides, ¡°I want to speak with my lawyer.¡± He ignored every question asked of him and he refused to testify at his own hearing. He just sat there during the whole court case. His attitude didn¡¯t earn him any points with the judge, who ended up giving him the maximum sentence of 25 years for his crimes.


    Over the years, John had tried to get in to talk to Len, but Len always refused to meet with him or anyone in law enforcement. Even offers to reduce his sentence, if he helped them find my mom, were ignored. I briefly wondered if he¡¯d meet with me, but I discarded the idea for many reasons. First, there was no way dad would let me go. Second, there was no way John would let me go. Third, there was no way that he¡¯d say anything useful after all these years. He may have known where mom was being taken, but after his capture, I have no doubt that she was moved somewhere that Len had never heard of. I did spend a pleasant few minutes fantasizing about talking to him and getting a break in the case. In all my imaginings, the ¡®how¡¯ I¡¯d succeed in getting him to talk was always hazy.


    Although, one daydream seemed almost possible. I¡¯d go see him and he¡¯d pretend to be all reformed, but I wouldn¡¯t believe him, of course. Then when I left, he¡¯d go make a call, only instead of leaving, I¡¯d actually have gone to the bathroom and then I¡¯d shift to R1 and watch him make his call. I¡¯d write down the number while the phone was ringing and I¡¯d hear him say, ¡°This is Len. Tell Jimmy that she came around asking questions.¡±, and then he¡¯d hang up. I¡¯d have John follow up on the number and then we¡¯d find whoever Jimmy was and he¡¯d lead us to mom. Case solved; mom saved!


    That might work in the movies or the comic books. There was a thread of possibility to it. Real life isn¡¯t so neat. However, my daydream did successfully distract me enough that my subconscious had time to work on the problem and provide a way forward. The police report had mentioned that police officers had gone to Len¡¯s mother¡¯s house to talk to her and to do a search of Len¡¯s room there. The report had also mentioned her address. What I just realized was that her address was only 45 minutes from here. I couldn¡¯t talk to Len, but I could talk to Len¡¯s mom. It wasn¡¯t much, but it was something.

 A Hot Tip

    With mid-terms exams coming up in two weeks, visiting Len¡¯s mom would have to wait. The first order of business was to bring Eva and James up to date on my recommendations and to see what they had. The second order of business was to study. I¡¯ve never been an eager student, but I work hard at my studies and that usually paid off in decent grades. With only a few years left till I was done with my schooling, I wanted to do well. Once those tasks were completed, I¡¯d visit with Mrs. Johnson.


    As expected, James wasn¡¯t happy with my recommendations.


    ¡°For a few of the companies, your research shows the company going in one direction and your recommendations are saying to bet in the opposite direction, Abby. You¡¯ve walked us through your reasoning, with a lone article hinting at support for your position and several clues from internet comments and rumors, but there just isn¡¯t enough to base your conclusions on.¡±


    ¡°James, I told you at the start of all this that sometimes I was going to go based on hunches or intuition. That¡¯s what I¡¯m doing. Of the eight companies that I¡¯m following now, I¡¯m only going with my gut on two. The rest mostly fall in line within the range of expectations or close enough, even if they are sometimes at the extremes of those expectations. If you don¡¯t want to trade based on the two that don¡¯t make sense to you, you still have six others to choose from. I won¡¯t be insulted.¡± I wasn¡¯t upset with James at all. In his place, I¡¯d be even more skeptical of my findings. He was taking all of this very calmly and trying to understand recommendations that didn¡¯t really make any sense, unless you happened to have more information. Which I did.


    ¡°James, Abby was spot on last time and we made some killer trades based on her recommendations. I¡¯m going to bet on her instincts again.¡±, Eva interjected. ¡°If you¡¯ll recall, she bet more heavily on her own recommendations and ended up beating us both.¡±


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    ¡°I know, Ev, and I¡¯ll make trades based on her information. I just wish that it made more sense. I can¡¯t replicate something that I don¡¯t understand. Part of the reason that I¡¯m taking this competition so seriously is that I need to be able to raise money to fund my Justice Foundation and learning about the whole process will make me better at it. How do Abby¡¯s feelings fit into that?¡±, James asked.


    ¡°Come on James! You¡¯ve never heard of hot tip?¡±, Eva replied back to him with a big smile on her face. ¡°If you¡¯re investing, you¡¯re going to get stock tips from all over. Everyone¡¯s got a sure thing to tell you about or a company that¡¯s about to pop and be the next Apple. The most important thing that you need to learn is who to trust. You¡¯ve known Abby for years, she¡¯s done a lot of work on this, she¡¯s putting her own and her fathers¡¯, real money into her trades, and she¡¯s been right before. On top of all that, she¡¯s bigly into Superman, so you know that she has an overdeveloped sense of responsibility. She wouldn¡¯t ever want to let you down. You¡¯ll never have such an easy decision in your investing life than this.¡±


    Did I mention that Eva was wonderful? After an endorsement like that, James had no choice but to give in. James gave us a rundown of his own recommendations and Eva updated us on the industries that she was following. At the end of our meeting, we each made our choices of the stocks that we¡¯d be investing in and James said that he¡¯d go over those choices and present us with the best way to invest in those companies. In a few days, we¡¯d enter our trades into the competition software and make them in real life as well.


    With that out of the way, we got to studying for mid-terms and for the next two weeks my life consisted of study groups for Chemistry, Algebra II, and History. I handled English, Spanish, Economics, and Digital Arts on own. Sometimes Bobby joined our study group and sometimes he brought along a few of his football friends as well. Some of those times we even got some studying done.


    The time passed quickly and soon exams were over. I felt that I had done well in most of my exams, with the possible exception of English. I wasn¡¯t sure if Mrs. Swenson would appreciate my views on Macbeth.

 Shannon鈥檚 House

    The day after my last exam, I took a bus over to Stateville to visit with Len¡¯s mother. Mrs. Johnson lived in a two-story house at the end of a dead-end street. Train tracks ran past the back of the house, but everything was quiet now. The mid-autumn air was only starting to cool and the leaves were changing colors. Looking around the neighborhood, I couldn¡¯t believe that such a sleaze like Len had grown up in a beautiful place like this. I¡¯d expected that his childhood was filled with horrors and that he¡¯d been brought up in a home that would match his actions. I guess that I was looking for some sort of explanation as to how someone could become a kidnapper and a slaver, but nothing could ever justify doing that to other people.


    Steeling my nerves, I walked up the porch steps and rang the bell. As I waited for someone to answer the door, I noticed that the house was in fairly good repair and I wondered if Mrs. Johnson was handy with a tool or if she had a handyman take care of the house. I heard footsteps approach the door and an older woman¡¯s voice called out through the closed door, ¡°Hello. Can I help you?¡±


    ¡°Hello Mrs. Johnson. My name is Abigail Smith. I was hoping that I could speak with you for a few minutes about your son Len.¡± I knew that Mrs. Johnson was looking me over through the door-viewer and I tried to look as innocent as possible.


    ¡°Are you a reporter, Ms. Smith?¡±, she asked.


    ¡°No, Ma¡¯am. Twelve years ago, Len and his friend Karl kidnapped me and my mother.¡±


    The door opened immediately, and Mrs. Johnson stood there staring at me. She looked to be in her mid-to-late sixties and reasonably fit for her age. Her shoulders weren¡¯t stooped or hunched over like I¡¯d seen in so many people her age and her shoulder-length gray hair was pulled back in a loose ponytail.


    ¡°You¡¯re Abby.¡±, she said in wonder, ¡°I didn¡¯t think that I¡¯d ever meet you. John told me all about you.¡±


    Now I was just as surprised as she was. ¡°John Buckler? He told you about me?¡± I couldn¡¯t believe it.


    ¡°Yes. John and I are good friends. Would you like to come in? It¡¯s warmer in the house and we can sit and talk.¡± She held the door for me and led me into the kitchen where she offered me a drink. I accepted some water and she brought out some social tea biscuits and sat down at the table next to me.


    ¡°I met John right after Lenny ended up in the hospital. He came over here to tell me about the accident and to ask me what I knew about Lenny¡¯s activities. He told me that a woman was still missing and that he needed to go through Lenny¡¯s things to see if there was anything there that would help him find her. I showed him to Lenny¡¯s room and helped him search it. We turned that room upside down but didn¡¯t find anything useful. Afterwards, he drove me to the hospital to see Lenny. Over the years, he¡¯s kept in touch with updates on the case and we became friends.¡±


    Something clicked in my head and I asked, ¡°Is he the one taking such good care of your house?¡±


    Mrs. Johnson blushed and gave a crooked smile. That was all the confirmation I needed. If John liked Mrs. Johnson, then I knew she was a good person.


    ¡°Mrs. Johnson, what..?¡±.


    She interrupted me with, ¡°Please call me Shannon, Abby. After all the stories that John¡¯s told me about you, I feel like I know you already. A few weeks ago, he even showed me the video of you saving that boy from the fire. That was very brave of you. He ranted for quite a while about that, saying that you had no business running into a burning house and he kept asking what the hell you were thinking about. I could tell that the whole time he was cursing your thoughtlessness, he was immensely proud of you. Watching the video, when you didn¡¯t come back out of the house for a few minutes, I thought you¡¯d burned up. That fire was eating up the house so quickly. But then you came around the house with that boy over your shoulder and I wanted to cheer. I couldn¡¯t believe that you¡¯d lived through that and now you¡¯re here, sitting in my kitchen.¡± Shannon was almost star-struck.


    To change the topic and get back on track, I asked her, ¡°Shannon, what was Len like as a child?¡±


    Gathering herself in, she responded, ¡°You want to know if he was always bad or if something happened to make him bad. You¡¯re looking for a reason. You¡¯re not the first. I can understand that, but the answer won¡¯t ease your mind much. He wasn¡¯t a monster and he never fell in with the wrong crowd. He was just a very quiet boy. He kept most of his thoughts to himself. He never got in trouble at school and I never caught him abusing animals or other kids. He did as he was asked and never complained. Some parents would say that made him a good child, but he wasn¡¯t. He wasn¡¯t good or bad. He was just there. He didn¡¯t connect with anyone, including me. He¡¯d return a hug, but never initiate it. It was that way with most things, even a simple greeting. I could tell that there was a movie playing in his head, but he never talked about it. John says that he may be autistic, but I don¡¯t think so. Lenny could interact with the world around him and with people, he just didn¡¯t want to. Whatever was going on in his mind was more interesting.¡±


    ¡°So how did he get started in human trafficking?¡±


    ¡°I have no idea. He got a job at a warehouse and moved out when he graduated from high school. I thought that he might go to university, but he said that he wasn¡¯t interested in that. I didn¡¯t hear much from him for around five years. Then one day he shows up at the house and asks if he can stay for awhile. He stayed for two years before he took you. Before you ask, no, I never saw him with anyone. He had a car and he would drive out some days and not return for weeks. Other times, he would be up in his room for days before going out again. There didn¡¯t seem to be any rhyme or reason to it.¡±


    We talked about Len for awhile longer and when my questions finally dried up, she asked if I¡¯d like to see his room.


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    ¡°You¡¯ve kept his things all this time?¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s all that I have left of him. Sometimes I find myself sitting in there and I don¡¯t know where the afternoon has gone to. He never connected to me, but I am his mother and I connected to him. I tried to visit him in prison once. He refused to see me. Memories are all I have left now. I¡¯ve thought about boxing his things up, but it¡¯s easier to just close the door, since I don¡¯t need the room for anything. Besides, there¡­well, you¡¯ll see.¡± She sounded sad and resigned.


    ¡°When he gets out, will you let him move back?¡±


    ¡°I doubt that I¡¯ll still be alive, but no. He¡¯s never coming back here. Some things just can¡¯t be forgiven. I won¡¯t even leave him the house in my will. It¡¯s going to be sold and the proceeds will go to charity.¡±


    Shannon led me upstairs to Lenny¡¯s room. ¡°Take all the time you need. I¡¯ll be out back in the garden working with my vegetables. Come on by when you¡¯re done.¡± With that, she left, and I was alone in Len¡¯s room.


    I immediately saw what Shannon had been getting at. The room was neat and orderly and lacked any personality whatsoever. There were no posters on the wall, no framed pictures of family, no personal achievement or objects of any sort, besides a set of weights along the wall. I¡¯d seen hotel rooms with more character. A queen-sized bed, a desk, some weights, a half empty bookcase with old schoolbooks in it. That it. There was a closet to one side and a private bathroom to the other.


    Knowing that John had searched the room didn¡¯t give me much hope that I¡¯d find anything, but I had nothing else to do and I was already here. I started with the bed. There was nothing under it and nothing under the mattress. I was trying to figure out how I could check if he¡¯s hidden something in the mattress, when I realized that I could use my field to check. I put the field around the mattress and found nothing extra in it. The same thing happened with the box-spring.


    The desk was the next obvious place and all I found in it were some basic office supplies. A scan showed me that there were no hidden compartments in the desk, or any envelopes taped on the back of a drawer. Using the field really simplified the entire search process and within a few minutes, I¡¯d finished examining the bookcase, the weights, and the closet without having found anything.


    There didn¡¯t seem to be many places to hide things in the bathroom, but I¡¯d seen a lot of movies and so I knew to check behind the toilet tank, in the toilet tank, and behind the bathtub panels. More nothing. The medicine cabinet was almost empty and the cabinet under the sink only held spare toilet paper and some cleaning products. My scans of the bathroom also showed nothing hidden and I was about to leave when I saw that the ceiling over the mirror was angled. The rest of the bathroom ceiling didn¡¯t have this angle.


    I left the bedroom and looked around. Across the hall I could see another room, Shannon¡¯s I guessed and to my left there was a narrow staircase. Given that I was on the upper floor of a two-story house, I assumed that the staircase led to an attic. I found it strange that the area under the staircase wasn¡¯t accessible. I supposed that it could have simply been closed off, as the narrow staircase wouldn¡¯t give you much storage space, but I decided to check it with my field.


    The field projected into the wall and I found a hidden alcove under the stairs. Sweet success! Now I just needed to get in. I sent the field out further until I detected a doorway set in Len¡¯s bathroom. The word doorway was a bit of an exaggeration. It was more like a small opening the size of a large doggy doorway, and it was set in back of the cabinet under the sink. I went back into the bathroom and tried to figure out how Len got into his secret room.


    Over the next several minutes, I understood why John and the police hadn¡¯t found this room before. It wasn¡¯t any easy space to get into. You had to know how to open the back section of the cabinet and once you did, you had to wiggle your body in through the small space under the pipes. Of course, I didn¡¯t have to figure out the entry mechanism. I just shifted to R2, where the door and the sink didn¡¯t exist, and I scooted through the tiny opening.


    The secret room was dark and once I shifted back into R1, I used my phone¡¯s flashlight to see. The room started off with enough height for me to stand upright, but quickly tapered down to nothing as the stairs got lower. Except for one banker¡¯s storage box and a duffle bag, the room was empty.


    Feeling excitement build up within me, I lifted the lid on the box and saw a ledger book and a stack of pictures. Every picture was of a woman or a child, with one arm shackled to a metal siding structure and the other arm holding a number. With growing horror, I realized that the numbers were in the thousands. Holy shit. The room suddenly felt too small and I had to get out and get fresh air. I tried backing out of the doggy doorway, but I was still in R1 and I banged up against the plumbing. The panic notched up a step or two as I struggled, and I was suddenly falling through the floor.


    I¡¯d overshifted and ended up in R3! The house didn¡¯t exist in R3, but the ground did. If I stayed in R3, I¡¯d fall through the ground floor and into the basement. A two-storey fall was very likely going to break something.


    I shifted back to R2 and tried to twist myself so that I would land on my legs and roll as I landed. I was only partially successful in that I got my legs under me, but I fell backwards instead of forwards and didn¡¯t roll so much as fall on my ass. It wasn¡¯t my best landing, but any landing you can walk away from, is a good landing. The question now was, could I walk?


    Carefully, I moved each of my limbs and felt no breaks. My legs were sore and my butt hurt, but I was able to stand up after a few tries. Trying to calm my racing heart, I shifted to R1, sat down in a sofa chair nearby, and took a few minutes to relax. That was scarier than running into a burning building.


    I never wanted to do that again, even on purpose. I¡¯d need to put practicing to shift to R3 on my to do list. High up on the list. Having made that decision, I went back upstairs and headed back to the secret room. I didn¡¯t feel so panicky now and I was able to think about the whole situation more objectively. These pictures were at least 12 years old and there was nothing that I could do for those women and children. At least not right now. I would have to find a way to get the pictures to the police. For now, I needed to get all of Len¡¯s stuff away from here.


    I shifted the bag and the box to R2 and pushed them out of the secret room, before crawling out myself. On the other side, I picked them up and made my way out of the house. I left the bag and box on the porch, in R1, and went back upstairs. Shifting back to reality, I made sure that everything in the room was as I¡¯d found it and went to the backyard to find Shannon.


    I thanked her for her time and for letting me search Len¡¯s room and suggested that next time John came over to our house for dinner, she should join him. It might bring up some questions from dad, but that was a problem for another time. Getting home was my current primary focus.


    Shannon was still gardening when I left, so as soon as I was out of sight, I shifted to R1. Back on her porch, I slung the duffle over my shoulder, picked up the box in one hand and walked back to the bus that would take me home. The box was very light, while the duffle wasn¡¯t. Without looking inside, I knew what was in the duffle. I just didn¡¯t know how much.

 Contents

    Five hundred and forty thousand dollars. That¡¯s what was in the duffel bag. Five hundred and forty thousand dollars, which according to the ledger represented the lives of 151 kidnapped women and children. Len had been paid five thousand dollars per person but had spent the rest on living expenses over the years before his capture.


    I couldn¡¯t get over the number of lives that one man could ruin without anyone taking any notice. He must have been kidnapping 20 to 30 people a year. I¡¯d been a victim myself and I¡¯d read the statistics, but the reality in the pictures of those women and children chained to the wall was overwhelming. So many lives were being crushed every day and there was no outcry. This is what I wanted my foundation for. These people needed help and people like Len Johnson needed to be stopped.


    From a practical perspective, I needed to find a hiding place for the duffel bag and pictures. The ledger I placed in my R1 backpack, along with ten thousand dollars. I vowed to myself to only use the money to achieve the foundation goals. Seeing as how I couldn¡¯t explain how I got the money; I couldn¡¯t put in the Hannah Foundation. There was also the small matter of the Hannah Foundation not existing yet and having no bank accounts to put the money into.


    I thought about just leaving the money in R1 or R2. I pictured just shifting the money into R1 and leaving it in the corner of my room. The problem was that I didn¡¯t know how long the field around the duffel bag would last or if it would fade away while I slept or if I got too far away from it or if I got too tired from holding my shield. If any of those things happened and the field faded away, then the bag would be sitting there for anyone, maybe a certain dad for instance, to see. Holding the field around the bag would also be a constant drain on my resources. I needed a place that only I could get to.


    I spent a long time walking through my house and thinking of hiding places, but nothing felt secure enough. I kept imagining some obscure reason for dad to all of a sudden need to check for something in the attic or the garage and finding the money behind a box that he hasn¡¯t touched in years. The truth was that I could just leave the money in my closet and even if he had to go in there, he would never even consider opening up the duffel. He¡¯d always been considerate and never invaded my privacy.


    In the end, I decided to take a page out of Len¡¯s playbook and hide the money in the walls of my room. All I had to do was go into R3, take the money with me and place it between the wooden wall slats. That way, only I could access it, and no one would ever find it, unless they were demolishing the house. Hopefully, I¡¯d have some notice on the demolition and I¡¯d move it out before then.


    Ever since I¡¯d first gotten into the R1, the new one without people, I knew that I could go into R3, where buildings didn¡¯t exist. I just didn¡¯t have a reason to go there. I was also too excited about the possibilities of R1 to bother. At the time, R3 didn¡¯t seem to offer many benefits. Now that I had a reason to get there, I reversed the process of getting into R1 and instead of dialing back the power from R2, I dialed up the power by an equal amount.


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    For the second time in two days, I found myself falling through the floor. Fortunately, I didn¡¯t have nearly as much distance to fall this time. Eighteen inches isn¡¯t far, but it did startle me, and I ended up falling on my ass, again. I¡¯d failed to consider that the floor of my room, while on the ground level, still had a concrete slab foundation that didn¡¯t exist in R3.


    I stood up and started walking around through the insides of my house. It was so weird. Like the people and the cars, I could see the ghosted shape of the house and walk right through it. It gave me a whole new perspective on the house. There was also that strange effect of being able to see through a wall, but as I walked through it, I¡¯d see the inside of it. This was similar to when I¡¯d play in traffic and seeing the messy interior of cars that passed through me.


    With my new perspective, I looked around the house for a better hiding spot. It would be much easier to find some closed off area that I could just stuff the bag into, instead of putting the bundles of money into the walls one by one. After a few minutes of searching, I found a small area in the main-floor bathroom, between the end of the bathtub and a beam. This small area had been sealed off because it was too awkward to make into a usable nook. However, it was big enough to stuff the bag into and I went to get it. I wrapped the bag in a field and brought it into R3. I caught it as it fell and brought it to the bathroom where I held the bag up into the space and then turned off the field surrounding it. The field was still surrounding the bag, so it kept a few areas from reforming inside the walls or the beam.


    Once the bag was settled in, I removed the field from it and stood there looking at my handiwork. Damn! This power was awesome. I made a mental note to add ¡®foundation inspector¡¯ to the list of jobs that my ability could lead me to excel at. If I could only find a way to inspect upper floors while in R3, then I could be a whole home inspector.


    I walked to the edge of the house and stepped up to the ground. I downshifted back to R2 and re-entered the house through the front door and returned to my room in R1. With everything now squared away, I could turn my attention to the ledger.


    The ledger was a fancier version of an 8.5¡± x 11¡± notebook, in landscape format, with a red cover and a fake leather black spine along the short side. The word ¡®LEDGER¡¯ was written in large gold letters across the center. Inside, each page had columns and rows that would be useful for accountants or bookkeepers. Len had used these pages to make entries for each person that he kidnapped. In very neat, small script, he had labelled his columns by date and time of ¡°Pickup¡±, the city and state, place, and name of pickup. He also had columns for Pickup number, delivery date, delivery time, delivery number, delivery location, amount. One entry read as follows:


    Mar. 21, 2006/9:37pm/Charlotte, NC/Felder Street/Susy Warner/#93/Mar. 23, 2006/6:34am/14872/SLS/5000.


    He had pages and pages of these notations. Most entries took up several lines, as he added notes about the pickup. It was all fairly straight forward, except for the delivery location. He alternated between three different locations: SLS, MTC, and PDC, with the majority going to SLS. I had not idea what or who any of those initials stood for and a quick internet search brought me too many hits to bother with, even when I tried restricting it to North Carolina. Although, with almost a day and a half from pickup to delivery, he could have taken his kidnap victims to several other surrounding states.

 Not a Date with Mark

    I spent an hour going over the ledger, looking for any clues or hints about who Len was working for, but I couldn¡¯t find anything, and I eventually put the ledger away for another day. It was late afternoon on Saturday and besides my outing to see Shannon this morning, I¡¯d been cooped up studying for weeks.


    Until my teachers packed in some new knowledge to be tested on, I was carefree. I wanted to go out. I wanted to do something. Eva and James were at a family dinner tonight and Bobby was at football practice. Our team had made the playoffs and every game from now on was do or die. Now that exams were over, Coach was filling up all their free time with practices.


    I wondered what Mark was up to. Only one way to find out.


    He picked up on the third ring, ¡°Hello?¡±


    ¡°Hi Mark! It¡¯s Abby. Are you busy now?¡±


    ¡°Not really. I have a geology exam on Monday, but I¡¯m ready for it. What up?¡±


    ¡°I finished my last mid-term yesterday and I¡¯m too antsy to stay home. I need to get out and everyone is busy.¡± Oh shit. Why did I say that?


    ¡°In nutshell, you¡¯re bored and I¡¯m your last choice.¡± He didn¡¯t sound upset. I actually think that he was laughing. At me? Ok. Fair enough. I¡¯d earned that.


    ¡°That didn¡¯t come out as nice as I¡¯d wanted it to and you¡¯re not so much ¡®last¡¯ as the ¡®unexpected¡¯ choice.¡±


    ¡°Well, when you put it like that, how can I refuse? What did you have in mind?¡±


    ¡°Nothing. That¡¯s the problem. What do you college people do?¡±


    ¡°Most college students spend Saturday night going to parties, drinking and passing out. You can¡¯t do those things yet, but I do have an idea of something we can do. Do you know where the Roark Library is?¡±, he asked.


    ¡°Sure. I¡­I go there to do my research.¡± I was going to say that I was there just before the fire, but I didn¡¯t want to bring that up.


    ¡°Can you meet me there, by the front doors, in half an hour?¡±


    After agreeing to meet with him, I headed to my room to change and freshen up, before getting on my bike and heading over to the library. I was really curious to find out what Mark had in mind for tonight. I wasn¡¯t na?ve enough to think that it was anything romantic. He was at least four years older than I was and while that wouldn¡¯t matter in ten years, it made was a huge difference now. It was probably illegal for us to get ¡°too intimate¡±. Being closer in age to his little brother, Connor, probably wouldn¡¯t help either. Not that any of this mattered. I wasn¡¯t looking for Mark to be my boyfriend, just my friend.


    I arrived at the library with a few minutes to spare and I locked up my bike. He walked out of the library just as I sat on the bench to wait for him and he joined me. ¡°Hi. Are you ready for a true college experience?¡±, he asked.


    ¡°That¡¯s why I¡¯m here. What are we going to protest? Are we going to march against segregation in our schools, for cleaner water or for free tuition?¡±


    ¡°You do realize that college students do more than that?¡±


    ¡°Sure you do, but you¡¯ve already said that we¡¯re not going to a party, so what else is left?¡±


    ¡°Pretty, brave, and a wisenheimer. You¡¯re the whole package, Abby.¡±


    I grabbed his arm and looked up at him with mock adoration, ¡°Do you really think I¡¯m pretty?¡± I batted my eyelashes at him.


    This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.


    He gently pulled away from me, laughing.


    ¡°Wait. Did you actually use the word ¡®wisenheimer¡¯? How old are you anyways? 90? Should we change your name to Saul and dye your hair white?¡±


    ¡°Abby!¡±


    ¡°Shall I get thee a tonic to ease thine cares? You look parched. I can bring it hither, but you have to make sure not to spill any on your slacks. In sooth, ye should be wary, for I am a rapscallion!¡±


    ¡°Ok, OK. I give up. You win. I concede the crown of snarkiness to you. Now, do you want to sit here and make fun of me all night or do you want to do something interesting?¡±


    I pretended to think about it.


    He pulled me up and we started walking.


    ¡°What¡¯s the plan?¡±, I asked.


    ¡°Since you¡¯re not going to college, I figured that you should see what it¡¯s like to be a student.¡±


    ¡°That makes no sense at all. Why would I want to see what it¡¯s like, if I¡¯m not going to go?¡±


    ¡°Because that way, you can see what you¡¯re missing. You¡¯ve decided, but you didn¡¯t have all the facts.¡±


    ¡°I don¡¯t think you¡¯ll change my mind, but I¡¯m game. Where are we going?¡±, I asked.


    ¡°You¡¯re going to listen to a lecture and then you¡¯ll have a chance to study.¡±, he replied with a pleased smirk on his face.


    I groaned and five minutes later, I followed him as he walked into the Rearden Geology Centre. I¡¯d passed by the building dozens of times and I¡¯d never even thought about going in. I had to admit though, that it was impressive. The entire first floor was set up like a giant mineral and rock exhibition. Hundreds of rocks, minerals, crystals and gemstones from all over the world were displayed, with spotlights shining on them to show off their best features. Each exhibited item had a plaque describing the specimen and giving information on what it was used for. Offices and classroom lined the perimeter of the exhibit.


    As we walked in, Mark switched into tour guide mode and spent the next hour showing me his favorite specimens and telling me all about them. That was the lecture part of his plans and he was really good at it. I¡¯d never really cared for rocks, and I still grouped them all as rocks in my head, but Mark made them interesting. He had passion for this subject, and it showed. It¡¯s hard not to get swept up in someone¡¯s enthusiasm when they love something so much.


    At the end of the lecture, we were back at the start of the exhibition and Mark asked me to pick any specimen and he¡¯d list its characteristics and uses. Kind of like a living version of flashcards. This was the studying part. I readily agreed and we started going to various specimens at random. What Mark didn¡¯t realize was that I was studying too. For each sample that I tested him on, I sent my field out and associated the rock or mineral with how the field identified it. That way, I¡¯d have a larger common vocabulary with my field, and I¡¯d know what things were made of when I scanned them. I¡¯d already done this with a bunch of metals at the forge, but now I was adding in all sorts of things that you wouldn¡¯t use in a forge, including gypsum, sandstone, limestone, quartz and all sorts of gemstones. By the time we were done, I could literally identify the specimens with my eyes closed, even if I couldn¡¯t list off all their characteristics like Mark could.


    ¡°That¡¯s what it¡¯s like to be in university, Abby. In high school, they force you to learn all these subjects that you¡¯re not interested in. It¡¯s mind numbing to sit in class every day for hours at a time and learn about things that don¡¯t hold your attention and don¡¯t relate to your life or what you want to do with it. In university, you get choose what you¡¯re going to study. You get to follow your interests.¡±


    ¡°Mark, I had a lot of fun tonight, but it wasn¡¯t because of the rocks. It was because you love rocks. Your passion carried me with you. I don¡¯t have that spark of interest that you have for things that come from the earth. I don¡¯t have that intensity for anything that¡¯s taught in a university. Also, most university professors aren¡¯t you. They¡¯ve either lost or never had that spark. Most professors couldn¡¯t hold my attention the way that you just did.¡±


    ¡°Well, you can¡¯t say that I didn¡¯t try and at least I got some studying time in. I was going to come here tomorrow and do this. It was much better having someone to help.¡±


    ¡°Hey, I¡¯m up for human flashcard anytime and I did learn a lot. I really liked those shiny rocks.¡±


    ¡°Those were gemstones.¡±


    ¡°Yeah, shiny rocks! Me like shiny rocks!¡±


    Mark facepalmed and shook his head. ¡°You¡¯re hopeless¡±, he said. ¡°But if you like shiny rocks, how would you like the chance to find some of your own?¡±, he asked.


    ¡°Really? Where?¡± I was interested.


    ¡°My family goes gemstone mining up near Asheville every year. You pay an admission fee to get into a gemstone mine and you get to keep whatever you find. Connor and Rose love it. We usually go during Spring Break. You¡¯re welcome to come stay with us for a week and join us. Your dad could come too, or you can bring a friend. We have plenty of room for everyone.¡±


    ¡°That sounds awesome. I¡¯ll check with dad and let you know. Uhm, would it be ok if I invited two friends?¡±

 Medical Training

    When Sun Energy Systems put out their quarterly reports their stock fell by 40% and I almost doubled my investment overnight. Combined with the solid returns of my other stocks and the biotech company that jumped up like crazy after they announced their successful trials, James, Eva and I held a solid lead over anyone else in the competition. I was still ahead of them, only by a smaller margin, as they¡¯d both risked more on my recommendations than last time. While I¡¯d still have to justify my recommendations going forward, I had a strong feeling that James wouldn¡¯t be giving me such a hard time anymore.


    Dad was very impressed with our results and refused my offer to return his initial investment and only risk his gains. ¡°Nothing has changed since our last conversation about this, except that I¡¯m even less likely to move my money away from you. I¡¯ll let it ride.¡± He also made me invest the other $30,000 that he initially wanted to give me to invest. I felt much better about taking it now that I had a proven track record.


    With the next quarterly reports due in January, I had some time before I needed to go see any of the companies. That left me time to concentrate on other things, such as strengthening my ability to hold my shield and working on using the field to scan things and people.


    As the weeks passed and the weather got colder, I kept up a daily routine sending out a shield every hour and holding it and my ability grew. Instead of being exhausted after half a minute and needing the rest of the hour to recuperate, I was able to hold the shield up for two minutes and I was ready to put the shield back up in half an hour.


    One of the reasons for my faster progress was finding out that if I used the field in other, less tiring, ways while I recuperated, my strength grew even more. It¡¯s counterintuitive to my way of thinking and I wouldn¡¯t have thought to try it, if it weren¡¯t for Eva having dragged me to the gym for another workout. The same way that I always try to get her to come to Kung Fu, she always tries to bring me to one of her workouts. She succeeds much more often than I do, because weight training has real benefits to Kung Fu.


    Eva used me as a trial client, and she liked to try out new workout programs on me. She actually had several paying clients that she worked with on weekends, but I was her guinea pig. She said that if I found the workout tough, then it would be perfect for her clients.


    Around Halloween, Eva gave me a new strength training program which included supersets. Supersets consist of working two muscle groups, one after the other. Instead of resting between sets, you finish one set of an exercise and immediately do a set of the other exercise that works a different muscle group. The theory behind supersets is that the muscles used in the first set will rest while you¡¯re working the muscles of the second muscle group. Not only does this save time, but it also increases your stamina. Eva said that sometimes you could even superset within the same muscle group, if you¡¯re going from a general exercise that hits the whole muscle group, to a specific exercise that works only one muscle in the group.


    After going through that grueling workout, I wanted to see if the superset theory would hold for my strength training with my field. I assumed that the holding the shield was a general exercise that hit the whole muscle group, and that using the field to scan things was a more specific exercise.


    The supersets worked wonders and through constant trial and error I learned to use my field to scan things in new ways. Sitting in class, I would surround my desk in a field and scan its materials, mostly wood and steel, but if I concentrated, I could also feel the gum on the underside of the desk and the ink and graphite on top of it. As I scanned more things, my brain became better at interpreting the data coming from the field and I started to get an image of what I was scanning. Instead of just knowing the materials in the desk, I could actually see the desk in my mind and see where the stress points were in the desk.


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    Besides scanning an object by surrounding it with a field, I was also able to learn how scan by projecting a field around me. Until the superset field training, I¡¯d always projected the field in such a way as it formed in a circle around me. However, I knew that when I brought the field closer in, it would contour to my body. Eventually, I realized that with practice and effort, I could change its shape around me and that the projected field didn¡¯t even have to have me at its center. I was able to project a rectangular field that encompassed the entire ceiling of the classroom, including the hanging lights. The field was incredibly versatile.


    Scanning people was still a problem though. Basic biology wasn¡¯t enough to let me interpret what the field was scanning, and I¡¯d still get headaches and become disoriented whenever I did it for too long. The solution to that problem came to me as I recalled the flashcard study session with Mark in the Geology Centre. Learning all those different rocks and minerals had improved my scanning, as my brain could associate the information that it was getting from the field with concepts and names of things that it learned. I needed to do the same thing with the human body. Once I could associate every bone, muscle and organ in the human body with a corresponding scan, I¡¯d understand what I was getting from a scan and maybe it wouldn¡¯t give me headaches anymore.


    I went with the assumption that I was a typical example of a healthy female human and I scanned myself, one part at a time. With my phone showing an interior diagram of a human hand, with each bone, muscle and tendon clearly illustrated and labelled, I started comparing the image on the screen with the image that I was getting from an extended field that I put around my hand. It was still strange how the permanent field that surrounded me did not give me any readings at all. The secondary field surrounding my hand did give me readings and when I placed it there, I got some noise, although far less than I got from scanning an entire person. It was very interesting how the more I compared the scan to the picture with explanations, the quieter the information became. The noise that I felt was at least partially a by-product of my brain not being able to understand what the field was sending. As my brain learned to interpret better, the noise level dropped considerably and the data came in, nice and quiet. The information was just there, and I could access it or not.


    My big worry was that I¡¯d forget the name of a bone or a tendon and the noise would start up again, but that didn¡¯t turn out to be a problem. Within five minutes, I couldn¡¯t remember most of the names of the muscles and tendons, but the scan didn¡¯t get noisier. Apparently, the information was in my brain and it could interpret the data without me being able to access the individual names from memory. That didn¡¯t sit well me though. What was the point of having the information, if I couldn¡¯t express it to others? I was determined to be able to name every structure in the body and I kept working on expanding my knowledge of the human body.


    By December, I had carefully scanned my whole body and could name everything in it, even it wasn¡¯t by its official name. I didn¡¯t see any reason to learn new words when simpler, more common descriptions already existed, so I used fingers instead of phalanges, stomach instead of abdominal cavity, and skin instead of epidermal sheath. I also used right, left, up, down, inside and outside, instead of anterior, posterior, proximal, distal, internal and external. As long as I could describe what I was talking about quickly, that was good enough. The names that doctors used were way too complicated.


    Once I¡¯d completed my self scanning, it was time to try scanning other people again. My first targets were girls my own age at school and I soon moved on to some boys. Scanning the boys sent me back to my phone for more studying. I¡¯d long known they had different equipment, but my brain needed more detailed information and scans to properly interpret and classify that equipment.


    Over the next few weeks, I had to scale back my scanning considerably, as the end of terms exams were starting. The whole ordeal of studying all day began again and I jumped through the required hoops until the it was over. With the end of exams, I was free for two gloriously empty weeks, which I had already committed to volunteering at the hospital. What was I thinking when I¡¯d made that decision?

 Christmas

    Like most years, I had no travel plans for the holidays. I was always busy with dad on Christmas day, but right after that, dad would leave to spend the next week visiting with his parents and his brother and sister and their families. I used to go with him when I was younger, but as soon as I could, I begged off. I loved seeing my grandparents, but I couldn¡¯t stand my aunts and uncles on dad¡¯s side, or their kids.


    My grandparents sold their modestly successful farm to a large co-op when dad showed no desire to do anything but blacksmithing. He was the youngest and his two older siblings had already left the house. Although they have a nice house near the coast, my grandparents spend most of their time traveling around the country. RV living. Sometimes, to change things up and take one of those ¡®around the world¡¯ cruises. They¡¯re a lot of fun to spend time with and they get me small gifts from wherever they go.


    Dad¡¯s older sister, Dana, is married to an army officer and has been moving all over the world from base to base. As Uncle Howard has risen in the ranks, Dana has become snootier and doesn¡¯t like associating with non-military civilians who just don¡¯t understand the ¡®pressures of being in a military family¡¯. Their kids are all in the army and they look down on those who don¡¯t ¡®take on the duty of defending this great country¡¯. I respect their service to our country. I just don¡¯t respect them or their attitude. Living in North Carolina, with over a dozen military bases spread out across the state and its tens of thousands of military personnel, I¡¯ve met many people in the military who are worthy of admiration and respect. Dana¡¯s family is not among them.


    Thomas, dad¡¯s older brother is a lawyer living in New York. He¡¯s been divorced twice and had a kid with each of his exes. His kids are both in their mid to late twenties and I¡¯ve rarely seen them. Uncle Thomas is always talking about his latest case where he totally destroyed the opposing council and got his guilty client off on some technicality that only his brilliant mind could have thought up.


    Neither of Auntie Dana or Uncle Thomas came to help out after mom disappeared and neither of them came to mom¡¯s funeral service. As far as I was concerned, they weren¡¯t family and there was no need for me to see or speak with them again. Ever.


    I usually spent the holidays at Uncle Magnum¡¯s, and he¡¯d plan a bunch of day trips all over. We¡¯d go bike riding in the cold or hiking or to museums. Last year we tried the polar bear plunge. Never again. I think I was blue for a week. This year, Uncle Magnum was taking a trip with Maggie. They¡¯d officially been dating for six months and things were looking good. A week together in Punta Cana was a big step and I hoped that they had a great time.


    That left me at home, by myself, once dad left. He was thinking of forcing the issue and making me go with him, but I reminded him that I was sixteen now and more than capable of staying by myself. He knew how I felt about his siblings and he let it go. He planned on facetiming me every evening.


    For Christmas, dad and I always made each other fun gifts in the forge. Last year he made me a saber for Kung Fu and I made him a forge hammer in the shape of Mj?lnir; Thor¡¯s hammer. This year I gave him a set of AirPods that I made. I even painted them white, so they¡¯d look like the real thing, and I bought him one of those charging cases to put them in. He had a good laugh when he opened his present and I knew that he¡¯d use them; not to listen to music but to stop people from trying to talk to him.


    ¡°This is excellent work, Abby. They have the look and the heft of the real thing. I¡¯ll be using these as a showpiece for my students.¡±


    ¡°Thanks. I figured that if you didn¡¯t like them, you could always go to an Apple store and try to see if you could exchange them for a set that worked. I wonder how long it would take them to realize they aren¡¯t real?¡±


    ¡°What would I want a set of real ones for? No. These are much better.¡±, dad hugged me and gave me my present. We never wrapped our presents or made cards. We just handed them to each other. This time, he handed me a blue foot-high replica of a Jeff Koonz balloon animal dog. I¡¯d seen a full sized one in a museum last year and I¡¯d been crazy for Koonz art since.


    ¡°This is amazing, dad! Thank you!¡± I gave him a big hug and held up my dog to the light. He weighed about five pounds.


    ¡°You don¡¯t have to worry about this dog. It won¡¯t burst on you, even if you drop him. He¡¯s actually better than other dogs, because you don¡¯t have to feed or bath him or walk him. Plus, he¡¯s blue, just like that dog from Blue¡¯s Clues.¡± Dad and I used to watch that show all the time, until they changed Steve for Joe. Joe was ok, but he was no Steve!


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    I named my dog ¡®Red¡¯ and took a bunch of pictures with Red in different poses and sent them to Eva with the caption, ¡°I Got a Dog!!¡± Of course, she loved my new dog and we chatted for awhile about it and then moved on to discussing Eva¡¯s family. She had left a few days ago to spend the holidays with some of her family in Florida and James had left for his family in Tennessee.


    Dad and I spent the day together like we always do on Christmas and had a great time. Christmas had been mom¡¯s favorite holiday and so we made a special effort every Christmas to remember her in a special way. One year, when I was little, we wrote her a long letter of everything that we¡¯d done that year. Another year, when there was a lot of snow, dad made a video of us making a snowman family and we narrated as if mom was going to be watching it later. Most years we worked together to make her something in the forge. A heart shape with her name on it or a plaque that read, ¡®We love you Mommy!¡¯ It helped keep her in our hearts and minds. This year we made a windchime with different metals formed into teardrop shapes because dad had remembered how she¡¯d been planning to get one before she was taken.


    The next morning, dad left to see his parents and I was on my own. I didn¡¯t mind at all, as I had the vacation all planned out. I was going to volunteer at the hospital. I had worked out all the details with Pierce a few weeks ago. I was interested in learning more about the different departments in the hospital and he scheduled me for the morning shift everyday at the pediatric oncology center, followed by another half shift shadowing a nurse in a different department every day or two. I figured that this would expose me to a large variety of medical problems, and I¡¯d be able to scan the people with those problems and let my brain learn to interpret what the field was sending it regarding those issues.


    Pierce started me off slowly by making my first day¡¯s half shift in the maternity ward. What an incredible and frightening experience! I¡¯d seen pregnant women before but seeing them with the field scan was another matter all together. First off, scanning pregnant women was ¡®loud¡¯, in that there was a ton of information being sent over. Had I not improved my scanning ability, it would have been a ten on the scale I used to use, and I¡¯d have been incapacitated by a monster headache in seconds. As it was, I had to limit the scans to the baby to ease the information overload. The baby scans didn¡¯t produce nearly as many alarm bells as their pregnant mothers did. I¡¯d never realized how stressing being pregnant was on a woman¡¯s body.


    Throughout the day, I encountered women having ultrasounds, women going into labor, and women giving birth and by listening carefully to what the doctors and nurses were saying and comparing that to my scans, my brain was able to interpret a good number of the alarms that the field was telling be about. I also started getting a feel for how far along the pregnancies were and how the baby was sitting in the uterus. That was the wonderful part.


    Not everything was wonderful though. Scanning an obviously pregnant woman and knowing that she was about to be told that her baby died in the womb was devastating. She¡¯s been so alive when she came in with her husband for her ultrasound appointment. It would be weeks before I could get the heartbroken look on her face as she left out my head.


    The next two weeks continued to remind me why it was dangerous to be a doctor. They did so much good, but the losses were too painful and the powerlessness to do anything for so many was maddening. I¡¯d seen this for years at the pediatric cancer centre. Now I was seeing it in almost every other department as well. One minute you felt amazed at what was possible and the next you were humbled by what was still out of reach.


    I asked Pierce how he managed, and he said that every year new discoveries and techniques were making more and more things possible and that for now we just did what we could. You¡¯ve got to hold on tight to the good memories and look for ways to make the bad ones stop happening. You can¡¯t save everyone, but it¡¯s better than not trying at all, because the bad things are happening regardless.


    That was really good advice to take into my foundation. No matter how hard I tried, I wouldn¡¯t be able to save every victim of human trafficking. I¡¯d just have to focus on those that I could.


    By the time everyone was back from vacation, I had learned to recognize and differentiate between many types of tumors and to know if they were benign (not cancerous or growing, but needed to be watched) or malignant (cancerous, growing and dangerous), or if they were metastasizing (spreading to other parts of the body). I could also use my scans to detect broken bones, ripped tendons, torn ligaments, some liver problems, kidney failure, skin cancer, swallowed objects, fever, lung damage, various infections and inflammations in the body, and much more.


    It was a good start and scanning people was becoming easier and less ¡®loud¡¯ as my brain was learning to understand what the field was saying. As with my scans of objects, I¡¯d even started getting a 3D map in my head of the people that I scanned, and I could immediately see where the alarms were. If I continued with this, I could eventually be the best diagnostician ever, only I wouldn¡¯t be able to explain to anyone how I knew what I knew.


    I could see this becoming a problem very quickly, as I was bound to scan someone that I knew with a medical problem that I shouldn¡¯t know about or that I would feel compelled to say something about. How do you tell someone that they have cancer or liver disease when there¡¯s no reasonable explanation for your knowing that? I didn¡¯t have an answer to that, but I had a feeling that I¡¯d better find one soon.

 Back to School

    When everyone got back into town, I gave them each a thorough scan. I still didn¡¯t know how I¡¯d break any bad news to them, but if they had something that needed immediate attention, I¡¯d have to find a way. Luckily no one had any issues that I could identify yet. I¡¯d make sure to scan everyone on a monthly basis. One thing that I¡¯d learned was that an early diagnosis gave you a much better chance at a full recovery.


    Scanning friends and family was an easy decision, but now that I was back in school, should I scan every student there, every teacher? Is that how I wanted to spend my life, constantly scanning people and trying to find indirect ways to let them know they¡¯re sick or dying? There was also a privacy issue. What if they already knew about their illness and didn¡¯t want anyone else to know?


    ¡°Ev, James, why aren¡¯t more superheroes doctors? The Flash or Superman would be incredible doctors and they could save lives that way too.¡±, I asked them during lunch.


    Eva answered first, as I¡¯d caught James mid bite. ¡°Because you don¡¯t need superpowers to be a doctor. Anyone can become a doctor, if they can memorize stuff and take the training. My Aunt Missy is a doctor and she¡¯s not the sharpest tool in the shed. We want our heroes to be better than us. Our society even considers the top athletes to be heroes because they can do things that the rest of us can¡¯t. Comic superheroes are the modern version of the Greek Gods, with better morals and less sex. Gods don¡¯t do mundane stuff. They do grand feats of awesomeness. They¡¯re not simple human body mechanics.¡±


    ¡°Superman and the flash would also be incredible janitors¡±, James added, ¡°but that¡¯s not what we need them for. With great power comes great responsibility, not regular or average responsibility. Connor McDavid would be an incredible minor league hockey coach, but that would be a colossal waste of his talents.¡±


    ¡°I see what you¡¯re saying, but saving lives is saving lives. Does it matter if you save a life by catching a person about to fall to their death or by unblocking an artery?¡± Given what they¡¯d said, I knew the answer, but I wanted to hear it.


    ¡°Can a doctor catch the person about to fall to their death? It¡¯s all just a question of resource management. Everyone needs to play to their strengths. Superman also doesn¡¯t go with the police on every domestic abuse case. He uses his time for the big stuff that only he could handle, and he trusts the police to do their job. If he was always doing their job, then he wouldn¡¯t be doing his.¡±, Eva answered.


    I guess I had my answer. I could spend all my time being a walking x-ray machine, but then I couldn¡¯t do the important work that I wanted to do and no one else could do my job, at least not in the same way.


    I decided that I¡¯d keep my scans to friends and family and limit all other people scans to my training at the hospital. While I was improving my scanning, I¡¯d also be looking for a way to scan people and let them know the results without giving away my secret.


    With that settled, for now, I got back into my normal routine of practicing with my shield throughout the school day and scanning objects while I rested. At night, I returned to Kung Fu, as Uncle Magnum had reopened the school after vacation, and worked on my skills there.


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    On my return to Kung Fu, I was surprised to see that Uncle Magnum assigned two new students for me to work with; Maggie and Bobby. Ever since Uncle Magnum had told me all about his wonderfully romantic vacation with Maggie, I was sure that she¡¯d finally be showing up soon to start regular classes. Bobby, on the other hand, I hadn¡¯t expected so soon. I was sure that he¡¯d give it a try eventually, but not yet. Maybe losing in the finals, not to Northfield though, was a wake-up call for him. I¡¯d have to ask him one day, but only once he was fully hooked. Regardless of their reasons for joining, I was happy to work with them and I tried to make the class as enjoyable as it could be, despite having to do horse stance and plank.


    January soon ended and only one thing still bothered me. I wasn¡¯t making any progress on finding out where Len took his kidnap victims. I¡¯d read the journal dozens of times, looking for any clues, but only those three sets of initials came up and I had no way to decode them. I tried scanning the journal, in the hopes that something was hidden in the cover, but it was just a cover. I¡¯d even scanned the duffle bag and all the money. Nothing. I was seriously considering how to get the ledger into the hands of the police and drop the whole thing in their laps, but I just couldn¡¯t give up yet.


    One of the first things that I¡¯d done when I got home with Len¡¯s things was to correlate the ledger numbers with the numbers the women were holding in the picture and put a sticky note on the picture with the name of the victim. I didn¡¯t want them to be anonymous numbers anymore. I¡¯d also separated the pictures by delivery location. Most of the women had been beaten at least a little bit and they had a lost and broken look in their eyes. A few of them however, looked at the camera with fury. They looked like they wanted to rip out Len¡¯s guts. My mom would have been in the next picture, had Len gotten away, and I pictured her as be one of those furious women. She would have fought them with everything she had. As I looked through the pictures, imagining my mom as one of these victims, I knew that I wasn¡¯t going to hand this over to the police. I wasn¡¯t giving up.


    I kept flipping and flipping, not really paying attention anymore to the victims, my thoughts wandering a bit, and my mind registered something different on one of the pictures almost at the end the stack. It was Tanya Gray, delivery number 5794, one of Len¡¯s earliest victims at number 5. Her picture wasn¡¯t taken from the same spot as the others that were delivered to SLS. This one was taken several steps back because there was a half pallet of boxes on the spot from which the picture was usually taken. By taking a few steps back, Len had gotten more background in the picture than usual and to Tanya¡¯s left, I could see an image of a snake in the shape of the letter S, with its forked tongue sticking out, stenciled on the wall. Nothing was written above or below it and I had the impression that it was a company logo.


    Was there a way to search company logos? I quickly checked the internet and found that the USPTO (United States Patent and Trademark Office) did have a searchable database for logos that were trademarked. If the company didn¡¯t trademark its logo, then it wouldn¡¯t be there, and I¡¯d have to try other ways to find the logo. I started looking through the site and learning how to search. First, I had to find the category for snakes and then I had to search it. It all took time, but I didn¡¯t care. I finally had something to latch on to. Even if this didn¡¯t work, I had a clue. I was determined to keep at it until I found what I was searching for.


    A few hours later, I found them! Serpentine Logistic Services. That¡¯s what SLS stood for. They did all sorts of freight handling services in the port city of Wilmington, NC. It was a four-hour drive, but only an hour flight away. I finally had a target to focus on and I would need to prepare for it.


    To do that, I had to speak with Mary O¡¯Reilly at the soup kitchen.

 Mary鈥檚 Place

    When dad and I moved to Briar County, for dad¡¯s new job, we continued with our visits to hospitals, churches and soup kitchens, searching for any hint of mom. A new area, especially being so close to Charlotte, gave us plenty of new places to visit.


    Some places we visited every few weeks and we got to know the people working there pretty well. Pierce Foreman was an orderly at the Briar County General Hospital when we first met him. He was one of the first people that dad handed the photo of mom to. Pierce had lost his mother the previous year to a drunk driver. He told my dad how helpless he felt about his own mother and he assured dad that he would do what he could. As the years went by, he studied to become a nurse and was now the head OR nurse at the hospital and through it all he always made sure that mom¡¯s picture was up on the bulletin board. He was the reason that I started volunteering at the hospital.


    Another person that entered my life because of mom¡¯s abduction was Mary O¡¯Reilly. She runs the soup kitchen on McDonnel Avenue. She looked at mom¡¯s photo and said, ¡°I know her! That¡¯s Hannah Smith. She works at the community center in Dell County. She helped my Robbie when he was having his troubles. He was angry all the time and wanted to take it out on everyone around him. I thought that I¡¯d lose him to the gangs or to drugs, but she talked to him and set him straight. She helped him see his own potential and she got him a job. He¡¯s a new man now. Anything I can do for Hannah, you just let me know!¡± Mary¡¯s been showing mom¡¯s picture to every new ¡®customer¡¯ ever since and she gets customers from her kitchen from all over the state.


    Mary was the one who sat me down, when I got old enough to really understand, and told me all about the horrible effects of human trafficking. She saw it often enough in her kitchen. She explained about the families ripped apart, about the young girls sold into sexual slavery, about the psychological problems that those that escaped from it had later on, and about the suicides of those that couldn¡¯t escape.


    Through her soup kitchen, Mary had met and helped tens of thousands of people over the years and she¡¯s made some interesting contacts. Anytime someone needed something, Mary¡¯s army of contacts could get it. That¡¯s what I was counting on when I called her.


    ¡°Hi Mary! It¡¯s Abby. Did I catch you at a good time?¡± I¡¯d called Mary on her cellphone while she was preparing dinner at the kitchen. I¡¯d helped out there often enough to know that at this time, she was mostly done with all the preparations and the food was just keeping warm. In about 20 minutes her first customers would be making their way in.


    ¡°You did indeed, Abby. You don¡¯t call often. Just usually stop by. This must be important.¡±


    ¡°It is. Someone left me with a cash donation to give to the kitchen, but they want to remain anonymous. I was hoping to stop by tonight or tomorrow sometime and drop it off.¡±


    ¡°Oh Sweetie, you don¡¯t have to set up a time to drop off a donation. You can do that anytime.¡±


    ¡°Yeah, but I was hoping to speak with Howie at the same time.¡±


    There was a long pause on the other end of the line and finally Mary said, ¡°You said that this was an anonymous donation?¡±


    ¡°Yes.¡± As I knew she would, Mary had caught on. This wasn¡¯t to be mentioned to dad.


    ¡°Ok then, Abby. I¡¯ll try to get a hold of Howie and see when he¡¯s available. I¡¯ll put in a good word for you.¡±


    ¡°Thanks Mary. I¡¯ll see you soon.¡±


    Mary would have arranged the meeting with Howie without the donation, but she was getting me access to one of her best contacts and saving me a bunch of time and trouble, so she deserved to get paid for it. I¡¯m sure that Len would be happy to know that his money was being used to help feed those less fortunate.


    Mary called back in less than ten minutes. ¡°Come on by after dinner, around 9pm. I¡¯ll buzz you in through the office door.¡±


    I thanked her and said goodbye before shifting to R3 to get some more money from the duffel bag. A 9pm meeting gave me just enough time to get in a Kung Fu class and a quick shower. I let dad know where I¡¯d be, for the next few hours at least, and I rode my bike to class.


    With my new discovery and finally moving forward with my plans, I was all keyed up and full of energy. Kung Fu was perfect for burning some of that off, but not as an instructor. Tonight, I wanted to be doing, not teaching. I let Uncle Magnum know before class and he had Charlie lead the beginner students. Charlie was Uncle Magnum¡¯s first student to reach master level and he was his usual assistant. He¡¯s been away this past summer, and I¡¯d filled in for him.


    Bobby arrived two minutes before class started and I nodded to him as he joined the class for the salute. I did the warmups with the rest of the class and once those were finished I moved off to the side of the classroom to work on my forms. After the forms, I was surprised to see Charlie join me.


    ¡°Sifu Magnum took over the class and sent me here to work with you. Twenty more minutes of forms, then sparring.¡±, he explained.


    ¡°Do you call him Sifu Magnum to his face?¡±, I asked him.


    ¡°Do I look that stupid?¡± We laughed and continued with the forms.


    Sparring with Charlie was always a pleasure. He was an excellent fighter. Although I was technically only one level below him, he was a few years ahead of me and at 6¡¯1¡±, he had a longer reach that I did. With all the other students, sparring was about making sure that I kept my fighting down to one level above theirs. This taught me control and let them feel challenged so they could improve. However, when Charlie and I sparred, I didn¡¯t have to hold back.


    Charlie was a more aggressive fighter and he started off attacking. I defended and watched for an opening to take advantage of before I attacked. We kept that up for several three-minute rounds and on the fourth I tried something new. I wrapped him in a field and concentrated on feeling every shift in his body as he prepared to attack. I wanted to close my eyes to restrict the flow of information to just my field sense, but this was new to me and I needed the visual cues to help me keep up.


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    Although I was getting more information, it was taking me a fraction of a second longer to assimilate it and understand how to use it. I was getting hit more often, and harder, as my reaction time lagged behind the information. I kept it up regardless, as every few seconds, the field did allow me to see what move Charlie was about to make and I had an extra split second to counter it.


    I knew that if I could master this technique, Charlie wouldn¡¯t ever get a hit on me again. Once I mastered it though, I wouldn¡¯t use the field with Charlie anymore. I needed to learn to use the field, but if I used it on him once I mastered its use, I wouldn¡¯t grow as a martial artist anymore. It was also cheating.


    I got tired of just barely keeping up with Charlie and I took off the field. Now things evened out again, except that I found that I had a better understanding of his body language. I was reading his movements as if the field was still surrounding him. My eyes had learned what to look for, which muscles tensed up before a kick, how his shoulders moved slightly before a hit. I¡¯d always used these visual cues before to anticipate what an opponent was about to do, but now I understood them at a deeper level. These tiny movements were telegraphing his actions and I had more time to react and plan. Now I was getting in more hits on him, harder ones too.


    Sparring time ended and Charlie and I saluted each other. ¡°What the hell just happened, Abby? We started off like we usually do, then you seemed distracted and then you kicked my ass.¡±, Charlie sounded more impressed than upset.


    I scrambled for something to say, and ended up with the mostly the truth, ¡°I think that all the times that Uncle Magnum has been yelling at me to watch my opponent¡¯s movements, has finally sunk in. When I was distracted, as you called it, I was trying to read your body to see what each movement resulted in. Once I figured it out, I was able to read your attacks better.¡±


    ¡°Damn! Now I¡¯ve got to up my game again. You¡¯re not making my life easy, Abby. I¡¯m going to have to make my movements smaller and more efficient, to give you less time to react.¡± That¡¯s one of the things that Uncle Magnum and I really like about Charlie. He sees all obstacles as a challenge and he¡¯s always up for a challenge.


    As I was heading off upstairs to shower and change, I passed by Bobby. He had an odd expression on his face.


    ¡°What up Bobby? You ok?¡±


    ¡°You weren¡¯t joking when you said that you¡¯ve have dropped me like a rock, if I¡¯d taken the playbook without holding up my end of the bargain, were you?¡±, Bobby asked. He¡¯d obviously watched some of my sparring with Charlie. I think that was the first time that he saw me spar with anyone.


    ¡°No. I wasn¡¯t.¡±


    ¡°I didn¡¯t believe you when you said it, but I do now. I¡¯ve never been so glad that my dad always insisted that I hold to my word.¡±


    ¡°Me too. Although, your condescending expression when I told you that almost got you a round-house to the head anyways.¡± I gave him a wink to show that I was kidding and went to shower.


    With a few minutes to spare, I reached the office entrance to the soup kitchen and Mary buzzed me in. I brought my bike in, left in by the entrance and made my way to her office next to the actual kitchen. Mary was very hands on and she either cooked or oversaw every meal that the kitchen served.


    I entered her office and Mary came over to give me a hug. ¡°It¡¯s good to see you, Abby. How¡¯s your dad?¡±


    ¡°He¡¯s good. He¡¯s still teaching at the university. He loves it there.¡±


    ¡°Is he getting out much?¡± That was Mary¡¯s way of asking if he was seeing anyone.


    ¡°Not really. I think he went out on two dates last year. Uncle Magnum set him up once and one of the teachers from the university tried to set him up with his sister. Neither worked out beyond a first date.¡±


    Mary looked sad at the news. She thought that dad needed to get out more and move on with his life. I couldn¡¯t agree with her more.


    ¡°Oh well. Give him my best when you get the chance. Now, Howie will be here in just a few minutes. I don¡¯t know why you need to see him, but I¡¯m sure that it¡¯s important, so I vouched for you. Do you want me to be in on the meeting?¡± Mary was the soul of discretion, but the less she was involved, the better.


    ¡°The less you know, the more believable you¡¯ll be if you¡¯re ever asked about it.¡±, I replied.


    ¡°Is someone going to come ask about it?¡±, she asked with raised eyebrows and a smirk on her face.


    I gave it some thought and answered, ¡°No. I can¡¯t see how they would, but this isn¡¯t playtime and you never know. I¡¯m just looking for some equipment. Oh, and before Howie gets here, I have that donation for you.¡± I pulled out an envelope from the inside pocket of my jacket and handed it over to her. She counted out the money, placed it in her drawer, and gave me a measuring look.


    ¡°Five thousand dollars is not playtime. Abby, are you sure that you¡¯re not in over your head? I know people that can help you if you¡¯re in trouble.¡± She thought that I was involved in something drug related like her boy, Robbie.


    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, Mary.¡±, I tried to reassure her, ¡°I¡¯m not in trouble, but other people are. If I can¡¯t handle it, I¡¯ll be sure to ask you for help.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s all I can ask, I suppose.¡±


    Howie came in shortly after and Mary stayed with us long enough to make introductions, first names only, and then left us alone.


    ¡°I know you.¡±, Howie said. ¡°You used to come to the kitchen and help out. You were with your dad and he showed your mother¡¯s picture around to everyone.¡±


    ¡°I remember you too. You had long hair back then and always came in wearing an army jacket. Dad used to show mom¡¯s picture everywhere we went. We never found anyone who¡¯d seen her though.


    ¡°I¡¯m sorry to hear that.¡± He sounded very sincere. ¡°Mary called me and said that there was someone that needed my help. She didn¡¯t tell me who or why, just that you were good people. What can I help you with?¡±


    I pulled out my shopping list of wants and started to read them off for him. ¡°I need a smartphone that can¡¯t be traced back to me. When it¡¯s tracked, I need it to show that I¡¯m somewhere else than where I actually am. I need to be able to use in anywhere in the world and have a strong cellular and data connection. Dual sim cards would be a bonus, so I¡¯d only need to carry one phone. Ideally, there should be a way to completely wipe the phones¡¯ memory in seconds, without anyone being able to recover anything.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s it?¡±


    ¡°Not quite. I also need a laptop with similar characteristics and an external drive that I can use to quickly download all the files from a computer, like they do in the movies.¡± I stopped here and asked, ¡°Is that even real?¡±


    ¡°Yes, but it¡¯s not as easy as it is in the movies. People tend to encrypt their data these days and it¡¯s getting harder to decrypt the files.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯ll have all the passwords I need to get into the files. I just need to copy the files, without anyone knowing. Oh, if it¡¯s possible, I¡¯ll need a program that can forward emails to a specific address and erase all traces that the emails were sent out. Assuming that I can get an administrator login, I¡¯ll need way to log on to the server remotely and erase all traces that I ever logged on.¡±


    I turned back to the list and kept on reading, ¡°A woman¡¯s medium sized Kevlar vest, a voice changer, and some way to copy everything on a cellphone.¡± I handed him the list.


    ¡°That¡¯s a tall order. I should be able to fill most or all of it, but even with the discount I¡¯ll be giving you because Mary vouched for you, it¡¯s not going to be cheap.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m not looking for cheap. I¡¯m going to be pissing off some very resourceful people. I need top quality and I can pay for it.¡±


    ¡°Depending on my sources, you¡¯re looking at thirty to forty thousand dollars for the high-grade gear and software. I could do it for a lot less if you just needed medium grade.¡±


    I pulled out two envelopes from the other inner coat pocket and handed them to Howie. ¡°Is this deposit sufficient?¡±


    He looked in each envelope and nodded his head.


    ¡°How fast do you need this?¡±, he asked.


    ¡°I¡¯ll need time to learn to use the equipment and then to practice with it. Is a month enough time to get it?¡±


    ¡°More than enough, but I¡¯ll use the extra time to make sure that you¡¯re getting the best.¡±


    With that said, we exchanged contact information, burner emails from both of us, and he left. I hung around long enough to thank Mary again before heading home.

 Preparation

    Waiting for Howie to get the equipment was driving me mad. I wanted to fly out to Wilmington right away and do something. Instead, I had to content myself with planning and practicing. Planning wasn¡¯t easy because there were so many unknowns. Were the victims kept at the Serpentine Logistics warehouse or were they sent elsewhere? How many victims were there? What kind of security was there at Serpentine? How many guards were there? Who was involved? I needed more information and the only way to get it was to go there and see.


    In the meantime, all I had was an address. I went on Google Maps and looked at the satellite images of the warehouse and I used street view to study the building. The warehouse was a typical rectangular building with lots of loading docs along one side and two stories of offices along the front. The building had a large area for trucks to maneuver in and out and had enough parking for fifty cars to the side. The entire area was surrounded by an eight-foot chain-link fence with barbed wire running along the top and the entry and exit gates had a manned guard station between them.


    I zoomed out from the building and studied the neighbors and the area in general, trying to get a feel for the place. I didn¡¯t want to waste time finding my way around when I got there. I wanted to hit the ground running. I planned my routes from the airport to the warehouse and I learned how far the closest police station was. I also looked up the chief-of-police and his contact information.


    Until my equipment came in and I was able to arrange for some time to get to Wilmington, there wasn¡¯t much else I could do. I kept up my hourly shield practice to increase my field strength and continued teaching my brain to understand the information from my field scans. I did that through more visits to the hospital and the Geology center, as well as Home Depot and Lowe¡¯s. Those last two had a surprisingly wide variety of interesting materials.


    On days that I didn¡¯t go to Kung Fu, I¡¯d taken to biking in R2 to release some of the tension that I was feeling. Coming back home from one of those rides, I saw that I had a missed call from Mark and I called him back.


    ¡°Hi Mark. Sorry I missed your call. What¡¯s up?¡±


    ¡°Hey Abby. Thanks for getting back so quickly. I was just planning our itinerary for Spring Break and I wanted to confirm that everyone was still set on your side.¡±


    ¡°Eva and I are all still on, but James has a wedding that his parents are making him go to up in Montreal.¡±


    ¡°They have weddings in Canada? Who knew?¡±


    ¡°Yeah. It came as a big surprise to him too. He¡¯s not very happy about it. They still have snow up there in March and while we¡¯re nice and toasty on the beach, he¡¯ll be stuck inside some igloo, snuggling up to a pack of sled dogs to keep the hypothermia away.¡±


    ¡°I guess Eva will have to bring him a bottle of sand to make it up to him. Anyways, I¡¯m arranging our flights and I¡¯ll need Eva¡¯s full name to book her ticket.¡±


    ¡°I thought we were driving to Jacksonville. It¡¯s only four hours away.¡±


    ¡°Change of plans. My mom said that it didn¡¯t make sense for me to drive with you guys, spend five days and then fly to Asheville for the gem mining and then fly back to Jacksonville only to have to drive you guys back here, only for me to drive back to Jacksonville for the second week of Spring break. This way we¡¯ll fly there, and once we¡¯re in Ashville, we¡¯ll take the bus back here and I¡¯ll drive back to Jacksonville. We¡¯ll have less time traveling and since the tickets will all be on points, it¡¯ll be cheaper than driving.¡±


    ¡°My head hurts just thinking about what you just tried to explain, but I¡¯m not going to complain about flying instead of driving.¡±


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    ¡°Me neither. I¡¯m really looking forward to the break. The professors have really been piling on the work lately and I wouldn¡¯t mind a rest. Are you excited about the trip?¡±


    ¡°Like you wouldn¡¯t believe. Beach and shiny rocks. How can a girl resist that?¡± Also, Jacksonville is only an hour away from Wilmington and Serpentine Logistics. I had already found a bus that could take me there, and I had a cover story planned out so that no one would question my absence.


    True to his word, March first arrived, and Howie called to say that everything was ready. We arranged to meet up again on Saturday afternoon at the soup kitchen, where he¡¯d show me how to work everything and I¡¯d make the final payment. Mary cleared away some space in the storage area and set up a table for us to use.


    Howie walked me through the features of my new phone and computer. I didn¡¯t understand most of the technical aspects of it, just that it was designed by the military for incursion into enemy territory and was untraceable. Anyone trying to find out where a call I made was coming from would find that my location changed every 30 seconds. It was like having a very advanced virtual private network.


    Besides the software, the phone itself was tied to a private satellite system that wasn¡¯t accessible by any governments. Access to that satellite was where a lot of the money was going to. The company had a yearly membership rate of five thousand dollars and the basic plan was over a thousand dollars a month. What passed for basic with this company was essentially unlimited everything at over twice the speed that I was getting on my phone now and was more than enough for my needs. Their premium plan had more to do with even greater speed and with multiple users.


    After that he showed me how to use the dual SIM features of the phone and which button to press to completely wipe the phone¡¯s memory. I hoped to never have to use that. He moved on to the six external drives that would automatically copy everything on a computer or a cell phone when a user logged on or I could activate the drives manually. He¡¯d added some high-tech decryption software, just in case I couldn¡¯t get the passwords that I needed. Each drive was sixteen terabytes, were the size of a thin wallet and weighed almost nothing.


    The programs would erase all traces of my logons and email transfers and were loaded onto thumb drives that I could plug into any server that I had administrator access to. He gave me a box of 50 and explained that they could each only be used in one computer system and needed a specific password to active the program. If I needed more, he could get them to me very quickly and a very good price, now that all the programming had been done.


    For the voice changer, he gave me two solutions. One was an app on my phone that I could activate at the touch of a button and that would deactivate automatically if one of the numbers on my personal contact list called me. That way I¡¯d never make the mistake of answering to someone I know with the voice changer on. The app let me choose from dozens of different voices, so I wouldn¡¯t sound like one of those creepy serial killers when I called someone. There were even a few celebrities and politicians to choose from and I tried to picture the police¡¯s reaction on getting a call from Barack Obama or Clint Eastwood.


    The other solution was a voice changer that was built into a lower face mask. With this on, both my face and my voice would be hard to recognize. This voice changer worked with the phone app to adjust the voice and so I¡¯d have many options for this as well.


    Finally, he pulled out a black hoodie and presented it to me.


    Eyeing the apparel quizzically, I said, ¡°This wasn¡¯t on my list.¡±


    ¡°Yes, it was. You asked for a Kevlar vest. This is better. You were probably thinking of the old-style vests that the police use, the ones with all that thick padding and that weighed a ton. This is the latest version. I chose a style that was more fitting with your age demographic. It¡¯ll be warm during Spring and Summer, but it will protect your arms and head, if you use the hood. It weighs a fraction of what the older vests use to weigh, but it still weights more than twice what a regular hoodie would weigh. You¡¯ve got to remember that either style of Kevlar will not protect you as much from the larger caliber bullets or from explosive tipped bullets. It¡¯s better not be get shot in the first place.¡±


    ¡°This is amazing! You¡¯ve gone beyond what I asked for on every item. Thank you!¡±


    ¡°I have a feeling that you¡¯re going to put it all to good use. Besides, Mary would have my hide if I gave you anything but the best. She¡¯s a good woman and she¡¯s been a good friend to me when I needed one.¡±


    We said our goodbyes and he was heading out the door when I caught up to him and asked, ¡°You wouldn¡¯t happen to know where I can get a small backpack parachute that can hold around 500 pounds do you?¡±

 Spring Break

    Dad dropped Eva and me off at the airport, where we met up with Mark. It was a quick one-hour early morning commuter flight into Jacksonville and Stacey was there to pick us up in White Ford Flex with a pink Ford emblem in front. Mark stowed our bags in the trunk, and he took the shotgun seat, while Eva and I piled in the back. I kept my backpack parachute on in R2. I was glad that I hadn¡¯t needed it for this flight, but it was better to be safe than sorry. My power didn¡¯t protect me from a fall from 30,000 feet.


    Stacey gave her son a big hug and turned to greet us. ¡°Welcome to Jacksonville. It¡¯s so good to see you guys again. How was the flight?¡±


    As she drove, we talked about the flight, school, the beautiful weather that they were expecting for the next week, and about the family. Some of Mark¡¯s aunts and uncles were staying over, along with their kids, so we¡¯d be in for a busy week. Mark hadn¡¯t bothered to mention the family gathering to me and I¡¯d be sure to make him pay for it later. Somehow. Maybe I¡¯d do a Kung Fu demonstration for the family and use him as the punching bag.


    ¡°Connor and Rose wanted to come along to pick you guys up, but I figured that you should enjoy your last few quiet moments before you joined the circus.¡±


    ¡°Usually it¡¯s just dad and me at home, and he mostly works in his forge, so watching your family circus might be fun.¡±, I said hopefully.


    ¡°You¡¯ll definitely learn to appreciate the quiet of home during this trip.¡±, Mark replied.


    ¡°Oh, and Mark, thanks for the heads up on the family reunion.¡±, Eva quipped. Thank you, Eva!


    ¡°Mark! You didn¡¯t tell them? What kind of a dirty trick was that?¡±, Stacey said and then proceeded to give Mark a lecture on proper manners. Mark looked a bit sheepish, but I caught a slight mischievous smile escape when he though no one was looking.


    I glared at him until he looked my way with an innocent expression on his face. I mouthed the words, ¡°What the hell?¡± and he answered, ¡°Mom, do you have any bottled water in here? I¡¯m feeling kind of parched.¡± My jaw dropped. This was revenge for my teasing him months ago? He was so going to pay for this. This was war!


    We arrived at his house shortly after that. I¡¯d had just enough time to quietly explain to Eva why Mark had set us up and for us to come up with our plan of revenge. Since he¡¯d invited us to a family reunion of sorts, we¡¯d be sure to include all of them in our plan.


    Mark¡¯s family came out to greet us and we were introduced to what seemed like fifty people, but was actually just three families, besides Mark¡¯s immediate family. Andrew¡¯s older sister, her husband and their two kids, and Stacey¡¯s two younger brothers, each with a wife and three kids. Most of the kids were Rose¡¯s age or younger, except for one boy that looked to be around Connor¡¯s age.


    Rose took over and showed us to our room, where we washed up and changed from jeans and tees to shorts and fresh tees. The coast was several degrees warmer than the western part of the state. All refreshed, Rose led us on a tour of the house, which was actually a mini mansion, with a pool, a gym, a billiards room, a bunch of bedrooms, and an enormous kitchen, where Stacey sat us down for a late breakfast.


    We spent the rest of the morning by the pool, tanning and occasionally playing games with anyone who was there, and listening to music on Eva¡¯s speaker. It was good to relax and let my cares fall away for a few hours. I didn¡¯t even think about practicing with my field once. Since I¡¯d found out about Serpentine, I¡¯d been so focused on my goals that I¡¯d forgotten that I have a life too and that I¡¯m supposed to just enjoy it every now and then.


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    Mark joined us for lunch and afterwards he took us out for a tour of the area, showing us the history of Jacksonville, as well as the trendier sections of town. Mark surprised me when he told us of Jacksonville¡¯s firm support for the 13<sup>th</sup> amendment, which made slavery illegal, in the form of Freedom Day and how they¡¯ve passed resolutions against modern day slavery. I found it ironic considering that there was human trafficking ring only an hour away.


    That evening, after dinner, Connor told everyone about my magic tricks, and I had to go into my swami routine again. Connor had a ball ready for me this time, but I surprised him by asking for three disposable cups. He ran to the kitchen to get them and made sure that everyone could see that I placed the ball under one of the cups. Then I moved the cups around at various speeds and asked the kids, and adults, to try to guess what cup the ball was under. It was an old trick, but with a new spin on it. They almost always guessed right, but because I had the ball in a field and kept shifting it to R1, they never saw it. The kids loved it and I decided to get a bit creative with it and had Mark do the trick from start to finish, without me touching anything at all. He was stunned. He knew I hadn¡¯t touched the ball or the cups, but the ball was gone.


    The kids clamored for more and I said, ¡°One more, but on the condition that you all have to help me with a special project tomorrow. It¡¯s not magic, but it¡¯ll be fun. Who¡¯s in?¡± All the kids were in and I did a final trick where I turned the cups right side up and dropped the ball into one of them. As it hit the bottom, everyone heard the sound of the ball landing in the cup before I shifted the ball to R1. Then I picked up the cup and poured the ball, that only I could ¡®see¡¯ with my field, into the second cup. They just saw that the ball wasn¡¯t in the first cup. I did the same thing with the second cup to the third cup, appearing to them like I wasn¡¯t doing anything but holding an empty cup and tilting it over. Once the ball was in the third cup, I brought it back to reality and poured it onto the table. Andrew cheered out loud and started clapping and the kids joined in. I got a lot of ¡°How did you do that?¡± and I reminded them about the swami and my promise again. I loved that swami. He got me out of so much trouble.


    Mark kept looking at the cups and at me and shaking his head, while Eva had a look on her face that said we¡¯d be discussing this later. I just looked back at the and mouthed, ¡°Swami¡±, with an apologetic shrug of my shoulders.


    Before going to bed that night, I asked Mark if there was a bicycle that I could borrow for a ride tomorrow morning. He took me to the garage and we tried out a few, until we found one that fit. He checked the tires, made sure that the chain was oiled and found me a helmet to use.


    ¡°Are you sure that you don¡¯t want me to join you?¡±, Mark asked.


    ¡°I really don¡¯t think that you want to be getting up that early. Besides, it¡¯s my meditation time. With no Kung Fu for the week, I need a way to relax.¡± I needed him to let this go. I couldn¡¯t very well have him come with me to Serpentine.


    ¡°I forgot that you do that too. I don¡¯t know where you find time or the energy for all the things that you do.¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s easy. I don¡¯t watch much tv and I¡¯m barely on social media. It¡¯s amazing how much time you don¡¯t waste that way. What about you? You seem to keep yourself pretty busy as well.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s just my geology studies and mining. I enjoy it so I do it all the time.¡±


    ¡°Nothing wrong with that. You know what you want to do and you¡¯re working towards it. Just don¡¯t forget that it¡¯s ok to relax every now and then. I was just reminded of that this morning, when I was sitting by the pool. I couldn¡¯t remember the last time I¡¯d just let everything go and done nothing except enjoy myself for a few hours. You should try it. Join us tomorrow.¡±


    ¡°Maybe I will.¡±, he answered. ¡°Anyways, make sure that you have your phone with you tomorrow in case you get lost.¡±


    ¡°No worries. I¡¯ve got my route all planned out.¡± That at least was the truth.

 Serpentine Logistics

    Waking up the next morning at five wasn¡¯t easy, but I wanted to make sure that I got to Serpentine early enough to see some people log into their computers, if I could. I got dressed in the bathroom, so as not to wake up Eva, and grabbed a few snacks from the kitchen. It was still dark as I eased the bike out of the garage and rode over to catch the first bus heading out to Wilmington. On the way to the bus, I shifted to R1 and when the bus arrived, I carried my bike inside.


    This early in the morning, there was almost no traffic and the bus driver may have taken advantage of that and gone a little faster because we arrived in Wilmington ten minutes earlier than I expected. From the bus station, it took me fifteen minutes to bike to the Serpentine warehouse and I shifted to R2 to ride right past the security guard and through the front gate.


    Shifting back to R1, I surveyed the security measures more closely and noted that they were a lot more extensive than I would have expected. Besides a very well-maintained fence, with coiled barbed wire all along the top, there were security cameras, every fifty feet, mounted on poles set ten feet inside the fence. The gate guard was also unusually alert, and he didn¡¯t have the look of a mall rent-a-cop. He had a military bearing, with no slouch to be found anywhere, and he was scrutinizing the cameras as if he were in the middle of a war zone and his life and everyone else around him depended on his attentiveness.


    I continued riding to the warehouse and stopped just outside of the building. I shifted into R3 to see if there were any hidden rooms or areas under the warehouse. The warehouse part only dropped down about around two feet because of the slab. However, I could see that the office section had a basement. I shifted to R2 again to slip in through one of the drive-up loading doors and took a few minutes to ride through the warehouse. Everything looked like you would expect a warehouse to look. High ceilings, racking, a lot of crates and boxes and pallets, and several trucks in the process of being loaded or unloaded, despite the early hour. The only thing strange was the level of security. As with the outside, the inside of the warehouse had cameras in every aisle and at every door and you needed a passcode to get into the office area from the warehouse.


    Not seeing anything sinister in the warehouse I left my bike in R1 by the office entrance and shifted to R2 to bypass the door. The office hadn¡¯t opened for the day yet, as it was still just a bit before seven in the morning, and I took a few minutes to walk around and get a feel for the place. I found the security room, with another attentive guard sitting watching the cameras, and took out one of the external drives from my backpack. I shifted the drive to R1 and plugged it in to the camera server that was on a rack behind his desk. Once it was set up, I shifted it to reality and it started downloading everything.


    When I¡¯d gotten the drives from Howie, I¡¯d practiced using them, and my other new toys, right away on my own computer and then on the computers of each of the companies that I spied on regularly to get my insider information. I knew that unlike what you see in the movies, the external drives did not cause an on-screen pop-up showing how much of the drive was copied already. Instead, there was a progress bar on the drive itself. The progress bar was hidden from view, so as not to give away what it was doing. Thankfully, the drive was completely silent and the guard was unaware of the copying going on a few feet behind him.


    I continued my tour of the offices. The president¡¯s office, Mr. Daniel Larimar, was very interesting. I¡¯d expected it to be large, and it was, but it also had three hidden areas in it. When I sent out my field to look for hiding places, I found a small floor safe hidden under rug in his office sitting area, a walk-in safe behind his credenza and a small bedroom room built into a space that was covered up by a wall and was accessible via a bookcase door. I guess the bookcase door to a hidden room is a clich¨¦ for a reason. The small bedroom had another door that led to a narrow staircase going down to the first floor.


    Before exploring any further, I located Daniel¡¯s computer and attached another external drive to it, being careful to place it in such a way that he was unlikely to notice it. As soon as he logged on to this computer, the download would start. I could force the download and then deal with the decryption later, but there was always the chance that it wouldn¡¯t work, so I decided to wait for now. The office had a second desk in it, with its own computer. That desk was much smaller and had nothing on it, except of the computer. I attached a drive to that computer as well and went to look in the walk-in safe.


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    My scan of the safe showed that it was the size of large closet and held a lot of bundles of paper. I wouldn¡¯t know how much money it was until I could get it out and count it, but there was much more than Len had in his duffel. There were also a lot of guns in there.


    Scanning the floor safe showed a bag of diamonds and several bags of jewelry, along with files of papers and some electronics that were similar to my external drives.


    I left everything where it was and did a quick search of every file that was in the office. There weren¡¯t many and they all had to do with regular Serpentine Logistics business. With only a few minutes before seven, I went into R2 and walked through the bookcase and into the bedroom. It wasn¡¯t a bedroom for sleeping. The room was furnished with only a bed and nothing else. The bed had four metal posts at each end and there were chains and cuffs attached to each post. To make matters worse, there were two cameras mounted in the corners at opposite ends of the room and a field scan showed that the camera wires led to Daniel¡¯s computer.


    I couldn¡¯t image the horrors that went on in here and I promised myself that Daniel¡¯s days of using this room were over. I was going to close this place down and see what I could do to make him pay. Although I knew that no matter what I did to him, the lives that he¡¯d ruined and the things that he¡¯d done could never be put right. That knowledge, however, wouldn¡¯t stop me from trying.


    As I expected, the first employees started coming in at seven and I followed each of them to their computers and recorded them putting in their passwords. A few of them had such easy passwords that I could make them out without the need to refer to the video. 9-8-7-6-5 was not very creative. Most of these employees were doing clerical or accounting work and I was almost positive that they had no knowledge of Serpentine¡¯s other activities.


    I hit paydirt at 7:30 when their IT director came in and I watched him log on. He took his security much more seriously and there was no way that I¡¯d be able to figure out his password without slowing the video substantially. Once he¡¯d logged on, I placed another drive on the main server and let it do its thing.


    The drive on the security cameras was done and I gathered it up on my way to check out the basement. Getting to the basement was a small problem, in that there was no visible access to the basement from the offices. I had to use my field to find the hidden door. Apparently, the regular office and warehouse staff were not in on Serpentine¡¯s other revenue source. The hidden door was inside an empty closet labelled ¡®Electrical Panel #4¡¯. There were no electrical panels in the closet, but you still needed to put in a passcode to open the door. Once you were inside, there was a secret way to open another sliding panel that would let you have access to the basement. I couldn¡¯t figure out how the door was supposed to be opened, and I ended up just walking through it in R2.


    Once past the door, there were stairs leading down into the basement. Reaching the bottom, there was another door, this one made of steel, blocking further access. I walked through this one as well and came to a large room, with holding cells on both sides and a security office at the very end with a one-way mirror that would allow a guard to keep watch on prisoners without their being able to see him. The cells were made of bars, just like you see on tv, and each cell had a toilet and a sink and drain in the middle of the floor. At the end of the row of cells there was a large, coiled fire hose mounted on the wall.


    All the cells were empty, but I still felt like I was being watched as I walked to the security desk at the end. I walked through the door and stared at the far wall from which were hung a few dozen pairs of shackles. The adjoining wall had three cattle prods affixed to it for easy access. The room was empty otherwise, except for the computer monitor showing the cameras in the cells and coming down the stairs and for the phone on the desk.


    I¡¯d seen enough down there and it was time to gather my things and go for today. Hopefully, I¡¯d downloaded some information that would tell me when the next ¡®shipment¡¯ would arrive.


    As I left the building, leaving behind only the two external drives in Daniel¡¯s office, I couldn¡¯t believe that what I had seen was real. This whole business was a front for human trafficking and it had been going on for years. Thousands of women and children had passed through this building on the way to a life of sexual or economic slavery. If this was going on here, in the United States, the freest country on the planet, how bad was it in the rest of the world?

 The Prank

    Reversing my route from earlier, I reached Mark¡¯s house by 9:30 and put the bike away. I could hear that some people were already up and about, but I avoided them and made my way up to my room as quietly as I could. Eva was still asleep and I left her like that while I took a shower. Even though I¡¯d barely entered reality during my visit to Serpentine¡¯s offices, I felt unclean for having seen the things there. I gave myself a good scrubbing and covered up my bathing suit with another pair of shorts and a tee.


    Eva and I went down to a light breakfast before taking our place by the pool once again. When all of the kids had joined us, Eva and I started to tell them about the special project that they¡¯d all agreed to work on. They loved the idea, especially Connor and Rose, and within minutes they¡¯d all pulled out their phones and were doing their research, quietly shouting suggestions to each other. I couldn¡¯t wait to see Mark¡¯s reaction.


    With twelve of us there by the pool, Eva decided that we needed some exercise and she got everyone to join her in doing a Zumba class. At first, I was surprised that the older boys were participating, but I soon took notice of how they were taking notice of Eva and all became clear. In her skimpy bikini, Eva was worth looking at. I grabbed my phone from the side and took a short video of the class, focusing mostly on Eva, and sent it to poor James in freezing cold Montreal. ¡°This is what you¡¯re missing. Just sayin¡¯¡± was all I wrote. He sent me an angry face emoji and a picture of snow-covered streets.


    We lazed away the rest of the day and planned to head to the beach tomorrow. For dinner that night, Stacey and Andrew took us all out to the Olive Garden and we put our special project into action. Connor started us off when his soup arrived.


    ¡°Gadzooks, Mark! This soup is scorching, but quite savory.¡± I was very impressed that he managed not to break out into even the tiniest of smiles and that none of the other kids let out a peep of laughter. Mark immediately turned to me and shook his head in resignation.


    ¡°Verily Connor, that has the appearance of a very fine broth. Don¡¯t you find it so, Mark?¡±, Rose chimed in. A few of the kids pompoused up their voices and cried out, ¡°Quite so. Quite so.¡± By this time Mark was trying hard not to laugh and Andrew and Stacy were wondering what the hell was going on.


    ¡°I adore a splendid repast in such a gracious establishment.¡±, Eva added. ¡°Imbibe some of Adam¡¯s Ale, Mark. You looked positively parched.¡± Eva¡¯s eyes sparked maliciously at him.


    Mark face-palmed and groaned. ¡°How long is this going to last?¡±, he asked.


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    ¡°In sooth, I cannot say. Children can be quite capricious. It may be that this ends on the morrow, but alas it may persist indefinitely. Years at the very least, I would hazard to guess.¡±, I answered.


    To this, several of the younger children gave out loud harrumphs and banged the tables in mock solemnity. That¡¯s when Eva and I lost it and broke down in fits of giggles of our own. The children continued with the fun throughout dinner and I had a feeling Eva and I had created a new family tradition. Mark was never going to live this down.


    The next morning was a repeat of the previous morning, in that I woke up at the same time and made my way to Serpentine Logistics in the same way. This time I only hung around long enough to make sure that my two drives had copied the contents of Daniels computers and to see if there were any prisoners in the basement. The drives were full and the cells were empty, so I unplugged the drives and headed back to spend the day with Mark and Eva at the beach.


    Over the next several days, in the late afternoons and before bed, I slowly plowed through the data that I¡¯d stolen from Serpentine¡¯s computers. The IT administrator¡¯s password got me past all the roadblocks. There was a lot to go through, but I focused first on Daniel¡¯s computers. The one that was on the small desk held very little on it, but what it had was incredible. It seemed that this computer was used exclusively to make banking transfers and so it had a file on it with all of Serpentine¡¯s bank accounts, including several offshore accounts. The amounts were staggering. Too bad I didn¡¯t have the passwords to those accounts.


    Daniel Larimar¡¯s computer was full of videos from his hidden room. I couldn¡¯t stomach to watch them, but I did copy the first fifteen seconds of a few and put them on an anonymous Dropbox site that I¡¯d be sending to the chief of police when the time was right.


    Besides the videos, Daniel also had the schedules of his special ¡®shipments¡¯ going back for years, along with the date of this next shipment, next Saturday at 2am. Twenty-four women and sixteen children between the ages of five and thirteen. The prisoners were collected in ones and twos from all over the coast and beyond and were smuggled into the port at Wilmington, where they were put on a truck and brought to Serpentine for holding and redistribution to their buyers or to other holding facilities all over the United States. Sometimes, prisoners were brought to Serpentine directly, as in Len¡¯s case, and were then shipped off.


    I spent hours putting the information together in a summary form, with surveillance camera footage from previous shipments of prisoners. I made sure to include still pictures from the cameras of every guard that was involved and of every employee of Serpentine that came in contact with the prisoners, such as Daniel and his IT guy, along with Daniel¡¯s assistant and his head of finance. I uploaded all the information onto the Dropbox account that I¡¯d created for Daniel¡¯s videos and scheduled the entire file to be available to the chief of police and his three captains next Saturday at 2am. I didn¡¯t intend for the information to reach them in that way, but just in case anything happened to me, I wanted to make sure that Serpentine went down hard.

 Mining

    After five days of surf and sand and pool, Eva, Mark and I, along with Connor and Rose, boarded a private jet and headed for Asheville. Some of the other kids wanted to come, but the plane only had space for eight passengers and Mark didn¡¯t want to be responsible for too many kids at once.


    I¡¯d only been on a regular plane a few times in my entire life and I¡¯d never thought that I¡¯d fly on a private jet. It was even better than I¡¯d imagined. We drove right up to the plane and got on. There were no security checkpoints to go through and no line-ups of any sort. Our luggage was loaded into a closet at the front of the plane and we went in the back to sit in large, plush, leather chairs.


    ¡°You¡¯ve spoiled me, Mark. I can¡¯t ever go back to economy flights.¡±, Eva said as she tilted her seat back and melted into the chair.


    Mark laughed and said, ¡°I know what you mean. It¡¯s very hard to take regular flights after going on a private flight. Grandpa got it about fifteen years ago, when taking regular flights became too restrictive. He travels all over the world to visit our mines and with this plane, he doesn¡¯t have to deal with the airlines. Even with all the hassles, Grandma still had to talk him into it. He¡¯s old school and felt that it was too much like pampering himself. She told him that even Sam Walton from Walmart eventually got his own plane and that seemed to settle the matter.¡±


    Minutes after we settled in, the plane took off and we were in the air less than an hour before we were on the ground again. Wow. With a regular airline that trip would have taken two or three times as long, if you consider that we¡¯d have had to show up at least an hour early for the flight and that we would have had to wait to exit the plane and go get our luggage. On this flight, the pilot opened the door, passed down our luggage to an attendant and we took a few stairs down to the ground, where Grandpa Jake was waiting for us.


    At around 5¡¯9¡±, Jake wasn¡¯t a tall man, but he had the broad shoulders and powerful build of a man who¡¯d spent a lot of his years working hard. Despite being in his early seventies, he moved with the ease of someone at least a decade younger. He had grey hair, blue eyes, strong features, and it was easy to see his resemblance to Mark.


    Grandpa Jake hugged his grandchildren and shook mine and Eva¡¯s hands in greeting and we all piled into his truck. It was a bit of a tight fit with four of us on the back bench, but Rose was small, and the trip was short.


    We arrived at Jake¡¯s house and unloaded our luggage. Jake showed us to our room and had us change into our mining clothes. Mark had told us to bring clothes that we didn¡¯t need to ever wear again. We¡¯d be panning in creeks and getting all muddy. Once we¡¯d changed, Jake showed us a selection of high rain boots that we¡¯d bring with us and had us each grab a shovel and a pick. The rest of the equipment would be provided by the operators of the gem mine.


    At the mine, Jake greeted the couple that ran the place like old friends, which they were. The couple, Steven and Susan Manning, had both worked for Jake in his early mining days and they¡¯d eventually bought this land and started a mine when they retired.


    ¡°We just opened up a new area for you to try out. It¡¯s a bit farther out than normal and higher up on the creek. I did some panning there last week and got some good quality stones. With the team you¡¯ve brought, I image that you¡¯ll do better.¡± Steven told Jake.


    ¡°They¡¯d better or they¡¯ll get no supper tonight.¡± Jake responded with mock seriousness.


    ¡°That sounds about right. Let¡¯s get you all geared up, Susan will give her standard speech for the new ones, and we¡¯ll get going.¡±


    Steven took us to a shed where he gave us each a sifting pan and a bucket and he pulled out small hand cart with extra large rugged-terrain wheels. We loaded all our gear onto it and Mark took the handle while Susan started explaining how it all worked.


    ¡°Now Steven¡¯s going to take you out to the new mining area. For those of you who know the drill, the rules are the same as last time. For those that don¡¯t, the rules are simple. If you¡¯re digging, make sure that you¡¯re at least three feet from anyone else so as not to smash them with your shovel. Also, make sure that you don¡¯t toss your dirt onto anyone nearby. If you see a rock that looks interesting, put it in your bucket and we¡¯ll verify it for you here. Better to take it and have it be nothing, than to toss away a 10 carat emerald. You can dig anywhere you want in the area but avoid hitting trees or tree roots. Anything that you find is yours to keep. Two weeks ago, a lady from up in Vermont was here and she took home a fifty-carat emerald. That¡¯s not the largest find we¡¯ve had here, but it¡¯s the biggest find this year. Before you head out, take two minutes to come to the shop and I¡¯ll show you the most likely rocks that you¡¯ll find today.¡±


    Eva and I went into the shop to look at the stones and I scanned them with my field. They were similar enough to ones that I¡¯d scanned in the Roark Geology Center that I would have recognized them easily. We rejoined the group and headed up into the mountain. On the way, Connor and Rose talked excitedly about the gems they¡¯d found in prior years and about what they¡¯d find this time. Jake told a story of how excited he¡¯d been when he was just starting in mining and he¡¯d thought he¡¯d found gold. He¡¯d been crushed when he was told that it was only iron pyrite, fool¡¯s gold. He¡¯d almost gave up mining after than, but he¡¯d already invested all his money in his mine, and he had no choice but to continue.


    Steven led us into a clearing next to a wooded area with a stream running through it. A newly installed sign proclaimed it this area to be ¡°Mining Area #17¡±. Rose immediately headed to the stream with her sifting pan and Eva joined her. Mark and Conner grabbed some shovels and some pans and followed Jake as he picked a spot to start digging, deferring to his greater experience. I just stood there for a moment and asked, ¡°Steven, are we limited to this clearing and stream or can we dig anywhere?¡±


    He replied, ¡°You can go wherever you¡¯d like on this side of the mountain, but I wouldn¡¯t want you to get lost and there are some wild animals that still roam around these mountains. This being a newly opened area means that some of them won¡¯t know to stay away.¡±


    ¡°Ok. Thanks. I¡¯ll see what I can find here first.¡± I rolled up my sleeves and got to work. In my mind, I superimposed a mental grid over the clearing and started following my imaginary grid with my field stretched out five feet wide in front of me and going five feet deep. As I walked, I scanned the ground for gemstones and noted the areas with the largest ones. It only took about ten minutes to cover the clearing and I attracted the attention of all three of the McKenzie men by the time I was done.


    Jake was the first to speak. ¡°Abby, what are you doing?¡±.


    ¡°I¡¯m looking for gemstones. Same as you.¡±


    ¡°You do know that they¡¯re usually found in the ground and that you¡¯ve got to dig to find them?¡±, he asked.


    ¡°Yup. But the trick is knowing where to dig and you can¡¯t know that unless you walk around a bit and get a feel for where the gemstones are.¡±, I answered him as if I had done this thousands of times and I was an expert in gem finding. I made sure to say it like I was imparting great wisdom.


    ¡°Have you done this before?¡±, he asked with a grin on his face.


    ¡°Not even once. However, my grandfather¡¯s grandfather once met a swami high up in the mountains of Tibet and the swami taught him a few things. One of them was how to feel the earth. That¡¯s what I¡¯m doing now.¡±


    ¡°I thought swamis were from India.¡± Jake replied.


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    ¡°People move around you know. Anyways, I¡¯m going to dig here.¡± I marked the spot with a big x and went to get my shovel, pickax and pan. My field had shown me a very large ruby about three feet down, surrounded by two slightly smaller rubies that had broken off of the big one. It wasn¡¯t the largest gemstone in the clearing, but the three stones together made for a nice dramatic flourish. I could always go for the other emerald afterwards.


    Digging down three feet was a lot of work, but I kept at it. Mark called out an offer to help, but I told him that I was fine. Every little while, I would sift through what I had dug up, just for show. There wasn¡¯t anything but dirt and a few smaller gemstones above the rubies.


    While I toiled, Rose and Eva each found small pieces of quartz and Connor found a sapphire stone big enough to be worked into a piece of jewelry. Mark and Jake each had nice mini emeralds to show for their effort. I was the only one with nothing to show for my work and Jake kept looking over at me with a look on his face that said that he questioned my ability to reason. However, he kept his thoughts to himself and didn¡¯t say a word. Mark, on the other hand, was looking for payback for my getting his entire family to tease him about his use of outdated words.


    ¡°Are you sure that your grandfather got the right instructions from the swami?¡±, he teased from the sidelines.


    ¡°Gramps was a very careful man, Mark. A real ¡®measure twice, cut once¡¯ type of guy. He got it right.¡±


    ¡°Maybe the swami¡¯s trick doesn¡¯t work?¡±, he suggested.


    ¡°Never doubt the swami, Mark. The swami is never wrong.¡±


    I kept digging and I could hear Jake ask about the swami and Connor told him all about the magic tricks that I did and how they were taught to me by my grandfather who learned them from a swami.


    A few minutes later I reached the rubies and collected them in my bucket. I put the bucket outside the hole and climbed out and stretched my back and my arms, making a big show of it. Then, without a word, I filled in the hole and took my bucket over to the stream where Eva and Rose were.


    ¡°How are you guys doing?¡±, I asked. They each showed me their finds and showed me how they used their pans to find gems.


    ¡°So. Did you find anything? Was the all-knowing swami right?¡±, Eva asked sarcastically.


    ¡°Of course he was. Why does everyone doubt the swami?¡±.


    ¡°Let¡¯s see then.¡±, she said and I passed the bucket over to her.


    ¡°She looked inside and looked up at me. ¡°What are those?¡±.


    ¡°Rubies.¡±


    ¡°They¡¯re awfully big. Are you sure?¡±, she asked. By this time, Rose had scooted over to have a look and before I could answer, she squealed.


    ¡°OMG! Grandpa Jake. Grandpa Jake. Look at what Abby found!¡±. She picked up one of the stones and gaped at it, totally stunned.


    Jake came over, followed by Mark and Connor. Rose handed the stone to Jake and took the other two out as well. Jake examined the largest ruby and then the other two as well.


    ¡°This is the biggest ruby that I¡¯ve seen outside of a museum. How did you manage to find this on your first hole?¡± he asked in awe.


    ¡°Well, you see, my grandfather¡¯s grandfather was in Tibet one time and he met this swami, who taught him all sorts of stuff and he taught my grandfather, who taught me. But I had to promise to never reveal how I did any of the things that he taught me.¡±, I replied, as Mark facepalmed and Eva groaned.


    Connor laughed out loud and said, ¡°Never doubt the swami!¡±.


    Jake looked at me curiously and asked, ¡°Do you have any idea how much this is worth?¡±


    ¡°No. I don¡¯t know much about the value of gemstones. Mark showed me some at the geology center and told me that they were shiny. I like shiny things, so he invited me to come here.¡± I liked playing the ditzy teenage girl.


    ¡°Mark told you they were shiny, huh? I¡¯m going to have some words with that boy later. In the meantime, do you mind if I take these over to Steven to examine and measure them?¡±


    ¡°No. Go right ahead. I¡¯ll go find more. Maybe I¡¯ll find a shiny green one this time.¡±


    As he walked away, mumbling ¡®I¡¯ll go find more¡¯ and ¡®shiny green one¡¯, I turned to Rose and Eva and said, ¡°Do you want me to help you find some nice stones or are you still doubting the swami?¡±.


    They both jumped at the chance and I put my boots on and scanned the stream. This area had a lot of one to five carat stones, but after a few minutes of looking I found a 15-carat moonstone and an eight carat peridot stone. I did a whole bunch of hand waving and pretend chanting and other hocus pocus, because it made Rose laugh, and then I led Rose to the moonstone and told her to dig down a bit. While she dug with enthusiasm, I quietly led Eva to the peridot and gave her similar instruction.


    ¡°How are you doing this Abby? Seriously. Don¡¯t give me any more of that swami shit, either.¡±, Eva said quietly, so that only I could hear her. ¡°If I have to hear about that damned swami one more time, I¡¯m going to hit you.¡±


    ¡°Remember how I told you that I could tell if a piece of metal had impurities in it?¡±, I asked her.


    ¡°Yeah, when you showed up that hottie Tyler.¡±


    ¡°This is kind of similar to that. Oh, dig a bit to your right. Perfect.¡±


    After Rose found the moonstone, I had to help Connor find a similar sized topaz and even Mark asked me for some help. I made him say, ¡°I shall never doubt the swami again¡± three times before I gave him directions to his own sapphire.


    For my own part, I finished off the day digging up the large emerald. I didn¡¯t bother showing it to anyone. I might have overdone it just a bit with the rubies already. I quietly unshifted my R1 backpack when no one was watching, and I placed it in there before shifting the whole thing back to R1. So that the others wouldn¡¯t start doubting swami, I dug a bit deeper and pulled out another emerald about the same size as the smaller of the rubies that I found. It was very shiny when I got it wet.


    Jake came to get us at the end of the day, and he gave me a look that I didn¡¯t understand. He definitely had something on his mind. He didn¡¯t say anything right away and Rose ran up to him to show him her moonstone. When Connor showed him emerald, Jake looked at me again. I just shrugged my shoulders and mouthed the word, ¡°Swami¡± to him. He smiled and shook his head.


    When we got back to the shop, Steven and Susan were there and they looked a bit shell shocked. When they saw me, the got up and congratulated me on my find. They were so excited for me, and I found myself at a bit of a loss. I looked over to Jake for help.


    ¡°Abby, the ruby set that you found is huge. The last set like that found in the area was in 1990 and once it was all cleaned up, it sold at auction for over $90 million dollars. Yours aren¡¯t as big and we don¡¯t know if they¡¯re going to be as special, but they¡¯re worth at least a five million dollars. If they¡¯re as special as I think they¡¯ll be, you¡¯ll get a lot more for them and you¡¯ll probably have to name the rubies. Steven and Susan are excited because when word gets out about this, their mine is going to be flooded with customers. Your find will put this place on the map. At the very least, they¡¯ll be able to sell this place for ten times what they paid for it.¡± Jake explained.


    Now it was my turn to be shell-shocked. With Len¡¯s money, I¡¯d started to get used to bigger numbers, but that was money that I had to hide and couldn¡¯t use directly for the Hannah Foundation. This money, more than five million dollars of it, could be declared and used out in the open. It was also ten times the amount that Len had ¡®donated¡¯ to me. When the gemstones sold, I¡¯d be able to truly start up the foundation. I had no idea that my playing around with the field could do something like this.


    ¡°I can start my foundation.¡± I still couldn¡¯t believe it and I didn¡¯t realize that I¡¯d said it out loud until Mark answered me.


    ¡°So now there¡¯s no chance of me changing your mind about college is there?¡± Mark gave me a despairing look and I glanced over at Eva. She had happy tears in her eyes.


    ¡°No. Not for awhile at least. I¡¯ll be too busy.¡±


    ¡°What¡¯s this about a foundation and what does it have to do with college?¡±, Jake asked.


    I ignored his question and pulled out my smaller emerald. ¡°I also found this shiny emerald. Is it worth a lot too?¡±


    It turned out that all the stones that I¡¯d helped find that day were worth more than I¡¯d thought. Eva¡¯s peridot could probably be sold for around seven thousand dollars, while the other stones were each worth around five thousand dollars. My shiny green emerald would need to be appraised, but it was also worth in the millions. Not bad for a day¡¯s work.


    Steven gave me claim voucher for my gemstones and promised to get them appraised for me. When I explained that I had plans to start my own charitable foundation, Jake suggested to Steven that he keep my name confidential for now, as there might be tax advantages to having the foundation own the gems, rather than me. He was going to ask his tax attorneys and let me know. The rest of the group decided to hold on to their gems for now, rather than selling them right away.


    One the way back to Jake¡¯s place, as Connor and Rose filled the car with their talk about their plans for their stones, Mark whispered to me, ¡°You know that you¡¯ve ruined future gemstone hunting for them? For me too, I guess. Any trips back there will be a disappointment compared to this.¡± He was smiling when he said it, so I knew he was teasing.


    ¡°I suppose that you¡¯ll just have to invite me along from now on.¡±, I answered with a contented grin on my face.


    ¡°Not a bad idea, Abby, but after those two finish telling their cousins about this trip, everyone else will want to come on the next trip and you won¡¯t have time to find your own gemstones.¡± He laughed out loud at the look of dawning horror on my face.


    ¡°I¡¯ll be happy to come and help everyone out.¡±, I started, ¡°Unless I¡¯m too busy doing my nails or my hair. I think I might even be coming down with a cough whenever you invite me again. Alas, my frailty and ill health may preclude me from enjoying your company on future such adventures.¡±


    Mark scowled and muttered, ¡°Frailty! What a load of¡­¡± I didn¡¯t choose to make out the rest of it.

 A Conversation with Jake

    We got back to Jake¡¯s house and after we¡¯d all showered and eaten, Eva went back to our room to facetime with James and show off her new rock. Connor and Rose went straight to bed. We¡¯d all had a long and exciting day. I was tired too, but I stayed to help Mark and Jake clean up after dinner.


    Afterwards, Jake asked us to join him for a drink. Being only sixteen, I had a hot chocolate. Mark had a local craft beer and Jake poured himself a bit of whiskey.


    We sat down around the kitchen table and Jake began talking. ¡°Abby, I know that everyone thanked you for saving Mark from the fire, but I want to add my own appreciation. You may not know it, but you saved the two most important things to me. My family and my company, in that order. At his point in my life, the only reason to have the company is for the benefit of the family. I¡¯d have retired years ago if it was just a matter of money.¡±


    ¡°You¡¯d go crazy in two weeks if you retired, Grandpa. Remember the family vacation a few years ago. No way you can retire. Besides, you love it so what¡¯s the point of retiring?¡±, Mark asked.


    ¡°Stop interrupting me, boy.¡±, Jake grumbled good-naturedly. ¡°I was trying to say thank you to this young lady. I love all my grandchildren, but so far, Mark is the only one that has my passion for the business. I¡¯ve made no secret of my intention to pass the company on to him one day, when he¡¯s ready for it.¡±


    Jake paused to sip his drink and continued, ¡°So by saving him you saved the company as well. I wanted to show my gratitude to you in more than just words though and I had decided that I was going to offer to pay for your college education. Hold on, Abby, I can see you want to say something, but I already know. You¡¯re not going to college. I heard that today. What you don¡¯t know is that before I knew that, I called old Kronin at the university and tried to set up a full scholarship for you. He and I go way back. Remind me to tell you about the time we fought off an alligator together. Anyways, Kronin interrupts me when I tell him what I want to do and says that there¡¯s no need. As the daughter of a full-time professor at the university, your education there would be free. Also, if it weren¡¯t, the university would have rewarded you with a full scholarship for saving one of their students. They¡¯re also looking for a way show their appreciation of your heroism. If you didn¡¯t know it, Kronin things the world of you. So, I¡¯m back to square one. Actually, after today, I¡¯m at square zero, as your find puts you in a whole new financial league and my backup idea of offering you a job at the company isn¡¯t as attractive anymore.¡±


    ¡°Jake, you don¡¯t need to do anything. I¡¯m just glad that I was able to help. Really. And I already got paid back. In saving Mark, I¡¯ve gotten to know him and your whole family and he invited me to join you guys today and I found the gemstones. Without those, I couldn¡¯t start my foundation for years. Saving Mark ended up helping me make my dreams a reality.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s a really nice way to look at it. My Nancy would have loved you for it. She was like that too. Sunniest disposition you¡¯ve ever seen. I¡¯m not like that though. I was raised to square up my debts as best I could, and I am indebted to you. If you ever need help with anything, please let me know.¡±


    I nodded solemnly and he asked me about my foundation and why I wanted it. I told him all about the public side of my planned Hannah foundation and I told him about mom and the kidnapping. Mark hadn¡¯t heard any of this before, since I rarely tell the whole story to anyone. I usually just say that she¡¯s gone and let it go at that. No one ever asks follow-up questions.


    ¡°That¡¯s probably the finest tribute that you could make to your mother and it¡¯s a worthy project in and of itself. I¡¯m even more upset that my Nancy isn¡¯t here to meet you. This is just the type of cause she would have loved to latch on to and help with. That was her thing. Once the kids were old enough, she worked with charities, while I concentrated on the mines. I was able to help her in one respect, and I think I can help you in the same way. The mining business requires a lot of accountants and lawyers, including tax specialists. If you¡¯ll accept my help, I can have some of our lawyers set up your foundation and make sure that the government doesn¡¯t step on your toes. I¡¯ve done that for a few charities in the past, but never for a charity that will be run by a minor. I don¡¯t know how that changes things, but we can find out.¡±


    ¡°That would be incredible. I was going to hire specialists once I had enough money, but before today I thought I had plenty of time to figure it out. Thank you. I guess it wasn¡¯t that hard to find something that I needed help with after all.¡±


    ¡°Oh no, Abby, this has nothing to do with what I owe you. My help with your foundation is part of what I owe my Nancy. I¡¯m also going to ask you to put me on your board of directors. Every reputable charity has a board that helps advise or guide the charity. They also help raise funds to some extent, even if it¡¯s only by attaching their reputation to the charity. Since Nancy passed, I haven¡¯t done any work with charities and she wouldn¡¯t have wanted that. If it¡¯s ok with you, I¡¯m going to have Mark be my point man on this. I want him get some experience with this as well and the two of you can learn about it together.¡±


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    ¡°I was going to ask anyways. Grandma Nancy talked about her charities all the time and she always said that she¡¯d get me more involved after college.¡±, Mark said to Jake. He turned to me and added, ¡°I can pick up the slack when your ill health kicks in and you¡¯re feeling frail.¡±, Mark said.


    ¡°I¡¯d love to have you on the board, Jake, and I suppose Mark can tag along, if he behaves himself.¡± I stuck my tongue out at him and we both grinned.


    Jake didn¡¯t miss seeing this byplay and said, ¡°It¡¯s good to see that you two get along so well. Especially with what I¡¯d like to suggest to you, Abby. This summer, a few weeks after school lets out, I¡¯m sending Mark to visit three of our mines and give me a report on them. He¡¯ll also be stopping at two potential mine sites to go over the data we have on them in person and then recommend which one we should be go ahead with. This trip is meant to get him some practical experience in evaluating existing and proposed mines and get him involved in the decision-making process. It¡¯s a three-week trip and he¡¯ll be spending between two and five days at each site. When he goes to visit the mines, he¡¯ll stay in hotels, but he¡¯ll be camping for the times that he¡¯s at the potential sites. I¡¯m mentioning all these details, because I¡¯d like you to go with him.¡±


    ¡°Me? I don¡¯t know anything about mining or the mining industry. Why would you want me there?¡±, I asked. This was so out of left field. I was really curious though. It did sound like fun.


    ¡°Normally, I¡¯d tell you about the great pay and experience, with is true, but that¡¯s not why. I watched you today at the gem mine. You surveyed the area before you started. You walked the clearing in a grid pattern. You didn¡¯t just run off and stick your shovel in, like the rest of us did. I have no idea how you found the gems, but you had some sort of connection or sense of the land. I once knew a miner who had that sense, but nothing as strong as what you did today. I tried everything to get him to join me. Unfortunately, he struck it rich early, retired to an island somewhere and got killed in a hurricane a decade ago. My point is, I didn¡¯t buy your line about the swami and I¡¯m definitely not buying your ditzy ¡®I was just looking for something shiny¡¯ bullshit. That¡¯s fine for the kids, but you¡¯ll need a better story if you want to keep your brains and ability hidden. I want you to go with Mark because I want your opinion of the potential sites, even if it¡¯s just a feeling. That¡¯ll all. I might not go with what you recommend, but I¡¯ll have my reasons if I don¡¯t. It won¡¯t be because I don¡¯t have faith in you. A lot more than just the ore in the land goes into choosing a site.¡±


    I looked over at Mark, who had been listening to all this intently, but hadn¡¯t said anything. ¡°How about you Mark? How do you feel about this? You¡¯re the one that would have to put up with me for three weeks.¡±, I asked.


    ¡°I¡¯m feeling like an idiot. I didn¡¯t realize the significance of your survey of the area, much less notice your grid pattern. I could tell that you seemed to know where to dig, but I didn¡¯t put it all together and realize how useful that could be for the trip. I would love to see what you¡¯d make of the sites and after having spent a week with you, I think I can manage for three.¡±, Mark said.


    ¡°I guess I¡¯m in then, if my dad¡¯s ok with it. It sounds like fun.¡±


    ¡°Good. Now before I go off to bed, there is one last favor I need from you Abby.¡± Jake had my attention.


    ¡°Mark is hiding something important from me and I¡¯d like your help in finding out what it is.¡±, Jake stated while looking directly at Mark.


    ¡°I¡¯m not hiding it. I¡¯m just not ready to discuss it yet.¡±, Mark countered, looking exasperated.


    ¡°You¡¯d like me to spy on your grandson while we¡¯re out looking at potential mine sites? You know Jake, even if I was a great liar, which you just told me I¡¯m not, I think he¡¯d see through my charade.¡± That elicited a big guffaw from Jake and a gentle smile from Mark.


    ¡°No Abby. I¡¯m hoping he¡¯ll tell you what he¡¯s got in mind and then you¡¯ll either tell him that he¡¯s a fool and he¡¯ll drop it or you¡¯ll tell him he¡¯s a genius and that he should quit being so cautious and just tell me about it. Either way, I¡¯m happy.¡±


    ¡°Plus, it won¡¯t hurt the boy none to be exposed to a strong woman. Too many girls these days are waifs with fake breasts, hanging on their boyfriends¡¯ arms like ornaments. A man needs a partner in his life, not a trophy or a cleaning lady.¡± I think I full on blushed at that and I definitely did not look up to see how Mark was taking this blatant matchmaking.


    ¡°Mark and I are just friends, Jake.¡±, I managed to say.


    ¡°That¡¯s fine. Being around you will let him see what he could have if he chooses well.¡±, Jake answered.


    ¡°What makes you think I¡¯m good for him?¡±, I asked.


    ¡°Don¡¯t play games with me, Abby. You ran into that fire! A fire no one else was going near. I may be old, but I can use a computer. I saw the videos. You didn¡¯t hesitate. I wish to God that I could say that I¡¯d have been right there beside you, but I don¡¯t know. You ran towards danger, while others recorded it. You ran because you heard someone was in danger and you could do something about it. How can being around someone like that be bad for him?¡±


    With those words, Jake bade us goodnight and left Mark and I sitting there in an awkward silence.


    After fifteen seconds, I said, ¡°Awkward silence.¡± We laughed at that and the tension that Jake had created between us broke. Shortly after, we both headed to our rooms to get some sleep.

 Back Home

    Dad was not happy to hear that I wasn¡¯t going to college. When I got home, I told him all about my trip and about finding the gemstones. I was so excited about how much the find was worth and what it could mean for the foundation that I completely forgot that I hadn¡¯t ever really talked to him about college or of my plans for a foundation.


    ¡°Dad, what did you image that I¡¯d be doing in college?¡±


    ¡°You have a lot of interests, Abby. I imagined that you¡¯d pick a few and see how you liked them as a profession. I also imagined that you¡¯d try some courses in other subjects and see if they interested you.¡±


    ¡°I already found something that I¡¯m interested in. I¡¯m going to help people like mom. People who were ripped away from their families and had their lives ruined.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s a good thing and I wholeheartedly approve, but what about your life Abby. You should get to experience the good things in life as well and college is a very memorable time in people¡¯s lives. They make new friends, learn new ideas, plan for their future and have a good time. You deserve that as much as anyone does. Your family was ripped away from you too. You¡¯re one of the people that you want to help with your foundation. You have your whole life to run the foundation, it can wait a few years until you¡¯re ready.¡±


    ¡°I thought that I¡¯d have to wait years until I could build up the foundation and get enough money through investments or donations to truly help people, but if the gemstones sell for as much as Jake says they will, then I don¡¯t have to wait. I can start helping people now, or as soon as the money comes in and I set up the foundation and organize it. There¡¯s no reason to wait longer than that. People go to college for two reasons, dad. To learn about what they¡¯ve chosen to do and to figure out what they want to do. I know what I want to do.¡±


    ¡°Then why not learn about it by taking business courses in how to run a charity or foundation? I can¡¯t remember if Galt has any courses that are specific to not-for-profit companies, but those courses do exist in other colleges.¡± Mark had asked me the same question months ago and I¡¯d brushed him off. I couldn¡¯t do that with dad.


    ¡°Because I don¡¯t want to wait four years to start helping people when I can make a difference now. I¡¯ll probably make mistakes along the way that I could have avoided by going to college, but in four years, I can help a lot of people. Also, I¡¯m not afraid to do research and take online courses.¡± I could see that he was starting to consider my side of this now.


    ¡°No, you¡¯re not.¡±, dad said with resignation, ¡°I saw that with the way you invested our money. You¡¯ve always put in the time and effort to excel at what you want to do. If you do that with your foundation, I have no doubt that it¡¯ll be successful. I suppose that college will still be there for you later, if you change your mind. It might even be more helpful after you¡¯ve had some real-life experience. You¡¯ll be able to associate your lessons with things that you¡¯ve done and discover other, maybe better, solutions.¡±


    I gave dad a big hug and said, ¡°Thank you, dad, for understanding. And thank you for agreeing to talk to Harry about all this for me!¡±


    ¡°Nice try, Abby. This is your decision and talking to Harry will be one of the many consequences of that decision that you have to deal with. If I were you, I would stress the possibility of going to college later, in four or five years maybe. You might also think about asking him to be on your board of directors.¡±


    Oh well, it was worth a try. Dad had a good idea with the board though. I was definitely going to do that and if that didn¡¯t work, I could always distract Harry by asking about the time he and Jake fought off an alligator.


    With dad mollified, I could concentrate on Serpentine Logistics and their next shipment of slaves this Saturday. I had a lot to do to be ready in time and I didn¡¯t have much time left, as today was Thursday already. My to do list looked like this:


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    <ul>


    <li>Coordinate my flight times and buses</li>


    <li>Find an excuse to be gone from Friday afternoon until Saturday night</li>


    <li>Pick-up special-order cameras from Howie</li>


    <li>Modify my body type and appearance</li>


    <li>Find an all-black outfit to cover my new body type</li>


    <li>Choose a weapon</li>


    <li>Pack all the gear into the large camping backpack</li>


    <li>Bring a few duffel bags</li>


    <li>Tune up my bike</li>


    <li>Coordinate with the Wilmington police department</li>


    <li>Stop the bad guys, save the people</li>


    </ul>


    Checking the flights and buses only took a few minutes. The airport was only about a half hour from here and I¡¯d only have to switch buses once to get there. After landing, I should be able to get to Serpentine by bus and bike in less that half an hour.


    Before calling Eva, I texted Howie to see if the cameras were ready. I¡¯d sent him an email with my requirements a few days ago when I realized that using my phone to take video wasn¡¯t going to work. A set of ten tiny cube cameras, hooked up to the internet to provide a live feed of the victims as they were brought in, would be much more efficient. They needed to be untraceable to their source, as the cameras might end up being found by the police. Howie texted back that he¡¯d meet me at the mall at 3pm.


    Eva answered her phone on the first ring. ¡°Hey Abby. Was your dad excited about the gemstones? My moms still flipping out about it. She¡¯s so happy for you.¡±


    ¡°Well, he was happy for me, but we kind of got stuck at the ¡®what do you mean you¡¯re not going to college¡¯ part.¡±


    ¡°Oh. You hadn¡¯t discussed it him? You seemed pretty sure these last few months.¡±


    ¡°Yeah, but I figured that I had until Senior year, so there was no point in having to go through an extra six months of arguing. Anyways, we talked it out and he¡¯ll support my decision, for now.¡±


    ¡°Wow! How¡¯d you manage that?¡± Eva sounded impressed.


    ¡°I threw a tantrum and stomped my feet and begged and pleaded until I got what I wanted.¡±


    ¡°That so doesn¡¯t sound like you. You probably had a bunch of really good sounding arguments ready for him and he¡¯s a fair guy, so it all worked out.¡± Eva knew me and my dad too well.


    ¡°Basically. Eva, I need to ask you for a favor and you can¡¯t ask me what it¡¯s for.¡±


    ¡°Ok. Shoot!¡±


    ¡°I need you to be my alibi for tomorrow afternoon until Saturday night.¡±


    ¡°What¡¯s if for?¡±, she asked.


    ¡°You¡¯re not supposed to ask. You¡¯re just supposed to say, ¡°I got your back, girl. Whatever you need, I¡¯m there for you.¡±


    ¡°Yeah, yeah, whatever. Pretend I said all that. Now where are you really going?¡±. I¡¯d expected this. I knew her just as well as she knew me and she¡¯d die of curiosity if I didn¡¯t tell her.


    ¡°I¡¯m meeting up with a boy that I like and we¡¯re going to spend the night together at his place in the mountains. I think he might be ¡®The One¡¯ and I might go all the way with him.¡± Never tell the truth when a perfectly good obvious lie will do.


    ¡°Abby, that is such a load of bull. You¡¯re the least boy crazy girl I know. You¡¯re not lesbian, but you don¡¯t seem to care about boys either. Not that it would make a difference if you did care, since you¡¯re so clueless about them.¡±


    ¡°Hey. I like boys and I¡¯m not clueless. I just haven¡¯t found any good ones yet.¡±


    ¡°See, that¡¯s what I mean by clueless. You¡¯re practically surrounded by perfectly good boys who are interested in you and you don¡¯t even know it.¡±


    ¡°No, I¡¯m not. Name one.¡± I challenged her, expecting silence or stammering. Instead she said, ¡°I¡¯ll name three. Bobby, Tyler, and Mark.¡±


    ¡°Are you out of your mind? Two of them are three or five years older than I am and are in college and Bobby doesn¡¯t like me that way. He¡¯s just a friend.¡± I didn¡¯t like where this conversation was going.


    ¡°From your own words, you provide proof that you¡¯re clueless. Mark invites you to spend a week with his family.¡±


    ¡°I saved his life. He was just being nice.¡±


    ¡°Tyler stopped by the hospital to see how you were doing. Twice.¡±


    ¡°I was in a fire. He knew me and wanted to make sure that I was ok.¡±


    ¡°Bobby took up Kung Fu to spend more time with you.¡±


    ¡°He wanted a winter sport to keep up his conditioning for football.¡±


    ¡°Wow. What reality are you living in, Abby? It¡¯s like you¡¯ve created some sort of alternate reality where the rules of this reality don¡¯t apply.¡± Despite the topic of conversation, I almost laughed out loud at how close she was to the truth of my abilities.


    ¡°It doesn¡¯t matter anyways. Will you cover for me? It¡¯s very important to me¡±, I asked her pleadingly.


    ¡°Yeah. I got your back, girl. Whatever you need, I¡¯m there for you. Will you at least tell me later on what this was all about?¡±


    ¡°Probably not. Thanks Eva. I¡¯ll call you later and we¡¯ll make a time for me to come over and drop off my bag.¡±


    A few minutes later, I went to meet Howie for the cameras. He showed me how to connect them to a network and how to upload the video to a live feed. I thanked him again and paid him for the cameras. Now I just needed to find a good outfit and pick a weapon. Butterfly swords? Sabre? Baseball bat?

 Return to Serpertine

    My flight landed on time at eight thirty on Friday night. Before leaving for the airport, I¡¯d made sure to spend a few hours at Eva¡¯s house before we both left to meet up with James. Eva told her mother that we¡¯d all be out late watching a movie and not to wait up for her. As soon as we left, I took off for the airport. Eva really was going to the movies with James.


    It had been a full flight and I¡¯d had to sit on the ground beside the main entry door because having the ghost of someone sitting on me for hours wasn¡¯t appealing. I¡¯d tried it for ten minutes and I¡¯d promptly moved when she¡¯d passed gas. I was in R1, but I still felt like I was marinating in it. She was also fidgety and talked to her seatmate non-stop. The floor was a much better choice.


    Upon landing, I rode my bike to Serpentine Logistics and verified that everything was as it was a week ago. I didn¡¯t want any surprises. I checked the cells in the basement, in case a freelancer like Len had dropped someone off, but they were all empty. Next, I verified that their wireless password still worked and I set up the cameras to connect to their internet and send out live feeds to a website that I specified. Placing the tiny cameras in the right locations took a little bit of time, because I had to verify that each camera was focused properly and looking in the right direction. I needed the extra time because I was working with gloves and my fingers were clumsier in them.


    So far, the building was empty except for the gate guard and the guard at the security station inside. It was still over four hours until showtime and I expected more guards to arrive at midnight. With all the cameras in the building, both mine and Serpentine¡¯s, I decided to go outside to make my call to the police.


    It wouldn¡¯t actually be a call yet. The Wilmington police had at ¡®text-a-tip¡¯ system where you could text in information about crimes anonymously. I didn¡¯t trust that anything would stay anonymous once they saw what was going on at Serpentine, but thanks to Howie I had the equipment to make sure that I stayed anonymous.


    Setting up my phone to show a fake name, Roger Willoughby, and number, I texted out ¡°Human traffickers will be operating in Wilmington tonight. Video from last time to follow.¡± I had a short video of the women in cells from one of Serpentine¡¯s more recent deliveries and I texted it to them, along with a number that they could reach me at.


    I had a few other ways of reaching out to the police, but I wanted to see if this would be effective. I got a call back in just under twenty minutes. Given that my video was two minutes long, I was betting that I wouldn¡¯t be dealing with an underling. I wasn¡¯t.


    ¡°Hello. This is Captain Stevens, of Special Investigations. We received your tip about human trafficking. What else can you tell us about it?¡±


    ¡°Their next delivery of victims is scheduled for 2AM. My information shows that there will be 40 women and children brought in.¡± I was using the voice changer in the mask and I sounded like a middle-aged man. I¡¯d decided not to go with the celebrity option, because I¡¯d felt that I¡¯d lose credibility that way.


    ¡°Sir, where are they being transported to?¡±, he asked.


    ¡°I¡¯ll call you back at 2AM and tell you.¡±


    ¡°Why don¡¯t you just tell me now? Why wait?¡±


    ¡°My information might be wrong. Once I see the captives, I¡¯ll call you back.¡±


    ¡°Sir, I¡¯d really like to get the information now. It¡¯s my job to check these things out. Two of the women in the video that you sent are on our missing persons list. They were identified through our facial recognition software. Both went missing two months ago. I don¡¯t know where you got the video from or your information, but it¡¯s not fake and we need to follow up on it.¡±


    I had wondered if they¡¯d think that the video was staged and I was just some idiot prankster, but it seemed that I had their full attention.


    ¡°They have guards patrolling the place and a lot of cameras watching over everything. If they see you, they¡¯ll have enough time to stop the transport. I won¡¯t risk that. Organize whatever you need in the meantime.¡± I was hanging up, when I heard him shout, ¡°Wait.¡±


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    ¡°I can¡¯t get a warrant to search the place if I don¡¯t have an address.¡± I knew that he was trying to trace the call, but I trusted Howie¡¯s equipment and I stayed on long enough to answer him.


    ¡°If this is important to you, you¡¯ll have a judge standing by.¡± I hung up and shifted back to R2 to get into the building.


    The floor safe was my next objective. Now that I didn¡¯t have to worry about anyone noticing if things were moved around, I could take a look at the files inside. In Daniel¡¯s office, I shifted to R2 and shifted the contents of the safe to R2 as well. Reaching into the safe, I removed everything and examined the ex-contents. The bag of diamonds was incredible. I¡¯d seen bags like this in movies and videos plenty of times and they¡¯d often referred to the diamonds as ice. I could definitely see why.


    I packed the diamonds away in my backpack and searched through the bags of jewelry. The bags were filled with engagement rings, diamond bracelets, and gold necklaces, along with watches and earrings. These weren¡¯t new pieces of jewelry; these were taken from their victims. I placed these bags back in the safe for the police to find. Maybe there was some way to get them back to the victims¡¯ families.


    Ever since I downloaded Daniel¡¯s computer and the server, I¡¯d been hoping for some clues about the organization behind the human trafficking. Daniel was basically a middleman. A sleezy, piece of filth middleman, but still only just that. He wasn¡¯t kidnapping the women and children, he was housing them and transporting them to their final destinations. I wanted to find the kidnappers, the brokers and the buyers. I wanted to track where the victims went after they were shipped off from here. The Serpentine servers didn¡¯t have that information anywhere on them that I could find and I was really hoping that the files in the safe would have something worthwhile for my search.


    Those hopes were dashed when I looked at the tabs. Each folder had the name of a bank on it and inside each folder were the details of those banks and passwords. Of course I realized that I could use that money to fund my search for more traffickers, but I didn¡¯t know how to transfer the money and even if I did, I didn¡¯t know how to do it without the money being traced to me. For now, it was useless information, but I stored it in my backpack for another day.


    My last chance was in the external drives that I¡¯d pulled out of the safe. I suspected that they had more of Daniel¡¯s videos on them, older ones that he didn¡¯t want to keep on his computer, but I plugged them into my laptop and checked them anyways. I was right. More videos. Another dead end. I was running out of places to look for clues. My last chance would be the delivery truck. If he had a GPS system, or some manifest, then I¡¯d be able to see where he picked up the women and children from. If that failed, I¡¯d have to use the police records of this investigation to see what leads they found. Maybe I¡¯d missed something in the server.


    Midnight rolled around and with it came ten beefy guards. They all drove into the warehouse and parked along the back wall. Two immediately went downstairs to the cells and two stationed themselves by the loading dock. The other six took positions at various points along the route that the victims would take on their way to the basement. This was standard procedure and I¡¯d seen in on the security camera files several times. In about an hour, the head of IT and Daniel would show up, along with the head of finance and Daniel¡¯s assistant. Delivery time was always all hands-on-deck at Serpentine.


    With some time on my hands, I returned to Daniel¡¯s office and checked out his walk-in safe. In R2 I just walked right through the credenza entrance and used my phone as a flashlight to look around. It was a small space, with shelves on one side and a tool pegboard on the other. The shelves were full of bundles of cash while the pegboard was covered in guns. Looking at the cash, I¡¯d hoped that I¡¯d brought enough bags to hold it all. I wasn¡¯t sure how I was going to get it all back home.


    The guns were another matter. I hadn¡¯t planned on taking those at all but seeing them changed my mind. I might need a gun at some time in the future and here was a whole collection just sitting around, waiting to be asked for a dance. It was possible that Howie could hook me up with a gun, should I need one, but I¡¯d prefer not to have to ask him for one. With a ¡®better safe than sorry¡¯ attitude, I examined the handguns carefully and picked a 22, a 38, and 45. From experience, I knew I could handle the 22 and the 38, but the 45 would probably have too much kick for me. I¡¯d take it anyways. A 45 makes for a good stocking-stuffer. Daniel was also kind enough to have a shelf full of ammunition for his various toys for me to choose from.


    Having chosen what I would take later, I left the walk-in safe without disturbing anything. Should Daniel decide to come in here before the transport arrived, I didn¡¯t want him to realize that anything had been disturbed. I¡¯d already taken enough of a chance by pillaging his floor safe, but that couldn¡¯t be helped, as I had to know in advance what was in there. Was there a way to stop him from opening the safe without becoming suspicious? I took a few seconds to scan the safe, saw that it was battery operated and shifted the batteries into R1. That will at least slow him down long enough for me to put the files and bag of diamonds back if I needed to.

 It Begins

    Daniel¡¯s management crew started showing up at a few minutes after 1am and thirty minutes later all four of them had arrived. Daniel was the last to show up and he stayed in the warehouse, sitting in the shipping office, playing Candy Crush as he waited for the truck to arrive.


    I spent the time checking to make sure that all the cameras were working and that I¡¯d gotten good pictures of every guard and every one of Daniel¡¯s crew. I uploaded those pictures into a separate folder on the Dropbox account and labelled it ¡°These are the Bad Guys¡±.


    With ten minutes left until the truck was supposed to show up, I changed into my outfit. Shoulder pads, arm guards, and shin guards covered with oversized black sweatpants and Howie¡¯s Kevlar hoodie. I completed the outfit with the voice changing lower-face mask and a pair of black, steel-toed workman¡¯s boots. The ensemble hampered my ability to move a little, but it helped ensure that if I was caught on an any of the cameras, no one would be able to easily identify me by gender or body type. I had no intention of shifting to reality at any point, but I¡¯d rather be prepared since plans didn¡¯t always work out the way you expected them to.


    I unstrapped my baseball bat from the side of my camping backpack and returned to the warehouse in time to hear Daniel shout ¡°Everybody get ready. They¡¯re at the gate.¡± The guards all got into positions, a few of them smiling in anticipation. These were not nice men and I made a mental note not to hold back with them.


    The sound of a truck backing up could be heard from outside and the loading dock door was opened by one of the guards. The back of a truck was visible, but there were no markings on it. It was just a white roll-up door with a heavy lock at the bottom. A few seconds later the driver entered from the side door and unlocked the door. I pulled out my phone and took a few pictures of him, just in case my cameras didn¡¯t get a good view of his face.


    With the door unlocked, a guard came over to lift the truck door and I shifted my focus from the driver to the back of the truck. I saw pallets of boxes stacked almost to the top of the truck. Where were the women and children? What the hell was going on? I started to question everything that I¡¯d learned about Serpentine, but the basement cells and the videos told me that I wasn¡¯t wrong.


    Two guards, each driving a forklift, drove up and started unloading the truck. They stacked the boxes neatly to the side and once the second row had been removed, I could see that the rest of the truck had been walled off, with only a pair of grey steel doors allowing access. The pallets had been cover in case the police stopped the truck! I breathed out a sigh of relief that I hadn¡¯t been wrong about all this.


    The doors were unlocked and opened, exposing a poorly lit area where gagged women and children sat huddled on the floor, shackled to metal rings welded to the floor. For a few seconds, I just stood there, watching the guards move in to unlock the shackles from the floor rings. It was so hard to believe that this was really happening, that slavery still existed in the freest country on the planet. The blank looks in the children¡¯s faces and the resignation and despair of the women froze me into inaction. Then one of the guards shoved a little girl out of the truck and anger flooded through me, waking me from my shock. I mentally noted which guard it was and I got to work.


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    I used my camera to record the guards getting the prisoners out of the truck and I went outside to get more information on the truck and its driver and to call the police. Almost as if he was trying to make my life easier, the driver had left his wallet in the console next to his seat. I took pictures of his license and of the truck registration papers and called Captain Stevens. As the phone rang, I made sure that my voice changer was turned on and I pressed send on the email that I¡¯d prepared for the captain.


    I didn¡¯t wait for the captain to say anything. As soon as he answered the phone, I gave him the address and said, ¡°Serpentine Logistics Services. The forty women and children just arrived and are being brought to the cells in the basement. If you check your email, you¡¯ll see that I sent you a link to a live feed of the cameras that I was able to set up inside the building. There¡¯s also a link there to a Dropbox folder with some videos and pictures of those slavers. There are twelve guards and four others there. The person in charge is Daniel Larimar. He¡¯s a really sick piece of work, as you¡¯ll see in the videos.¡±


    Captain Stevens responded that they were on the way and proceeded to ask me questions about the layout of the building and where the guards would be. I answered him and hung up quickly. I wanted to make sure that the captives would be safe until the police arrived.


    Returning to the warehouse, I saw that the last few women were being brought through to the office side. I shifted to R2 and followed them right after the door closed. I could see the line of captives being prodded to move faster as they made their way into the ¡®Electrical Panel #4¡¯ closet and down to the jail cells, where they were shoved into the cells by the guards. As the last woman was about to move into the cell area, a guard grabbed her by her a hair and pulled her back. He was the same guard that had shoved the little girl earlier.


    ¡°Brando, if you¡¯ve got everything here covered, I¡¯m gonna take this one back upstairs for a bit.¡±, he shouted across the room.


    ¡°Sure thing. They¡¯ll all be locked up nice and tight. Take your time.¡±, Brando answered.


    The woman started struggling, but she had no chance. The guard was huge, and she was in chains. Even if she managed to get out of his grasp, there was nowhere for her to go, but she kept struggling until the guard smacked her hard across her face and she slumped over with a dazed look on her face. The guard half-carried her out of the room and up the stairs where another guard joined him, and they walked down the corridor to an empty filing room.


    The police were minutes away, but they wouldn¡¯t get here in time to save this woman from more abuse. After all she¡¯d been through already, there was no way that I was going to let anything else happen to her. I followed them into the room in R2, the bat held firmly in my hand.

 Rescue

    The sadistic guard that had shoved the little girl was holding the woman against the wall and whispering to her all the things that he planned to do to her, while the other guard started unbuckling his belt. I didn¡¯t need to see any more. Starting with the bat pointed towards the floor, I swung my arms up in an arc to catch the second guard¡¯s face and shifted the bat to reality just before it connected. The bat was back in R2 before the other guard could turn around to see what had made that crunching sound.


    As the guard saw his friend on the ground, he let the woman go and I repeated my performance for his benefit as well. The only difference was that this time I gave it a more traditional baseball swing, using a two-handed grip, choking up on the bat, and making sure that my right elbow was up and away from my body. I think that his feet might have left the ground, but I couldn¡¯t be sure. I am sure that he went down hard. I don¡¯t know how much damage I did to him, but he wasn¡¯t going to get up anytime soon. Maybe never at all. At that moment, I didn¡¯t care, and I didn¡¯t bother to go check if either of the guards were breathing.


    The woman had curled herself into a ball in the corner of the room, with her head buried in her arms. I don¡¯t think that she was even aware yet that she was safe from the guards. I knew that there were no cameras in this room and so I shifted into reality and crouched down a few steps away from her.


    ¡°It¡¯s ok. They¡¯re not going to hurt you. They¡¯ve been knocked out. The police are on their way and should be here in a few minutes.¡± With the voice changer still on, I spoke to her as soothingly as I could. At first, she didn¡¯t respond, and I kept telling her that she¡¯d be ok, and that help was on the way. Once it was apparent that she wasn¡¯t about to get hit or raped, she relaxed her arms a bit and looked out at me and the guards on the floor. I¡¯m sure that in my mask and black clothing, I wasn¡¯t the most reassuring sight, but the seeing her tormentors lying in such uncomfortable positions must have made her feel better because she asked, ¡°Did you do that?¡± I heard a slight accent in her voice and briefly wondered where she was from.


    ¡°Yes, I did.¡±


    ¡°Are the police really on their way. Is this finally over?¡±, she asked with tears starting to run down her face.


    ¡°They should be here any minute now, but I want to make sure that you¡¯re safe while they secure the building and lock up the bad guys. I¡¯d like to take you to one of the other offices and have you lock yourself in until this is over. Is that ok? I need to go make sure that the others stay safe as well.¡± I¡¯d considered asking her to stay in this room and lock the door, but I couldn¡¯t ask her to lock herself in with the guards, even if they were unconscious or worse.


    She looked at me and nodded her head. Before we left the room, I sent out my field as far away from me as it would go to see if there were any guards in the area and to check for cameras. With no guards or cameras around I quickly led the woman into an adjoining office, and I made sure that she locked the door before I left. As soon as the door closed behind me, I shifted back to R1 and went to check on the captives.


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    Besides being confined against their will and miserable, the captives were ok for now. Although I started to worry about what would happen when the police arrived. Would the guards hold the women and children as hostages? There was no way for the police to get into the jail cells without someone getting hurt. I couldn¡¯t believe that I hadn¡¯t thought of this before and I started swearing in my head. Just because I could get and out of anywhere, I¡¯d let myself forget that others couldn¡¯t.


    Thinking that I needed to secure this area before the police arrived, I counted the guards and tried to see how I could take them out without any of the captives getting hurt. There were four guards in the basement. One was sitting in the security office at the back with the camera display, one was pacing between the cages, and one was on either side of the door to the cells. I debated whether I should take out the guard outside the door first or last and decided that he¡¯d be last because there was a camera watching the outside of the door that was linked to the camera room in the security office. That meant I needed to take out the guard in the office first. There was also a phone in the office and if the guard saw anything strange, he could call for reinforcements.


    In R1, I walked across the holding area and into the security office. Brando was sitting down and watching the cameras. He was leering at a close up of one of the children. I put a field around one of the cattle prods on the wall and shifted it into R1. Then I used a field to shift Brando into R1 and used the prod and the bat on him, repeatedly, before I shifted him back into reality. By bringing him into R1 with me, the whole thing had happened without a sound in reality. I left his unconscious body lying on the floor and I turned off the camera system in the cells, as well as the live feed to my cameras. One down, three to go.


    With the camera systems off, I didn¡¯t have to worry about the police seeing footage of me later. It was possible that a few of the captives would see something, but no one would be able to make sense of it. After all, baseball bats don¡¯t swing themselves. I used the bat on the pacing guard just as he turned to face the other way and the blow didn¡¯t catch him full on. He staggered dazedly to the side but managed to stay up. My follow up swing crashed him into the bars of one of the cages and he slumped to the ground. The sound of the guard hitting the cage had gotten everyone¡¯s attention and they were all watching his motionless body as I ran towards the guard by door, who was now running towards me to see what happened to the guard. The force of the bat hitting his face as we were running towards each other sent tingles up my arm and to my shoulder. I thought that his head was going to fly off of his body. Instead, his head was stopped in place by the bat and the body flew out from under him. He landed on his head and his body came crashing down on top of it. It was gruesome and I felt like throwing up for a minute or two afterwards. I took a few deep breaths to calm myself down and I went to take out the guard outside. I didn¡¯t think that I could use the baseball bat again, so I brought him into R1 and used the cattle prod instead.

 The Bad Guys

    After dispatching the last guard in the basement, I hurried up the stairs and out of the building to find out what was going on. The police should have been here by now. Their response time was awful, and I planned on lodging a complaint with Captain Stevens. He picked up on the second ring.


    ¡°Where the hell are you?¡±, I yelled into the phone.


    ¡°We¡¯re in a tactical van a block away reviewing the plans for the building. The plans don¡¯t show the basement that your live feed is coming from. We¡¯re trying to figure out how to get in there without the guards taking the women and children hostage.¡± He sounded frustrated and angry.


    ¡°Don¡¯t worry about that. I took care of the guards in the basement. If you move quickly enough, no one else will be able to get to the captives.¡±


    ¡°What do you mean you took care of the guards? How many did you take care of?¡± Captain Steven¡¯s voice sounded like he was having a tough time restraining himself and I heard someone in the background saying that the live feed had gone down in the basement.


    ¡°Six guards need to go to the hospital.¡± That was true enough since they¡¯d either be going to surgery or the morgue. ¡°Captain Stevens, you need to move in now. Daniel has a small arsenal of guns in this office upstairs. If he realizes that six of his guards have been knocked out, you¡¯re going to have a much tougher time taking him in and you or your officers could get hurt. Hurry. I¡¯ll try to see if I can take out a few more of them in the meantime.¡± I didn¡¯t give him a chance to respond. I hung up on him again and went back inside.


    Other than the gate guard and the guard inside watching the cameras, there were four guards left and the truck driver. He was using a hose to wash out the interior of his truck. I found all four of guards relaxing in the warehouse. They were probably called in for the prisoner intake and were hanging around for their next shift instead of heading home. I would have enjoyed knocking them out, but it was faster to just lock them out of the office area by disabling the passcode mechanism using my field. I shifted the passcode reader power wire to R2 and reached into the reader to remove it.


    Upstairs, I found Daniel in his office, sitting and talking with his managers and his assistant. They were relaxed and weren¡¯t even discussing their captives. Maybe I missed that part. Daniel was telling them a golf story from his last trip to Florida. Everyone looked like this was just a normal day at the office for them and not like they just took delivery of 40 humans that were going to be turned into slaves to amuse a bunch of sickos. Destroying 40 families meant nothing to them.


    I wasn¡¯t sure why all of them were even here. The guards had done all the work and it didn¡¯t take four people to supervise the unloading of the captives. Also, now that the captives were all locked up in their cells, why were any of the managers still around. It was almost a half past two in the morning. Why weren¡¯t they heading home?


    The answer came a few seconds later when the computer on the small desk in the office chirped. The finance guy went over and checked the computer. ¡°The money¡¯s been sent to the account, Daniel. Just a bit over $1.9Million. I have the bank confirmation.¡±, he said.


    ¡°Excellent, Jerry! Please see that it gets moved into our other accounts right away.¡±, Danial instructed.


    The finance guy, Jerry, got up to make room for the IT guy to work on the computer. As he started to type on the computer, Daniel said, ¡°Seb, now that the money is in, you have two weeks to get the merchandise to the buyers. I want you to confirm all the delivery details for each piece and send our clients their delivery dates. Use encryption code 6 this time and as usual, don¡¯t use the office computers.¡± Seb, short for Sebastian I guessed, was Daniel¡¯s assistant and he got up to start his task right away.


    Seb didn¡¯t get very far before there was a buzz from Daniel¡¯s phone. Daniel got up and pressed a button on his phone. ¡°Yes?¡±, he asked.


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    ¡°Sorry to disturb you, sir, but Darryl at the front gate missed his check-in a few minutes ago and he¡¯s not answering my calls. His last message was the confirmation that the truck had come in. I¡¯d like to send a few of the guards that are on standby to the gate house to check if everything is ok.¡± This was from the inside guard watching the cameras.


    ¡°Send out two guards and put the rest on alert. Keep in constant contact with the two guards that you send. Call me immediately if you lose contact with them.¡±, Daniel ordered.


    Daniel went over to his window and he was soon joined by the finance guy. Both of them stared out, trying to pierce the darkness with their eyes. I moved closer so I could look out too. ¡°I think I see a car coming in.¡±, Jerry said. ¡°No, make that two cars. What the hell?¡± Just then, what seemed like a fleet of cars came out of the darkness and turned their flashing lights on. If I was a bad guy, I¡¯d be soiling my pants right about now.


    IT guy ran up to the window and shouted, ¡°Oh shit! Daniel, what do we do?¡± He was in full panic mode, but Daniel was almost calm as he stared issuing out orders to his people. ¡°Seb, call the guards in the basement and have them hole up. Let them know the situation and tell them to use the merchandise as hostages in negotiating a way out. That should distract the police long enough for us to get out of here. Jerry, get back on the computer and erase everything in it. Format it if you can. If you can¡¯t do it in three minutes, destroy the computer.¡±


    Uh-oh, I couldn¡¯t let that happen. I had a better use for that computer. Before Jerry could start walking to the computer, I wrapped it in a field and shifted it to R1. To be safe, I did the same thing with Daniel¡¯s computer. I wanted the police to find that one. With the screen and keyboards and mice still looking like they were hooked up, my work went unnoticed, for the moment.


    ¡°Our reinforced doors should hold them off for a bit. They also won¡¯t have the layout of the place, so they¡¯ll go slowly. Robert, go hit the panic button on the server. Destroy it all. Fast.¡±, Daniel instructed. Mr. IT guy, Robert, started running out of the office and I used the bat to break his leg. I wanted these four caught and questioned and put in jail for life. They weren¡¯t getting out the easy way by getting knocked unconscious.


    Robert started screaming in pain and when the others looked to see what had happened, all they saw was Robert on the floor wailing in pain. It looked an accident. He¡¯d tripped, landed badly and hurt his leg. Nothing to panic about or stop them from their tasks.


    ¡°Daniel, I can¡¯t reach the guards in the basement. No one is answering.¡±, Seb called out.


    ¡°My computer is down. It¡¯s not working.¡±, Jerry said.


    ¡°Mine too.¡± This last was from Daniel. ¡°What the hell is going on here?¡±


    The sounds of boots coming up the stairs could be heard. Lots of boots. Seb suddenly ran into the office, closed the door and locked it. ¡°We need to leave. There¡¯s no more time. They¡¯re here.¡±, he said.


    ¡°Seb, open the side door. I¡¯ll get the guns.¡±


    Seb reached for the bookcase lever just as I brought down my bat across his forearm. The pain must have been intense because he didn¡¯t even scream right away. I knew it was coming though and I stepped away and made my way over to Jerry, who was still sitting at the small desk with his hands on the useless keyboard. It was just too tempting a target for me and I managed to bring down the bat in a way that broke both of his wrists with one swing. It was a motion that I used with my staff at Kung Fu and I made sure to put maximum power into it.


    Jerry¡¯s scream did not harmonize well with Seb¡¯s, or with Rogers not so quiet whimpers of pain. Daniel looked back and for at each of his crew screaming in pain and confusion was written in large on his face. From outside the room, a voice over a microphone started yelling, ¡°This is the Wilmington Police Department. Come out with your hands where we can see them, and no one needs to get hurt.¡±


    Now Daniel was panicking. He turned back to his credenza to open the walk-in safe to get to his guns, but I had no intention of letting him get off without a few love taps from my bat. I ran through his desk and jabbed him in the back. As he turned around to see what had hit him, I moved to the side and swung the bat into his pelvic bone, specifically his left ilium wing, near or on the iliac crest. I felt proud that I¡¯d remembered that level of detail from my studies of human anatomy.


    Daniel crumpled, crying in pain. I felt no sympathy for him whatsoever. I remembered the videos that he took, and I swung again, breaking something in his shoulder. Through my anger filled haze, I couldn¡¯t remember the names of the bones just then. I was starting my next swing, targeting his knee, when the door burst open and men poured inside, guns drawn and shouting orders. It was enough to snap me out of my anger and check my swing. I had things to do.

 Freedom

    While the police milled about, confused as to how all four of the bad guys were out of commission, I walked over to the small desk and picked up the computer from the floor. It was one of the newer smaller models and it would fit easily in my backpack. The computer under Daniel¡¯s desk was an older tower model. I picked that one up and moved it away from the wires that used to go into it and gently set it down. I knew that the field would allow the computer to go back to reality and not be in the same space as the wires, but it was too important to even chance it. Once the tower computer was on the ground, I shifted it back to reality. I didn¡¯t bother to plug it in.


    With the computers taken care of, I put a field around all the cash and shifted it to R1. I did the same with my three chosen guns and their ammunition. The guns and ammo I packed away immediately, but there was simply too much cash to pack away right now. I still didn¡¯t know how I would get it all to the airport and back to my house. It was too bad that I couldn¡¯t simply drive home. It would be a four or five hour drive, while the first flight back wasn¡¯t until 9am; still six full hours. Wait. Why can¡¯t I drive? Each of Daniel and his crew had driven here, as had the guards. There must be at least one car that I could use and even if I crashed the car, who was going to complain about it.


    I found Daniel¡¯s keys in his coat pocket. The coat was hung up nicely on a hook behind his door. Seb kept his keys in the upper left-hand drawer of his desk. One of their cars would suffice.


    I watched for a few moments as stretchers were brought in and the bad guys were carted off. I followed them out of the building and to the waiting ambulances. There were a lot of ambulances, but none of the prisoners were out yet. What was going on? I went off to the side and called Captain Stevens.


    Stevens answered on the first ring. Before he could say anything, I asked, ¡°Didn¡¯t you find the entrance to the basement? Why haven¡¯t you freed the women and children yet?¡±


    ¡°We found the entrance where you said it would be, but the door was built like a vault. We¡¯ve got people working on it now.¡± That reminded me to reactive the cameras in the basement and with a few swipes on my phone it was done.


    ¡°What about the woman in the office?¡±, I demanded.


    ¡°What woman in the office? We didn¡¯t find anyone. Was she a prisoner?¡±, he asked.


    ¡°Yes. She might be hiding and is too scared to come out. She¡¯s in the office adjacent to where you should have found two knocked out guards.¡±, I explained.


    ¡°Hold on.¡± I heard him give some commands and a policewoman and a paramedic raced into the building. While we waited, he said, ¡°You were wrong about the guns. There weren¡¯t any in the offices upstairs.¡±


    ¡°Did you look in the walk-in safe?¡±, I asked, knowing that he didn¡¯t know there was one.


    ¡°Walk-in safe?¡±, he asked.


    ¡°You keep repeating what I say. Yes, the one behind the credenza. To save you some time, there¡¯s also a room behind the bookcase and a floor safe under the rug.¡± I could hear Captain Stevens swear under his breath and call for more officers. A few seconds later, the police returned to Daniel¡¯s office in force.


    ¡°Sir. Do you mind if I ask you how you knew all of this? Also, can you tell me how you managed to send six guards and four others to the hospital, all without being seen by anyone, including me?¡±, he asked politely, but I could tell that he¡¯d rather wring my neck to get the information.


    Before I could answer him, the paramedic and the policewoman came out with the woman that I¡¯d saved from the rapists. They had a blanket around her shoulders, but you could still see the shackle chains around her wrists. She looked dirty and beaten up but not so broken anymore. When she saw all the police cars, her rescue became more real to her and she straightened up a little bit, as if some of the crushing weight bearing down on her had been lifted a bit. She wasn¡¯t alone anymore.


    I nearly cried as I watched her walk to the ambulance. I pictured my mother in her place and the joy she must be feeling to know that she would be going home, that her nightmare was ending. The effects of her imprisonment would last for the rest of her life, but at least she¡¯d get to live out that life in a manner of her own choosing and not as a slave.


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    Captain Steven¡¯s voice brought me out of my thoughts. ¡°Sir. Are you still there?¡±


    ¡°Sorry Captain. I was thinking about the driver of the transport truck. Were you in time to catch him?¡±, I asked, as much to deflect his questions as out of curiosity.


    ¡°We got him. He swears that he didn¡¯t know there were women and children in the truck.¡±, Stevens said in a tone that showed he knew the driver was lying.


    ¡°He knew. He¡¯s been here before and his actions were practiced. I won¡¯t tell you how to do your job, but I¡¯ll just remind you that if his truck doesn¡¯t have a GPS tracker on it, his phone most likely does. You¡¯ll probably be able to trace him through his Waze history, if he uses it, or Google maps history.¡±, I suggested.


    ¡°Already on it.¡±, he answered and was again interrupted by someone, but I couldn¡¯t hear what was said. I figured it out a few seconds later when the captives started being led out. Captain Stevens said that he¡¯d call me back and went off to oversee the care of the thirty-nine newly released prisoners.


    In R1, I walked among the victims and this time I did cry. Many of them were hugging each other and crying tears of joy at their rescue. Some were just sitting on the ground, wrapped in a blanket, and taking in their newly recovered freedom. Most of the children were holding up pretty well, but two of them were nearly catatonic, seemingly unaware of their surrounding and staring at nothing. Their recovery would take a long time.


    The woman that I¡¯d saved was going to each of the ex-captives and saying a few words to them or giving them a hug or a smile. She¡¯d borrowed a pen and pad from one of the police officers and she exchanged email addresses with several of them. They thanked her for her encouragement and for keeping their spirits up or for making sure that they¡¯d gotten food. I learned that her name was Magda and it was obvious that she¡¯d been a leader to these people in their time of need.


    I wished that my foundation was up and running already. This is what it was set up for. These people needed the resources that the foundation could provide, and Magda was just the type of person that I needed working at the foundation.


    Through it all, the police and the paramedics were taking statements and seeing to the medical needs of the ex-captives. Other than malnutrition, most of their physical hurts was superficial. The slavers hadn¡¯t wanted to damage their merchandise. The psychological damage was another matter altogether.


    Heading back into the building, I heard a familiar voice and walked over to Captain Stevens as he was giving the Chief of Police a report. ¡°Yes, Sir. They¡¯re all being checked out as we speak. So far, no major physical injuries except to the guards and to the Serpentine people. Three of the guards are dead from blunt force trauma, two others may not survive their injuries and if they do, the medics don¡¯t think they¡¯ll regain their full faculties. The last one will be in the hospital for awhile. The four Serpentine people each have broken bones, but they can talk, and they¡¯ll be able to stand trial.¡±


    I¡¯d killed three people. Maybe five. In the books that I read, the heroes always feel guilty about taking lives. Even though they know it was in self defense or there was no other way, they agonize over their actions. I didn¡¯t feel that agony. I didn¡¯t really feel anything negative at all about it. I¡¯d felt great satisfaction in giving them back some of the pain they¡¯d dished out and I was glad that I¡¯d stopped them from hurting more people. Maybe when the excitement of the night wears off, I¡¯ll feel different about it.


    ¡°No Sir. No one besides one of the victims saw the guy. I¡¯ve spoken to him a few times, but we haven¡¯t been able to get a trace on his location or find out anything about him. All we have is the name Roger Willoughby and even that we had to get a judge to approve, since our tip line is supposed to be anonymous.¡± I knew they¡¯d break their own rules of anonymity, if it was important enough. Thank you, Howie!


    ¡°We¡¯ll continue trying, but I hope that we don¡¯t find him. He did a really good thing here. We were able to rescue forty people today and shut down a part of the human trafficking ring. We¡¯ve got to their computers before they could wipe them and there¡¯s bound to me some information on the rest of their operation. This could be a really big break for us. In my mind, he¡¯s a hero.¡±, Stevens paused and listened for a bit before answering, ¡°No, sir. I won¡¯t be repeating that to the press. We¡¯ll just say that we were led to the warehouse by an anonymous tip from a concerned citizen.¡±


    I left Captain Stevens¡¯ side and went to see which cars belonged to Daniel and Seb. I still had to pack up the money and my gear and find a way to fit my bike in the car before I could drive home. It had been a long day and I was tired, but I felt triumphant. I¡¯d done it. I¡¯d tracked down the people who¡¯d taken my mother from me and gotten some payback. Not everything had gone according to plan, but enough had and lives had been saved. I knew that this was only a battle that I¡¯d won and not the war, but I¡¯ll take my victories one family at a time. Watching the captives hugging and celebrating their freedom had made me feel whole, like I¡¯d accomplished something truly important. I wanted to feel that again and I knew that my work was just starting. There were so many victims of human trafficking and I was going to help as many as I could.

 Epilogue

    I made it back home in one piece. Sure, it took six hours instead of the four that it should have taken, but learning to drive a car on your own is not as easy as it might seem. Thank God for the internet. It also helped that I was able to shift the car into R2 and drive that way all the way home. I lost count of how many cars I would have hit if I¡¯d tried to drive home in reality.


    By the time I reached my house, my crash course in driving had improved my skill significantly, and I felt comfortable behind the wheel of Seb¡¯s truck. I¡¯d chosen Seb¡¯s truck for three reasons. First, it was a much older car than Daniels¡¯ late model Mercedes and didn¡¯t have a built in GPS system that could be tracked. Second, it was much bigger than Daniel¡¯s and could easily hold my bike and all the money. Third, it had a full tank of gas and I didn¡¯t want to stop anywhere and fill up. Most gas stations had video cameras and I didn¡¯t want there to be any proof that I¡¯d been away. As it happened, the gas tank had been reading empty for the last fifty miles before I finally parked in front of the house.


    I left the car in R1 and headed inside to put away my gear. It still amazed me that I¡¯d become so much stronger with the field that keeping a car in R1 or R2 for the day wouldn¡¯t exhaust me. Hiding the cash in the house took a long time, as I hadn¡¯t found any other dead spaces and I had to use R3 to store it all, bundle by bundle, in between the walls.


    With all the cash from my trip hidden away, I drove Seb¡¯s truck to the University¡¯s main parking lot. I parked the truck and, still in R1, let myself into the parking administration offices to ¡®borrow¡¯ a Professor Parking pass and car sticker. Dad had one on his car and I knew that some professor would leave their cars in the lot for weeks at a time. Hopefully, I¡¯d find a better place to stash the car soon.


    With the cash and the car all taken care of, I biked over to Eva¡¯s house and snuck into her room. She was still asleep, and I quietly shifted back to reality and slipped into the blow-up bed that we¡¯d set up for me yesterday. I fell asleep almost as soon as my head hit the pillow.


    My absence had gone completely unnoticed by everyone and with the end of Spring Break on Monday, life returned to normal with school in the morning and Kung Fu most nights. The final quarterly reports before the end of the Stock-Picking Competition came out a few weeks later and Eva, James and I made two more big trades that cemented our lead over everyone else. We won the top three spots in the competition. Mr. Chandler and the representative from O¡¯Donnell and Sons Financial Services presented us with our cash prizes and Mr. O¡¯Donnell himself called James to offer him a summer internship with their company. Not only had James won first place, but his returns beat those of O¡¯Donnell and Sons by a very wide margin. By making trades throughout the year, and not just when the quarterly reports came in, James had pulled ahead of me and beaten my earnings by 2.3%. Slow and steady did win the race. Eva had come in slightly behind me.


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    Overall, I¡¯d managed to almost double the money that dad and I had invested, and I intended to continue growing those investments. However, going forward, I¡¯d be focusing less on doing my own research and more on looking into the stock picks of the best of the best when it came to insider trading. I was going to take a trip back to Raleigh this summer and see what companies the Governor and his fellow Senators were up betting on.


    Just before final exams started, Mark stopped by the house.


    ¡°Hi Abby. I thought you could use a study break.¡±, he said when I opened the door and let him in.


    ¡°I can always use a study break.¡±, I replied earnestly. The only class that I didn¡¯t have to study for was economics. As he¡¯s promised, Mr. Chandler was allowing us to drop our lowest test score and mine were all high enough that I could afford to drop the final test. Like usual, the studying was getting to me. I couldn¡¯t wait for high school to be over and done with.


    ¡°What brings you by Mark?¡±, I asked.


    ¡°Can¡¯t I just be here to say hi?¡±


    ¡°No. You would have called to say hi and you¡¯ve never just stopped by before. You¡¯re one of those ¡®I¡¯ve got to have a reason to go somewhere¡¯ type of people. It¡¯s the geology nerd in you. You¡¯re social awkward and have few, if any, social skills. Are you sure that you weren¡¯t home schooled?¡± As I talked, I walked him into the kitchen and we sat down.


    ¡°Ouch. Maybe if you weren¡¯t so tough on me, I¡¯d want to stop by and say hi.¡±, he suggested.


    ¡°Maybe, but I doubt it.¡±


    ¡°You might be right about me having a reason to be here.¡±, he said a bit sheepishly.


    ¡°Aha!¡±, I exclaimed triumphantly.


    ¡°Yeah, Grandpa Jake asked me to stop by with some papers to sign.¡±, he said as he pulled out said papers.


    ¡°Papers for what?¡±, I asked.


    ¡°Four things actually. One is a form for your father to sign that says that you can travel with me on McKenzie Resources business this summer. Another is your employment agreement with your pay information and your duties. That one both you and your father need to sign. The third set of papers is for your permission to release your gemstones to be cut by one of the best gemcutters in the world. A properly cut gemstone can make a huge difference in the final auction price. Grandpa Jake is playing Christie¡¯s and Sotheby¡¯s off against each other to get you the best deal on the auction commission. For items as expensive as yours, they generally take a commission of 13.5-14% and he¡¯s trying to get them to lower it and claim the rest as a charitable donation.¡±, Mark explained.


    ¡°Wow. That¡¯s great. I¡¯ll need to call him later and thank him for all his help. You certainly know how pile up the reasons for showing up. What the fourth set of papers for?¡±


    ¡°You¡¯re right. Four reasons for showing up is too much. I¡¯ll save the last one for next time.¡±, as he stood up as he said this started for the door.


    ¡°If I have to chase you down, I¡¯ll make it hurt.¡±, I told him, and he laughed and came back to the table.


    ¡°Nothing important, just some paperwork for you to sign to start your foundation.¡±, he said nonchalantly.


    I grabbed the papers from him and looked them over. I couldn¡¯t believe it. Once these were signed, I¡¯d officially be in charge of the Hannah Foundation, a registered charitable operating foundation with the purpose of combating the effects of human trafficking.


    The Hannah Foundation was about to become a reality.


    The End of Book 1

 Book 2: Abbys Dream - Prologue 1: A Conversation with Howie

    ¡°I need people, Howie.¡±, I insisted.


    ¡°I don¡¯t do people. I¡¯ve already told you that. You need special equipment, you call me. You need surveillance gear or weapons, you call me. Untraceable phones and hardened computers, I¡¯m your go-to guy. I can¡¯t get you people, Abby. Put out an ad or go see a recruitment firm.¡± Howie sounded as frustrated as I felt.


    ¡°Come on, Howie. You¡¯ve got contacts all over the world. One of them must know someone who can help me. Put out the word and I¡¯m sure someone will suggest a name in less than two hours.¡± I actually wasn¡¯t sure of that at all. I was guessing, but it sounded good. For good measure, I added, ¡°Don¡¯t make me have to call Mary and tell on you.¡±


    I heard Howie laugh on his end before he finally asked, ¡°What are you offering?¡±


    Yes! He was going to do it.


    ¡°$5,000. You can split it with whoever gets you the information any way you want. I just need a name and for you to set up the initial meeting.¡±


    ¡°Fine. What qualifications are you looking for?¡±


    I¡¯d given that question a lot of thought and I had my answer ready, ¡°Ex-military, any branch, with experience in intelligence gathering. Team leadership skills would be helpful, as well as familiarity with logistics. I¡¯m looking for someone who knows how to be discrete and is willing to work in an unofficial capacity.¡±


    ¡°They have to be ok working for cash and know how to keep their mouths shut.¡±, Howie translated.


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    ¡°Essentially. I have two other positions that I need to fill, but I want to see if the team-leader will have any suggestions first. If not, I¡¯ll call you again. Do you think you can have someone for me this week?¡±


    ¡°Abby, I don¡¯t even know if my contacts will know anybody. I haven¡¯t done this before so I won¡¯t promise you anything. I¡¯ll put the word out today and I¡¯ll call you if and when I¡¯ve got someone for you.¡± As usual, Howie hung up without saying goodbye. When he was done talking, you were done too.


    Dropping my phone on my bed, I picked up my textbook and returned to my studying. Finals were only a few days away and then I¡¯d be free for the summer. Well, free from school at least. My summer was pretty much booked with work already. I would have one week to enjoy lazing about with nothing to do before I was off with Mark to evaluate potential mine sites for Grampa Jake. I¡¯d be getting back about a week or so before dad¡¯s second semester class started and he¡¯d asked me to assist him again this year. I¡¯d also be assisting Uncle Magnum when I got back, as his usual assistant Charlie was taking time off to visit his family in Seattle. To cap it all off, now that the papers from the Hannah Foundation had been signed, I¡¯d need to open an office and find some staff to get it going.


    I managed to get in two solid hours of studying before my phone rang. I couldn¡¯t help laughing when I saw that it was Howie.


    ¡°You¡¯re right on time, Howie. Who did you find?¡±, I asked, pretending that I was expecting his call.


    ¡°How the hell did you know that I found someone? How did you even know that there was someone to be found? And how did you know that I¡¯d find them so quickly?¡± I could tell that he was genuinely curious.


    ¡°First, you wouldn¡¯t be calling me if you hadn¡¯t found someone. Second, there are over one hundred thousand active military personnel in North Carolina alone and over half a million veterans. There had to be at least one that would fit my requirements. Third, you¡¯re the Amazing Howie and you work miracles.¡± It never hurts to add in a compliment, especially when it¡¯s true.


    ¡°Well, there¡¯s no point in arguing with you when you¡¯re right. Your miracle will meet you at two o¡¯clock on Sunday by the fountain in Chester Park. Don¡¯t be late.¡± Howie hung up on me again.

 Abbys Dream: Prologue 2: Monologue

    With my studying done for the day, and two days until my meeting in the park, I set off for Kung Fu and spent a few hours both assisting and practicing, before returning home for a late dinner with dad.


    Having gone to bed early on Friday night, I woke up early on Saturday and decided that more studying could wait. Outside of my window showed a beautiful day taking shape, with the sun just making its way up over the trees. It would be too hot to go biking later on in the day, but right now I could see the trees swaying slightly in an early morning breeze. After taking a few minutes to get ready, I quickly and quietly made my way to the garage and got my bike. I slipped into R2 to get out of the garage without making any noise and returned to reality once I was clear.


    My usual route took me to school, where I like to ride several circuits around the track. At a quarter of a mile around, eight fast laps gave me a good warm up and I felt ready to move on. The university was my next stop. Although half the fun of hanging around the university was seeing the hive of activity as the students went about their day, riding around the quad and having the place mostly to myself also had its charms. Only a few hard-core early morning joggers crossed into my view, as I rode past the library and the Roark Geology Center.


    The center reminded me of my tour last year with Mark and that in turn brought to mind the last time I¡¯d seen Mark. It was only a week ago, when Mark had brought over all those papers for me to sign. I remember being so excited about signing the official papers to start up the Hannah Foundation.


    When dad got home, he got a little misty eyed and told me again how my mom would have loved what I was doing. However, when I showed him employment papers, Dad had flatly refused to sign them. Dad¡¯s signature was necessary because I¡¯m still a minor. I¡¯d be turning 17 in less than two months and starting my senior year of high school at the end of the summer.


    ¡°What¡¯s wrong with the employment contract, daddy?¡±, I asked him when he refused to sign it. ¡°Isn¡¯t it just a formality? Jake wouldn¡¯t try to cheat me out of any money that he owed me and the money isn¡¯t much compared to what the auction for the gemstones is going to bring in.¡±


    ¡°Abby, you always have to be very careful with contracts, especially when they are between friends. You need to read contracts very carefully and understand what is being given by both sides. I¡¯m sure that Jake isn¡¯t intentionally trying to cheat you. His lawyers probably told him that they needed you to be an employee in order to satisfy their insurance requirements for you being on the trip. It makes sense and, in most cases, I¡¯d have signed it already. The tricky part here is that the employer-employee relationship has certain legal implications. As an employee, anything that you discover while you¡¯re an employee of McKenzie Resources would technically belong to them. You couldn¡¯t use it for your own benefit.¡±


    ¡°But that¡¯s what I¡¯m going on the trip for. To help them decide on which potential mine site is better.¡± I still wasn¡¯t seeing the problem and I was a little confused.


    ¡°That¡¯s true, Abby. Jake wants to hire you to give your feelings about which mine site would have more potential. I¡¯ve known that you could sense things about metals ever since you first brought me an ingot in my forge and told me that it wasn¡¯t good. Jake knows it too. He saw what you did in finding the gemstones and believes that your ¡®land sense¡¯ will give you insights that will be useful in making his decision. I think he¡¯s very astute and for the cost of using up an extra seat on his plane and your contract, he¡¯s doesn¡¯t have much to lose. The problem starts when you discover something in one of his existing mines that you¡¯ll be visiting or if your sensing of metals leads you to other information that might be useful for McKenzie Resources. Under the employment contract, that information would belong to the company and you couldn¡¯t negotiate with them to get more money for that information.¡±


    ¡°I like Mark and Jake. If I found out something that could help them, I¡¯d be happy to share it with them for free. I¡¯m mostly going on the trip to learn about mining and because I think it might be fun.¡±, I said.


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    ¡°That¡¯s good. I was really hoping that it didn¡¯t have anything to do with you finding Mark to be attractive.¡± Dad¡¯s matter of fact tone and the sudden shift in the conversation caught me off guard and I barely managed a weak denial.


    ¡°Dad, he¡¯s four years older than I am. He¡¯s like an old man already, well past his prime.¡± I felt the heat of my blush and knew that I wasn¡¯t fooling him.


    ¡°Uh huh. I read somewhere that young women your age seemed to have a preference for college men. I must be misremembering what I read.¡±


    I wasn¡¯t getting anywhere playing defense with dad. Time to go on the attack. ¡°Don¡¯t worry, dad. By the time someone gets to be your age, their head is full of so much information that it¡¯s hard to keep everything straight. It¡¯s not dementia or anything. I hope.¡± At that, dad gave me his ¡®one-eyebrow raised look¡¯ and sipped his coffee.


    ¡°Getting back to the contract¡±, dad continued, ¡°let¡¯s see if I can explain it another way. Do you remember the terms of my contract with Galt University? Specifically, the ones about any art that I produce?¡±, dad asked.


    ¡°Sure. Any art of sculpture that you make belongs to both you and the university and sales are split with 90% going to you and 10% going to the university. They don¡¯t even charge you a fee if they¡¯re the ones selling your art.¡±


    ¡°Good, Abby. Think about that for a moment. I am an employee of the university and I am creating that art on their premises, using their tools and their supplies. Why didn¡¯t they insist on keeping all of the sales revenue?¡±


    ¡°Because that wouldn¡¯t be fair to you. You¡¯re taking basic materials and using your skill and knowledge to turn it into something that people are willing pay a lot of money for. Your reputation, that you¡¯ve spent your whole life building, is a big reason that people buy the art. Over time, as your reputation grows, so does the prestige of the university that can claim you as one of their faculty. If you didn¡¯t get a good portion of the sale, then why would you even make any art there at all?¡±.


    ¡°Exactly. My abilities add value to their raw materials. The university recognizes my value and they pay me accordingly. The same is true for what you can do for McKenzie Resources. You may be adding value and you need to recognize that. Have you taken the time to look at how much money a successful mine can bring in or how much money it takes to start up a mine? The sums are astounding. We sometimes hear in the news about huge corporate mergers of pharmaceutical companies or financial businesses that total between two and five billion dollars. In the mining industry, those sums are the norm. Sometimes setting up a single mine, along with all of its components, can cost between half a billion and five billion dollars.


    If you¡¯re simply going to tell Jake that you ¡®feel¡¯ that mine A is better than mine B, then this contract is fine, as it will help establish your credibility and reputation. But I think that you have the capacity to do more than that. I think that your ability can give him specific details about each property. Perhaps you¡¯ll sense another deposit on his property or on another nearby property, or any other useful information. If that¡¯s the case, then you¡¯ll need to be able to charge for those extra services and get paid adequately. Even though you¡¯re his friend, he should pay you what you¡¯re worth. Harry Kronin is my friend and he made sure that his offer to me paid me for my value. Jake should do the same. Working with or for friends can be fun, but it¡¯s usually a fast way to lose those friends, if proper care isn¡¯t taken in the beginning.¡± Dad finished his speech and handed me the contract.


    There was no way that I was going to ignore dad¡¯s advice. I sat down at the kitchen table and started going over the contract line by line. When I finished, dad and I talked about what needed to be changed and I sent the contract back for McKenzie lawyers to make the changes. Besides transforming my words into legalese, they accepted all the changes.


    I played dad¡¯s monologue over and over in my mind as I rode away from the university and headed towards downtown. Dad only had the vaguest notion of one of my abilities, yet he had come up with several ways that I could add value to McKenzie Resources. Imagine how helpful he¡¯d be if he knew about all my true abilities. By keeping everything a secret, I was losing out on some excellent advice from dad. I also hated lying to him. That¡¯s not the kind of relationship that I¡¯d had with him throughout my life. Maybe it was time to re-evaluate my decision to keep it all a secret. Why was I keeping my power a secret anyways? I know dad would never tell anyone, so it wasn¡¯t that. I just..wasn¡¯t ready.


    I spend the rest of my bike ride considering dad¡¯s suggestions of how to add value and how I could go about putting them into practice. By the time I got home, I had a mental list of what I needed, and I spent some time searching online for what was readily available. I had a feeling that I might need Howie¡¯s expert procurement skills again. It¡¯s a goo thing that I was already scheduled to meet up with him tomorrow.

 Abbys Dream: Prologue 3: Interview

    Howie arrived five minutes early and parked his car in the parking area less than 100 feet from the fountain. I watched from R1 as he and a short brunette got out of the car. Neither said a word as they walked purposefully towards the fountain. The woman seemed young, in comparison to Howie, probably in her late twenties, and around 5¡¯2¡±, compared with Howie¡¯s 5¡¯10¡±. Her dark hair was pulled back in a ponytail and she wore no makeup. She had a darker skin than mine, but that didn¡¯t mean much, as I¡¯m fairly pale, and her bearing was pure military, even though she was only wearing jeans and a t-shirt. I was reminded of all those movies where a tiny drill sergeant would stand toe-to-toe with a massive cadet and dress him down as if she were three feet taller than him. It didn¡¯t seem like this was a person to mess with and, for some reason, I liked her right away. I hoped that I wouldn¡¯t be disappointed after having spoken with her.


    The two of them stopped beside the fountain and Howie checked his watch. The woman simply stood at parade rest and looked around. Checking my phone, I saw that I had around a minute left before two o¡¯clock and I made my way to the other side of the fountain, where I wouldn¡¯t be seen as I slipped back to reality. I made the transition with ten seconds to spare and came around to greet them.


    ¡°Hi Howie. Thanks for setting this up.¡± The startled look on Howie¡¯s face as I greeted him was priceless. I knew that he¡¯d been looking forward to giving me a lecture about the importance of being on time and how being late wasted everyone¡¯s time. Blah, blah, blah. In contrast to Howie, the woman took my entrance in stride and merely smiled at me as I approached.


    ¡°You¡¯re welcome, Abby. Thanks for being on time.¡± I gave Howie my most innocent smile and looked towards the woman. Howie picked up on my cue immediately and said, ¡°I¡¯d like to introduce you to Captain Shauna Martinez. Captain Martinez, this is Abigail Smith.¡±


    Shauna and I shook hands and Howie continued, ¡°Since we spoke last, I¡¯ve had a chance to review Captain Martinez¡¯s background and confirm that she has the qualifications that you requested. Unless you need anything, I have to make a quick delivery to another client. I¡¯ll return in half an hour to take Captain Martinez back to her car. This envelope has a copy of Captain Martinez¡¯s resume and background information.¡± Howie handed me an envelope and started to leave.


    ¡°Hold on a second, Howie.¡± At my words, he turned around and I handed him one of the two backpacks that I¡¯d brought with me. ¡°Your fee is in there, as well as a list of a few things I was hoping that you can get for me this week.¡±


    Howie swung the backpack over his shoulder and said, ¡°I¡¯ll see what I can do.¡±, as he walked back to his car.


    When we were alone, I turned to Captain Martinez and said, ¡°Captain Martinez, I¡¯d like to thank you for coming out to meet with me. I¡¯m not very formal, so please call me Abby.¡±


    ¡°I will, if you¡¯ll call me Shauna. You¡¯re not what I expected when Howie contacted me about a job opportunity.¡±


    ¡°No, I don¡¯t suppose I would be. Not many teenagers try to hire experienced military personnel. This is real though. It¡¯s not a prank. I¡¯ll explain why I need your expertise soon. First, I¡¯d like to know a little bit about you and why you¡¯re here. Why aren¡¯t you still in the army?¡± It was another hot day and I started walking further into the park, towards a tree covered path that was usually several degrees cooler.


    Shauna fell in step beside me and said, ¡°I joined the army when I turned 18. My older brother, Samuel, had enlisted when he was 18 too. For him, it was highly recommended by the courts and it allowed him to stay out of jail. For me, it was to stay connected to Samuel. By the time I joined up, he had already cleaned up his act and had made the army his home. He was a rising star in military intelligence. My organization skills led me into the logistics side of the army and over the next five years I rose in the ranks and went from a supply clerk to managing entire supply warehouses to working with generals to make sure that their units had the equipment and the supplies that they needed in the field. Throughout those years, my brother and I stayed in touch and when a good position in military intelligence opened up, he pushed me hard to take it. I really enjoyed running logistics, but the chance to work more closely with my brother was hard to pass up. Initially, it wasn¡¯t much of a change from what I¡¯d already been doing. Instead of outfitting full battalions for the field, I was outfitting individual agents and making sure that they had safe houses to go to and equipment in the various cities that they worked in. Eventually I ended up running a team of people that made sure that the agents in the field had everything they needed, from local currency to proper visas and passports to housing, even pets. Anything they needed to make their covers believable and as airtight as possible.¡±


    Shauna paused in her story. It was a nice story, but I could tell that she was hesitating because her story was about to take a turn. We found a bench that was entirely in the shade and Shauna continued, ¡°Six months ago, my brother missed sending in a scouting report from Venezuela. I wasn¡¯t involved with his team, but word gets around. I asked my superiors to be involved and I was refused. They said that because he was my brother, my judgement would be clouded, and I was ordered to stay away from his case. My unofficial sources were telling me that he¡¯d been caught up in a general sweep by the Venezuelan secret police, but they didn¡¯t know where he was being held and they couldn¡¯t ask through diplomatic channels without giving away that he was an agent. All they were doing now was waiting around and hoping that one of their other assets would find something out.


    After he¡¯d been missing for three months and with no updates through official channels, I tried again, and I was refused again. I decided that I¡¯d try to find my brother by myself and I requested a leave of absence. When that was rejected, I resigned my commission. For the last two months, I¡¯ve been using every contact I know of to find out more about where my brother was taken and I think that I¡¯ve finally found out where he might be. It¡¯s only rumor so far, but I know a few people that might be able to corroborate the information. My next goal is to find a way rescue him. Unfortunately, I¡¯m almost out of money. I need a job that will pay me enough to continue working towards freeing my brother. So far, all the openings that I¡¯ve found are for security jobs that don¡¯t match up with my experience.¡± Shauna let out a frustrated breath as she finished her story.


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    ¡°If you manage to rescue your brother, will you return to the army?¡±


    ¡°No. I¡¯d don¡¯t think that they¡¯d take me back and I don¡¯t want to go back. When I succeed, my brother will go back, but I won¡¯t. I was hardworking and loyal to the army for almost ten years, but when I needed their help, they cut me out. My superior didn¡¯t even try to be understanding. He quoted the rules at me and sent me away.¡±


    ¡°I asked you that question because I¡¯m looking for someone who will stay with me long term. I need someone to build a team and run it. Your experience with logistics and intelligence is exactly what I need. Having heard your story, I think that you¡¯re the perfect candidate for the position.¡±, I explained.


    ¡°What is the position and how would you be able to afford hiring me, much less a team? Are you one of those geniuses that created a computer company and sold out for a billion dollars?¡±, Shauna asked.


    I laughed at that. ¡°No. Nothing like that. Let me tell you my story and you¡¯ll understand.¡± I gave her the rundown on my kidnapping and mom¡¯s disappearance and then I told her about my idea for the Hannah Foundation and its goals.


    ¡°The public face of the Hannah Foundation will be all about helping the victims of human trafficking and their families and I¡¯ll need of your organizational and logistical services for that. However, the foundation needs to have another aspect to it. It can¡¯t just be about helping the victims once they¡¯re freed or escape. I want to go after the traffickers themselves. I want to stop their operations and rescue anyone we can. For that, I¡¯ll need intelligence gathering and logistical support during the operations.¡±


    ¡°I love the idea of the foundation and what you¡¯re trying to do, but how are you going to pay for it?¡±, Shauna asked.


    ¡°I wondered about that too when I first got the idea. I thought that it would take me years to get enough money to even start on the public face of the foundation. However, a few months ago, I went gemstone mine with some friends and I found some incredible gemstones. They go to auction in July. Uncut, they¡¯ve been appraised at over ten million dollars. When the money comes in, I¡¯ll be donating most of it to my foundation and starting the public side of the operations. The hidden side of the foundation will be funded separately from the public side and it won¡¯t show up in any Hannah Foundation records. It will be strictly off the books. For now, your salary and that of the team will be paid in cash and in advance.¡± I saw Shauna¡¯s eyes widen when I said that.


    ¡°Before we go further, I need to know if you want the job.¡± I thought she¡¯d take the position, but I wasn¡¯t sure. She¡¯d done a great job in keeping her expressions neutral so far. Her reaction to the upfront cash payment had been her only giveaway. She¡¯s probably a very good poker player.


    ¡°You didn¡¯t really explain where the cash was coming from for the second foundation, but seeing as how you¡¯re paying in advance, I guess its not something that I have to worry about. Also, if I¡¯m going to save my brother, I don¡¯t have the luxury of being picky right now. I¡¯m in.¡± I hoped that she wouldn¡¯t be picky later, but like her, I wanted to get things started.


    We agreed on a salary for her services and soon began discussing the team that I needed her to build. My plan was to hire a technology specialist as well as an accountant specializing in following money transfers.


    ¡°We¡¯ll need the technology expert right away to set up our systems and communications networks, but the accountant can wait until we have some leads to follow. The accountant will need to have other skills to fill up their time. Also, if we¡¯re providing the information and logistics, who do you have to carry out the actual operation? Or do you plan on giving over the information to the police?¡±, Shauna asked.


    ¡°The accountant can wait until we have a secure network set up, but I already have enough work to keep him or her busy for weeks. I don¡¯t mind if they have other skills, but I¡¯d rather you focused on finding us the best person for that job, even if they have no other skills. As to someone to carry out the operations, I¡¯ve got that covered already. He has asked to remain anonymous for now. I can assure you that he¡¯s very good at his job and I¡¯ll arrange for you two to speak prior to any operation. Right now, I¡¯d like you to focus on finding some temporary space and finding our team.¡± Before Shauna could object to not knowing who she¡¯d be working with, I handed her my backpack.


    ¡°This is your first three month¡¯s salary and some start-up capital. Once you¡¯ve come up with a list of the equipment that you¡¯ll need and a budget for your team, I¡¯ll give you enough to cover those costs as well.¡± Shauna unzipped the top of the bag, peeked inside and then looked up at me in surprise.


    ¡°How much is in there?¡±, she asked.


    ¡°$100,000¡±.


    ¡°And you¡¯re just trusting me with this? After meeting with me for less than half an hour. What if I just take it and leave.¡±


    ¡°You won¡¯t. Howie wouldn¡¯t have introduced us if he didn¡¯t have reason to trust you. And even if he got bad information about you, it wouldn¡¯t be in your best interest to take the money. Howie would put the word out about what you did, and you¡¯d have a much harder time finding work in the future. You¡¯ll need a lot more than that to rescue your brother and you¡¯d have fewer options available to you. You also need to remember that I¡¯m putting together a team and if you took the money, then their first mission would be to find you and ask for it back.¡± Although I had said all that in a matter of fact way, I kept my gaze locked to hers the whole time and I made sure that she knew how serious I was. ¡°Finally, you know what that money is being used for. If you took it, you wouldn¡¯t just be stealing from me, You¡¯d be hurting people like yourself. People who¡¯ve been victims of a kidnapping. You¡¯d be helping kidnappers continue to profit from slavery and you¡¯d be no better than those slavers or than those that took your brother.¡±


    Actually, it was Len''s blood money and I had no way to spend it legally without calling attention to myself so even if I lost it all, it wouldn''t matter much. I didn¡¯t think that would happen though. I had a good feeling about Shauna.


    ¡°I see. You¡¯re not blindly trusting me. You¡¯re trusting me to do what¡¯s in my best interests and you have plans just in case I¡¯m not smart enough to do what¡¯s best for me. I can respect that.¡± She held out her hand to me and we shook on our agreement to work together.


    We made our way back to the fountain and saw Howie waiting for her in his car. As she was about to go to him, I said, ¡°Shauna. I don¡¯t want your concentration split while you¡¯re working for me. I¡¯m going to need you 100% focused on finding the slavers. So, we¡¯ll need to rescue your brother as soon as possible. Get the team set up and verify where Samuel is being held and his rescue will be our first order of business.¡±


    Shauna¡¯s face lit up and then she totally floored me by coming to attention and saluting me. She let out an enthusiastic, ¡°Yes, Ma¡¯am¡±, and took off to meet up with Howie.

 Chapter 1: Lost

    Where did those books go? That¡¯s what I¡¯d really like to know. Last year, when I hadn¡¯t been run over by the bus, I¡¯d lost the books that I was holding. Somewhere between the bus almost hitting me and the bus disappearing as it went right through me, I¡¯d dropped the books. I¡¯m pretty sure that they dropped into one of the other layers of reality, but I haven¡¯t been able to get back there again. Ever since the bus incident, I¡¯d only gone into sublayers of reality, R1, R2, and R3, where I was only halfway between being in reality and being in one of the three layers of reality. I¡¯d put myself in a bubble of the layer, but that bubble was still connected reality. I was pretty sure that the books had fallen and stayed outside of reality. I wanted to go there and see what it was like.


    That¡¯s what I¡¯d been trying to do for the past three weeks and I¡¯d failed at every attempt. Today, I¡¯m sitting in a grassy clearing on a small hill beside a McKenzie Resources silver mine in Idaho and thinking about what I¡¯d already tried and what I could do differently. It didn¡¯t seem to be a power issue, as my field strength had increased dramatically over the past few months. My shield exercises, combined with all the scanning that I was doing, had already taken me to the point where I could hold the multiple fields required in my shield for over twenty minutes straight and I could do that every hour, until 4pm, without the need for a midday nap.


    I also didn¡¯t think that it was a control issue that was stopping me from being able to enter a layer. I could shift between the sublayers incredibly fast now and I could even put up the multiple fields required for my shield in an instant. Over the past few weeks of my trip with Mark, I¡¯d even worked on changing the shape of the field, both when it surrounded my body and when I created it away from my body.


    There had to be a technique, a way to get into the layer, that I hadn¡¯t thought of yet, and the frustration was starting to get to me. I felt like Ralph in the 80¡¯s tv show ¡®The Greatest American Hero¡¯. He was gifted with a costume that gave him superpowers, but he didn¡¯t get the manual in how to use it. He couldn¡¯t figure out how to fly and a little boy had to show him how the comic book superheroes launched themselves into the air. Then he had to figure out how to land. It wasn¡¯t pretty. His flying technique also really sucked.


    Uncle Magnum loved that show and we spent a week or two watching all the episodes. He used the show as a lesson in the importance of proper training and practice. His favorite saying was, ¡°Don¡¯t practice until you get it right. Practice until you can¡¯t get it wrong!¡± I¡¯d taken that lesson to heart, but in this case, I didn¡¯t know what to practice. You can¡¯t practice what you can¡¯t do.


    I heard my name and looked up to see Mark heading my way. He was out of breath by the time he reached me and a little sweaty. His 6¡¯1¡± frame didn¡¯t have much fat on it, but it also wasn¡¯t bulging with muscles either. He was a healthy, good looking 21-year-old who spent too much time studying and not enough time keeping fit. I¡¯d need to do something about that when we got back home.


    ¡°Hey Abby.¡±, he said as he sat down a few feet from me and tried to catch his breath. ¡°The management presentation is done, and Karl wants to give us a tour of the mine. You ready for another trip underground?¡±


    ¡°Sure. That sounds good. I¡¯m not getting anything accomplished just sitting here anyways.¡±, I said, putting on a happy face and trying to put away my frustration.


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    As I got up to join him for the walk back to the mine¡¯s administrative offices, I¡¯d realized that I¡¯d failed in hiding my feelings when Mark asked, ¡°I¡¯m not sure what you were looking to accomplish up on this hill, but if you need more time, then I can delay the meeting by an hour.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s nice of you to offer, but I don¡¯t want to slow you down or keep your people from their work any longer than we need to. I¡¯m just trying to figure something out. I¡¯ll get it eventually.¡±


    ¡°Anything I can help with? Maybe I can offer a fresh perspective on whatever you¡¯re trying to do¡±, he offered.


    I started to say that I didn¡¯t think anyone could help me, but then I changed my mind. I had an idea of how I could present my problem to him. ¡°I¡¯m trying to figure out a new magic trick where I disappear from one place and show up in another.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯ve seen those. They usually use a trapdoor in the floor or find some way to conceal their movements. Don¡¯t they have books on online with explanations of how it¡¯s done?¡±


    ¡°There are lots of those, and I can do a variation of those tricks. I¡¯m looking to do it in a new way.¡± I was about to go on, when Mark asked a question that cut to the heart of the matter.


    ¡°Why? If you can already do it one way, what do you gain by doing it another way?¡±.


    Did I really need to get into another layer of reality? Wasn¡¯t the ability to get into a bubble of that reality enough? What good would it do me to actually be in the layer?


    ¡°Is there only one way to mine?¡±, I asked him. ¡°Since we started this trip, I¡¯ve seen both surface mining and underground mining. You also have more options than just a pickaxe to mine with these days. There are dozens, if not hundreds, of tools that you can use. Each one is geared towards a specific purpose and situation. If I want to do my magic trick outdoors, then a trapdoor can¡¯t be used, nor can a curtain or mirrors. Having another way to do the trick gives me more tools to use. Also, sometimes the solution to one problem will help you solve other problems in the future.¡±


    ¡°Ok. You have a good point. Since I know nothing about magic and how it¡¯s done, then the only advice that I can give you relates to general problem-solving techniques. I learned about a few of those in some of my business courses at Galt.¡± We had almost reached the mining office, where Karl was waiting for us, and so Mark paused our walk to finish his thought, ¡°There seems to be three things that you need think about when faced with a tough problem or question. One, are you asking the right question? What are you trying to accomplish? You need to look at your overall goal and define what your problem is. Make sure that you¡¯re addressing the correct problem and make sure that you¡¯re focusing on the root problem and not on what is caused by that problem. Sometimes visualizing what success looks like will help you see what your goals and your obstacle are.¡±


    Mark held up two fingers and continued, ¡°Two, what assumptions are you making. List them out. Which of them are you sure of? Which of them might be wrong? Sometimes a mistaken assumption can send you off in the wrong direction. Separate what you know to be true from what you think is true.¡±


    Putting up his third finger, Mark finished, ¡°Three, think outside the box. I¡¯m sure that you¡¯ve heard that one. Among other things, it means that you should look for solutions from other areas. Often there are tools or ideas that are used in other industries that solve your problem. You don¡¯t need to reinvent the wheel, you just need to find a new way of using it to solve your problem.¡± Mark finished and continued walking to the office.


    ¡°Wow. You just saved me a few years of university. Thanks Mark!¡±, I gushed at him.


    He laughed and flipped me the finger as he opened the door for me. I blew him a kiss as I walked past him. I may have been flippant with Mark, but what he said made sense and I¡¯d have to spend time thinking about it. Because he didn¡¯t know my exact problem, he¡¯d given me generalities and now it was up to me to apply them. First however, we were going on a tour of the mine with Karl.

 Chapter 2: The Tour

    As we had done the two previous mines, Karl had us put on jumpsuits, protective eyewear, and hardhats and before taking us into the mine to see where the work was being done. The tour was quite extensive, with Karl narrating the whole time like an experienced tour guide at a local attraction. He told us when each particular shaft had been dug and how much ore was mined from it and he had lot of stories about the false leads they¡¯d followed a few times. Karl seemed to know every inch of the mine and he obviously loved what he was doing. Karl¡¯s expertise was wasted on me, as I wasn¡¯t paying much attention. I didn¡¯t need to know the details. I was here to get a general idea of the mine and how it worked so that I¡¯d have a better understanding of mining in general. My real task was supposed to start when we visited the proposed mines later on in our trip. Mark was the one who needed to pay attention and he was giving Karl his full attention, taking it all in.


    Mark¡¯s interest let me hang back and use my field to scan the mine as we walked. Karl had given me a clipboard with a map of the mine and as we walked I made notes on it. I shaped my field into a rectangle, six meters wide by six meters long by two inches high, and I sent it down hundreds of meters into the surrounding rock. As the field passed through the rock, it sent information about the type of rock that it was going through and it let me know where the silver and other metals were. Once deep in the rock, I moved the field around so that I¡¯d get the shape of the deposit and I noted it all down. The miners have a way to get the same information by doing core samples, but it could take them months to get the kind of information that I was getting in seconds. I was also getting the information for free. Taking core samples and analyzing those samples is fairly expensive. Sometimes work in the mine has to be stopped while the samples are being taken. My way was much better.


    I¡¯d taken dad¡¯s advice to heart and I¡¯d been doing this mapping at each of the mines that Mark and I had visited so far. Howie had come through for me again and gotten me access to specialized 3D mine mapping software. While I could have found some software myself, Howie¡¯s software was better in that I didn¡¯t have to have years of geology experience to use it. It was very easy to use and had intuitive controls. I¡¯d spent the week after exams playing around with it and practicing all over town. However, I wasn¡¯t just practicing with the software, I was also practicing with my field. While it was easy to shape my field into a rectangle and send it out in any direction, I had never actually tried to measure the depth at which I found minerals. ¡®Around 15 meters down¡¯ wasn¡¯t good enough. I wanted exact measurements of where the deposits were. I spent hours honing my perception of how far down I was sending the shaped field.


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    Another great feature of the software was the access to its extensive library of maps. Topographical maps, geological maps, physical maps, and mineral maps. These maps could be downloaded and turned into 3D maps that I could edit in minutes. I¡¯d called Mark and gotten the GPS coordinates of all the mines or properties we were going to visit and I downloaded them and the areas surrounding them into the software program. Combined with the GPS built into my phone and my computer, I¡¯d had no trouble in adding my findings. By the end of the tour, I¡¯d have a complete map of the different ore bodies in and around the mine.


    After the tour of the mine, Karl took us around the rest of the complex and showed us the processing center, the offices, the mechanical bay and the tailings pond. As I had done at the other mines, when the tour was finished, I asked to borrow one of the golf carts that they used to get around, or an ATV if they had one, and I spent a few hours driving around the entire mine site and updating my 3D map. Over the next day or two, as Mark learned the ins and outs of the mine, I¡¯d ride around the surrounding properties and find out if they had any interesting deposits to record.


    From what I¡¯d seen at each mine, Grampa Jake¡¯s people really knew their business and there wasn¡¯t much value that I could add to the work that they were already doing. However, their future work was another matter and Jake and I would be having an intense conversation about that a few weeks after Mark and I got back home.

 Chapter 3: Found

    Two days later, we said our goodbyes to Karl and headed for the airport in our rental car. Up till now, we¡¯d been staying in decent hotels located within a few miles of the mines that we visited. Our next two stops were going to involve camping. I wasn¡¯t a big fan of camping, but I¡¯d done it before and found that it wasn¡¯t all bad. I liked the campfires and the open air and I loved watching the stars. Sleeping on the ground and peeing in bushes, not so much.


    It was a bit surreal getting off a private plane with a load of camping gear. The contrast was almost physically painful and I had Mark take a picture of me so I could send it to Eva. My discomfort would give her joy. Initially, I¡¯d hoped that she¡¯d be able to come with us, but her family and James¡¯ were going on another vacation. This time they were only going for three weeks and they were due to come back a few days after I was scheduled to get back from this trip. James had managed to have his internship with the financial company start after his return. He was very excited about it and he hoped that he¡¯d be learning from them and not simply be relegated to making coffee for everyone.


    With our gear loaded into a rented SUV, Mark drove us out to the middle of nowhere Arizona to look at a potential site for a new copper mine. When Jake had mentioned a potential site, I¡¯d pictured vast tracks of barren land. The reality was a bit different. While there were indeed vast tracks of barren land, there were also a handful of people working on that land, along with their own tents and supplies. They were surveying the land and trying to establish the extent and location of any ore body. We met with the lead surveyor, Sylvie, and she took us on a tour of the property. In order not to bias my report, Mark asked Sylvie not to discuss any of her findings with me. This is something I had requested of Mark on the plane ride over when he tried to show me the initial survey map of the site.


    Once the quick tour was over, Mark and I separated, with him heading off to see the work being done on the site and me borrowing one of Sylvie¡¯s rented ATVs out to do my own surveying. I only had the rest of today and tomorrow to explore not only the site, but the surrounding properties as well. Because we were spending a lot less time here than on our previous mine visits, I needed to move much faster and I decided to use a much larger rectangle field for my explorations. Starting at the far corner of the property, I shaped a rectangular field that was fifteen meters long and fifteen meters wide, by two inches in height and sent the field down to several hundred meters. As I expected, I didn¡¯t find any useful deposits and I moved over fifteen meters. This time, I tried to double the size of the field, leaving it still two inches in height. Holding a field that big was a bit more of strain than holding the fifteen-meter field, but it was only for a few seconds. At the next area I doubled the field in size again. Now I felt the strain, but it was still manageable and I decided to leave the field at 60 meters by 60 meters. I¡¯d need to be able to do hundreds of these to cover the property.


    The afternoon wore on and my map took shape. I made notes of anything I found on my phone along with the GPS coordinates and I would input in the information on my computer at the end of the day. I got more that a few strange looks from the surveying and exploration crew as I crossed over the area that they were concentrating on. From their point of view, they were watching someone ride an ATV in a grid pattern, stopping every sixty meters and then continuing on another sixty meters. I wasn¡¯t using any equipment that they could see, besides my phone.


    The crew had already left by the time I finished and called it a day. It was dinnertime and I was exhausted. Mark had set up our camp and had a nice fire going. It was warm out and we didn¡¯t need the heat, but we did need to eat and Mark had a stew just about ready by the time I pulled up a log and sat next to him.


    ¡°You look beat. I had no idea that the swami business was that tiring.¡±, Mark said as he filled up a bowl of stew and handed it to me.


    ¡°It normally isn¡¯t, but we didn¡¯t have much time here, so I have to work faster.¡± I paused to take a bite of stew. I groaned with pleasure and Mark smiled at the compliment. ¡°Mark, this is really good. How can you make something that tastes this good out in the middle of a clearing?¡±


    ¡°Gramma Nancy taught me how cook on trips just like this. Grampa Jake would be out all day surveying and she insisted that I spend at least a few hours with her learning to cook. The secret is preparation. If you plan properly and bring the right ingredients and utensils with you, it¡¯s really quite easy.¡±


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    While he was talking, I finished by bowl and handed it back to him for a refill. ¡°Well, you¡¯re hired. I¡¯ve always wanted my own personal chef. I¡¯ll have to get you one of those white puffy chef hats and an apron.¡±


    ¡°Oh. Sorry, I can¡¯t take the job. I don¡¯t do well with hats. My head¡¯s the wrong shape.¡±, Mark replied in mock disappointment. I started in on my second bowl.


    ¡°That¡¯s too bad. I guess you¡¯ll just have to settle for all powerful mining magnate. It¡¯s not personal chef, but it works as a consolation prize.¡± I said between bites. I was already thinking about my third helping.


    We ate in silence for awhile and as I handed my bowl to Mark for another refill, I saw his raised eyebrows, but he didn¡¯t comment. Instead, he handed me back a full bowl and said, ¡°You were the talk of the team today. Sylvie said that every member of her team asked what you were doing out there. I was going to tell her that you were a swami mystic and that you were ¡®sensing¡¯ the land, but I don¡¯t think that they would have believed me. They only believe in proven science. Instead, I told them that you were born with a genetic quirk that let you sense the electromagnetic fields all around us and that you could tell where the ore in the ground was by feeling the fluctuations in the field.¡±


    I nearly choked on my food. Damn. That wasn¡¯t far from the truth. I turned by reaction into a laugh and asked him, ¡°Did they buy it?¡±


    ¡°Of course. I was very convincing. The only problem I have now is that they¡¯re all excited to know the results of your efforts. Did you find anything interesting today with your swami senses that will be worthy of the massive bullshit that I shoveled?¡±


    ¡°I did, but I can¡¯t tell you about it. Yet.¡±, I answered.


    ¡°Why not? Isn¡¯t that why you¡¯re here?¡±, Mark asked, genuinely perplexed.


    ¡°Yes and no. Jake only hired me to give him my feelings as to which of two sites would be a better candidate for a mine. Any detailed information that I uncover is not part of our contract and I¡¯m free to deal with Jake for that information. I had his lawyers make that change to the standard contract before I signed it.¡± I hadn¡¯t discussed this with Mark before and I wondered how he¡¯d take the news.


    Mark stared at me for three solid, never-ending, seconds and then he started laughing and said, ¡°Abby, I need to be there when you negotiate with him. It¡¯s been years since someone outfoxed Grandpa Jake."


    ¡°Jake was trying to fox me?¡±, I asked quietly, looking at my almost empty bowl. I felt my chest tighten. I¡¯d really liked Jake.


    ¡°No, Abby! He would never do that. That came out wrong. I should have said ¡®out-thought¡¯ or ¡®out-maneuvered¡¯. Grampa thought he had a handle on your ¡®land sense¡¯, but he didn¡¯t understand the extent of it. If he did, he would never have given you the standard contract. He¡¯s completely underestimated you and that¡¯s not a mistake he often makes. As you can see by the team that¡¯s here, mineral exploration is very expensive and time consuming. If you can provide detailed information, then the savings could be significant. He¡¯d be happy to pay you for that. He wouldn¡¯t cheat you, Abby.¡±


    Mark sounded sincere and I felt my body relax. I managed to hold back the tears that had been threatening. ¡°I can¡¯t really blame Jake for his mistake. I didn¡¯t pick up on the contract problem either. My dad did.¡± Just then, I felt of wave of gratitude for dad. I was so lucky to have him in my life.


    It took me a few minutes to get myself under control again and when I did, I noticed that my bowl was empty. Should I have some more? Why not? I handed Mark my bowl again and this time the look on his face got me all defensive and I said, ¡°Hey! It¡¯s not a very big bowl. Camping bowls are made small.¡±


    Mark just nodded and said, ¡°Yes, Ma¡¯am!¡±.


    ¡°Are you trying to fat-shame me, Mark?!¡±


    ¡°I wouldn¡¯t do that. Besides which, you don¡¯t have an ounce of fat on your body. You and Eva are the two fittest people I know. It¡¯s just that¡­¡±, Mark stopped mid-sentence.


    ¡°Just that what?¡±, I challenged him indignantly.


    ¡°Nothing. I wasn¡¯t going to say anything.¡± Mark gave a dramatic look at his watch and said, ¡°My! Would you look at the time? It sure is getting late. I¡¯ll go make sure that the tents are secured.¡± With that, Mark got up and rushed away.


    I stayed beside the fire and finished my dinner. Afterwards, I cleaned up our dishes and got out my computer. Sleep was calling me, but I knew that it would be better to get all my data inputted tonight. I would sleep better knowing that it was done. Also, with the 3D map completed, I could see if there was any part of the land that I¡¯d skipped over. I¡¯d have a chance tomorrow morning to fix it.


    The next morning, we got up early and got ready for the day. Mark made breakfast and, like the night before, I cleaned up the dishes when we were done. We made a good team. By the time Sylvie and the survey team returned, we had stuck our campsite and had all our possessions packed neatly in the car.

 Chapter 4: A New Find

    Being in the middle of nowhere meant that you were surrounded by lots and lots of nowhere. There was no way that I would be able to make a detailed scan of the entire area surrounding the proposed mine in a day. Instead, I used a shotgun approach, where I peppered an area with lots of randomly placed field tests. If I found anything in those test areas, then I would explore everything adjacent to it. If there were no interesting minerals in the scan, then I¡¯d move on. I might miss something by doing this, but it let me cover a lot of area in a short amount of time.


    Spending around two hours going outwards from the site in each direction meant that it was late afternoon by the time I finished my exploring. I returned to the campsite hungry, tired and dirty. Mark and Sylvie were having a meeting as I drove the ATV back to the surveyors, but they made their way over to me as I was filling up the tank for the next person to use it.


    ¡°Your timing couldn¡¯t be better, Abby. Sylvie and I just finished going over the final report and I was about to call the pilots and see if they could be ready to leave in an hour and a half.¡±, Mark said.


    ¡°Make it two hours and you¡¯ve got a deal. I need a bit of time to clean up and get a snack at the plane hotel.¡±, I answered.


    ¡°Plane hotel?¡±, Sylvie asked.


    ¡°She means the FBO, the fixed-base operator. It¡¯s where the plane gets hangered between flights. They have showers for the pilots and a lounge for customers waiting for their flights to take off. Two hours it is. Are you ready do go?¡±, Mark explained.


    ¡°Sure. I¡¯ll input my data on the way to the plane. How long is the flight to Arkansas and where are we staying tonight? If you want to survive to see another sunrise, make sure that the word ¡®outdoors¡¯ doesn¡¯t pass your lips.¡± Sylvie and Mark both laughed at my threat.


    ¡°The flight is around two hours and we¡¯re staying indoors at a Travelodge right next to the airport.¡± Mark had put extra emphasis on the work indoors.


    ¡°That¡¯s good. I can¡¯t tell you how glad I am that I won¡¯t have to kill you. Dirt comes out in the wash. Blood is a whole other matter.¡± I finished with the ATV and handed the keys to Sylvie.


    ¡°You wouldn¡¯t kill me. Not when you¡¯d already gone through all the trouble of saving my life. That would just mean that you got into all that trouble for nothing.¡±, Mark responded.


    ¡°That¡¯s true.¡±, I said dejectedly. Then I perked up and added, ¡°But I can make you wish you were dead.¡±


    Mark frowned at the glee in my voice and was about to continue our teasing banter when Sylvie asked, ¡°She saved your life?¡±


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    ¡°Yes. Last September she ran into a burning building and carried me out.¡±, Mark answered.


    Sylvie gave him a skeptical look, waiting for the punchline.


    ¡°It¡¯s true. No joke. Here, I¡¯ve got the video.¡± Mark pulled out his phone, swiped at it a few times and handed it to Sylvie.


    ¡°You downloaded the video to your phone?¡±, I groaned, ¡°Seriously? Why would you do that?¡±


    ¡°To remind me why I keep you around when your tongue gets too acerbic.¡±


    ¡°Acerbic? Really? Nobody uses that word in normal conversation. Why didn¡¯t you just say ¡®snarky¡¯?¡±, I asked.


    ¡°There you go again. Being all acerbic.¡± Mark drew out that last word and giving the final syllable a hard K sound at the end. I couldn¡¯t hold a straight face anymore and I lol¡¯ed.


    While we¡¯d been talking, Sylvie had been watching the video and when it ended, she had that weird look on her face that I¡¯d seen several people have after watching the video. I¡¯d termed it ¡®stunned disbelief¡¯ and I dreaded what was coming next.


    ¡°Holy shit, Abby. That was incredible. What the hell did you think you were doing?¡±


    I couldn¡¯t get Mark to stop laughing for five straight minutes. Somewhere in the middle of his chortling, he managed to gasp out, ¡°That¡¯s why I have the video with me! I love hearing people ask you that.¡±, and then he was off again, holding his sides and enjoying my discomfort.


    Eventually, we made our way to the car and said our goodbyes. Right before we were about to leave, Sylvie jumped in with a quick question. ¡°Abby, my team is going to very upset with me if I don¡¯t ask you if you found anything in all of your, uhm, surveying.¡±


    I looked over at Mark, who wasn¡¯t trying to hide his own curiosity, before turning to answer Sylvie. ¡°I can¡¯t go into details, but I will tell you that you and your team are working on the second largest concentration of copper on the property.¡±


    ¡°There¡¯s another ore deposit location? Where?¡±, Sylvie asked.


    ¡°You¡¯ll have to wait for the final report in two weeks to get information. Oh, and there¡¯s an intact skeleton of a T-Rex in the southwestern corner of the property.¡±


    As we drove away, leaving Sylvie with lots of unanswered questions, Mark asked, ¡°You enjoyed that, didn¡¯t you?¡±.


    ¡°Yup.¡±


    ¡°You do realize that not knowing the location of the other ore deposit, or if there really is another deposit at all, is going to drive her crazy?¡±


    ¡°Yup.¡±


    ¡°Was it payback for the looks her team have been giving you for the past two days or for asking you that questions about the fire?¡±


    ¡°Neither really. I wanted to answer her truthfully, but I can¡¯t give her more information until I¡¯ve set my deal up with Jake.¡±


    ¡°So there really is a T-Rex skeleton? In good shape?¡±, Mark asked.


    ¡°Definitely. I¡¯ve seen one in museum. They¡¯re very similar.¡±


    ¡°A few years ago, I was with Grampa Jake at a mining site when a dinosaur fossil was discovered by the workers. They called in a paleontologist from a local museum to evaluate it. The fossil had been too badly damaged to make it worth a lot, but I got interested in fossils for awhile and looked up their values. Do you know what a T-Rex skeleton is worth?¡±


    ¡°I¡¯ve never given it much thought. Well, any thought.¡±, I answered truthfully.


    ¡°Full skeletons are fairly rare, and T-Rex ones are very rare. One of the most famous was sold at auction in the late 1990¡¯s for a little over $8,000,000.¡±


    It took a little while for that to settle in and then I whispered, ¡°In that case, I¡¯ll keep the locations of the other ones to myself for now.¡±

 Chapter 5: Diamonds

    Mark convinced someone at the FBO to let me shower and change before the flight. It felt wonderful to be clean again. I grabbed a snack of cookies and a granola bar as we passed by the lounge and soon we were sitting in the lush comfort of the plane. I don¡¯t remember falling asleep, and I missed both takeoff and landing.


    The next morning, I met Mark downstairs at the hotel¡¯s complimentary continental breakfast. He was just finishing up a phone call.


    ¡°Good morning, Abby! I hope you slept well.¡±


    ¡°Like a rock. I barely remember getting from the plane to the hotel. I didn¡¯t realize how tired I was. How about you?¡±


    ¡°Not as well as you, but good enough to get me though the day. Given how tired you¡¯ve been, I think we should take a vacation day today and start up again tomorrow completely refreshed.¡±, Mark suggested.


    ¡°That works for me. I¡¯ll text dad later and let him know about the extra day. What should we do with our free day? Sit by the pool? Go shopping? Get back to sleep?¡±.


    ¡°All those options are on the table, but I¡¯d like to suggest another. Did you know that only a few hours from here is Crater of Diamonds State Park? You get to keep whatever shiny bits you can find.¡± Mark said enticingly. He was smiling from ear to ear.


    My heart raced with excitement. ¡°You know how I love shiny things!¡±


    ¡°I should warn you though, the largest diamond ever found there was only 40 carats and finds of 5-10 carats will make the local news. Try not to break any records please. People might start asking you too many questions if you keep finding gemstones and placing them at auction.¡±


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    ¡°Ok. If I find any huge diamonds, I¡¯ll sneak them out. Got it.¡±


    We stopped to pick up some sturdy shovels on the way. When Mark started to pick out sifting pans, I told him to put them back, as we wouldn¡¯t be needing them. Yeah, I was getting cocky but this was the only aspect of my abilities that I was willing to share with anyone and it felt good to flaunt it once in awhile.


    Mark and I had a wonderful day at the diamond park. Compared to the past few days, scanning the park for diamonds was a joke. The diamonds lit up for my field like fireflies in the Great Smoky Mountains of Tennessee. There were so many diamonds around, from tiny one sprinkled all over to huge ones, buried deep in the earth. I dampened my inner greed and focused only on those that were three or four feet down. Those required some work, but it was so worth it.


    I did end up breaking the record for the largest diamond ever found in the park, although no one but Mark and I would ever know it. Sometime in the next few months, it would find its way into an auction, with the seller listed anonymously, and I¡¯d have more funding for the Hannah Foundation. Besides that huge rock, I also dug up one 35 carat diamond, three 20-25 carat diamonds and an 18 carat diamond. Mark didn¡¯t know about those as I snuck them into my R2 backpack when he went to the bathroom. After that I mostly kept my finds to the five to ten carat range. They¡¯d make really nice gifts for my friends. I was also pretty sure that Uncle Magnum might need a diamond in the next six months and I chose a beautiful 7-carat yellow diamond for him.


    By the time we left, I had a bag of uncut diamonds that rivaled the bag of cut diamonds that I¡¯d taken from the safe at Serpentine Logistics a few months back. Mark didn¡¯t do so badly either, with a little guidance, and he was taking home several presents for Conor and Rose. He planned to quietly slip a few diamonds to Andrew to give to Stacey.


    Feeling high from our incredibly successful outing, Mark took me out to dinner and we talked for hours. Because of our age difference, I knew that it couldn¡¯t lead to anything, but it felt nice to forget about that and just spend time together.

 Chapter 6: Back to Work

    Mark and I were back on the road early on the following day for our last stop in our mining tour. This time, we were going to see a potential iron producing property and it wasn¡¯t in the middle of nowhere. The site was located about an hour north of Little Rock and three miles outside of a very small town called Hasting¡¯s Summit.


    Unlike the Arizona site, this one didn¡¯t have a surveying crew. We were on our own. The survey crew had already been on site and had mostly completed their report. Mark had the draft version of it and was going to use it to review the site. I was going to do my thing and scan the land, section by section. I was really glad to see that mark had arranged for the survey crew to leave us a few ATV¡¯s and some fuel.


    While Mark set up our tiny base camp, I looked over my map and headed out to a corner of the property to begin my scans. After spending weeks travelling, I was anxious to finish the job and get back home. I missed dad and Uncle Magnum. I also missed Eva and James, but they wouldn¡¯t have been at home anyways. I missed going to Kung Fu and making things in the forge. With the sudden feelings of homesickness, I decided to see if I could stand increasing the rectangular field to 100 meters. I knew that I could do it, but I didn¡¯t know how exhausting it would be. I was hoping that the added strain would be compensated by the need for considerably fewer scans.


    The new size was barely manageable, and I kept it up until lunchtime, when I joined Mark at our base camp. There was no cooking this time, just some store-bought sandwiches that we¡¯d kept in a cooler.


    ¡°Find any dinosaurs so far?¡±, Mark asked me between mouthfuls of his turkey sandwich.


    ¡°Not a one. Just rocks and ore. How much longer do you need here? I can¡¯t imagine there¡¯s much for you to do without any equipment here.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m pretty much done. I¡¯ve seen the site, read the report, and visually verified what I could. Based on the reports findings of where the pit will be, I¡¯ve also created a rough map of where the ore processing buildings should go and where the tailings could be stored. I¡¯m just guessing based on location to the pit. If we decided to open this location, we¡¯ll have to explore further to make sure that we put the buildings on solid ground and that there are no underground steams that we might pollute with the tailings.¡±, Mark explained.


    ¡°Well, I¡¯ll be done going over the property in a few hours. Give me your map and I¡¯ll verify the areas under your planned building.¡±


    ¡°Abby, I know that your land sense is real, but what exactly are you sensing and how far does it go?¡±, Mark asked.


    ¡°Well, I¡¯m not sure how far down I can sense things, I¡¯ve never really tried to find my limit in that. The sensing takes a lot of strength to maintain and I¡¯ve been focused on maintaining it as I ride the property. I want to have as complete a picture as I can get. Mostly, I¡¯ve been stopping at a depth of 300-400 meters. If I sense ore in an area, I¡¯ll go lower, until I have a better idea as to its shape.¡±


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    Mark sat frozen for a few seconds and finally said, ¡°When you said that you were going to negotiate with Grandpa Jake about more detailed information, I had no idea that you could get that level of detail or to that depth. That¡¯s absolutely incredible. The savings in time and money are huge. You need to make sure that you squeeze as much of those savings from Grandpa Jake as you can.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m going to try my best. Please don¡¯t tell Jake about this conversation though. I don¡¯t want him to have time to prepare.¡±, I said.


    ¡°I promise that I won¡¯t say a word to him it, but it won¡¯t make any difference in the end. Grandpa will play fairly with you and not just because he likes you and because you saved me. He¡¯ll do it because he¡¯s going to want your services again and again. His biggest problem won¡¯t be trying to negotiate your price down. His problem is going to be whether he can pay you enough to want to do work for him at all.¡± Mark shook his head in as if trying to deny his own conclusions.


    ¡°I don¡¯t understand. Why would I turn down doing well paid work for Jake?¡±, I asked with some confusion.


    ¡°Because you don¡¯t need the money. The gemstone that you found a few months ago can fund the Hannah Foundation for years and you just found a diamond that will probably match that at auction. Anytime you need money, you can just go to a public mine and find a gemstone that¡¯s worth millions of dollars. Add in your dinosaur finds and you¡¯ll never need to work unless you want to.¡± Mark seemed pretty sure of his reasoning, but he was making one wrong assumption. He assumed that the Hannah Foundation was just going stay a small local charitable organization. I had much bigger plans for it, but I kept those thoughts to myself.


    After devouring my sandwiches, I went back to scanning, but Mark¡¯s questions about how deep I could scan kept coming back to me. I know that in a few areas I¡¯d gone to 800 meters and in one I¡¯d passed the 1000-meter mark and I didn¡¯t remember being overly exerted doing those scans. That meant that it was the size of the field itself that was a limiting factor and not the distance that I sent it Only I didn¡¯t usually need to go to 1000 meter so that knowledge didn¡¯t change anything, until I realized that distance wasn¡¯t just about going down. I could send out the field away from me as well.


    I sat down and experimented. I shaped a 100 by 100-meter field and then turned it on it¡¯s side and send it down 50 meters into the earth. Once the field was in place, I send it out, moving horizontally across the property. I passed 2000 meters and I still had clear data. At 3000 meters, over a mile and a half away, I stopped. That was plenty far. I lowered the field down 100 more meters and brought it back.


    With four scans back and forth, each one dropping by 100 meters, but going out 3000 meters, my horizontal scanning could drop the number of scans I needed by around 85%. Seven hours of work could be done in one hour. I¡¯d need more time to make notes, but with fewer scans required, I wouldn¡¯t have to worry about keeping up the scanning all day and I could probably afford to make the field even bigger. I planned on trying that with the surrounding areas, once I was done with the mine site.


    The hardest part was coming up with a new way to make my notes quickly on the computer and making sure that I was putting in the data in the appropriate location on the map. I spent half and hour fiddling around with the computer until I was satisfied with my new notation technique and less than an hour later, I was finished scanning the site and moving on to the adjoining properties.


    As tiring and boring as the work could get at times, these feelings were easily eclipsed by the high of finding an ore body of significant size. I loved it when my field ran up against a deposit, identifying and highlighting what it saw. It felt useful and productive and positive, unlike the all the negative and frankly murderous applications of my powers.

 Chapter 7: The Farm

    With my new technique, I was able to finish the scan of the surrounding areas my late-afternoon. As I made my way back to the campsite, I saw a farmhouse along the road with a For Sale sign out in front. Curious, I brought the ATV to a stop out front and walked up the long front yard path leading to a screened in porch. Past the two-story house, I could see a barn and fields that seemed to my untrained eye ready to harvest. From the road, the house had looked to be well maintained, but as I drew nearer, I could see signs of recent neglect. The paint on the porch railings was starting to peel and the weeds had begun invading the flower patch next to the porch. Nothing that couldn¡¯t be fixed with a little bit of work. The owners had lovingly cared for the place and now they were leaving. I wondered why.


    As I reached the porch steps, I saw a little girl, around 5 years old, watching me from the front door. The sundress she was wearing was bright red, with little white flowers, maybe tulips, all over, and her light brown hair was a little messy, probably from running around. I waved to her and called out, ¡°Hi!¡±. She didn¡¯t wave back or say hi. Instead, she called out, ¡°Momma! Someone¡¯s here.¡± and ran inside.


    Since I had already been announced, I stayed where I was and waited for ¡®Momma¡¯ to come out. Less than a minute later, Momma emerged from the front door and greeted me. She looked like a much bigger version of her daughter, with light brown hair that was not messy, and wearing a red sundress that matched her daughter¡¯s. Momma was no frail waif. Momma was at least 5¡¯10¡± and looked like she could match any of the farmhands that must work for her. A quick scan to verify what I strongly suspected also showed that Momma was five months pregnant with a healthy-looking boy.


    Before she could ask me my business, I quickly introduced myself. ¡°Good afternoon. My name is Abby and I was just doing some surveying work on the neighboring property to the west. I saw the For-Sale sign and thought that I¡¯d stop to see the place.¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s nice to meet you, Abby. I¡¯m Emily. Seeing as how you¡¯re the first person to ask to see the place in months, I¡¯ll be happy to show your around.¡± Emily came down the steps and we shook hands. She moved more easily than I expected of a woman five months pregnant, but I guessed that her larger frame, combined with her not carrying too big, made the job of hauling around a baby much easier than it would on someone smaller.


    The little girl, whom her mother introduced as Emma, joined us for a tour of the various barns and sheds on the property and for a survey of the crops in the field. Emily was a no-nonsense woman and the tour only took about fifteen minutes, after which we make our way back to the farmhouse for a room by room tour. With the exception of the family room, where Emma had been playing with her toys, the house was extremely neat. Overall, I was very impressed with Emily¡¯s organizational skills and her ability to manage both the business and the house in such an orderly fashion.


    Emily ended the tour in the kitchen and offered me for coffee. I accepted a cold glass of water instead and we sat down at her table and talked.


    ¡°Abby, I¡¯m not one to pry much, but you seem a little young to be a surveyor. I met a few of the ones that were here over the past few months surveying the old Dunham property, and you¡¯re by far the youngest one I¡¯ve seen.¡±


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    ¡°Pry away Emily. I don¡¯t mind. I¡¯m not officially a surveyor and I¡¯m going to be a Senior in high school this fall, so your observations are bang on. I know the owner of the land personally, and he thinks that my opinion on the land as a potential mine would be useful, so he asked me to take a look. He was sending his grandson anyways and I¡¯m a last-minute addition.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯d like to say that what you said makes sense, but it really doesn¡¯t. If you¡¯re not a surveyor, how can you form an opinion on the land that will be of help?¡±, Emily asked.


    ¡°I don¡¯t know how or why, but I can get a sense of the rocks and minerals in the land around me. He¡¯s not looking for hard numbers, just my opinion based on my land sense.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯ve never heard of that, but it¡¯s not my money and he¡¯s welcome to do what he wants with his.¡± Emily was obviously skeptical, and I appreciated that she didn¡¯t say ¡®waste¡¯ in there anywhere.


    ¡°What about you, Emily? You¡¯ve got this place running like clockwork. Why are you selling?¡± If she could be direct, I wasn¡¯t going to tiptoe around the subject.


    ¡°Debt. Plain and simple. I¡¯ve got too much of it. Maybe if we¡¯d have started out with a clean slate, we could have managed it, but I took over for my father when he passed, and we¡¯d seen some pretty lean years just prior to that. Daddy borrowed from the bank to get us through but paying off that debt hasn¡¯t been possible. Since Chris, my husband, and I took over the farm, it¡¯s been making good money, but we¡¯ve had invest all of it into new equipment and stock and the rest has gone to paying off the interest on our debt. To help ends meet, Chris had to take a job at the canning factory out on Miller¡¯s Way, but they closed down about a year ago and now he¡¯s over in Little Rock working security while I run the farm. He¡¯s staying out at his brother¡¯s place there and he comes home every few days. We¡¯re making do, but it¡¯s no way to live. Also, with the baby on the way, I¡¯m going to need more help with the farm and that means that Chris will have to come back and we won¡¯t have the extra money to make our payments. I love this place, but Chris and I figured that we¡¯d be better off as a family selling it.¡±


    ¡°Has your farm every been surveyed to see if it has any ores in it? The neighboring land has some. If there¡¯s some on your land, then you¡¯d have another source of revenue or you could sell the land, pay off your debts, and start fresh somewhere else.¡±


    ¡°When old Mr. Durham told us about the iron he found on his property, Daddy had surveyors from a few companies over here and nothing ever came of it. Even if we found some ore today, it would take years until they¡¯d finish surveying it properly, evaluate its worth and start seeing some revenues.¡±


    ¡°Well, I can¡¯t make any promises, but I know someone who might be interested in buying this place. If you¡¯d give me your coordinates, I¡¯ll pass along them along. What¡¯s your asking price?¡±


    Emily and I talked a bit about the value of a land versus the value of a working business and then she walked me out.


    ¡°Thank you for the tour, Emily. It was really nice meeting you and Emma. Maybe if I come back this way again, I¡¯ll get to meet Chris and the new little guy.¡±, I said.


    ¡°It was my pleasure. I don¡¯t get to meet new people very often, so it was nice for me too. Please stop by again. I¡¯m sure Chris would like it. As to the little guy, it might be a little gal. We¡¯ve didn¡¯t ask yet.¡±, Emily said as she patted her slightly bulging stomach.


    ¡°It¡¯s a little guy. I guarantee it.¡±, I replied.


    ¡°What makes you so sure? Everyone seems to have a different opinion, based on how I¡¯m carrying or how tired I am or on the glow of my skin.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m sure because in the same way that I sense that land, I sense that you¡¯re carrying a boy.¡± I left her at that and made my way back down the drive and to the ATV


    Back at the campsite, Mark was waiting for me and I talked him into saving a night of camping and heading home instead. I was finished my survey and there was no point in spending another uncomfortable night outdoors. I really missed my bed.

 Chapter 8: Return

    It felt great to be back home and sleeping in my own bed. The morning after my return, I slept in and took my time getting up. Dad had left to teach his class hours ago. For the next few days, I didn¡¯t have much planned except waiting. Waiting for Eva and James to return, for Shauna to find the rest of our team, for dad¡¯s second summer semester course to start, and waiting for the auction of my gemstones at the end of the week.


    With an abundance of free time on my hands, I ate a leisurely breakfast and pulled out my computer to work on my two presentations for Jake. It was best to get this done when things were quiet and everything was still fresh in my mind. The first one was relatively short and simply compared the two potential mining sites in terms of which one had more ore and which I felt would be easier to extract, given the surrounding rocks and the depth at which I felt that the ores were located.


    The second report had detailed 3D maps of each of the potential mines, as well as the three existing mines that Mark and I had visited. The maps not only showed the shape of the ore bodies, but also the intervening rock and the depth, to the meter, of each layer of rock and it also showed any underground streams or reservoirs. Based on my scanning information, I used the mining software to calculate the value of each of the ore deposits and to create a model for how best to mine out the ore. Finally, for each of the properties, I created a larger map that included the surrounding areas, those not owned by McKenzie Resources, and showed where they had ore deposits, if any. Each of the properties got it¡¯s own section in the binder, with the 3D maps, ore value calculations and it¡¯s own conclusions and recommendations section.


    While I was happy to have finished the work, I still didn¡¯t have any clue as to what all of this would be worth to Jake and McKenzie Resources. Luckily, dad worked at a mining school and he¡¯d have colleagues that would know. My plan was to show dad the binders when he got home and come up with questions to ask his fellow teachers.


    Making the binders reminded me that I¡¯d be needing to expand on my list of publicly traded companies that I would be monitoring. The competition was over, but I still had my investments and soon I¡¯d have the foundation¡¯s investments as well. Even if my intention was to hire James to handle all that for the foundation, I still needed to give him the occasional hot tip and I didn¡¯t want to always rely on the same ten or fifteen companies. I made a list of four cities that were an hour or two flight away and started looking for publicly traded companies in those cities. Finding publicly traded companies in New York, Washington, Atlanta, and Nashville wasn¡¯t hard at all. Deciding which companies I wanted to visit was a bit tougher and I ended up spending the rest of the afternoon making my choices.


    Having taken three weeks off from Kung Fu, I needed to make up for lost time and I headed over to Uncle Magnum¡¯s place. While traveling with Mark, I¡¯d made it a point to spend at least a half hour a day stretching and when time permitted, I¡¯d practiced my forms. However, that wasn¡¯t a real substitute for class; it merely kept the rust off.


    I found Uncle Magnum in his office, working on his student profiles and updating each one with their latest progress and planning out their next series of challenges. He and Charlie each reviewed these files on a monthly basis and made notes for each other so that no student was left stuck in a rut. They wanted all of their students to improve and advance to the next level.


    ¡°What do you have planned for me in those files of yours?¡±, I asked Uncle Magnum as I walked into his office.


    ¡°Abby! Welcome back.¡± He rose from his chair and came around the desk to greet me with a hug. ¡°You have a nice tan, but you also have circles under your eyes. Too much work and not enough Kung Fu. Did you get any practice in while you were away?¡±.


    ¡°A little. Stretching and forms mostly.¡±, I answered and almost winced as he replied with the words that I knew were coming.


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    ¡°Ah, that means that you neglected your push-ups and horse stance. Not to worry. We¡¯ll get that straightened out in no time.¡± Uncle Magnum gave me an impish grin and rubbed his hands together in glee. I groaned and shook my head in mock disgust.


    Uncle Magnum went back behind his desk and continued, ¡°As to your question about what your file says about your future, it says that we need to talk.¡± He gestured towards one of the chairs in front of him and I sat down, feeling a little trepidation. Usually when I asked him about what came next, he¡¯d tell me about the next form that I had to learn, or he¡¯d introduce me to a new weapon. In all my years with him, Uncle Magnum had never invited me to talk about what would come next. A small pit opened up in my stomach as I waited for him to begin.


    ¡°Since I started teaching you, I¡¯ve had your progression planned out and you¡¯ve been following the plan closely. Sometimes you took a little longer to perfect a technique and sometimes you caught on right off the bat. Overall, your dedication and skill has allowed you to make good progress.¡±, began Uncle Magnum.


    ¡°I hear a ¡®but¡¯ coming up.¡±, I filled in as he took a pause.


    ¡°But! But since last summer your progression curve has changed. Instead of a steady march uphill, you¡¯ve been taking big leaps forward. Your ability to read your opponents body language has improved significantly, causing your sparring to jump to a whole new level. Your forms are crisper, with more understanding behind each move and even your strikes have gotten more precise and much more powerful. I¡¯ve spoken about it with Charlie and he sees it too. Neither of us knows what to attribute it to. It¡¯s not like you were undisciplined before and you¡¯ve turned over a new leaf. Your dedication had remained constant throughout.¡± Uncle Magnum paused again, perhaps hoping that I¡¯d explain the change.


    Unfortunately, I couldn¡¯t tell him how I¡¯d managed to improve. I knew exactly what had caused those jumps in skill, but I wasn¡¯t prepared to explain it to him. Using the field to encase and scan my opponent had allowed to actually see the mechanics behind every move they made and learn to read body language by even slight shifts in weight or the tensing of muscles. That understanding had carried over even when I wasn¡¯t using the field. I simply knew what to look for and after some practice, it became natural to look for those small changes to figure out what attacks were coming next.


    The same thing happened when I wrapped a field around Uncle Magnum while he was doing his forms. Following the shifting and tensing of his muscles allowed me to better visualize flow of the moves and the intent behind each strike and block. My new understanding allowed me to go from merely parroting the steps I¡¯d been taught to being able to truly understand their purpose. Learning how he breathed during each movement gave me better timing in releasing my own energy and making the most out of each strike.


    It seemed that anything that I learned using of the field was handled differently by my brain. New techniques were integrated into natural reactions much more quickly and information was much easier to remember. How else could I explain being able to recall the distribution of minerals for miles underground with only a handful of notes? Normally, I had trouble memorizing a list with seven items on it. Anything I learned from a scan became embedded in my memory.


    When I didn¡¯t jump in with an explanation, Uncle Magnum continued, ¡°From your expression, I can see that you still don¡¯t want to talk about it. I¡¯m not sure why. You do realize that it¡¯s a good thing and I only want to know more about how you¡¯re doing it so that I can help you and other students improve?¡±, he asked.


    ¡°I know, but I¡¯m not ready yet. I¡¯m also pretty sure that it won¡¯t work with anyone else.¡± Uncle Magnum¡¯s eyebrows raised a bit when I said that.


    ¡°Well, all that was a round-about way of saying that I think that you¡¯re ready to take your red belt test. The only problem with that is that you¡¯re way too young to be taking the test and everyone will think that I¡¯m biased in even allowing you to try. That¡¯s why I¡¯ve contacted my Sifu in Raleigh, Sifu Zhang, and he¡¯s agreed to evaluate you. If his assessment matches mine, he¡¯s agreed to oversee your testing and help guide your future training.¡± Uncle Magnum eyed me slightly warily as he said this. Maybe he was worried that I¡¯d turn down the offer or that I¡¯d make him look bad in front of his Sifu. He needn¡¯t have worried. There was no way that I¡¯d turn down the early chance for my red belt. It¡¯s what I¡¯d been dreaming of since I was four and took my first Kung Fu lesson.


    ¡°I¡¯d love to give it a shot and I¡¯m sure that he¡¯ll have plenty of stories about you when you were training with him.¡± I gave Uncle Magnum my biggest toothy smile.


    ¡°I¡¯ll talk to him about limiting those stories and I¡¯ll warn you right now that if you say one word about this Sifu Magnum business, I¡¯ll make sure that you do ten minutes of horse stance before every class!¡±

 Chapter 9: Layer 2

    I woke up early the next morning and I ached all over. Uncle Magnum took my acceptance to be evaluated by his old teacher seriously and he wanted to make sure that I was prepared. I had a feeling that the next few weeks were going to be painful. Since my technique had improved so much, Uncle Magnum decided to work on stamina, one of the things that my field couldn¡¯t help with, and he had me alternating between the punching bag and sparring for most of the class. He and Charlie took turns sparring with me so while they each got to rest, but I had to keep going. For the first time in awhile, I sweat completely through my uniform. At the end of the night, I gladly accepted Uncle Magnum¡¯s offer for a ride home. I could barely move.


    The only cure that I knew of for sore muscles was stretching and that¡¯s what I did, after breakfast. It was a sunny summer morning and I did my stretching in the back yard, carefully loosening each muscle group and finishing off with a cool down and some meditation. Since finding out about my field manipulation abilities and learning to control them, my meditation skill had actually gotten worse. I¡¯d sit there, eyes closed, and keeping my breathing steady and anyone watching would probably think that I was just being in the moment. Instead, I was pushing out my field and feeling where everyone and everything around me was. I¡¯d use my field to feel the motion of the trees as the wind picked up or I¡¯d wrap a field around a squirrel as it chased its mate across telephone wires. Once I put a field along a stretch of road, just to feel cars roll across it.


    Today I didn¡¯t send out any fields. I stayed in my mind and worked on the problem of getting into the other layers of reality. Mark had given me three questions that were supposed to help me with problem solving. What is the problem you¡¯re trying to solve, have you examined your assumptions, and has this already been solved by others in different industries? He said it much wordier than that, but that was what it boiled down to.


    The problem to be solved was how to get into another layer of reality. Simple so far. One assumption was that there were other layers, but I wasn¡¯t questioning that because I¡¯d actually been in the other layers. The bus incident had a definite sequence to it. People disappeared, the bus greyed out and passed through me, the bus disappeared, the buildings greyed out, the buildings disappeared, and then I was back in reality. I hadn¡¯t noticed the people greying out, but my mind was a little busy at the time and I was going to assume that they did grey out before they disappeared. I felt confident in that assumption and I moved on.


    What else was I assuming? Was it really a sequence? It was a sequence of events as I saw them, but since the bus incident I hadn¡¯t followed that sequence. If I were about to be hit by a bus now, I¡¯d shift into R2 directly. Blind instinct had taken over when the bus was about to hit me. My subconscious was looking for a way out and it started going through all of its options one by one. Like if you didn¡¯t know what channel your favorite show was on and you started at channel one and worked your way up. If you knew the channel, you¡¯d just go directly there. This wasn¡¯t exactly like that because I could only go to the ¡®reality¡¯ channel and increase the volume to R1 and then turn it higher to R2 and R3. I couldn¡¯t get to the ¡®layer one¡¯ (L1) channel, or any other channel.


    Questioning my assumptions didn¡¯t seem to be getting me anywhere so I moved on to thinking outside of the box and seeing there was a solution out there from another industry or field. Hmmm. Another field?! I¡¯d heard of gravitational fields and electromagnetic fields, but I didn¡¯t know anything about them, except what was suggested by their very names. Mark had even explained away my abilities to Sylvie as being able to sense the electromagnetic field of the earth. Time for an internet search.


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    Back in my room, I started up my computer and I did some quick reading on gravitational and electromagnetic fields and found my self out of my depth within a few sentences. Whenever I read about sciency things, my brain seems to take a holiday. Faced with the prospect of figuring out what all the terms mean, my eyes just glazed over. In this case, I did manage to gather that electromagnetic fields are composed of wavelengths, that there are different types of electromagnetic fields and that the main differentiator between the different types was the frequency of the field. The frequency describes the speed of the electromagnetic wave. Higher frequencies had sorter, but faster, wavelengths.


    My brain was already hurting and I wasn¡¯t even sure if I was understanding it correctly. That didn¡¯t mean that it wasn¡¯t useful. Maybe my field had a wavelength too and if I sped it up or slowed it down, then I¡¯d get a different frequency and reach a different layer of reality. I looked up how to change a frequency and didn¡¯t come up with anything that I thought would be helpful, until I came across a mention of having the field pass through something else. There hadn¡¯t been anything around me during the bus incident for the field to have passed through and change its frequency, so passing the field through a physical object wasn¡¯t the answer. What else could I pass the field through? A few moments of search brought up the term ¡®frequency doubling¡¯. I didn¡¯t understand what it was, but the name itself gave me an idea that I needed to try out right away.


    Although I didn¡¯t need to sit on my floor to work out how to use my field anymore, I had gotten into the habit of doing so when I tried new things and so I grabbed a blue pen and a black pen from my desk and sat down on my floor. I placed the pens in from of me, each a few inches apart from its neighbors, and wrapped them in their own individual fields.


    Focusing on the blue pen¡¯s field, I pictured it as a wave and tried to speed it up by making my imaginary waves shorter. As I expected, nothing happened, but I had to give it a try. Next, I spent a few minutes trying to feel the wavelength of the field. I managed to feel a pulsing in the field, but I had no way of getting it to pulse faster or slower. That left me with my ¡®frequency doubling¡¯ idea.


    When I had created my protective shield, I used the concept of multiple fields surrounding each other. This time I superimposed one field on top of another and created a new combined field, but the pen stayed where it was. For a few minutes I was stumped about what do to and then I realized that I hadn¡¯t activated either field. I tried again, this time superimposing an R1 field over the inactivated field around the pen. I felt the pen slip into R1. That didn¡¯t seem to do much. I could have had the same result with just an R1 field. I tried activating the first field to R1 as well. This time, the pen disappeared from my senses completely. Success!? Kind of. Where was the pen and how do I bring it back?


    The pen was gone and I couldn¡¯t even sense it, but I could still sense the new combined field. It pulsed a little faster than a single field did, as if it had a new, higher, frequency. I could also feel that the field was pen shaped. At first, I though that I just couldn¡¯t sense the pen because it was no longer even partially in this reality, but as I continued to focus on the field around the pen, I started to ¡®see¡¯ the pen again. It was very faint and I had a feeling that this was yet another aspect of the field that I¡¯d need to strengthen through practice.


    Wrenching my thoughts back to the blue pen, I turned off both fields at once to see what would happen and I lost all sense of the pen shape. The pen didn¡¯t return to reality and I had no way of getting it back.


    Turning to the black pen, I set up the dual R1 fields and sent it to where the other pen went. After the pen disappeared, I turned off the second field that I¡¯d added and the pen reappeared, in R1. Yes! I still needed to be sure of just where I was sending the pen when I used to the combined field, but at least I could get it back. I released the pen from its fields and gathered my thoughts.


    Then I did something monumentally stupid. Without thinking it through, I shifted to R1 and superimposed another R1 field around myself.

 Chapter 10: In L1

    Ok. That was crazy, but I was going to have to try it sooner or later. Might as well be now.


    I was still in my room, and everything looked the same. Only it wasn¡¯t. There was a stillness now that hadn¡¯t been there a few moments ago. I realized that the quiet that I¡¯d noted during the ¡®bus incident¡¯ was back. All the typical house noises, like the constant hum of the central air unit or the occasional noise of the house settling, were gone.


    I stood up and walked over to my window. At first glance, nothing had changed. Then a bicycle went by, without anyone on it, its pedals rising and falling under their own power. This was followed by several driverless cars and an empty stroller walking itself. There were no greyed-out images of people at all. I was fully within the first layer of reality, L1. No people.


    This was amazing. It had taken me a year, but I was finally back in one of the layers and I¡¯d done it on purpose this time. I still didn¡¯t know how getting into the actual layer was better than simply being in an R1 bubble, but I was determined to find out. After all, when I¡¯d first gotten this ability, I had no idea what I could use it for and a few months ago I¡¯d been able to use it to save forty people from a life of slavery.


    Pulling myself away from the window, I sat down on my bed to think about what I should do next. What the hell? The bed was hard. It had no give to it at all. I might as well have sat down on a rock. Even the sheets, which I hadn¡¯t bothered to straighten up this morning, were frozen in place and my weight didn¡¯t press them down. I got up and tried to move them. They wouldn¡¯t budge.


    I walked around the room and experimented by trying to move things. Everything was stuck in place. My chair wouldn¡¯t even move when put all my weight pushing against it. Whereas normally I could breath on my desk lamp¡¯s pull-chain to make it move, all my strength wasn¡¯t enough to cause it shift from its position.


    Pacing back and forth, my mind tried to work out what was going on. I couldn¡¯t move anything, but the bikes and cars outside were moving. It seemed as if the movement couldn¡¯t be initiated here in L1. This was a layer of reality, one of it¡¯s building blocks. When you put all the layers or building blocks together, you ended up with the final product that was our normal reality. The layers themselves had no movement. You only got that in the final stage of reality. So the layers formed reality, but then reality changed the layers?


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    The explanation felt right and I was feeling good about my reasoning skills when my foot caught the edge of one of the pens that I¡¯d placed on the floor and sent it skittering across the room and under my bed.


    That wasn¡¯t supposed to happen. It shouldn¡¯t have moved. I walked over to the bed and knelt down to get the pen. It was the blue one that I¡¯d ¡®dropped¡¯ into L1 by removing its fields. I made my way back to the black pen and tried to pick it up. It wouldn¡¯t move. How were the pens different?


    It only took a few seconds for the answer to click and it all made sense. The black pen still had a counterpart in reality. The blue one didn¡¯t exist in reality anymore. By removing the blue pen from reality, I¡¯d taken away its anchor to there and so I could move it around in L1. The black pen was still tethered to reality, in that I hadn¡¯t turned off the fields that surrounded it and moving it could only be done there.


    Something felt odd about the blue pen though and that was strange in and of itself. I shouldn¡¯t be feeling anything about the pen. It was just a simple pen and I didn¡¯t have a field around it. How was I sensing anything from it? I closed my eyes and concentrated on what exactly I was feeling. Wrongness. Not in an evil way, more like something didn¡¯t belong. Out of place.


    I realized that what I was sensing was coming from my field, the one that always surrounded me and that I¡¯ve never been able to turn off. That field was sending information that my brain in turn interpreted and converted into this feeling of something being out of place. It was showing me that this pen was a construct of reality that had been dropped into L1, where it didn¡¯t belong. It vibrated at a different frequency than everything else here and the field was picking up on that.


    I wondered if I was giving off the same vibe as the pen, but I didn¡¯t feel any different. Maybe it was just that you can¡¯t feel your own incompatibility with your surroundings. Or maybe the combined L1 field that I still had around me kept me slightly apart from L1. Should I shut down the fields to check it out? What if I shut down the fields and couldn¡¯t get back to reality? Two R1 fields sent me to L1. I presume that two R2 fields would send me to L2. What two fields would send me from L1 to reality?


    That¡¯s when I made the second monumentally stupid decision of the day and shut down my L1 field.

 Chapter 11: Experiments

    You¡¯d think that I would eventually learn not to be so impulsive, but I felt pretty confident that I wouldn¡¯t get stuck in L1. The bus incident had proven that. Even without conscious control of my abilities, I¡¯d been pulled back to reality. How that worked, I had no idea, but I should be able to figure it out, in time.


    Giving my field my full concentration, I became aware of two things. First, it wasn¡¯t taking any power to stay here. Whenever I was in R1, I used up some energy to stay there and as I became stronger in using my ability, I was able to stay in R1 for longer and longer periods of time. However, it always used power. Now it was like I was in reality and didn¡¯t need to expend effort to stay. I had re-anchored myself and L1 was my new ¡®home-base¡¯.


    This fact was confirmed to me by the second thing that I realized, namely that the field that always surrounded me, my base field, was now attuned to a different frequency than before. The frequency matched the L1 field that I¡¯d been holding.


    Damn. In the back of my mind, I¡¯d been counting on my field to stay at the same frequency as it always had. Now I needed to think of another way to get back to reality and a cold sweat enveloped me.


    I wasn¡¯t panicking yet, but the possibility of being stuck here was starting to make me nervous. Any food here would be tied to reality and I wouldn¡¯t be able to move it, much less eat it. I took a deep breath and let it out slowly. There was no need to worry. I just needed to experiment and see what combination of fields I could use to get back to reality.


    The next several minutes were spent trying different combinations of fields to see which ones would get me home. Since my base field was now L1, I tried combining it with an R1 frequency field. Nothing happened. I guess it was incompatible with the L1 field or the combined wavelength of the two fields didn¡¯t result in reaching a new layer or a sub-layer. I tried the R2 and R3 fields with similar results.


    I hit paydirt when I superimposed the L1 field with another L1 field and ended up in L2. I was still in my room, but now it was empty. Four bare walls and openings where the door and the window used to be. I got up to look outside and saw that the parked cars along the street were gone, as were the bushes and the trees.


    This time I was bright enough not to simply turn off the L2 field. I removed the outer L1 field and returned to L1. I¡¯d go back later and experiment to see if two overlapping L2 fields would bring me to L3 or what would happen if I combined an L1 field with an L2 field. Right now, the priority was getting back to reality.


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    It didn¡¯t seem like an L1 field could be combined with any other field that I know of to get me back to reality. That meant that I¡¯d have to change my base shield back to the frequency of normal reality. I¡¯d tried combining it with R1, R2, and R3 fields and that didn¡¯t work. If I tried surrounding it with two additional R1 fields that would be the same as another L1 field and then I¡¯d just go back to L2. The only other options that I hadn¡¯t tried was to work with was a neutral R field;, one that wasn¡¯t activated, or maybe a combination of two of those R fields. If two activated R1 fields sent me to L1, then two disactivated or neutral R fields might get me back to R.


    That theory sounded good to me, but I still had the problem of turning the L1 field surrounding me into an R field. For several minutes I tried willing it to change and then I surrounded myself with an R1 field and tried to match two frequencies. Neither effort yielded anything useful. To be honest, I didn¡¯t really expect them to, but I was trying to be thorough in investigating the possibilities and I wanted to be able to cross those ideas off my list before I tried my real idea.


    My idea involved putting an R field between my skin and the existing L1 field. Maybe then I¡¯ve be able to cancel the L1 field and return to reality. I really hoped that it would work, as I only had one more possibility to try after this.


    It didn¡¯t work. It turns out that the field surrounding me did just that. There was no gap between my base field and my skin in which to add another field. That left me with my alternate plan of using the field of my R1 backpack, which I always had on, to alter my L1 field. The two fields were connected, but separate, and I intended to let the R1 field frequency slowly bleed into the L1 field and take it over.


    It wasn¡¯t easy to do and it took a lot of trial an error. My cold sweat had turned into full on sweat as the minutes slowly ticked away into an hour. Eventually, I managed to create a small opening in the connection between the two fields and by pushing a lot of energy into the R1 field while drawing energy away from the L1 field, I as was able to overpower the L1 field and change its frequency to R1.


    From there it was a simple matter of deactivating the R1 field, turning it to my normally passive R field and then superimposing another R field over it. The two R fields brought me back to reality.


    Relief washed over me as I sat down on my bed and sank into the mattress. The softness of the bed reassured me that I was truly back in reality. I¡¯d only been stuck in L1 for an hour and a half, but it had felt like much longer. I was tempted to lay down and take a nap. Instead, I practiced shifting to L1 and then back to reality. I let the feel of bleeding one frequency into another act as my guild to discovering how to change between frequencies and with another half hour of practice, I could go from L1 to reality in an instant.


    I briefly though about continuing my experiments further, but I rejected that. I¡¯d done enough for one day in that regard. More than enough. It was time to put my new discoveries to good use and I knew just what I wanted to do first.

 Chapter 12: Using New abilities

    In R2, it was a fast three-minute bike ride to General Avenue and the scene of the ¡®bus incident¡¯. The windows and door of the real estate agency had long ago been repaired and there were no traces of the bus crash. Except for the concrete bollards that the city council had erected along a few blocks of General Avenue to ensure that no similar accident could ever occur, you would never know what had happened here.


    I got off my bike and walked to the spot where I had nearly died a little over a year ago. The memory was still very vivid in my mind and I had a feeling that it always would be. Besides the kidnapping of my mother, it was the most significant event in my life. It was the day that I discovered my abilities.


    I had visited this spot several times over the past year, but this time I would be going back into the layers that I had seen when the bus passed through me. Surrounding myself in an L1 field, I shifted to L1 and looked around for the books that I had dropped a year ago. They weren¡¯t anywhere to be found, so I shifted to L2 and found them right at my feet. It seems that I had held onto them until the bus had disappeared.


    Much like the blue pen in my experiments earlier today, the books gave off a sense of being out of place. The sense was stronger with the books that it had been for the pen and I made a mental note to verify if the sense got stronger with larger objects. The books were in great shape. They¡¯d been sitting in the road for over a year, but that road was in L2 and so nothing could touch them or cause them to deteriorate.


    It felt good to find the books and I held them reverently, like I would a trophy. I had done it. It had taken some time, but I was finally able to do on purpose what I had only been able to do by accident before.


    The moment passed and I shifted the books into my R1 backpack before I returned to my bike and rode off, in L2, to a wooded area located about five miles outside of town. Without any need to watch out for traffic, I soon pulled up to the overgrown firebreak in the woods in which I had hidden Seb¡¯s truck.


    Shifting back to reality, I pulled off the branches and the tarp that I¡¯d used to camouflage it and I verified that the truck had been undisturbed since my last visit. This area of the woods was rarely visited and I¡¯d made sure, before I¡¯d stowed the truck here, to check at the local parks services offices for the dates of the next clearing of the firebreak. I still had another month before workers were scheduled to cover this area.


    With the truck uncovered, I loaded up my bike into the back and shifted myself and the car to R2 for the ride home. It felt good to drive again and despite not having driven for a few months, it felt natural. I didn¡¯t hit a single greyed-out car the whole way. I also ran every red light and blew through every stop sign. I¡¯d have to make sure not to get into the habit of doing that or I¡¯d never pass my driving course this summer.


    I parked the truck on the street just outside my house. I removed my bike from the back, shifted the truck to L2 and removed the field from it. Now the car would stay in L2, without me having to use up any energy to keep it there, and I didn¡¯t have to worry that I¡¯d get tired and it would suddenly appear on the street in reality. The truck immediately started giving off ¡®wrong frequency¡¯ waves, but I ignored it. I was going to cause a lot more of those waves going forward.


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    It was still early enough that dad wasn¡¯t home yet and I had the house to myself. From my closet, I pulled out the duffel bags that I¡¯d used to transport the money that I¡¯d liberated from Serpentine a few months ago. That money, almost three million dollars of it, was currently sitting in between the various walls of my house. I braced myself and shifted to R3. This time I was ready for the short drop through the house foundation and I managed to not fall on my ass. Score one for the good guys! I was getting better at this shifting thing.


    Getting the money out of the walls was much easier than putting it in. I wrapped the bundles in a field and shifted them to R3, where they fell into the open duffel bags that I¡¯d set up beneath them. Returning to my room in reality, I threw the bags into the corner of my room and shifted them to L2 and removed the fields surrounding the bags. The money could now be easily accessed, and I never had to worry about dad, or anyone, finding it by mistake. I really liked having my own personal storage universe. It made life so much easier.


    With those chores out of the way, I was at a loss of what to do. I was all keyed up from figuring out so many new things about my power and successfully using that knowledge to solve a few of my problems. I needed to do something. To tell someone. But there was no one to share my victories with. My decision to keep this all to myself kept coming back to haunt me. Although I¡¯d given those closest to me a glimpse into my powers, by showing them my ¡®land sense¡¯, that was only the tip of the iceberg. There was so much more to tell.


    My mood took a turn for the worse as I contemplated my choice and knew that despite my loneliness I wasn¡¯t going to tell anyone about my abilities. The full extent of my power needed to remain a secret. My plans for Shauna and the as yet unknown team were going to piss off a lot of very powerful and well connected people and I had no doubt that they¡¯d come looking for me, if they ever found out what I could do.


    As always when my mood darkens, I tried to snap out of it by putting my problems in perspective. Yes, I had a secret that I couldn¡¯t share with anyone, but I had a superpower. Not only that, but my superpower was letting me live my dream of helping victims of human trafficking. If that meant that sometimes I¡¯d feel a little lonely or isolated, then I¡¯d just have to suck it up and move on. I was one of the lucky ones. Some people never lived long enough to reach for their dreams at all.


    My mind flashed to Evan, the seven-year-old cancer patient at the hospital ward that I volunteered in a few times a month. A few months ago his condition had taken a turn for the worse and he¡¯d been deteriorating ever since. Before I¡¯d left on the trip with Mark, Evan had asked his parents to stop his treatments. The treatments were making him feel sick and they weren¡¯t working. The doctors had told his parents that he only had a few weeks left to live, a month at best.


    I know that you¡¯re not supposed to compare problems, since everyone¡¯s problems are important to themselves, but compared with Evan¡¯s impending death, my issues were insignificant.


    Eva and I had planned on visiting Evan in a few days, when Eva returned from trip, but all of a sudden I felt like I couldn¡¯t wait a few days. I wanted to check up on him now. Maybe Evan wouldn¡¯t be there in a few days.

 Chapter 13: Magic for Evan

    I parked my truck in front of the hospital and left it in L2. I loved not having to look for a parking spot or to parallel park. The pediatric oncology ward was on the fourth floor of the hospital and I made my way over there with an uneasy felling in my stomach. For some reason, I felt sure that Evan had died while I was away and that I¡¯d walk into his room only to find an empty bed.


    As I turned the corner into the corridor with Evan¡¯s room, I let out a sigh of relief when I saw Evan¡¯s parents sitting on either side of his door, like guardian lion statues protecting the entrance to the treasure room. Evan was still alive! I¡¯ve never been so happy that clairvoyance wasn¡¯t my ability. My premonition of his passing was just my imagination running away from me.


    Both heads swiveled in my direction as I came closer and I could see the wary expressions on their faces relax. I wasn¡¯t a doctor or a nurse come to prod their son further and maybe give them more bad news. I was just the friendly volunteer who played with their son. I gave them a small wave as a greeting and asked them how Evan was.


    ¡°He¡¯s doing much better than the doctors expected, but he¡¯s not doing great. He barely has the strength to get up out of bed for a few minutes every day. He¡¯s tires easily and he sleeps a lot. I expect he¡¯ll be completely bedridden in a few days. After that, the doctor says that he¡¯ll only have a week or two.¡±, Evan¡¯s dad said. His voice was flat and it sounded like he¡¯d given that speech a few times already.


    Despite their sorrow, Evan¡¯s parents sat with me and told me of all the funny moments that I¡¯d missed during my trip. They told me about Evan never complaining to them or crying about his sickness and how hard he had worked to cheer them up after each piece of bad news that the doctors had brought to them. We sat there and they talked about him for half an hour before Evan woke up and we all went in to see him.


    ¡°Abby! You¡¯re back. How was your trip? Did you find anything?¡± Evan asked me as soon as he saw me. Although he sounded strong, he didn¡¯t look it at all. He looked tired and worn out, like he¡¯d just finished running a marathon. He¡¯d also lost more weight since I¡¯d last seen him and he had large circles under his eyes.


    He was sitting up in his hospital bed, propped up by pillows on all sides. He¡¯d probably fallen asleep that way after lunch. I walked up to his bed and he slowly lifted a clenched fist for me to bump. I could tell that it was an effort for him.


    ¡°Hey Evan. I like the new hair style. Stubble is all the rage these days.¡±, I said.


    ¡°Yeah, without the chemo I¡¯ll have long hair down to my waist before you know it. How was your trip?¡±, Evan repeated.


    I told him all about my trip, about going into the mines, camping and riding out to do my own survey. He hung on every word and his eyes popped when I told him about the dinosaur.


    ¡°A real T-Rex!?¡±, he asked.


    ¡°Yup. Only I haven¡¯t told the owner about it yet, so keep it quiet. I need to negotiate with him before I tell him where it is. I¡¯m pretty sure that I¡¯ll be allowed to name him. Got any ideas for a good name?¡±


    ¡°The Evanator!¡±, he shouted, shortening his arms into mock t-rex arms and moving them slowly from side to side. We all laughed at that and Evan started suggesting a bunch of other names.


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    ¡°Sorry. I¡¯ve already decided. I¡¯m naming him after the fiercest and bravest person that I know. My dinosaur will be called, Evan.¡± Evan let out a whoop at that and turned to his mom and said, ¡°Abby¡¯s naming her dinosaur after me! I¡¯m going to be famous.¡±


    A nurse I didn¡¯t recognize from my shifts at the hospital walked in then to check on Evan. She tried to shoo us all out to let Evan rest some more, but Evan wasn¡¯t going to let that happen.


    ¡°I¡¯m not tired. I just woke up a few minutes ago. Abby¡¯s been away and he have a lot to catch up on. She¡¯s going to show me some new magic tricks.¡± Evan said this firmly. He wasn¡¯t asking for her permission. He was telling her. The nurse took one look at his determined face and decided to back down.


    ¡°Can I stay and watch?¡±, she asked.


    ¡°Sure. Abby does great magic tricks. But you can¡¯t ask her how she does her tricks. It¡¯s a secret.¡± Evan looked at me as he said this and I nodded my head.


    ¡°How did you know that I¡¯d have a new magic trick for you?¡±, I asked Evan.


    ¡°Because you always have a new trick when you come to visit.¡±


    ¡°Huh. You¡¯re right. Pretty smart kid. Well, this one took me awhile to figure out and I need a bit more of a set-up than usual. Hmmmm, let¡¯s see. I¡¯ll need one of those mobile privacy screens.¡±


    I turned to the nurse raised my eyebrow enquiringly. She left the room and came back less than a minute later with one. We set it up between Evan¡¯s bed and the window and I made sure that the screen wouldn¡¯t show my silhouette behind it by draping a blanket over it. A final check to make sure that no one could see me behind it and I was ready to go.


    ¡°Ok. All set. Now Evan, do you want me to appear behind the screen or do you want me to disappear from behind the screen?¡±, I asked him.


    ¡°Uhm. Appear!¡±


    ¡°Great. And do you remember the magic words?¡±


    ¡°Of course! I love choc...¡±. I stopped him there.


    ¡°Hold on Evan. Not yet. I¡¯m going to leave the room. As soon as the door closes behind me, I want you to say the magic words out loud. But don¡¯t yell. We don¡¯t want to disturb anyone.¡±


    Evan nodded his head and I passed by Evan¡¯s parents and the nurse, all with quizzical expressions on their faces.


    As the door began to shut behind me, I shifted to R2 and raced back into the room. I passed through the nurse and the screen and came to a stop behind the privacy screen. I got there just as Evan finished saying ¡®cookies¡¯ and phased back to reality. I was about to pop out with a giant ¡®Ta-da¡¯ but thought better of it. Let them doubt first.


    After a few seconds, the nurse asked, ¡°What¡¯s supposed to happen now?¡±.


    Evan whispered, ¡°Abby¡¯s supposed to reappear behind the screen.¡±


    ¡°I don¡¯t think her trick worked this time¡±, Evan¡¯s dad said.


    And that¡¯s when I burst out with my ¡®Ta-da¡¯.


    The nurse nearly had a heart-attack and Evan¡¯s mom jumped about a foot in the air. I may have overdone my entrance by just a wee bit. Evan didn¡¯t seem to care though. He started laughing and clapping and for just a few moments, he seemed like his old self. Full of life and energy. It didn¡¯t last long, but his parents saw it and I noticed their eyes start to glisten.


    The nurse got her nerves calmed down and asked, ¡°How the fuck did you do that?¡± Her hand immediately rose to her mouth in shock and embarrassment. She looked appalled at having sworn in front of a child and she immediately began to apologize to Evan¡¯s parents. Evan¡¯s dad started laughing and reassured her that it was ok. ¡°I was wondering the same thing myself. If you hadn¡¯t of asked that, I was about to.¡±


    Throughout all this, Evan¡¯s eyes had gone huge in amazement at the swear word used by the nurse and he tried to hold in his laughter. He didn¡¯t succeed and soon we were all laughing. After the laughter died down, Evan wanted to see some of my old tricks and I obliged him for the next half hour before the nurse put her foot down and shooed us all away to let Evan rest and to take his vitals.


    As I gave Evan a hug goodbye, being careful not to inadvertently crush his emaciated frame, he whispered to me, ¡°I loved your new trick, Abby. Thank you for showing it to me. It¡¯s too bad you can¡¯t make cancer disappear.¡±


    I vaguely remember leaving the hospital room and having Evan¡¯s parents hug and thank me for visiting and brightening up Evan¡¯s day. My mind was stuck on Evan¡¯s parting words to me. ¡°Make cancer disappear.¡± All the way home, those words echoed in my ears on the way and my brain struggled to come to terms with the suggestion. Why couldn¡¯t I do that?

 Chapter 14: Trial and Error

    How was making a rubber bouncy ball shift into R1 different from removing a ball of cancer? At it¡¯s most basic level, there was no difference at all. If I could surround it with a field, then I could shift it to another layer of reality and I didn¡¯t have to bring it back to the same place that I took it from. Wasn¡¯t that essentially what surgery did? Surgeons opened up the body and cut out the cancer. I could do the same thing, but without cutting into the body.


    The idea stunned me and its sheer simplicity rocked my reality. I could remove things. Why hadn¡¯t I seen this possibility before? I¡¯d been so focused on learning about my ability and its rules that I¡¯d overlooked the simplest applications of that knowledge. I mentally kicked myself for my stupidity. This is just the kind of thing that I was missing out on by not sharing my secret with dad, Eva and James. One of them would have worked this out months ago.


    Figuring that I¡¯d wasted enough time already, I opened my computer and started researching all about cancer removal surgeries. I quickly learned that using my abilities to remove things would be enormously helpful in certain ways, but in other ways it would be a real challenge.


    When it came to cancer surgeries, it seemed that there were three types of problems that you could encounter. The first was the surgery itself. Surgery involved cutting open the body and that meant that infection could set in. Cutting someone open is also very stressful to the body and many cancer patients were already very weak from the results of the cancer. Blood loss was another factor that had to be taken into account. All these factors worked in my favor as my method of cancer removal would bypass these issues.


    However, the other types of problems that cancer surgeries had, I would have to work around as well. These problems had to do with the where and how the cancer was distributed in the body. Sometimes the cancer was too close to or wrapped around a vital organ and removing it could end up killing the patient. Other times, the cancer wasn¡¯t localized into a mass or a ball that could be removed but was instead distributed around the body in smaller clusters of cells. In both of these cases, surgery was ruled out in favor of other treatment methods, such as chemotherapy and medication. I felt confident that with practice, these wouldn¡¯t be insurmountable issues for my abilities.


    As I continued my research, I also found that even when surgeons removed a mass of cancer, there was still the possibility that they¡¯d miss a bit of it and the cancer would eventually regrow. That meant that if I were to shift out the cancer, my control of my field would have to be precise enough to detect and surround individual cells. I had never used my field so precisely and didn¡¯t even know if that level of precision was possible. So far, I only worked with entire objects that were large enough to be seen by the naked eye.


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    This was going to take a lot of work and I didn¡¯t know if I¡¯d have enough time to develop my abilities in time to save Evan. Despite the great time he¡¯d had earlier today, he was fading fast and might only last another week. I¡¯d spent months ratcheting up my power to be able to do the things I could. How was I going to be able to learn enough control in less than one week?


    Maybe I wouldn¡¯t have to remove the cancer in one shot. What if I could remove a part of it, weakening it, and giving Evan more time? I could keep on removing more and more of the cancer, buying me time to learn enough control to get rid of it entirely. Who knows, if I kept taking out chunks of the cancer, it just might give up and shrivel away.


    With that happy thought, I worked on a plan to increase my skills. I would start off with practicing on inanimate objects and move on to live test subjects when I¡¯d gained some skill. Looking around the room for some inspiration, my eyes lit on a pencil on my desk. Could I remove the graphite center of the pencil from the wood surrounding it?


    I wrapped the pencil in a field and scanned it. The parts were easy to identify. There was a rubber eraser at the end, a piece of aluminum holding it in place, the wood shaft of the pencil and the graphite core. I focused on the core, put a field around it and activated it into R2. That was surprisingly easy. I now had an empty pencil and I scanned it again to check if there was still any graphite residue that I¡¯d left behind. I couldn¡¯t detect any, but that didn¡¯t mean much. I hadn¡¯t tried to detect such minute amounts before.


    While searching for ore with Mark, I¡¯d gotten used to finding ton quantities, but I¡¯d had no trouble finding gemstones and diamonds in the gram quantities. However, this was several orders of magnitude smaller than that. Looking at the empty space in the pencil, I could see some grey residue where the graphite used to be, so I knew that there was some graphite left. That knowledge led me to try scanning again, this time focusing on only a small part of the pencil and trying to blow up the image in my mind. I had to teach my field to zoom in closer and closer by shrinking the area of the field progressively and seeing what information I was getting.


    After a lot of trial and error, my field finally showed me the graphite residue. By that time, my field had contracted so small that I couldn¡¯t see it anymore. However, I could still feel it in my mind and sense the small particles of graphite. They were so tiny and I wasn¡¯t sure if I could make a field that small. I tried anyways and was partially rewarded with a minuscule field that surrounded several particles of graphite, along with some of the wood. It wasn¡¯t perfect, but it was pretty good for a first try.


    Unfortunately, my subsequent tries didn¡¯t get much better and soon I couldn¡¯t keep up my concentration. Like everything else, this was going to require practice and a lot of patience. Working with such tiny fields was easy from a physical standpoint. I could hold the field around a particle all day long and never notice it. However, creating the tiny field to surround only a few particles required intense concentration. It was too damn easy to lose my visualization of the particles. It was like singling out one particular piece of floating dust in an attic and then trying to grab hold of it. Not easy!

 Chapter 15: More Magic

    I needed some food and a break, so I did both by going to the kitchen and checking to see if I had any pre-made frozen white chocolate chip cookies. Bless the Gods! I¡¯d make extra last time and I quickly put them on a tray and turned the oven on to 450 degrees. While I waited for the oven to heat up, I noticed the time and saw that dad should be home soon. Somehow, he always showed up when the cookies were ready and today was no exception. The front door opened just as I was taking the cookies out of the oven. I was starting to think that I got my ability from dad. His power was being at the right place when cookies were ready. Not the best power when it came to fighting bad guys, but still quite useful.


    ¡°Hi Abby. How was your day today?¡±, dad asked as he came into the kitchen and gave me a hug.


    ¡°Hi dad. It was ok. I took care of a few errands and I visited with Evan after lunch.¡±


    ¡°I thought you were going to go with Eva after she gets back on Thursday. Is he ok?¡± Dad hovered over the pan of hot cookies and inhaled the sweet aroma. I sent him to the table where I¡¯d set up plates for each of us, along with tall glasses of milk.


    ¡°I got nervous that something would happen to him before then and I couldn¡¯t wait anymore. He¡¯s fine. Well, as fine as a boy dying of cancer can be. I did some magic for him and we had a good time. His parents are barely holding up though. They¡¯ve been told that he only has a week or two left.¡±


    We talked about Evan for a bit as we ate our cookies, occasionally dunking them in the milk, and soon moved on to other topics. He told me about some of his students that were working on interesting pieces and I told him about Uncle Magnum¡¯s plan to have me try out with Sifu Zhang. Was it really only last night that we¡¯d made that plan? It felt like weeks had passed since then.


    Dad¡¯s eyebrows rose quizzically at the mention of the tryout. ¡°Sifu Zhang was Paul¡¯s teacher since he started Kung Fu. Zhang mentored him often and they were very close. I¡¯m pretty sure that if Paul had stayed in Raleigh, Zhang would have set up Paul to be his successor. I know that Paul has been back many times, but I don¡¯t think that Zhang has ever come out here to see Paul¡¯s school. Paul must have said some pretty amazing things about you to get him to come out here.¡±


    ¡°I hope Uncle Magnum didn¡¯t oversell me. I have been getting much better lately, but I¡¯d hate to disappoint him.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m sure that you won¡¯t. Paul knows his Kung Fu. If he thinks you¡¯re ready, then you are.¡±


    We lapsed into silence for a few moments after that and I remembered that I needed to talk to dad about the reports that I¡¯d made for Jake. I ran to my room and brought the reports back to him.


    ¡°The first one is a report on my general sense about the two potential mine sites. It doesn¡¯t go into any detail, but my conclusions are there, if only in broad strokes.¡±


    Dad read it over. ¡°I think that this adequately represents what he hired you to do and you¡¯ve done a nice job with explaining your feelings.¡±


    I handed dad the second report without comment. He opened it up and started reading. I ate more cookies. Dad kept reading and when he got to the 3D maps, he lowered the reports and asked, ¡°Did you make these maps?¡±


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    ¡°I used a mining mapping software program to create each of the maps. The software had existing topographical maps of the areas and I only had to input all the ore data.¡±


    ¡°You were able to get all this information using your ¡®land-sense¡¯? These reports show ore bodies a half mile down, Abby. Are you telling me that you can get accurate knowledge a half-mile into the ground?¡±


    Trust dad to get to the heart of the matter. Well, there was no helping it now. In for a penny, in for a pound. ¡°Actually, I can go a lot deeper. Around three miles.¡±


    Dad looked a little shocked. ¡°Three miles¡±, he repeated. He shook his head to clear it and gave me a penetrating look. ¡°You didn¡¯t just have a vague feeling about where those gemstones were. It wasn¡¯t just luck. You knew exactly where they were and how big they were, didn¡¯t you?¡±


    I blushed a little at that. ¡°Yes, Papa¡±, I replied, keeping my eyes downcast as if I were getting scolded.


    ¡°Don¡¯t you ¡®yes, Papa¡¯ me. Your ability is far stronger than you¡¯ve let on. We¡¯ll talk about that later. Right now, we need to focus on this report. Do you have any idea what this kind of information will be worth to Jake?¡±


    ¡°No. From talking with Mark, I know that it will save them both time and money, but I can¡¯t quantify it. I was hoping that you could talk to a few of your fellow professors and see what they have to say. Mark says that Jake won¡¯t cheat me because he¡¯s honest and because he¡¯ll want me to do this again for him. He also said that Jake¡¯s problem will be that he won¡¯t be able to pay me enough money to bother evaluating mine sites for him.¡±


    ¡°How so?¡±


    I went on to explain about the diamonds that I¡¯d found and the dinosaur bones and how Mark didn¡¯t think I¡¯d ever have to work again, unless I wanted to.


    ¡°Mark is very astute. Your ability to see into the ground has many practical applications and any one of them would more than pay the bills. Archeologists would love to have your ability, as would treasure hunters, construction managers, surveyors, and miners such as Jake. I¡¯ll talk with some of my colleagues and get their opinions as to what this sort of information would be worth. However, I won¡¯t show them your report. As much as practicable, you should keep the extent of your ability a secret.¡±


    Wow. Here I¡¯d been worried that dad would be upset at me for hiding my power and he¡¯d just told me to do keep doing it. It was like getting a blessing directly from the Pope!


    Of course, I had to know why he thought so. ¡°Why keep it under wraps?¡±


    ¡°If your abilities became public knowledge then your gemstones would be seen as more commonplace and you¡¯d get much lower bids for them. A lucky find by a young woman presents a compelling and unique story. That same girl doing it several times a day takes away from that story and turns the extraordinary into simply ordinary. Collectors are all about unique and rare. Everyday is for other people. That is why I rarely ever make the same piece twice. Everyone that buys one of my pieces is getting a one-of-a-kind item. When you put that new diamond up for auction, it will probably be better if you do it through an intermediary or at least have them list the seller anonymously. It will add to the mystique. Also, you shouldn¡¯t put up more than one or two of your major finds per year and consider putting your next one up for auction in Europe.¡±


    Dad¡¯s pretty savvy. In less than a minute he¡¯d already seen a whole bunch of stuff I¡¯d missed. He¡¯s definitely a keeper.


    ¡°There is one more thing that I need to understand, Abby.¡±


    Oh oh. I keep forgetting that dad¡¯s insights can also be turned against me.


    ¡°You mentioned that you did some magic tricks for Evan. I didn¡¯t even know that you were interested in magic. What kind of magic did you do?¡±, he asked.


    There was no way that I was showing dad my magic tricks. He¡¯d figure out that they were impossible in about two seconds. Instead, I looked him straight in the eye and said, ¡°Watch, as the amazing Abby makes the last cookie disappear!¡± and I grabbed it and ran out of the room.


    I heard his laughter all the way to my room.

 Chapter 16: Animal Testing

    Uncle Magnum had put me through the ringer again and I woke up later than usual the next day. I hoped that Sifu Zhang would come to test me soon. I couldn¡¯t do this for several more weeks. I got out of bed and got ready for the day, including spending half an hour stretching away my aches and pains. My original plan for today was to relax, but with the new possibility of helping Evan I was out the door minutes after I¡¯d cleaned up from breakfast.


    My research into cancer yesterday had brought up something very interesting. More and more often, dogs were being used in cancer research since they get cancer just like people do. Many drugs developed for humans were being used to treat dogs and knowledge gathered from dogs with cancer was being used to better understand human cancer. Not having ever owned a pet, I hadn¡¯t known that dogs got cancer, but it got me to thinking about training my cancer removal abilities on dogs.


    I know that animal rights activists would get all upset by what I planned to do, but I just couldn¡¯t see the harm in trying to cure dogs that were going to be euthanized anyways. As long as I made sure that what I did to the dogs didn¡¯t cause them any pain. Who knows, I might even be able to save a few of them.


    My truck was waiting for me right in front of my house, in L2. I shifted to L2 and tried to open the door. It wouldn¡¯t open. The door handle wouldn¡¯t budge. I was pretty sure that I¡¯d left the car unlocked. It wasn¡¯t like there was anyone around to steal it. I tried sticking the key in the door lock, but it wouldn¡¯t go it. The lock was jammed. What the hell was going on?


    I stood there thinking for a bit. Everything had been fine when I¡¯d parked it yesterday. I¡¯d driven it here in R2 and sent it to L2 as I went inside. Hmmm. Could there be a difference about L2? I shifted myself and the car to R2 and tried the door again. It opened easily. That was so weird. I¡¯d need to test that out later though. Right now, I had work to do.


    I parked my truck in front of the local animal shelter and left it in L2. I¡¯d been to the shelter once before, when I was twelve years old. Dad had finally relented and agreed to let me get a dog. I¡¯d pestered him for years about it and he¡¯d always explained that we didn¡¯t need the additional hassle of having a pet. I¡¯m not sure what made him change his mind, but I didn¡¯t want to him to change it again so I begged him to take me to the animal shelter right away. A half hour later we were back in the car, without a dog, and an hour later my pet allergy had been confirmed by my pediatrician.


    In order to avoid another concentrated dose of animal dander setting off a round of sneezing and hives, I mostly stayed in R1 during my visit, only shifting occasionally in to R2 to walk through doors. The shelter had some pets displayed at the front of the center, but most of their animals were housed in kennels at the back. Even all greyed out, as they were in R1, the dogs were so cute and fluffy. I really wanted to play with them. I restrained myself, both because of the potential hives and because my hands would go right through them.


    In front of the kennels there was a six-foot passageway where people could look in on the dogs and decide which one they wanted. Currently two families were taking an inspection tour. One family had two young children and they seemed to have settled on a gorgeous Labrador Retriever. The little girl wanted to name him Cuddles and I wanted to shake some sense into her on behalf of the dog. Going through life with the name Cuddles had to be so humiliating for the dog. The other family had a teenage son, around fourteen years old and they were walking back and forth in front of the cages, looking for some connection to take place. The boy was trying to look nonchalant as his parents called out suggestions, but his eager eyes gave him away. He really wanted a dog.


    Sitting down in the hallway and shutting out the babble of the two families, I wrapped the dog in the leftmost kennel in a field and scanned him quickly, looking specifically for cancer. Cancer was one of the first illnesses that I¡¯d learned to recognize with my field and I inspected each dog for it. I found my first customer in the seventh kennel, just to the left of the Labrador that I prayed wouldn¡¯t be named Cuddles. He was an older husky and had a slight limp in his right foreleg as he paced in his kennel. The cancer mass wasn¡¯t very big, but it was in his elbow and it obviously bothered him. He kept stopping and holding up his leg for awhile to ease the discomfort. Only the excitement of having children nearby got him to stand up and pace.


    Finding the tumor was the easy part. Knowing what to do about it was the hard part. In this case, the mass was growing from the bone and while I could get rid of the protrusion, that didn¡¯t mean that I was curing the cancer. In fact, there was more cancer in the bone. It had penetrated about ten percent into the bone. Would a slightly thinner bone be a health problem for the dog? I just didn¡¯t have the years of study and experience to be able to answer that.


    In the end, my decision to try the tumor removal wasn¡¯t based on my need to practice with my talent, but rather it was just that I couldn¡¯t leave that husky in pain. I fortified myself with the knowledge that the cancer was a death sentence for the dog. If a family were to adopt him, they might pay the cost of a leg amputation for the dog but barring an adoption the shelter would certainly elect to euthanize the dog. Anything that I did wouldn¡¯t be worse that death or dismemberment.


    The next time the husky lay down to rest, I tried encapsulating the protruding part of the tumor. The field ended up surrounding the entire tumor. Until now, I¡¯d had only put a field around an entire object and reshaping the field to cover only a part of an object apparently needed more direct control. Covering only half of the tumor right away seemed to be a non-starter. To get the hang of it, I needed to work with the field surrounding the whole tumor and pull it back from there.


    Learning how to contour the new edge of the field so that it molded to the shape of the bone took even more time and by the time I got the hang of it, the dog had become restless and started moving again. Wrapping a moving person in a field is something I¡¯d done with both Charlie and Uncle Magnum. However, doing the same thing with half a small tumor in the leg of a moving dog was a bit beyond me so far. I had to wait for the dog to lay down again and while I did that I continued to examine the rest of the dogs.


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    Only two other dogs in the shelter had cancer. A poodle type dog at the end of the row had some sort of cancer in it¡¯s blood cells that I couldn¡¯t do anything about. I¡¯d only been able to detect the cancer at all because of the exercises micro-scanning that I¡¯d done yesterday. The other dog, a bulldog, had a similar cancer to the husky¡¯s, but in the back leg. I¡¯d see what I could do for her after the husky.


    As soon as the husky settled down again, I sent the protruding part of the tumor into L2. I held my breath in anticipation. Great. Now the dog was just laying there, panting away and looking so damn cute. I let out my breath and waited. I didn¡¯t want to try anything else until I was certain that I hadn¡¯t injured the dog. At least he didn¡¯t seem to be in any pain so far.


    The family left the kennel with their new dog. I shook my head in resignation as the little girl kept calling him Cuddles. Meanwhile, the teenager seemed to have settled on an adorable Irish setter puppy. A few minutes later, I was alone with the dogs and I made my way over to the husky. With no one around now, the dog didn¡¯t look like he was getting up anytime soon. I was tempted to return to reality and get him excited enough to stand, but I remembered that there were cameras overlooking this corridor.


    Feeling frustrated with the delay, I took a chance on no one noticing his absence for a few minutes and used my field to send the husky into L2. Following a mere second behind the dog, I appeared next to him and stood there watching him. He was still lying down. I would have expected him to be surprised at the change in venue or to react to my appearance, but he didn¡¯t. I bent down for a closer look and saw that he wasn¡¯t moving at all. His eyes weren¡¯t blinking, his tail wasn¡¯t swishing, and he wasn¡¯t even breathing. This reminded me of the L2 effect that had stopped me from getting into my truck earlier.


    For several moments I thought that maybe I¡¯d killed the dog by bringing him into L2, but he didn¡¯t look dead. It seemed more like he was frozen. Poking his side elicited no reaction from the dog. Unlike the truck, he seemed pliable enough and I was able to move his fur as I ran my hand over his back. That was a bit different than the truck, where I couldn¡¯t even fit the key in the lock. How were they different?


    Using the field surrounding the dog, I scanned him and found that I was getting almost no alarms from him at all. When I focused on it, the cancer was still giving out a light buzzing sound, but all the rest of the alerts that would normally come through weren¡¯t there. As far as the field was concerned, he could almost be a stuffed animal dog. With nothing moving inside the dog, I guess there couldn¡¯t be any alerts.


    Suddenly, I realized how the dog and the truck were different. I¡¯d removed the field from the truck when I¡¯d left it in L2, while the dog still had his on. I quickly removed the field from the husky and touched his fur. It wouldn¡¯t change direction as I brushed it. I could still pick him up and move him around, only now I couldn¡¯t alter anything about the dog himself. Even his tail couldn¡¯t be moved. He seemed to be in stasis. He was still alive, but it¡¯s as if he¡¯d been put on pause.


    All this new information left me with one big question. Why could I move in L2, but the dog couldn¡¯t, even though we both had fields around us? I rolled the question around in my mind, again looking for any differences. Could it be that my base field had something to do with my being able to move in L2? I already knew that my base field acted differently from fields that I projected onto other things or people. For instance, the base field always surrounded me and couldn¡¯t be dismissed, as the other fields could. Also, the base field didn¡¯t continually scan me and give me feedback about my health. I needed to wrap myself in a second field to get that information.


    Whether the difference was due to my base field or not is a question that would have to wait. I needed to focus on the task at hand and get back to the frozen dog. Evan¡¯s life depended on it.


    Taking the dog back to where I¡¯d picked him up, I lay him back on the floor and shifted him back to reality and me back to R1 to observe. His reaction was surprising. He immediately stood up and barked, looking around from side to side, sniffing the air. He was confused. I think that he could smell me on his own fur, as I¡¯d held him in L2, but he couldn¡¯t see me. He started pacing his kennel and letting out a little whine every now and then. I felt so bad for him that it took me almost half a minute to notice that he wasn¡¯t limping. Yes! I¡¯d made him better, at least temporarily. He still had cancer, only now it wasn¡¯t affecting his leg.


    While I waited for him to calm down, I went over the now sleeping Bulldog and removed the cancer in her back leg. I didn¡¯t go with half measures this time and took the whole thing out in one shot. Her cancer was even smaller than the Husky¡¯s and wasn¡¯t even causing her pain yet. Once the mass was removed, I zoomed in on where the cancer was, carefully inspecting the edges to see if there were any cancer cells left over. Ugh! There were still plenty of cancer cells all along the edges.


    Although I¡¯d taken away over 99% of the cancer, that last 1% still represented a lot of cells and going after them one cell at a time was going to take forever. There was also the fact that I couldn¡¯t get my field small enough to encapsulate just one cell. Those things were like 5-10 microns tiny. They made grains of sand look big in comparison. However, I¡¯d read that if some cancer cells were left untouched, then the cancer could return.


    It took an hour of painstaking work to get all of the cells out of the Bulldogs leg. Where I could, I encapsulated bunches of cells together, taking out some good cells with the bad. The job left me feeling exhausted and I knew there was no way I could do the same kind of job for the Husky. Instead, I opted to go bigger and use multiple fields. First, I removed the remaining cancer in the bone. Next, I created a field to fit into the area in which the mass used to be. I surrounded that field with another field that was a few cells bigger and then I shifted everything between the two fields to L2. A quick zoomed-in scan later and I confirmed that the husky was virtually cancer free. A few pockets of cells that I¡¯d missed when removing only part of the cancer had moved a bit away from the immediate area. A few minutes of hunting and pecking for them and I was done.


    I looked at each of the dogs and neither seemed the worse for wear and they were both cancer free! I had really done it. Oh my God! This was unreal. The implications of this were incredible and I was still having a hard time coming to grips with it. If Evans¡¯ cancer was similar to that of the dogs, I had real shot at helping him.


    Excitement thrummed though my tired mind, as I got some tissues from the bathroom and returned to L2 to gather up the cancerous cells. It was quite disgusting, but it had to be done. I hated leaving a mess behind and I was going to be back here several more times over the next several days. I would need more practice sessions before I was going to try this on Evan. Nothing could go wrong when I was working on Evan. Nothing.

 Chapter 17: Possibilities

    Leaving the animal shelter, I was all keyed up with nowhere to go. I drove around in L2 for awhile, feeling the rush of speeding on an empty road with no chance of being caught in a speed trap. I¡¯d discovered that I was able to drive the car in L2, if I put a field around it first. For the millionth time, I wished that I¡¯d been given some sort of a manual in how my field and the layers worked.


    Eventually the exhilaration of finding a new use for my ability wore off and I found myself on the highway heading west, towards the mountains. I didn¡¯t have any reason to be going there and it took only a few moments to turn the truck around and head back to town. I didn¡¯t have to change to the other side of the road, but I figured that it¡¯d be good practice.


    As I drove around, I started reviewing the last few days in my mind and trying to figure out the implications of each new revelation. First, I¡¯d found my way back to into the other layers of reality, L1 and L2. It felt good to accomplish that, but what could I do in those layers that I couldn¡¯t do in R1 and R2? So far, I¡¯d used the layers to store the truck and the money that I¡¯d taken away form Len and the guys from Serpentine. The layers had to be good for something besides acting as my own personal storage universe.


    I¡¯d also just found out that objects that I store in the layers are held in stasis. How was that useful? I suppose if I was cooking a few different things for dinner, then I could pop each dish out of the oven and send it into L1, where they would stay fresh from the oven until I brought them back. Only I wasn¡¯t much of a cook and I rarely, if ever, cooked more than one dish at a time.


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    What else needed to be preserved? Cold food. I already had a fridge and freezer. I didn¡¯t need a whole universe for that. Endangered animals. I suppose that I could shift a few breeding pairs of certain animals in to L2 and use the layer as a sort of Noah¡¯s Ark for future generations. The problem with that was that only I could access the layers and all those animals would be lost when I eventually died.


    Organs. Transplant teams had a limited time to transfer an organ, such as a heart or a liver, from one person to another. I could create a service where I store the organs indefinitely. I liked this idea, except it fell apart for the same reason as the last idea. There was only one of me. Organ transplants were happening all over the world. I could only preserve organs in one place at a time. Maybe that would be good enough, though. I didn¡¯t have to solve the global problem. I could help locally.


    I briefly considered the possibility of storing all sorts of nuclear waste and other biohazard products in L2. The benefits were amazing, in that there would never be a risk of those materials poisoning anyone. However, I didn¡¯t know if the radiation from the waste would have any long-term effect on the layer. Even if there were no long-term effects on L2, making the problem simply go away wasn¡¯t conducive to our society finding better solutions in the future.


    Before too long, I was back home and still didn¡¯t have any better ideas of how to use the layers to their full potential.

 Chapter 18: Eavesdropping

    Eva and James returned the next afternoon and I met them at Big Julie¡¯s Pizza for a welcome home get-together. We placed our usual orders and started getting caught up on our adventures over the past few weeks. Bobby joined us before the pizza arrived and added his own stories into the mix. It felt really good to be surrounded by my friends again and I leaned back for a few seconds, taking in the feeling and appreciating the moment, as Eva tried to abridge her story about getting bitten by a jellyfish and James explained what really happened.


    Usually, I¡¯m so focused on the story that I don¡¯t look at the reactions of everyone around me. This time though, as I ¡®appreciated the moment¡¯, I caught James giving Bobby a raised eyebrow and a questioning look. Bobby returned the look with a very quick shake of the head. I briefly wondered what that was about, but I put it out of my mind and got sucked back into Eva¡¯s animated denial that she¡¯s in any way at fault for all the hilarious things that seem to happen to her on vacation.


    This year, in contract to last year¡¯s hectic road trip sightseeing extravaganza, Eva and James¡¯s families had chosen to rent a house on the beach in Miami. Their stories showed them walking along the boardwalk, spending time at the beach, and constantly trying out new restaurants. It sounded much more relaxing that last year¡¯s vacation.


    Bobby¡¯s stories centered around his summer job as a lifeguard at that the municipal aquatic center. I was really glad to have pretty much finished my food before he told the story of having to evacuate the pool because of ¡®floater¡¯. Eww! I¡¯m not sure if I¡¯d ever go swimming there again.


    For my part, I told them about going into the mine shafts with Mark, staying in hotels and camping out. I didn¡¯t go into much detail about what I¡¯d found though. During the camping stories, I noted a few more odd looks, this time between Eva and Bobby. I¡¯d brushed off the looks before, but now I was getting really curious. Something was going on and everyone at the table was aware of it but me.


    I¡¯m not proud of what I did next. It was sneaky and mistrustful, but I just had to know what the big secret was. Given how I was keeping a huge secret from all of them, I should have just shrugged off the looks and moved on. Like that goose and gander thing. Instead, I excused myself to go to the bathroom and let them talk about whatever it was that was on their minds. I was back in my chair in less than twenty seconds, in R1, and listening to the intense conversation what was supposed to be going on in my absence.


    ¡°No Eva, I¡¯m not chickening out. She was away for most of the time you¡¯ve been away and only got back Sunday night.¡±, Bobby explained. He looked a little frustrated with Eva.


    ¡°And since then?¡±, Eva retorted.


    ¡°Have you met Abby? When is she not doing something?¡±, Bobby sighed and James laughed.


    ¡°He does have a point, Eva. Abby is constantly working on something or other, and she doesn¡¯t even tell us half of the things she does. I have no idea where she gets her energy from. Besides, Bobby¡¯s been working every day at the pool. There¡¯s only been three nights since she got back and she¡¯s probably been at Kung Fu each of those nights, getting back into shape after her trip.¡± James looked over at Bobby for confirmation.


    ¡°She hasn¡¯t missed a class this week. Actually, she¡¯s been doing two classes each night.¡± Bobby verified.


    ¡°So why haven¡¯t you talked to her there?¡±, Eva countered. I started getting an uneasy feeling in my stomach. What did Bobby need to talk to me about and why was Eva so insistent about it?


    ¡°You have not idea how little chance there is of that these days. I¡¯m not sure what¡¯s going on, but since she got back, her uncle has been working her harder than I¡¯ve ever seen. He¡¯s separated her from the rest of the students and he and Charlie trade off teaching the class while the other spars or puts her through grueling exercises. It¡¯s non-stop for her. She has incredible stamina. I¡¯d have keeled over after only a few minutes. After class, she barely has enough energy to change out of her soaking uniform and her uncle drives her home.¡±


    ¡°Hmm. I wonder if she¡¯s training for a tournament. She¡¯s never done one before. Ok, I¡¯m sorry I doubted you, Bobby. Do you have a plan?¡±, Eva asked him.


    ¡°I have my Kung Fu gear with me. I was planning on walking her to class after dinner.¡±, Bobby answered.


    Eva nodded her head in approval. ¡°Good. You don¡¯t have much time or you¡¯ll miss your shot.¡±


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    What shot? Why the rush? Luckily, Bobby also wanted to know that and asked her.


    Eva continued, ¡°If you thought that Abby was busy before, you haven¡¯t seen anything yet. Tomorrow is the big auction and if it goes like I think it will, she¡¯ll have more than enough money to start her foundation. Put that together with whatever¡¯s happening in Kung Fu, and her starting her teaching assistant job for her father next week and Charlie going on vacation soon and you¡¯ll need to schedule time to see her two weeks in advance.¡±


    ¡°I could wait a few weeks until it all dies down,¡± Bobby offered.


    ¡°Good luck with that. The next time she¡¯ll come up for air will be when school starts. Her active life is not your problem. Your problem is who she¡¯s active with. Tyler is enrolled in the class that she¡¯ll be assisting in and Mark will be involved to some degree with the auction and her foundation. There¡¯s a really good chance that one of them is going to ask her out before you do.¡±


    Wait. What? Bobby wanted to ask me out? I wasn¡¯t sure how I felt about that. I wasn¡¯t sure how I felt about him. And why was Eva so sure that Mark and Tyler were interested in me. Nothing had ever happened between any of us. She had to be wrong. I needed time to think but there wasn¡¯t any more time. I¡¯d have to come back from the bathroom in just a few seconds.


    I returned to the table and the three of them were talking about the upcoming Comic convention in San Diego, as if they hadn¡¯t just been conspiring to¡­to get me to go out on a date. With Bobby. What was I going to say to him if he asked? I felt a moment of panic as I took my seat and remembered that he wasn¡¯t going to ask me now. I still had a bit of time. With some effort, I put it out of my mind and fell back into the conversation.


    Changing the topic, Bobby turned to me and asked, ¡°What¡¯s going on with you at Kung Fu, Abby? I¡¯ve been going for seven months and I¡¯ve never seen you training like you are now. Is there a tournament coming up or something?¡±


    ¡°Nothing so easy as that, Bobby. Uncle Magnum asked me if I¡¯d like to be evaluated to see if I¡¯m ready for my red belt test. I agreed to give it a try and now he and Charlie are determined to make sure that I don¡¯t embarrass the school. Since Charlie is going on vacation in two weeks, they¡¯re trying to get in as much training as they can in the meantime. On the plus side, I¡¯m burning off so many calories every night that I can easily afford to have some ice-cream for dessert.¡± The last part I¡¯d said just as our waitress came over to check up on us and we all placed our orders. Eva and James shared a lava-cake, while Bobby took his inspiration from me and ordered a sundae.


    ¡°How about you, Bobby? Are you enjoying Kung Fu? You¡¯re there almost every night¡± I asked.


    ¡°I really like it. I¡¯m trying to get in as many classes as I can before I take a break from it for a few months. Football training season is starting soon. Once that starts, I¡¯ll be lucky to get in one class a week. I¡¯m definitely going to start up again after the season though. I¡¯ve never come back to training this fit before.¡± From there we talked about our plans for the rest of the summer until dessert arrived.


    When the food was finished and our bills were paid, I turned to Eva and reminded her that we needed to go see Evan tomorrow. ¡°Dr. Blake says that he doesn¡¯t have much longer left. Another week or two at the most. I went to see him a few days ago and he was only able to stay awake and alert for an hour.¡±


    Eva looked stricken by the news and confirmed that she¡¯s meet me at the hospital at one tomorrow. We said our goodbyes and James and Eva got on their bikes and pedaled for home. Bobby lingered behind and I started to get nervous.


    ¡°Want some company on the way to Kung Fu?¡± he asked me.


    I shrugged my acceptance and we walked in silence for a few blocks; both of us lost in our own thoughts and worries. If I hadn¡¯t eavesdropped on my friend¡¯s conversation, I would be heading to class without a care in my head and I¡¯d have been completely blindsided when Bobby worked through his doubts and fears and simply asked me, ¡°Abby, would you like to go on a date with me?¡±


    This was the guy that I¡¯d called a coward? He was certainly working hard to break that image of himself. He¡¯d actually said the word ¡®date¡¯ so that I had no way of misunderstanding his intentions. He had committed himself and was forcing me to re-examine my feelings towards him. Without the prior knowledge of his intentions, I¡¯d have been at a complete loss in how to answer him and I probably would have embarrassed us both with my surprise and whatever I managed to stammer out.


    Having been forewarned, I was able to look into his eyes, blushing only slightly, and answer, ¡°I¡¯d like that.¡±


    His expression tried for calm acceptance but didn¡¯t quite make it. Relief warred with surprise and victory to get the top spot. His surprise at my answer wasn¡¯t something I expected. I realized that he hadn¡¯t expected me to say yes. It made me question why and it left me wondering if he¡¯d planned any further than just asking me out. The ¡®why¡¯ I¡¯d ask him about later. The ¡®further¡¯ planning question was of more immediate issue.


    ¡°Do you have some place in mind for the date?¡± I asked innocently.


    ¡°Uhm, actually, I don¡¯t. I honestly didn¡¯t think you¡¯d say yes. Not that I didn¡¯t want you to, because I did. I really hoped that you would, but I thought I might be too late already,¡± he stammered out.


    Now I was really curious. ¡°Too late how?¡±


    ¡°Too late because you may have put me in the friend zone already and too late because Mark might have asked you out already.¡± Well, I had asked and he had given me a very straight-forward answer. He really wasn¡¯t holding back.


    ¡°Mark and I are just good friends,¡± I explained.


    Bobby looked doubtful at my statement, but he kept his mouth shut about it. Instead, he asked me where I¡¯d like to go to on our date.


    An evil thought occurred to me and I answered, ¡°My friend Mary O¡¯Reilly runs a restaurant west of the city center. I can make us a reservation if you¡¯d like.¡±

 Chapter 19: A Visit to see Evan

    My body must have been getting used to the training because I didn¡¯t wake up sore the next morning. I did a half hour of morning stretching anyways. It was a relaxing way to start the day and with work starting next week, I wouldn¡¯t get the chance to do it for much longer. I skipped the ten minutes of meditation at the end because there was no way that I could empty my mind of my thoughts and worries of the day. Today was The Auction!


    I¡¯d been avoiding thinking about it because the anticipation was killing me. With the lower end of the expected selling price of the gemstones set at a little over eleven million dollars and the upper end in the mid-twenty million range, there was only upside and excitement. Even a quarter of the lower end was more than enough to get going and I couldn¡¯t wait to get started.


    Shauna had set up six office buildings for me to visit next week and had a few more interesting options for me that she was keeping to herself, depending on the outcome of the auction. She had also interviewed potential receptionists, marketing and public relations directors, legal and governmental advisors, psychologists and medical specialists. Some of these would be full-time employees and some of them would be on retainer, meaning that they would be available to us when we needed them. Shauna¡¯s organization skills were quite incredible and once the money came in, and I chose our new offices, we would hit the ground running.


    The auction was set for late afternoon and my rubies were the final item for bid. Jake had finalized the deal with Christie¡¯s for the auction and as the stones were being sold on behalf of the charity, they had agreed to donate back 25% of their fees to the Hannah Foundation. Jake had played Christie¡¯s off against their top rival, Sotheby¡¯s, to get the donation and he had to let Sotheby¡¯s auction the large emerald that I¡¯d found as consolation prize. The emerald was going on auction next week and that one was going to me in my name. It wasn¡¯t the largest raw emerald ever found in North Carolina, but the master faceter that Jake had hired to cut had been able to minimize the amount that had to be cut from it and it was the largest cut emerald that had gone to auction from the state. Sotheby¡¯s had appraised the stone at just under two and half million dollars. Not bad for an afternoon digging with friends!


    With just over eight hours to go before the auction, I needed to keep myself busy. I drove out to the animal shelter again to check the new arrivals for cancer and only found a terrier with the blood cell cancer that I didn¡¯t know how to remove. The dog park, just at the edge of Washington Park, ended up having three dogs that needed my attention and I got the opportunity to refine my skills. In two of the cases, I was able to get rid of all the cancer in under ten minutes. The third dog¡¯s cancer was different in that it was right up against his spine. Tendrils of the cancer had even begun to surround it. Removing all of the cancer would be delicate work and I wasn¡¯t sure if I could do it.


    The main problem was that the foxhound was constantly moving. The mass seemed to be causing her a great deal of discomfort and she kept trying to find a position that didn¡¯t hurt quite so much. If I could send her into L2 for an hour, I might be able to remove the cancer entirely. However, her human stayed with her the whole time, giving her plenty of attention, and I wasn¡¯t able to make her disappear without flipping him out.


    Before the dog and her human left the park and drove away, I was able to remove about ninety percent of the interior of the mass by simply forming a field inside the mass and sending it to L2. I didn¡¯t know if it would be enough to ease her pain, much less kill off the cancer, but it was the best that I could do. I noted down the time and planned on returning to the park another day at this time. Maybe the park was part of their daily routine and I¡¯d get another shot at helping the foxhound.


    I left the dog park feeling unsatisfied and I knew that I was being too hard on myself. I¡¯d helped two dogs and maybe I¡¯d done some good for the third. I¡¯d also gotten in more practice and improved my ability to help Evan. The scoreboard would definitely list the trip to the dog park as a win, but it didn¡¯t feel like one.


    With two hours before I had to meet Eva at the hospital, I headed home to do some more research on brain tumor removal. It usually takes about eleven years of training to become a neurosurgeon and that¡¯s with experts training you every step of the way. I had a few days. Every little bit that I learned could come in useful and I only had a week, at the most, before I had to perform brain surgery. I watched video after video, taking in the list of problems that could occur with brain surgery before finally stopping to make myself lunch.


    I was running late so I rode my bike in R2 the whole way to the hospital. Not having to slow down for anything was a real time saver and I beat Eva there by five minutes. On the way up to his room, I tried to prepare Eva for Evan¡¯s weakened condition, but even I was stunned at how far he¡¯d deteriorated in the past two days. When I¡¯d last seen him, he¡¯d still been the Evan that I knew. Tired looking and bedridden, but still Evan. Now, he was hooked up to half a dozen machines and it was obvious that they were the only reason that he was still alive. His body was shutting down.


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    Evan¡¯s mother came over and gently ushered us out. ¡°It means a lot to us that you¡¯ve come to visit him, but Tom and I want you to remember Evan the way he was. You shouldn¡¯t see him this way.¡±


    What do you say to that? How do you respond to a parent that is watching their child die right in front of them and no longer have any hope that he¡¯ll make it. I didn¡¯t know. With tears streaming down my face, I reached out to her and embraced her. She hugged me back fiercely and when she released me and returned to Evan¡¯s bedside she was crying as well.


    Through it all, from seeing Evan lying in his bed to watching his mom go back into his room, Eva hadn¡¯t said a word. There was pain in her eyes and she was trying hard to hold in her emotions. She didn¡¯t want to break down in front of Evan¡¯ mom and add to her pain. I led her to an empty room down the corridor and sat her down in one of the visitor¡¯s chairs. I sat down next to her and held her hand as tears quietly spilled down her cheeks.


    ¡°We used to do play all sorts of word games with our names. Combining them and making them into new rap artists. His favorite was EvanEva. Sometimes I¡¯d pronounce his name like Heaven and he make something for me and say that is was forEva.¡± Eva sniffed and looked up at me. ¡°I didn¡¯t get to say goodbye to him, Abby. I though he had more time. I just hugged him and told him that I¡¯d see him when I got back.¡± She grabbed me and I held her as the barrier that she¡¯d used to hold back her grief came down.


    I ached to tell her that there was still hope, that there might still be something that I could do to save him. The words wouldn¡¯t come though. I couldn¡¯t give her false hope. She was facing her loss now and it would break her to have to do it a second time. If I wasn¡¯t able to help him, no one would ever even know that I¡¯d tried.


    We left the hospital together and made our way to our bikes. Eva was meeting James for a late lunch and as she rode away, I texted James about what happened and asked him to make sure that she¡¯d be ok. Within seconds my phone was ringing and I gave a very worried James a slightly longer version than the text. He told me that he¡¯d make sure she¡¯s alright.


    With Eva gone, I returned my bike to the stand and made my way back into the hospital. Evan¡¯s steep decline had forced my hand. I didn¡¯t feel like I was ready but if I didn¡¯t do something now, then it would be too late. At this point, there didn¡¯t seem to be any downside to trying. Even if I made a mistake, the outcome would only be changed by a matter of hours.


    I shifted into R1 and slipped past a half open door to get into Evan¡¯s room. His parents were on either side of his bed, each holding one of his hands. They were here alone for this final vigil. I sat down on the end of Evan¡¯s bed. He was so small that I easily had enough room. Taking a deep breath, I wrapped Evan in a field and listened to all the alarms going off in my head. His body was in distress and I wasn¡¯t sure that even the complete and immediate removal of the tumor would do any good. Hopefully, the machines keeping him alive would keep him with us long enough for his body to recover. It was going to be close.


    I released my field surrounding Evan and sent one out to encompass his tumor. The tumor was different than the tumors that I¡¯d removed from the dogs in that it wasn¡¯t embedded in bone. It sat growing on and in his brain, interfering with his critical functions. The chemotherapy drugs had kept it at bay for awhile, but when those eventually failed, the tumor had started to take over.


    I got to work and removed the tumor in sections. I didn¡¯t worry about leaving tiny clumps of cancer cells on my first pass. I¡¯d get those later. The first order of business was to stop the cancer from doing further damage. Very carefully, I sent more and more of the cancer into L2. It was a slow process because the cancer had wrapped itself around vital vessels in Evan¡¯s brain and if I mistakenly removed even a small piece of those blood vessels, then he¡¯d get bleeding in his brain and that could kill him in moments. I had no way of closing a blood vessel, so I took extra care.


    As I moved out each section, I kept a close eye on his monitors, watching for any sudden blips that would tell me that I¡¯d messed up. I could have wrapped him in another field and gotten much more accurate information, but all the alarms in my head would distract me from the job at hand. The monitors stayed quiet two solid hours while I worked. Had they been attached to me, those monitors would have been blaring at my increased heart rate and nurses would have come running in to see what was wrong.


    Removing the cancer had left me feeling drained. Maintaining that level of focus was exhausting and I was covered in sweat. I¡¯d been forced to leave some stray cancer cells behind, knowing that I¡¯d have time to take them out before they could multiply sufficiently to cause Evan new harm. For now, I¡¯d done all that I could.


    I stood up and stretched and looked at Evan¡¯s face for the first time in hours. He still looked awful. His condition hadn¡¯t changed, and his parents were still at his side, only in different positions now. Prayers and grief had given away to the mundane tasks of eating and keeping the rest of the family up to date on his condition.


    I wanted to stay and keep an eye on Evan, but I had to get home quickly. Dad had us all set to watch the auction as it unfolded and if I didn¡¯t leave now, I¡¯d be late. There was nothing more that I could accomplish by staying, so I left, hoping that it wouldn¡¯t be the last time that I saw Evan.

 Chapter 20: The Auction

    I needn¡¯t have worried about missing the auction. Christie¡¯s auction house had made a big marketing push regarding my rubies and turned them into the main event of the auction. With all the interest they¡¯d generated for the rubies, they decided to pack in a truly long list of opening acts. Then again, maybe it was normal. I didn¡¯t have much experience with auctions.


    It was a hybrid of a live and online auction. It was live in that there was actually an auctioneer working a real crowd of bidders at Christie¡¯s auction house in New York City. Meanwhile, there were also hundreds of bidders who were participating online. These online bidders had either placed their maximum bids beforehand or had fast and secure internet connection to be able to place their bids with the auction house during the live bidding.


    As the seller of a major piece up for auction, dad and I were given the equivalent of VIP backstage passes to the whole auction. We had live views of the bidding room, special screens that were updated in real time for each new bid, information screens for each item up for bid, continuous tracking of expected selling prices versus actual selling prices along with corresponding projections showing what that spread would mean for our item. As it got closer to our item¡¯s turn to be bid on, we¡¯d also get access to an expert who would give us the insider¡¯s view of what was happening, which bidders to watch for, and how things were progressing.


    Dad cooked us some pasta while we waited, and I prepared some celebration cookies for afterwards. Uncle Magnum called to ask how the auction was going and dad explained about the long list of opening acts. We invited him to join us and he said he¡¯d be right over with Margaret. Dad put up some more pasta and I added more cookies. Occasionally, we checked in on the auction to see how far along it was. Missing out on the action because you¡¯re busy straining noodles just wouldn¡¯t do.


    The table was set and the food was ready when the M&M¡¯s showed up. I tried giving Uncle Magnum and Margaret a celebrity couple name, like Brangelina, but neither Marnum nor Magret had a nice ring to it. I¡¯d opted for M&M or The Ems, depending on my mood. I told them it was fitting since they were so sweet together. Uncle Magnum made a gagging gesture, but Margaret smiled and gave it her approval.


    The food was gone, along with the cookies, before the rubies came up for bid. Dad had rigged up the computer to display on our TV in The Parlor and we were all sitting comfortably on the couches and completely focused on the action. As the rubies were being brought out, our assigned action expert came on-line in a corner of the screen and introduced himself.


    ¡°Good evening, everyone. My name is John Sinclair. For the next quarter hour, I¡¯ll be your own personal valet or caddy for the auction, helping you follow the action and understand what¡¯s going on behind the scenes.¡±


    We all shouted out our hellos to John while the auctioneer started talking about the exquisite features of the rubies and comparing them to other famous ruby finds over the last hundred years.


    ¡°Terrance, our auctioneer, may sound disinterested in your rubies, but I can assure you that¡¯s not the case. He comes from a long line of jewelers and truly appreciates items such as these. The rubies really are incredible and the Master Faceter who worked on them did an incredible job bringing out the star shaped reflection in the gems.¡± John continued to interject little nuggets of information until the bidding began.


    The bidding opened at three million dollars. My heart started beating faster and I leaned forwards on the couch. Even if the bidding stopped here, the foundation would have a solid start. Paddles in the crowd were raised and lowered and within moments the bidding had reached four million dollars.


    ¡°Don¡¯t worry about the low price we started at. Remember, you¡¯ve set the reserve price at ten million dollars and we don¡¯t have to sell it at less than that. Starting low allows more bidders to participate and that helps to establish the rubies as a coveted item. We¡¯re also trying to build price momentum to carry the final price well past the reserve price. Rubies of this quality don¡¯t come along every day and the bidding floor has over a dozen internationally known collectors, or their representatives, who will only start bidding once the initial bidding frenzy dies down. That¡¯s doesn¡¯t even take into account the online bidders, some of whom are also major collectors. If we¡¯re very fortunate, we¡¯ll get a bidding war that will drive the price far above the appraised value, as egos and bragging rights overshadow value.¡± John briefly explained all this while the bidding moved up to five and a half million.


    ¡°Did he really say that three million dollars is a low price?¡±, I heard Margaret quietly ask Uncle Magnum.


    ¡°He did. It seems that we¡¯ve been hanging around in the wrong circles¡±, Uncle Magnum whispered back.


    Ignoring their further banter, I watched in fascination as the bidding topped ten million dollars and John said, ¡°Ok. Now we should see some bidders drop out. Ten million is the first psychological barrier. We¡¯ll see another at fifteen and again at twenty.¡±


    ¡°Do you think that it will really go that high?¡± dad asked with only a trace of awe in his voice.


    John smiled and said, ¡°My money is on the bidding reaching just under thirty. I think the collectors are going to drive up the price. There¡¯s been nothing on the market quite like this for awhile and I haven¡¯t heard of anything coming up, except for an exceptional emerald next week. Even though the emerald is larger than the rubies, it isn¡¯t as special and is valued at around ten percent of the rubies. With nothing else on the market, the collectors have given the rubies their full attention. I¡¯ve spoken in confidence to a few representatives who told me that their maximum bids are in the mid twenties.¡±


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    We all grew quiet after that and continued to follow the bidding. It didn¡¯t take long to see John¡¯s predictions come true as more bidders dropped out at each psychological barrier. Once the bidding reached twenty million dollars, there were only six bidders left and the action slowed down to a level that I could follow each of the bids. John gave us some background on some of the bidders and which ones he thought would stick to the end.


    Three bidders were left at the twenty-five million bid and I couldn¡¯t stay seated anymore. I walked over to the dining room table, next to the tv, and watched in nervous anticipation. We were already past the expected upper end of the auction price and bids were increasing by a quarter of a million dollars at a time. I expected each bid to be the last, but they kept coming as the auctioneer turned to face one bidder after another. Two of the bidders were there in person and a third was online and had his or her bids relayed by an employee of the auction house. My heart was racing and it was all I could do not to cheer as each bid came in.


    ¡°We have a very interesting bidding war going on here. The online bidder is a Chinese billionaire who made his money by having very strong connections to the Chinese government. There¡¯s a good chance that he¡¯s looking to buy this item on behalf of his government. Of the two live bidders, the one sitting in the front row is a representative of a wealthy European collector and the one towards the back is the son of a Sultan of a middle eastern nation. When national pride is on the line, my experience has shown that values get distorted. I¡¯m about to lose the office pool and Terrance is going to win it. He chose thirty-three million¡±, John expounded, ¡°and unless I¡¯m wrong, and I¡¯m never wrong, it might even go higher.¡±


    Uncle Magnum immediately added, ¡°They are heading into the fire swamp!¡±, while I said, ¡°Iocaine power! I¡¯d bet my life on it.¡± We both burst out laughing and I could hear John¡¯s chuckling from the computer.


    Dad looked very confused and I quickly explained about John¡¯s reference to The Princess Bride. Dad shook his head in bewilderment and Margaret facepalmed. Regardless, the joke had eased the tension that I¡¯d been feeling, and I was more relaxed as the bidding escalated.


    The wealthy collector dropped out at twenty-nine million and the other two billionaires battled on. When the gavel finally sounded the Chinese billionaire was the new owner of the Hannah¡¯s Tears rubies and the Hannah Foundation was thirty-three and a half million dollars richer, less auction house fees of ten percent and whatever the taxes the foundation would owe.


    I think that we were all in a state of shock for the next half hour, trying to come to grips with the foundation¡¯s massive windfall. I remember John congratulating us and explaining how the money would be wire transferred to the foundation¡¯s account, less the auction house fees, as soon as the buyer settled his account. Having already spoken to my bank manager earlier this week and explained about the auction, warning him to expect a large injection of funds into the account, I knew that the wire transfer would take two to three business days to clear. By next Wednesday, the money would be sitting in the account, available for foundation needs.


    Having eaten our celebration cookies already, dad suggested that we all go out for celebration ice-cream. I was all for it, until everyone started in on how the newest multi-millionaire in the group should pick up the tab. I groaned. This could get old really quick.


    Over an ice-cream cone, (that dad paid for!), Margaret grilled me about my plans for the foundation. I told her about needing office space and my plans to go see some this week and about the need to hire staff. Uncle Magnum suggested a few vacant offices in his area.


    ¡°You¡¯re thinking too small, M¡±, I replied. ¡°I¡¯m not in the market for a place only big enough for three or four people. I¡¯m going to get a place that has enough room for at least a dozen full time staff and several part-timers.¡±


    ¡°What do you need so many people for?¡±, he asked.


    ¡°Three or four months ago, the police in Wilmington responded to an anonymous tip and raided a logistics company. They rescued forty women and children that had been kidnapped and were being sold into slavery. The police got their statements and made sure that the victims had basic medical care. After that, the victims were more or less on their own. Social services helped get the children back to their families and helped some of women contact their families, but that¡¯s basically all the help they received. No one was there to offer counselling services, no one offered legal aid to the five women who were kidnapped from other countries and brought here against their will. No one offered to help these people restart their lives. If mom is ever rescued, I want there to be someone out there that can help her. We can be there for her, but she¡¯ll need a lot more help than you, dad and I can give. That¡¯s what the foundation is for and that needs people, a lot of people, supported by a well-funded organization.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m sorry, Abby. I guess I didn¡¯t think this through, and I underestimated your ambitions. How are you going to have time to take care of the foundation? It sounds like a full-time job and you¡¯re still in high school.¡±, Uncle Magnum asked.


    ¡°I¡¯m going to hire the best people I can find and give them their tasks. Then I¡¯m going to hire a manager to stay on top of them. Even in school, there are always breaks that I can use to answer any questions they have. I can also answer their questions by email in the evenings and weekends. Although, I may have to miss a few of your classes from time to time.¡±


    ¡°No way! You¡¯re not getting out of horse-stance so easily. You¡¯ll just have to skip school. Priorities, Abby! You¡¯ve got to get your priorities in order!¡±, Uncle Magnum said in pompous mock severity.


    ¡°I¡¯m going to pretend that you didn¡¯t just say that, Paul, and so is Abby¡±, dad replied giving first Uncle Magnum and then me a stern look.


    ¡°And did you forget that I¡¯m a teacher as well and I definitely don¡¯t approve of your advice?¡±, Margaret scolded him playfully.


    Uncle Magnum raised his hands in surrender. ¡°Ok. Ok. No need for violence. You know how much I hate fighting.¡± I let out a sharp laugh at that. Fighting is what he lived for. He turned to me and in a fake whisper said, ¡°Abby, don¡¯t get caught skipping school!¡±


    Spending this time with family was the perfect end to a very long and very emotional day. I couldn¡¯t believe that it was only this morning that I¡¯d practiced removing cancer at the dog park. It felt like weeks had passed since then. Visiting Evan with Eva, spending hours removing the cancer from Evan, the thrill of the auction. So much had happened today, yet if I¡¯d known what was coming, I¡¯d have wished for the day to be longer.

 Chapter 21: Losing a Friend

    The next morning Pierce called from the hospital. Evan had passed away in the night.


    Yesterday, I¡¯d left a note for Pierce asking for him to let me know of any changes in Evan¡¯s condition. When I saw that it was him calling, I answered with excitement, expecting to hear about Evan¡¯s almost miraculous recovery. I was prepared to pretend to be shocked and relieved and to exchange stories about how awful Evan had looked only hours before.


    The news of Evan¡¯s death shattered me. I knew he was very close to dying yesterday. I knew it from all the noise of his scan. He¡¯d been in terrible shape and wasn¡¯t even able to breath on his own anymore. His organs had been shutting down one by one. But I¡¯d put that knowledge aside and allowed myself to have hope because I was the great freaking Abby and I could cure cancer. A flash of white hot anger went through me at my own stupidity. However, it dissipated before it could take hold and left me feeling empty of all emotions but a deep sadness.


    I quietly thanked Pierce for letting me know, hung up the phone and started crying. Tears rolled down my face and soon I was sobbing out loud. I hated crying, but I couldn¡¯t seem to stop. Evan was gone. More than that though, the feeling that I¡¯d failed him wouldn¡¯t leave my mind. I¡¯d had the power to save him. If I¡¯d have realized that I could remove cancer earlier, if I¡¯d practiced less or just tried it on him right away, Evan would still be alive. I hadn¡¯t killed him, but I hadn¡¯t saved him either.


    ¡°Abby? Are you ok? Can I come in?¡± Dad called from my door. I¡¯d been crying for a few minutes and I guess I¡¯d been loud enough to hear in the quiet house. The worry in his tone calmed me enough that I was able to answer, ¡°Yes.¡±, between sobs. Dad sat down next to me and held me as I cried. He reached over to my bedside table and passed over the Kleenex box to me. I took it gratefully and blew my nose and dabbed the tears from my eyes.


    I can¡¯t remember the last time that I¡¯d cried in front of my dad. After mom was taken from us, I cried all the time, but not since we¡¯d moved to this house. Having seen my dad bear the pain of losing mom without crying, I¡¯d felt that crying was a weakness. It wasn¡¯t. I knew that. It was a release of your emotions and it was healthy. But it still felt like weakness to me.


    ¡°Pierce called me after he got off the phone with you. He told me about Evan. I¡¯m really sorry, Abby.¡±


    ¡°He was so young. Just a little guy with no hair and a huge smile. He was dying the whole time that I knew him, and he never complained about it. He¡¯d be there smiling and playing or trying out a magic trick. I played all sorts of games with him and I showed him magic tricks, but in the end, I wasn¡¯t able to help him.¡± I almost started crying again as I tried to explain to dad my failure.


    ¡°Abby, you did what you could for him. You paid attention to him and you added joy to his life. That¡¯s what you were there for and you did it well. Sometimes that¡¯s all you could do.¡±


    Not looking him in the eyes, I asked ¡°What if I could have done more?¡±


    ¡°In hindsight, we could always have done more or done things differently. What if I had taken a break from working and gone with you and your mother shopping that day? In hindsight, we are almost always to blame for something. You cannot live your life in hindsight and you cannot use it to take on blame for yourself. You must examine your actions from what you knew or thought you knew at the time. Given what you knew about Evan and his condition, did you do all that you could have for him? Did you make him happy when you saw him? Did you show him that you cared for him?¡±


    I took a few moments to think about it. ¡°Yes. I did.¡±


    ¡°Then everything else is unimportant. Do not second guess yourself in this. You did your best by that boy and you should be proud of that.¡±


    That was hard advice to take. Evan was dead after all and all of my powers hadn¡¯t been able to change that outcome. I felt like Superman arriving on the scene too late to save a drowning child. Dad was right though. I done what I thought I¡¯d needed to do. I hadn¡¯t realized that Evan had taken such a dramatic turn for the worse. If I¡¯d have known, I¡¯d have gone to him right away. I had done the best I could for him. I knew it was true. Only Evan was still dead and it felt like I hadn¡¯t done enough.


    ¡°Thanks dad. For someone who¡¯s naturally quiet, you give a pretty good pep talk.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯ve had a lot of practice. I¡¯ve been giving them for years.¡±


    ¡°Really? To whom?¡±


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    ¡°To me. For years afterwards, I felt guilty for not being with you and your mother the day that you were taken. That wasn¡¯t just a random example I gave you. I still get occasional bouts of the ¡°I should haves¡±, where I blame myself for you having to grow up without your mother, but I¡¯ve gotten better at talking myself out of them.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯ve never blamed you one bit for that day. No even for a second. You were working. You couldn¡¯t follow Mom and me around all the time just in case we might get kidnapped. What kind of life would that be? It¡¯s also not like you weren¡¯t there for me and for mom before she was taken. You always had time for us and since her kidnapping you¡¯ve always been there for me. I couldn¡¯t have asked for a better dad.¡± I hugged him fiercely after that and he hugged me right back.


    Breaking away from the hug, I wiped at my eyes to clear away a few more tears that were trying to escape, and said, ¡°I guess I¡¯d better go get ready. Eva doesn¡¯t know yet and she won¡¯t take the news as well as I did.¡±


    ¡°That bad?¡± dad asked.


    ¡°Yup. I¡¯m going to pick up James on the way to see her. He¡¯s her boyfriend and holding your crying girlfriends while she¡¯s upset is in the job description.¡±


    ¡°Good thinking, Abby. When faced with a task, it¡¯s critical to figure out the best tool for the job.¡±


    ¡°Did you just call James a tool?¡±


    ¡°Oy! We are not going down that path. Please give my condolences to Eva on her loss.¡±


    With those words, dad left me to get ready and shortly after I was knocking on James¡¯ front door. He wasn¡¯t up yet and his mother told me to ¡°Go ahead and wake him up. He shouldn¡¯t be sleeping away the day.¡± So I did.


    James was normally a morning person, but not today. He did not appreciate my being there so early and he wasn¡¯t shy about telling me so in terms that wouldn¡¯t have made it past the tv censors. When I told him that Eva was going to need him today, he immediately stopped complaining and asked, ¡°Is it Evan?¡± I told him and he kicked me out of his room so he could get ready.


    James¡¯ mom insisted that we have breakfast before going to see Eva and while we waited for her to make us some omelets, James told me about his late lunch with Eva yesterday and how broken up she was over him.


    ¡°Oh! I almost forgot. James, I¡¯m going to need your help. The auction was last night.¡±


    ¡°Crap, Abby. I forgot. I wanted to stop by and watch it with you, but with Eva so sad, I couldn¡¯t leave her. How did it go? Did you reach the reserve price?¡±


    ¡°Uhm¡­we did quite a bit better than that.¡±


    ¡°The reserve price was ten million dollars. How much better did you do?¡±, he asked with interest.


    ¡°The rubies sold for thirty-three and a half million dollars.¡±


    ¡°Oh my Lord!¡± That was from James¡¯ mom. She was unloading an omelet from the skillet to the plate and she had a shocked expression on her face. James was no better. His jaw hadn¡¯t dropped to the floor, but it did hang down a bit.


    ¡°Holy shit, Abby! That¡¯s amazing.¡±


    ¡°Language James.¡±


    ¡°Sorry Ma¡±. This scolding and apology were a ritual with them and I loved seeing it in action. His mom didn¡¯t really care about him swearing, but felt that she should, and James wasn¡¯t sorry.


    ¡°Anyways James, I have a few things that I need to spend some of it on, but I¡¯ll need you to invest the rest and make it grow. I¡¯m officially hiring you to be the foundation¡¯s investment manager. We are signing on to be your first multi-million-dollar client!¡±


    James tried to object, but like dad did with me last year I overcame all of his objections. ¡°James! Stop. It all boils down to trust and ability. I trust you and you¡¯ve already proven that you can do the job. Only the numbers are bigger. The theory is the same. You¡¯ve got this.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m not sure if I¡¯m even allowed to do the job, Abby. I might need a license or have to be bonded or something.¡± James was nervous and was trying to stall for time. I wasn¡¯t going to give him the chance to back out.


    ¡°Even if you¡¯re not allowed to make the trades yourself, you¡¯ll be in charge of directing the trades and making sure that they¡¯re done to your instructions. James, this is what you planned on doing. You¡¯re just doing it earlier than you expected. This is your shot to start funding your own foundation. Between the base salary that the Hannah Foundation will pay you and the performance bonuses, you¡¯ll be able to save enough to start your justice foundation and you can get your uncle the legal help he needs to start going after what the government owes him.¡±


    Reminding him about his own goal of helping out his uncle and others like him that were abused by the system sealed the deal. James straightened his back and shook my hand. ¡°You¡¯ve got yourself an investment manager, Abby. I¡¯ll start looking into the details of what I¡¯m allowed to do tonight. By Monday, we¡¯ll hit the ground running.¡±


    ¡°Make it Monday afternoon at around five. I¡¯m starting my teaching assistant job on Monday morning and I¡¯d visiting a bunch of offices in the afternoon. I¡¯ll also want you to speak with Grampa Jake. He¡¯s on my board of directors and he¡¯s worked with foundations before. If he can¡¯t answer your questions, his lawyers and accountants can.¡± I pulled out my phone and sent James the contact info and I sent a quick email to Jake telling him to expect James¡¯ call. A few minutes later, Jake¡¯s secretary emailed back that Jake was expecting a call from James on Monday morning.


    After breakfast, James and I made our way to Eva¡¯s house and broke the news to her. Unlike me, she had correctly evaluated Evan¡¯s chances of survival after seeing him and mostly cried herself out yesterday. She¡¯d never had the hope that I did and so she wasn¡¯t a complete wreck like I¡¯d been on hearing the news. We shared our memories of Evan for awhile and then, in an effort to lighten the mood, James told Eva about the auction and of his new position as the Hannah Foundation¡¯s investment manager. Eva¡¯s mood shifted gears and we all able to put aside our grief for awhile. It would return soon, especially since we were scheduled to work in the hospital tomorrow and there was the eventual funeral to go to, but for now we tried to focus on the happy times ahead.

 Chapter 22: At the Forge

    ¡°Don¡¯t you ever take the summer off?¡± That was how I greeted Tyler on Monday morning.


    Dad and I had arrived half an hour before class and while he reviewed his notes for the course and prepared his work area, I walked around and chatted with the students as they came in.


    ¡°Abby! It¡¯s good to see you.¡± He came over and gave me a hug in greeting. I was taken by surprise and only just managed to hug him back. That was more physical contact than we¡¯d ever had and it felt like he¡¯d just upgraded our relationship from acquaintance to¡­to¡­something more than acquaintance. Just like that. I didn¡¯t mind the improvement, but I wondered at its source.


    ¡°I was planning on taking this second summer semester off, but I couldn¡¯t get into your father¡¯s courses for this fall. It was either take this one or wait until Spring. I also knew that there was a chance that you¡¯d be assisting your father this semester, so I had to sign up for it.¡±


    A hug and telling me that I was part of the reason that he was taking another summer course? Was he hitting on me? I wished Eva were here. She¡¯s better at seeing this kind of thing. I truly suck at it. It had taken eavesdropping on Bobby to find out that he liked me.


    I was saved from having to come up with a response as dad called the class to order. As this wasn¡¯t an intro course, dad quickly reviewed the safety procedures with the class and I handed out the course project list to each student. Every student had to choose two projects from the list to complete before the end of the course. The skills required for each object were listed next to it, as well as the evaluation criteria that would be used by dad to grade it.


    The five-week course, Advanced Blacksmith Designs, was a 301 course and dad explained that he would start off every class with a half hour of instruction in a new technique. The students would then have two and a half hours to practice it. Dad and I would roam around and offer advice and answer any questions the students had.


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    Assisting dad this year was way better than last year, where I felt like I was babysitting the students and making sure they that didn¡¯t burn themselves. Not only were the students fully aware of all the safety issues, these students had all taken a least two other courses in blacksmithing and they were actively interested in what they were doing. They wanted to learn and that made a huge difference.


    ¡°Watch your heat, Tyler. You¡¯ve got it closer to welding temperature. Try to keep it at around 1900 degrees Fahrenheit for this material. If the steel gets too hot, then it¡¯ll start throwing off sparks and you¡¯ll burn the metal.¡±


    ¡°Thank, Abby.¡± Tyler said and proceeded to make the necessary adjustments. ¡°Starting over at this point would have sucked. Can I repay you with a coffee after class?¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s nice of you to offer, but I have to run after class. I have a few appointments this afternoon.¡± I had replied without taking his earlier behavior into account and was therefor caught off-guard by his follow up question.


    ¡°Tomorrow then?¡±


    The guy was nothing if not persistent. What the heck had changed over the past year? Honestly, if he had asked me a few months ago, I¡¯d have probably accepted his offer. Now though, I wanted to give whatever I might have with Bobby a chance.


    ¡°Besides the fact that as a teaching assistance my employment contract forbids me from accepting your generous offer, I¡¯m actually busy all week.¡± Tyler¡¯s curious look caused me to explain, ¡°I¡¯m looking for office space to set up my foundation and my realtor has set up a full schedule for me.¡± My realtor was actually Shauna, but the rest was the truth. Of course, my explanation only led to more questions about the foundation.


    ¡°You¡¯re not even a Senior in high school yet and you¡¯re already starting a foundation to help the survivors of human trafficking. That¡¯s incredible. At your age, I couldn¡¯t see past my own issues. I think that what you¡¯re doing is great. If you ever need a volunteer to help out with anything, please call me.¡±


    Volunteers! How had I missed that? I¡¯d been so focused on who I needed to hire, that I¡¯d completely forgotten that charities and foundations were powered by amazing people who gave of their time to help others. Not only that, but Galt University had a community involvement program that required all of its students to volunteer a certain amount of hours every semester. I wasn¡¯t sure how many hours were required of them, but I knew a certain dean who might know and who might help me get on the list of approved organizations. He was on my board of directors after all. I¡¯d be giving Harry a call between some of my viewings this afternoon.

 Chapter 23: Hannah鈥檚 Home

    Shauna picked me up right after class and I was surprised when we started heading west.


    ¡°I thought that our first appointment was downtown. You¡¯re going in the opposite direction.¡±


    ¡°About that. I made a few changes to our schedule¡±, Shauna replied. ¡°I cancelled all of our viewings today. And all of them for the rest of the week.¡± Shauna didn¡¯t sound a bit apologetic as she said this. Her face had a determined quality to it, as if challenging me to override her decision. I had no intention of doing that. Over the past month, I¡¯d found Shauna to be incredibly effective and if she cancelled all of our appointments, then I knew that she had a very good reason behind it.


    ¡°So where are we going?¡±, I asked her.


    She didn¡¯t answer my question right away. ¡°I watched the auction the other day. You¡¯d told me the range of what the auction house was anticipating so I was expecting for the rubies to sell for around fifteen to seventeen million dollars. When the hammer finally came down at thirty-three, I thought I was going to lose my voice from yelling and cheering. I was so excited for you. The Hannah Foundation had gotten twice what I had expected and that changed things.¡±


    ¡°Changed things how?¡±


    ¡°The way I see it, the extra money is a bonus. It¡¯s great to have, but it wasn¡¯t planned for or needed in the short term. You can get along just fine for years without it. When you asked me to find potential office spaces for the Hannah Foundation, you were looking at the short-term. You wanted to start the ball rolling and have space for the people that you would hire. Once you had the offices, you¡¯d start looking at making arrangement for where you could temporarily house any of the people that we rescued and for places where they could get the counseling and training they needed to get back on their own feet. However, with the extra money that come in, I think that we should be plan for the longer term right away. Why outsource the temporary housing and training center? Why not simply get everything set up in one place?¡±


    ¡°I couldn¡¯t agree with you more¡±, I responded. ¡°Having everything under one roof would be amazing, but I can¡¯t afford to buy a building big enough to do everything that you¡¯re suggesting.¡±


    ¡°You can¡¯t downtown or even within the city limits, but just a bit farther out, you definitely can. When I saw the auction results and realized what you should be doing for space, I went searching and I found a place just ten minutes outside the city. It¡¯s an old church compound and it has everything you wanted and lots of things that you didn¡¯t think of.¡± Shauna ended her description there and refused to go into any more detail about the place. She said that she wanted me to look at the place and decide for myself.


    Although I was itching to push her for more information, I realized that I wouldn¡¯t get anywhere with her. She had a smile on her face that told me that she was having too much fun making me suffer through the waiting. I know because I¡¯d done the very same thing to Eva on many occasions. With the topic of the old church off the table, I placed a folder next to Shauna and asked her to read through it later today.


    ¡°What¡¯s in it?¡±, she asked.


    ¡°Just some properties I want you to look into.¡±


    ¡°Properties for what?¡±


    Now it was my turn to smile. ¡°I¡¯ll tell you all about it later; once we¡¯re done with the old church.¡± It turned out that Shauna did not appreciate my use of her own tactics against her.


    Soon we had left the city behind and ten minutes later we pulled into a two hundred space, sparsely populated parking lot that led up to a one-story building with a large hall in the center and office wings on either side. Tucked away behind that building, Shauna pulled up in front of another building, this one much older than the first and having a more residential feel to it.


    ¡°Wow! This place is awesome. How much are they asking for it?¡±, I asked Shauna as she parked the car.


    ¡°Asking price is two point nine million dollars. It¡¯s been on the market for a little over two years and I think we can get it for around two point four.¡±


    ¡°Why hasn¡¯t someone already bought it? Two years is a long time.¡±


    ¡°The church had been running a small medical center out of the main building for over ten years and one of their requirements is that the new owners sign a fifteen-year lease with the nuns that run it. The lease is not very lucrative and being forced to take on the clinic interferes with most buyer¡¯s redevelopment plans. From our perspective, having an on-site medical clinic could be a good thing, but we won¡¯t be saying that out loud to them.¡± Shauna gave a predatory smile as she said this last bit.


    Shauna introduced me to the real estate broker, Tom Kepler, and he took us on a tour. The property sat on twelve acres of land and had four larger buildings on it. The main building that we passed on the way in held the main sanctuary, or as Tom called it, the banquet hall. He was trying to downplay the ¡®church¡¯ aspect of the property and present it as a potential business. With a seating capacity of three hundred and fifty, the banquet hall had a stage nestled inside the far wall. I could easily picture the reverend giving his weekly sermon from the stage, with a choir singing hymns behind him. The hall could also double as a gymnasium, with basketball nets that folded out from the ceiling on either end. The design had clearly been stolen from every high school gym in the country.


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    On either side of the hall were small wings. The wing on the left housed offices, meeting rooms, lounges and bathrooms. Tom explained that at its peak, the church that used to use these facilities had dozens of community outreach programs and they also raised funds by renting out the hall and the meeting rooms to weddings and local businesses.


    The wing to the right of the hall held the medical clinic that Shauna had mentioned. Ten treatment rooms, a waiting room, a reception desk and it¡¯s own entrance. It was a nice setup and I could see why the nuns weren¡¯t eager to give it up. Unfortunately, the clinic was closed on Mondays and the place was deserted so I didn¡¯t get to meet any of the nuns who worked there.


    Finally, behind the hall was a large commercial kitchen that could be used to prepare food for a small army. Having worked at Mary¡¯s soup kitchen, I knew enough to know that this was an impressive set up and the equipment was first rate.


    Tom took us out the back door and back to the building that we parked in front of. Instead of simply calling it the rectory, he rebranded it as the administrative offices. Sure it had offices and a reception area, but it also had spacious living quarters for a minister, his family, and some guests. The rectory was connected by a covered walkway to another building that housed the church¡¯s learning center. The small school had eight classrooms on the lower level and teachers¡¯ offices and a cafeteria upstairs.


    By this point in the tour I was feeling slightly overwhelmed. I¡¯d gone into the day thinking I was going to see four-to-six thousand square feet of office space for a staff of around fifteen people and instead I was being led through what could almost be termed a compound. All that was missing was a fence surrounding the property. This place was huge. It would need someone just to take care of the grounds and someone else to administer the property. I took Shauna aside for a moment to tell her of my growing fear that this was overkill, but she quickly answered that I shouldn¡¯t worry and she¡¯d explain after the tour.


    After the rectory, Tom walked us out to a series of small residential cottages. Each one housed up to four occupants, everyone with their own bedroom and bathroom suite, and having a common living room, dining room and kitchen. The church had used them to house visiting members of the clergy, as well as their teachers and the nuns who ran the clinic. The nuns were still using one of the six cottages and they would continue to do so under any new lease.


    Finally, we walked around the grounds, to a large industrial looking building. It was completely hidden from the other buildings and it housed the equipment needed for the grounds, such as a tractor with mowing attachments and utility vehicles, as well as having storage rooms for supplies and building materials for the entire property. Tom never told us what the building had originally been intended to hold, but at the moment, only a quarter of it was being used.


    It took us over an hour and a half to see the entire property. An hour and a half. I¡¯d expected spending my afternoon taking elevators to see fancy, air-conditioned office spaces and I¡¯d ended up hiking through woods to see a small, secluded lake at the edge of the property. Apparently, it was an excellent place to mediate or to contemplate our place in the universe. Tom went on quite a bit about how this place would make an excellent executive retreat.


    It was truly beautiful though and I thought of the therapeutic effect it could have on survivors who visited this place. When viewed with that idea in mind, this property was a dream. This place would provide the perfect environment for helping people restart their lives. With only a few modifications, survivors could relax here and feel safe. They could stay in the cottages and get the therapy and training they¡¯d need to get their lives back on track. A cold office setting wouldn¡¯t be best place for people who¡¯d been had their lives stolen from them. This place could be their new beginning.


    ¡°Shauna, you¡¯re amazing!¡±, I said to her as we got into her car to head back home. ¡°This place is perfect. It has everything the Hannah Foundation needs. It¡¯s exactly what I didn¡¯t know I wanted.¡±


    ¡°So, you don¡¯t want to go see other places?¡±, she asked with a smirk on her face.


    ¡°Are there other places like that?¡±


    ¡°Actually, yes. There are quite a few of them in North Carolina, but this is the best one in the area. Unfortunately, a lot of churches are for sale these days. It¡¯s sad because many of these places were the heart of their communities and they brought the people together. In some cases, the church moved to a new area when the demographics of the area changed, but in most cases, the churches simply closed down. This church closed when the minister, Simon Cadieux, passed away. The community had been shrinking for years, as families moved to the city or left the state to look for work, and Simon held the church together with an iron will. With him gone, no one had the strength to continue the fight.¡±


    ¡°How do you even know all that?¡±, I asked Shauna.


    ¡°Yesterday, when I called to set up the meeting with Tom for today, I spoke to the nun, Sister Clara, that runs the clinic. She sounds like a very caring person and I think the closing of the church is still a painful subject for her. Anyways, none of the other churches available in this area of the state are as nice as this or as big as this one. Should I start negotiating with them?¡±


    ¡°Absolutely. Like you said, we can buy it with less than the ¡®extra¡¯ money that the auction generated. We are going to have to find someone just to run the place though.¡±


    ¡°About that. I was thinking that the team and I could set up shop in the old rectory building. It would save us from having to rent a place and the team and I could also double as the property admin staff in between rescue jobs. It also means that we could be legitimate employees of the foundation and won¡¯t need to hide our income. If you¡¯re ok with it, we could get a low base salary from the foundation and the remainder of our salaries could be in the form of a bonus or lump sum payment from your ¡®other sources¡¯ of funding. It¡¯ll make life easier around tax time.¡±


    ¡°Whatever works for you and your team, I¡¯m good with. Speaking of team. When will you be hiring them? Also, didn¡¯t you already rent premises for you and the team?¡±, I asked.


    ¡°I found several potential premises, but I didn¡¯t sign any leases yet. I was waiting to see where you¡¯d be setting up the foundation offices first. I figured that I¡¯d pick the one closest to you and reduce your travel times. The team and I could start working out of my apartment for the first few weeks, or until you sign the papers for this place. It¡¯ll be cramped, but we¡¯ll save money and the intimate setting will let us to get to know each other much better and see how we work as a team. It lets me see who has any annoying habits that the rest of us couldn¡¯t live with. As to meeting them, I¡¯m planning on hiring them tonight. Jenny Selinger, our cyber and technology expert, will start right away with setting up our network. Gabriel Danson, our banking expert could start as early as next week, if you¡¯ve got work for him.¡±


    ¡°I definitely have work for him. Let¡¯s see how fast you can close on this place and get the team set up here.¡±

 Chapter 24: A Busy Week

    The rest of the week went by in a blur. It seemed like every moment of my time was spoken for. Mornings working with Dad, afternoons starting up the foundation, and evenings with Uncle Magnum. With everything that had to get done for the foundation, I was seriously regretting both my assisting position and agreeing to the extra training required for by evaluation by Sifu Zhang, Uncle Magnum¡¯s teacher. I didn¡¯t even have time to keep learning about my field, although I did continue holding up multiple fields all day long. I was almost reaching the point where I didn¡¯t notice any strain and I wanted to make sure that I didn¡¯t get rusty.


    Our first task for the foundation was finalizing the purchase of the property. We got lucky there, as the property had been on the market for awhile and the church representative had all the usual required information ready for us. Land survey, title search, environmental reports, equipment listing, maintenance reports, appraisals and inspections. All of it was given to us in a neat binder and Shauna and I pored over it, learning everything we could about the property. Then we hired a few experts to look it over. Both of us were out of our depth when it came to the details involved in assessing the property.


    While the experts did their thing, Shauna and I toured the property again and this time I quietly used my field to inspect the buildings, looking for cracks in the foundations and for any other physical defect. Luckily, the buildings were all well cared for and in good repair and we took a few minutes to talk to the caretaker, Fred Shainer, about staying on and working for the foundation. His relief was evident at our offer and he explained that he¡¯d been taking care of the property for over twenty years and he loved the place and his job. He¡¯d been anxious for the past two years about losing his job when the place was finally sold.


    I also had a chance to meet with the nuns who ran the medical clinic and that would be renting one of the wings of the main sanctuary. There were three nuns and they were in the middle of a clinic day. Sister Clara Hennessey was in charge, with Sisters Olivia and Amelia rounding out the team. Sister Clara spent a few minutes with us between patients showing us around and explaining their mission. All three of the nuns were registered nurse practitioners and they ran the free clinic for the surrounding communities. They were trained to do full medical exams and prescribe medication with no direct doctor oversight. However, there was a doctor at the local hospital that they could turn to for help and questions and who signed off on their work every month.


    ¡°I can¡¯t tell you how excited we all are about you taking over the church. I was so worried about what a developer would do with the place. Shauna told me all about the Hannah Foundation and I think that it¡¯s wonderful. I know that Father Simon would have approved. If the sisters and I can be of any help to your organization, we are here for you.¡±


    We talked some more about the clinic and I got to meet the other two sisters. I¡¯d always heard or read stories about how strict and stern nuns were, but these nuns, and the ones I¡¯d worked alongside at Mary¡¯s Kitchen, were friendly and welcoming. I had yet to meet a mean nun.


    The experts needed a few more days to complete their opinions but, barring them finding anything unusual, I was satisfied with the property and told Shauna that I was ready to sign the papers on Friday. She agreed and called the notary to get all the paperwork ready. With that out of the way, Shauna and I met with her top candidates for receptionist/administrative assistant, public relations/government liaison, and counseling/training. Everyone at the Hannah Foundation, even those from our ¡®rescue¡¯ team, would start off wearing at least two hats. Shauna was taking over as overall supervisor, as well as being responsible for procurement and security. Jenny would run the IT department for both the foundation and the team, and Gabriel would be the accountant and chef for the charity, when he wasn¡¯t tracking down the bad guys through their banking transactions. Strangely enough, he started out in the army as ¡®food service specialist¡¯. His family owned a restaurant and he was brought up cooking for large amounts of people. I made a mental note to have him spend some time in Mary¡¯s Kitchen and learn what he could from her.


    By Wednesday afternoon, we¡¯d hired the charity staff and our team members and Shauna had made arrangement for phones to be installed, internet to be hooked up, photocopiers and computers to be delivered and we¡¯d ordered enough office furniture to get started. She¡¯d also engaged a payroll service company, a cleaning company, and a boutique legal firm that specialized in immigration law. She was a whirlwind and I was starting to wonder what there¡¯d be left to do after she¡¯d been at this for a few weeks. I was in awe that the military had let this phenomenal person get away from them.


    On Thursday I took a break from all of my jobs. Dad had a conference that he needed to attend and he¡¯d cancelled all his classes for the day. I took advantage of the break and decided to take care of some pressing business. It was earning report season and I was almost too late to take advantage of it. Sure, I had all the reports from the companies I¡¯d visited before, thanks to Howie¡¯s thumb-drive gadget software, but with the large amount of money that I now had and needed to invest for the charity, I needed a greater number of companies to invest in.


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    Having informed Shauna that I wasn¡¯t available for the day and letting Uncle Magnum know that I was taking the night off to rest and recover, I grabbed an early morning flight to Atlanta. From Atlanta, I few to Nashville, then New York City and Washington. In each city, I visited the offices of three or four publicly traded companies, got their passwords, downloaded or copied their quarterly report, if I wasn¡¯t too late already, and inserted Howie¡¯s thumb-drive program that would let me get future quarterly reports without having to come back to their offices. I¡¯d thought that just having their admin passwords would be enough to access their systems remotely, but that wasn¡¯t the case. When I brought up the issue to Howie, he spent a few minutes mumbling about clients that changed their requirements and soon provided me with a software upgrade. I still wasn¡¯t sure how it did it, but it seemed to search the company¡¯s intranet to get the needed information to create a VPN tunnel that would allow me to access their system remotely. From my perspective, Howie had just provided me with new magic thumb-sticks that replaced the old magic thumb-sticks. As long as it worked, I didn¡¯t care. Although it did mean that I had to spend some time revisiting all the other companies that I¡¯d pilfered information from. Luckily, they were local and didn¡¯t necessitate any flights.


    I spent almost the entire day running around in either R1 or R2 and besides slipping back into reality to buy a pretzel from a street vendor (and to go to the bathroom), no one ever knew that I was there. I ran onto flights just as they were about to leave without showing my ID, I shared taxis with unsuspecting travelers, and stole corporate information. It was incredibly cool and lonely at the same time, but I was so rushed to get it all done that I didn¡¯t dwell on either of those aspects for very long. I had a job to do and it needed to get done.


    Waking up at 6am the next day was not easy. All the running around, trying to get everything done in one day, had exhausted me. However, this afternoon I was signing for the new Hannah Foundation property and I still had to help dad with his class this morning. Throughout my morning stretching and meditation, I had a nagging feeling that I was forgetting something. That feeling kept coming back to me all day and I couldn¡¯t remember what it was that I wasn¡¯t remembering.


    The class breezed by like normal and I spent the two hours afterwards going over all the corporate information that I¡¯d picked up from the companies that I¡¯d visited the day before, along with the latest information from the other companies that I was already following, and prepared a short report for James to use in making investment decisions for the foundations. At this point, I had over thirty companies that I was getting insider information on and there was no way that I could try to find or fake a bunch of ¡®internet rumor¡¯ to hide behind so that James wouldn¡¯t get suspicious. Instead, I took the opposite track and didn¡¯t try to justify my choices to him at all. I simply sent him the list of companies with a comment next to each one that indicated if the company was going to make or miss its projection and by approximately how much. Any company that had interesting news, be it a new patent, a new product, or an upcoming collapse, I starred and let him know that he should focus on those companies, as they would be more volatile and could lead to very large gains in the near term. If James decided to question me about the information, I planned on just telling him the truth. I was breaking into all of these companies and stealing the information from their servers. Somehow, I didn¡¯t think that he¡¯d believe me, but that wasn¡¯t my problem.


    Shauna arrived to pick me up just as I finished emailing James my picks and asking him to give me suggestions on how I should make these trades on my own account. It finally dawned on me what I¡¯d been forgetting all day. My emerald was going on auction this afternoon. It wasn¡¯t the main attraction like my rubies had been and so I wasn¡¯t getting the full VIP treatment, but they¡¯d provided a live feed, if I wanted to watch or they¡¯d be emailing me the results if I didn¡¯t. Grandpa Jake had said that I should expect the stone to go for around two million dollars before fees and taxes. This time the money was going straight into my personal bank account, instead of to the foundation. Dad had insisted that I have my own nest egg, which I could choose to save for my eventual retirement or use to invest in projects that I wanted to pursue. I already had a few ideas of where to invest some of it, but that would have to wait until next week. Right now, I had to sign for Hannah¡¯s Home, the Hannah foundations¡¯ first property.


    Shauna did the impossible and found a spot to park right across the street from the notary¡¯s downtown office. Our broker, Tom, and a representative from the church were waiting for us in a conference room and we all sat down and started signing documents. Each party had to sign the deed of sale, the adjustments for taxes and prepaid utilities, and the fifteen-year lease for Sister Clara¡¯s medical clinic. It was very quick, as the foundation lawyers had approved all the documents and Shauna and I only had to make sure that what were signing was exactly what had been approved. The toughest part of the entire meeting was actually handing over the seven-figure certified check.


    Holy Shit! A year ago, the most I¡¯d ever spent on anything was a few hundred dollars. Now I was signing checks for millions of dollars. Things were changing so quickly and I was sure that they wouldn¡¯t be slowing down anytime soon. This was only the first step of my plan for the foundation and on the way home I told Shauna to put the rest of my plan into motion. I needed to move ahead fast because Jake was finally back from his trip. He¡¯d invited me over for dinner to discuss my report on his mines. I was very anxious about the dinner, because if my plan didn¡¯t work out, I¡¯d have wasted more money than I¡¯d ever spent before. On the other hand, if my plan succeeded, the long-term future of the foundation would be secured.

 Chapter 25: A Meeting with Grandpa Jake

    There were four of us sitting at the overly large dining room table that could easily handle sixteen diners. We were clustered around the end closer to the kitchen with Grandpa Jake sitting at the head of the table and Mark sitting to his right. Dad and I sat to his left, with dad sitting next to Jake. The original plan didn¡¯t have dad being there, but after he¡¯d spoken to one of his colleagues from Galt¡¯s mining school about my reports, he¡¯d asked me if he could join the dinner meeting and help with my negotiations for the ¡®extra¡¯ reports that I¡¯d done. Since he was the reason that I even had anything to negotiate over, I jumped at the offer and texted Jake immediately to see if it was ok to add him to the guest list. Besides, it felt great to have dad¡¯s support for this part of my life and it was nice to see dad getting out and being sociable. He stayed at home or his workshop way too much.


    The food was incredible, and I was busy enjoying every bite when I noticed that Mark kept looking over at me.


    I looked back at him and asked, ¡°What??¡±, and all of a sudden I was sure that I had some food on my face. Quickly, I used my napkin to wipe at my mouth and surrounding areas. Mark just sat there, smiling again, but looking a bit sheepish as dad and Jake turned to him questioningly.


    ¡°It¡¯s nothing. I was just taking notice of your, uhm, healthy, appetite.¡±


    ¡°Are you on that again? Really? Don¡¯t you have something better to do with your time?¡± I gave him my sternest look.


    ¡°Not really. I¡¯m just amazed that someone your size can put away so much food?¡±, he replied.


    ¡°First of all, the food is really good. Second of all, I worked today, unlike some, and I¡¯m hungry. Third of all, I don¡¯t need to explain myself to you.¡± He was having fun and I wasn¡¯t about to let him keep attacking me. Time to put him on defense.


    ¡°Maybe you want to tell your grandfather what you¡¯ve been keeping from him. I¡¯m sure he¡¯d rather hear about that than listen to his grandson try to shame a lady for her eating habits. Isn¡¯t that right, Jake?¡± I turned to Jake and gave him my sweetest and most innocent expression. I may have batted my eyelashes at him once or twice.


    Jake and dad started laughing and Mark¡¯s smile faded instantly only to be replaced with a stunned look.


    ¡°That escalated quickly. I can¡¯t believe you threw me under the bus like that.¡±


    ¡°You deserved it!¡±, Jake answered him. ¡°A gentleman doesn¡¯t comment on a lady¡¯s eating habits. It¡¯s a sure way to get skinned alive, as Abby just showed you.¡±


    ¡°A word of advice, Mark. Abby doesn¡¯t like being on the defensive. When she¡¯s attacked, she attacks back.¡±, dad added.


    ¡°I guess I knew that already, but I¡¯d somehow forgotten.¡± Mark turned to me, gave a slight bow and said, ¡°My most sincere apologies, lady Abby. I won¡¯t comment on your intake of great quantities of food that belie your lithe frame in the future. Nevermore will I marvel, out loud, at the shovelful of food that you ingest with such gusto.¡±


    For awhile I thought that dad and Jake were going to collapse from laughing so hard as my dessert made it¡¯s way down Mark¡¯s face. I don¡¯t remember having thrown it, but I regretted it almost immediately, as it was a warm chocolate pudding that I¡¯d only managed to take a few bites of.


    ¡°Mark! Didn¡¯t Josh just finish telling you that Abby attacks back?¡± I think he had more to say, but he couldn¡¯t keep a straight face and just burst out laughing again. That got dad going again and the two of them were doubled up and holding their sides like a couple of eight year olds after someone farts in church.


    As Mark sputtered and started to get indignant at my abuse, I calmly got up from the table to get another serving of dessert. Out of pity for Mark, I returned with my dessert and a few towels for him to clean up with. He took my peace offering and I drew his attention to my new stock of ammunition. I raised my eyebrows questioningly and he silently indicated his surrender with the raising of his arms. Calmly, I returned to my chair and dug into my dessert as if nothing had happened. It was so good. I felt bad for having wasted some.


    After the food and the joking around, we got down to business. I pulled out one of the folders from my bag and handed it to Jake. It was a very slim folder with only a single page in it.


    ¡°This is my general impression of each of the two potential mining sites and a comparison between the two. Overall, your Arizona copper land has a whole lot more ore than the Little Rock site has iron ore. It also has two significant deposits for you to mine. In addition, the Arizona copper is much closer to the surface and should be easier to mine.¡±


    ¡°Thank you, Abby. Based on what you know, which one would you recommend?¡±


    I pretended to think about it, but I already had my answer ready. ¡°I don¡¯t know enough about your existing mining holdings to tell you which is a better investment for McKenzie Resources. There are also many other factors, such as ease of obtaining a permit, infrastructure, price fluctuations of the different ores, and McKenzie¡¯s available exploitation resources, that I know nothing about.¡± I paused here for dramatic effect, but also because this is where the real presentation was about to start.


    ¡°Does the report that I¡¯ve given you fulfill the terms of my contract with you? Are you satisfied with the results?¡±, I asked Jake, while noticing a faint smile cross Mark¡¯s face. However, true to his word, he had kept our discussions from our trip to himself.


    Jake took a minute to read the report. It was only one page. ¡°Yes, it does. However, your mention of a second large deposit in Arizona is interesting and I would like to know where you think it is. My exploration team only found one deposit.¡±


    Dad saw that as his cue to join the discussion. ¡°That¡¯s what we¡¯re here to discuss with you. Abby¡¯s contract with you only asked for her impression of the two sites. You¡¯ve just stated that her report met with your expectations. However, her ¡®land-sense¡¯, as you¡¯ve referred to it, is actually much stronger than either of us knew. With her ability, she was able to prepare much more thorough reports on each of your potential mine sites. I¡¯m here to help Abby negotiate with you for those reports. I have made some inquiries about the value of the reports, so I have a general sense of what they might be worth.¡±


    Jake¡¯s face was like stone. I couldn¡¯t get any sense of what he was thinking of at that moment.


    ¡°You showed the reports to others?¡±, he asked quietly.


    ¡°No.¡±, dad replied. ¡°I talked about the contents in general terms. I have no desire to have Abby¡¯s talents made public. It would diminish the value of any future gemstones she finds and add a level of notoriety to her life that I don¡¯t think she¡¯d enjoy.¡±


    Jake seemed relaxed a bit at that. ¡°Okay. I agree. However, I¡¯ve always treated Abby fairly in the past. Why did she feel she needed you to help her negotiate with me?¡±


    ¡°She didn¡¯t. I did. She was willing to help you by giving you all the information for free. However, I believe that she needs to get paid for the value that she provides and I think that she won¡¯t push you hard enough because she may feel indebted to you for the help you¡¯ve given her in selling her gemstones and in setting up her foundation.¡±


    ¡°Nothing wrong with a father looking out for his daughter. I can appreciate that. You should know though that I feel indebted to her. She saved Mark¡¯s life and, by extension, my company. The help I¡¯ve given her doesn¡¯t even scratch the surface of what I owe her. I wanted to do more, but she doesn¡¯t seem to need anything that I can offer her right now. You sure you don¡¯t want to go to a fancy college, Abby?¡±, Jake teased. I guess it¡¯s clear where Mark got it from.


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    ¡°Not getting into that now Jake. Thanks for opening up a sore spot with my dad sitting right next to you though. Dad, make sure to squeeze a few extra percent out of him, please.¡±, I answered right back at him, with a smirk of my own.


    ¡°Before Abby decides to go get another dessert and toss it at you, Jake, let me show you one of the reports that she did on your existing silver mine in Idaho and you can judge the value of what she¡¯s offering.¡±


    I pulled out another report, thicker this time, and handed it to Jake. Now was the moment of truth.


    Jake opened the report and started reading. I tracked his eyes as he read it, watching for the moment when he saw the depth to which I¡¯d scanned and the details that I was providing. Bingo! His eyes got big and he started flipping towards the map to verify the information. Jake stopped for a minute and excused himself, only to return a minute later with his own binder and maps. He started comparing the two reports and I looked over to Mark to get his impressions of his grandfather¡¯s mood. Mark was in heaven.


    ¡°You¡¯re enjoying this way too much, Mark¡±, I whispered to him, so as not to disturb Jake from his studying of the report.


    ¡°More than I can tell you. Grandpa Jake is always in control and almost always right when it comes to people and his mines. To see him so thrown off is a once in a lifetime opportunity. I¡¯ll be able to bring this up as an example of his fallibility for years to come. This is definitely worth a faceful of pudding.¡±


    ¡°The pudding wasn¡¯t a requirement for this. You could have just stopped teasing me and still had this moment of joy.¡±


    ¡°Yeah. I could have, I suppose. Not much fun in that. Besides, now I¡¯ve got a story that I can tell people whenever I introduce you to them. Hi, Aunt Beatrice, this is Abby, the girl I told you about that saved my life and then threw a huge bowl of pudding in my face.¡±


    ¡°It was not a huge bowl. I¡¯d characterize it as a cup at most.¡±


    ¡°Sorry Abby, but size never decreases in the telling. In a few years, it¡¯ll be the size of punch bowl, at least.¡±


    I glared at him in mock anger and waited in silence while Jake finished reading the report.


    When he was done, Jake looked over at his grandson. ¡°You knew about this?¡±


    Mark didn¡¯t even try to deny it. ¡°Abby told me about some of the things she was doing and I have a vague idea of what¡¯s in that report. When she told me how far down she was sensing and to what detail, I knew you¡¯d underestimated her abilities. I didn¡¯t see any reason to ruin her surprise. I¡¯ve been waiting for weeks in quiet anticipation to watch you negotiate this deal. I want to learn from ¡®the voice of experience¡¯.¡± With those last words, Mark changed his voice and did a passable imitation of Jake.


    ¡°Son of a gun. My own grandson set me up and is now basking in my challenges. I may have to make some changes to my will.¡±


    ¡°You go right ahead, Grandpa. I¡¯m sure Connor, Rosie or anyone of the cousins will be able handle whatever changes you make.¡±


    ¡°Josh, as the voice of experience, I feel that I need to let you in on a secret. Grandchildren can be a pain in the ass!¡±


    ¡°Spare the rod and spoil the grandchild?¡±, dad added helpfully.


    ¡°Amen, Josh. Amen.¡±


    ¡°Abby, this report is amazing. We¡¯ve been working that silver mine for decades and your 3D map has more detail about the ore body than mine does. If I¡¯ve done my calculations right, we can improve output from the mine by at least a few percent based solely on your detail of the positioning of the ore body. If I were to factor in the time savings and cost reductions involved in knowing exactly where the ore is, McKenzie Resources can improve the bottom line by five to ten percent. I¡¯m also embarrassed to say that whatever software you used is several generations better that ours. I¡¯d like to know more about it and how you came across it.¡± Jake was shaking his head, as he continued gazing at the 3D map.


    Mark couldn¡¯t help snarking in, ¡°Wow, Grandpa. What happened to playing your cards close to the vest and not letting the other side know how badly you wanted the information? Play it cool? Keep your emotions in check? You¡¯re practically begging Abby to walk all over you. You need to be firm and willing to walk away if you don¡¯t get the deal that you want!¡± I got the feeling that Jake had given Mark quite a few speeches about how to negotiate.


    Jake just looked at his grandson, blinked a few times and said, ¡°Abby, would you mind going to the kitchen and getting me a few more of those desserts? I don¡¯t think that Mark has had his fill quite yet.¡±


    ¡°Uhm, I ate the last one. Sorry!¡±


    ¡°No, it¡¯s ok. It¡¯s my own damned fault. Should¡¯ve gotten a bigger rod to beat him with as a child. It¡¯s too late now though.¡±


    ¡°Actually Jake, it¡¯s not too late.¡±, I said as inspiration struck me.


    ¡°Really? How do you figure that? He¡¯d pretty big to be putting over my knee and he probably won¡¯t sit still once he sees the ole hickory stick.¡±


    ¡°One thing that I noticed about Mark when we were on our trip is that he¡¯s out of shape. He was out of breath just coming up a small hill to come get me. He spends way too much time studying and almost no time exercising. I either go to or teach a Kung Fu class almost every day. It¡¯s a great way to stay healthy. Maybe if you urged Mark, he¡¯d join. I can almost guarantee that eventually he¡¯ll get hit with a stick!¡±


    The look of horror on Mark¡¯s face was almost as priceless as was the gleam in Jake''s eyes. I could tell right away that Mark would be enrolling at Uncle Magnum¡¯s place before the end of the week. Another convert to the ways of Kung Fu! Score one for the good guys.


    ¡°Not to interrupt Abby¡¯s recruitment of another sparring partner, but there¡¯s more to the report¡±, dad interjected. He pulled out another folder and handed it to Jake. Jake took it and opened up the 3D map that was folded up inside. It took him a few seconds to orient himself and understand what he was looking at.


    ¡°This is a map of the area surrounding the silver mine?¡±, he asked.


    ¡°Yes. Abby took the time to survey as much as she could all around the mine site and all of the other mines that she went to as well. You¡¯ll note that most of it is pretty empty of silver, except to the north of the mine. There¡¯s a decent sized vein about a half mile away. Given that it¡¯s not that far from your mine and that it¡¯s further away from the town to the south, you may be able to add it as a phase two to your existing mine and you may not have as many regulatory hurdles to get a permit. All the ore processing equipment and buildings that you currently have can be used as well, so you won¡¯t have to build more, unless it can¡¯t handle the increase capacity.¡±


    ¡°Enough. Enough. You had me with the 3D map of my mine. You win. Let¡¯s talk about the value of these reports. I need to finalize the deal with you and then get to work on buying up some of the areas surrounding my properties. Properties, mind you, that I¡¯ve already paid someone to explore and they¡¯ve failed to find anything.¡±


    ¡°Uhm, about that. You don¡¯t need to rush.¡±, I said.


    ¡°Why¡¯s that, Abby?¡±, Jake asked.


    ¡°Because¡­I may have¡­uhm¡­already bought all of them. Well, the only the ones with significant deposits.¡±, I answered sheepishly. All of them were staring at me. Even dad. I¡¯d sort of neglected to tell him about this part of my plan.


    ¡°You bought all of them?¡±, dad repeated.


    ¡°Well, not just me. The Hannah foundation bought most of them. I only bought two or three. One of them has a working farm on it.¡±


    ¡°Why?¡±, dad asked.


    ¡°Well the couple who runs the farm are very nice and they¡¯re going through a hard time. I figured that I¡¯d help them out. I think it¡¯ll be a good investment. Also, the far end of their farm, which is just some pasture land, is sitting on top of a fair sized iron deposit.¡±


    ¡°No, Abby. I meant why did you buy all the properties? That seems like a big investment and Jake might not have a use for some of them anytime soon and even if he does, they¡¯ll usually take years to get a permit. Won¡¯t you need the money to run your foundation?¡±


    ¡°Most of the properties are in the middle of nowhere and I got them very cheap. Others are next to a mine site and have been explored and found to have nothing worthwhile, so I got those even cheaper. It¡¯s not my fault that the exploratory teams missed looking in the right place or couldn¡¯t go deep enough in enough places to find the ore. As to the foundation, we went way over expectations on the sale of the rubies and I figured that we needed to invest some of it for the long term. Mines are long term investments and as the owners of the land and mineral rights, I figured that we could either lease the land to McKenzie Resources or sell them the mineral rights for an initial fee that would cover our investment and a yearly royalty on the mined ore. Eventually, the royalty from all the mines should be enough to sustain the foundation.¡±


    Dad took in my explanation and shook his head. ¡°I can see that you¡¯ve had this planned out for awhile. Please remind me why I am needed here at all?¡±


    ¡°Because you¡¯re my daddy and I love you! Also, the whole idea of looking for things that might be useful to Mckenzie Resources was yours. You told me to look for things that I could negotiate for and then make sure that I got paid for the value that I brought to the table and here we are. Sitting at a table.¡±


    ¡°Why are you all just staring at me? Come on, that was funny. I was going to go with something about ¡®buying the farm¡¯, but I decided it was too punny.


    I¡¯d never gotten three face-palms before. I wish I¡¯d taken a picture of it.


    I got up from the table and walked around to Mark. ¡°Anyways, you and Jake can still have fun negotiating, while Mark and I go for a short hike to work off dinner.¡±


    At the door, I stopped and added, ¡°Just don¡¯t forget to get at least half the sale price of the dinosaur and I want naming rights.¡±


    As the door closed behind me, I could just hear Jake shout out, ¡°What dinosaur??¡±

 Chapter 26: Planning a Rescue

    The next afternoon, Shauna drove me out to the newly christened ¡®Hannah¡¯s Home¡¯ and introduced me to her team. As we¡¯d planned, they¡¯d set themselves up in the old refractory building, which was the main administration building for the foundation. Jenny, our technology expert, was a surprise. I guess the movies had conditioned me to think of all women hacker/IT specialists as either skater girls or nerds. At 6¡¯2¡±, long brown hair, green eyes and dressed in business suit, she wasn¡¯t what I was expecting. She also didn¡¯t slouch. It was a little disconcerting and it made me straighten my own posture as we spoke.


    Gabriel, however, looked and dressed exactly like a stereotypical accountant, down to the sweater vest and glasses. The one distinct difference from the stereotype was that Gabriel was jacked. Even his muscles had muscles. It was obvious that Shauna had picked these two from a pool of ex-military professionals.


    Once we were all properly introduced, Shauna started us off with a rundown of what information she had about her brother, Samuel. In terms of rescuing people from imprisonment, Samuel was going to be our trial run. Shauna only had unsubstantiated rumors that her brother was being held in a prison about twenty miles outside of Caracas in Venezuela, and no matter how hard she tried, she couldn¡¯t find any definitive proof.


    ¡°The prison and the surrounding area is heavily guarded. I have satellite images of it from the US intelligence services, but no one has any information on the internal layout of the prison or on the prisoners. No one has been released from the prison in years and the guards that were approached for information have all been reassigned and we haven¡¯t been able to track them down. Their families haven¡¯t heard from them at all. My sources also tell me that intelligence hasn¡¯t been able to hack into the prison. Either they¡¯re very sophisticated or they¡¯ve gone completely old school and aren¡¯t online at all. I¡¯m at a loss as to how to proceed. I¡¯d really wanted this to be our first rescue, but I think we need more time and I don¡¯t want to keep Abby waiting on her other priorities.¡± Shauna tried to sound upbeat, but defeat was written all over her bearing.


    ¡°On the day I met you, you asked me if I had anyone to carry out any operations of if we¡¯d just hand over information to the police. I told you that I had someone and I do. He specializes in just this sort of thing. Give me what you have and I¡¯ll get it to him.¡±, I said.


    Shauna did not look excited, but she handed me a thin folder. ¡°Who is he?¡±


    ¡°The name he goes by is Roger Willoughby. If you want to know who he really is, I can¡¯t help you. I can tell you that he was the source for the police on the rescue of forty women and children on their raid on the Serpentine Logistics warehouse in Wilmington, back in March of this year. You should read the police file on the raid. It¡¯s quite interesting. You can also see if Captain Stevens, the officer that was in contact with Roger, will speak with you. Roger is very good at what he does and he¡¯s agreed to help us on any rescue operations.¡±


    ¡°And how do you know him?¡±, she persisted.


    ¡°I don¡¯t. He contacted me about a month before I met you and offered his services. He¡¯s the reason that I decided to create a team to investigate the organizations behind the trafficking. When I found the gemstones that would eventually pay to create the Hannah Foundation, the owners of the mine leaked the story to the local newspaper. The owners told the reporter all about my plans to open a foundation to help the survivors of human trafficking. The write up in the newspaper mentioned that and mentioned me by name. Anyways, Roger saw the story and looked me up online. When he saw the videos of the fire, he decided to call me and let me know that I¡¯d impressed him and that he was available to help me, if I needed it.¡±


    ¡°Wait. What fire videos?¡±, Gabriel asked. Jenny and Shauna both looked confused as well.


    ¡°Uhm. That¡¯s not important. The point is that he gave me instructions to a storage locker that had a duffel bag full of cash and some files in it. The cash and files were taken from the traffickers. I¡¯m using the cash to fund our clandestine operations and to give any survivors a jump-start on their new lives. The files have banking information that I¡¯m hoping Gabriel can track to their sources and give us leads to more traffickers or their customers. He even left me a few computer drives that we can try to mine for information, but I¡¯m not holding out much hope of finding anything on them. The police and probably the FBI have gone through them, but it¡¯s possible they could have missed something.¡±


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    I¡¯d worked on this story for weeks, looking for any major holes, and I¡¯d rehearsed it over and over again. I knew it wasn¡¯t perfect, but I¡¯d left enough details to make it verifiable and it seemed to account for the money and the files that I was going to give them. It also had the benefit of a mysterious operator who could break into anywhere and who was definitely not me. The best part about it all was that it would let Shauna and Captain Stevens meet. When we did finally start to find human traffickers, I was pretty sure that the captain could make things much easier for us by vouching for any information that we provided.


    Wanting to distract the team from asking me too many questions, I pulled out my backpack and started pulling out bundles of cash. Not only did it lend credibility to my story, but it was also served as a great distraction. Large stacks of bills tends to do that to most people who¡¯ve never seen real money before. I know it distracted the hell out of me.


    My ploy worked and there were no follow up questions that would expose the holes in my story, such as why didn¡¯t Roger just hand over the information to the police or FBI, why didn¡¯t he get his own team to follow up on the leads and the account, who the hell would trust a sixteen year old girl with so much money and why would he think said girl was even capable of doing anything with the information. Those are fairly large holes in the story, and the whole fire thing was the only thing that I could come up with that might even come close to giving the imaginary Roger a reason to trust me. The idea was that he was so impressed with my selflessness and courage, that he figured I could handle the task. Damned thin, but what other choice did I have, if I wanted to keep anyone from knowing what I could do.


    After I took out the last of the twenty-five bundles of $10,000, and asked Shauna to inventory it and secure it in a safe, I handed Gabriel a folder with five of the Serpentine accounts and their passwords. These were some of the accounts into which the slavers got paid and the money was then moved to another account. I had the information for that account as well, but I didn¡¯t know Gabriel that well and I didn¡¯t want him having access to that money just yet.


    I explained to Gabriel about the accounts. ¡°While we wait for Roger to see what he can find out about Samuel, I¡¯d like you to follow the money transfers that led to the payoff and hopefully you¡¯ll be able to get us some leads on Serpentine¡¯s clients and that can lead us to some of the victims. I¡¯d like you to work closely with Jenny on this, as I think that we¡¯re going to be pissing off very rich and very powerful people. They¡¯ll have excellent security.¡±


    Gabriel and Jenny both nodded and I continued, ¡°Shauna, regarding Samuel, since there¡¯s nothing else we can do at this point, I¡¯d like you to assume that your information is correct and Samuel is in that prison and that Roger can get him out. We¡¯ll need a plan to get him out of the country. There¡¯s even the possibility that Roger might decide to free other prisoners at the same time. Samuel or the others will need supplies, food, clothes, temporary shelter, and new identities. When Roger gets them out, there¡¯s going to be a massive manhunt for them. I¡¯d like to see a list of what resources you can bring in to help him, how fast those resources can be activated, and what they will cost.¡±


    I spent the rest of the afternoon with Shauna. It was quite the education watching her organize the resources that I¡¯d suggested. For each requirement, she set up multiple alternatives and started making plans for each one. Something as simple sounding as transportation became a nightmare to plan for since there was so much we didn¡¯t know. Would Samuel be able to walk on his own? How many others would Roger release? Would they be healthy enough to travel? Did we need to arrange for a car or a van or a bus to carry everyone?


    As Shauna planned, I realized just how much different this rescue was going to be than the last one. This time, it wasn¡¯t enough to just alert the police and knock out a few guards. This time I would have to personally release Samuel and any others. How would I know which of the others to release? It would really suck to free a bunch of thieves and murderers.


    Once I decided on who to take, I¡¯d probably need to take the captives into one of the layers or sub-layers of reality. That was the easy part. In the layers however, they wouldn¡¯t be able to move, just like the dog that I¡¯d brought to L2 to get rid of its cancer. How was I going to get them out of the prison if they couldn¡¯t move? Obviously, I could carry them like I¡¯d carried Mark, but I¡¯d really only carried him for a short time and I¡¯d been exhausted afterwards. There was no way that I could carry Samuel and any others out of the prison and out of the surrounding area. Well, I guess I could, technically. In L2 no one could find us and I had as much time as I¡¯d need, but I couldn¡¯t be gone for very long without my friends and family wondering where I was. With the flight time being around four and a half hours each way, I needed to get in and get out as quickly as possible. I could disappear for a day and a night, but not much more than that. I had a feeling that I would need to beg Eva to cover for me again.


    Finding a solution for lifting people in L2 didn¡¯t take very long. Being able to get the solution delivered quickly and with enough time for me to train in using it was another matter.

 Chapter 27: A Quick Conversation with Howie

    ¡°Hi Howie!¡±, I said when he picked up.


    ¡°Hey Abby. How¡¯s Shauna working out?¡±


    ¡°She¡¯s awesome. I¡¯ve put her in charge of the day-to-day administration of my charity.¡±


    ¡°Huh. That seems to underutilize her skill set.¡±, he commented.


    ¡°Well, she may have a few other duties, but we can discuss that another time.¡± Actually, we would not be discussing that. Ever.


    ¡°Can you get me a powered exoskeleton suit?¡±, I blurted out. I find that often works in moving the conversation to less sensitive matters.


    There was a short pause on his end. ¡°Sorry, Abby. My brain had to switch gears. I wasn¡¯t expecting that question. You¡¯re making a habit of that. To answer your question though, yes, I can get you a suit. Is it just the one and will you be the one using it?¡±


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    ¡°Yes and yes. I need to be able to carry a heavy load over a long distance and up and down stairs. Anywhere from 100 to 300 pounds.¡±


    ¡°So not just the ones that provide strength to your legs. You¡¯ll need the full suit that enhances your upper body strength and provides significant back support. There are quite a few models you can choose from, including both civilian and military models. A lot depends on the battery life you need, how complex the tasks your doing is, the weight of the actual suit, and the amount of armor protection that¡¯s required.¡±


    ¡°Well, I¡¯ll need it to be lightweight, since I¡¯ll probably be wearing it for an entire day or carrying it with me. As to batter life, do they come with a passive mode, where I¡¯d just be wearing the suit without it assisting me?¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m not sure. I¡¯ll have to look into that.¡±


    ¡°I don¡¯t need any armor. I just need help in lifting. Overall, battery life and low weight are the key features I¡¯m looking for. The task is a very simple lift and haul.¡±


    ¡°Ok, Abby. I¡¯ll see what I can get you.¡± Howie sounded like he was about to hang up.


    ¡°Wait! I need it yesterday. Since that¡¯s not possible anymore, when¡¯s the next earliest I can get it?¡±


    ¡°You can¡¯t rush this, Abby. I need to research the best options for you. I¡¯ll call you tomorrow.¡± He hung up on me again. I sighed and changed for Kung Fu.

 Chapter 28: A New Student

    Uncle Magnum was not happy that I¡¯d missed class last night, again, and he made sure that I knew it. It was obvious because he separated the class into two groups and had one group do the regular warm up and the other group to do the special warm up. I was the only one in the special group. It started off with extra horse-stance and continued with a full fifteen minutes of plank. The rest of the class kept stealing glances my way, wondering why I was being singled out.


    I tried to talk to Uncle Magnum about it, but he told me to concentrate on my form, so I suffered through the agonies of warm up in silence. Well, I was silent, but Uncle Magnum¡¯s exhortations to sit lower in horse-stance or to tighten my core in plank were not silent at all. I was seriously beginning to wonder if agreeing to be evaluated by Sifu Zhang was worth the pain and bother. With everything going on in my life, did I really need this now?


    It turns out that I did, because just as class was ending, I heard the front door open and Mark walked in. He was wearing a concert t-shirt for a band I¡¯d never heard of and a pair of sweatpants. He was here for the beginner class. God loves me!


    When Mark saw the gleeful expression on my face, his expression turned to horror and he started to leave.


    ¡°Hold it right there! One more step towards that door and I¡¯ll be on the phone to Grandpa Jake. I¡¯m assuming my comment about your lack of physical fitness has something to do with you¡¯re being here?¡± I was enjoying this so much and he wasn¡¯t even in any pain yet.


    ¡°Hi Abby. Fancy meeting you here. I was just thinking that I should come over and see what this Kung Fu stuff is all about. Figured I¡¯d watch a class and see if it¡¯s for me.¡±


    ¡°Watch a class? No way. Kung Fu is about doing, not watching. Let me show you where you can put your stuff away and I¡¯ll go over the opening salute with you.¡±


    ¡°You look like you¡¯ve had a rough time already. I could come back another night.¡±


    ¡°Nah. Tonight was an easy class.¡± I lied. It was grueling and I was in desperate need of a shower. ¡°I¡¯ll introduce you to the teacher and get some water while you two talk. We have ten minutes until class starts.¡±


    After he put his things away, I brought Mark over to Uncle Magnum and made introductions.


    ¡°Ah, you¡¯re that Mark. You look different standing up. Taller.¡±, Uncle Magnum said without even the slightest hint of smile on his face.


    Mark was caught completely off guard. ¡°I think that most people look taller standing up. I¡¯m sorry, have we met before?¡±


    ¡°The last time I saw you, you were hanging over Abby¡¯s shoulder before she handed you off to some firemen. Looking at the size of you now, I can¡¯t figure out how she managed it.¡±


    Mark understood immediately and answered solemnly, ¡°I don¡¯t know how she did it either, but I have the video saved on my phone. Maybe we can get everyone here to watch it with us and we can try to figure it out.¡± I didn¡¯t like his smirk as he said the last part and I made a mental note to wipe it off of his face as soon as class started.


    ¡°Knowing Abby, you¡¯re going to regret that offer. However, step into my office for a few minutes and I¡¯ll give you the sales pitch.¡±


    ¡°Don¡¯t bother with the hard sell, Uncle. He¡¯s going to be signing up whether he likes it or not.¡± With that quip, I went up to my room, changed my t-shirt and freshened up a bit. I hadn¡¯t planned on staying tonight, but there was no way that I was going to miss Mark¡¯s first class.


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    For once, I didn¡¯t mind horse-stance and I honestly enjoyed plank. I was next to Mark the entire time and made sure that he did them properly. It was my job after all and I think that it¡¯s important to do your job to the best of your ability.


    ¡°How long does this plank last, Abby?¡±, Mark asked while gritting through the pain in his knuckles and shoulders.


    ¡°Another three and a half more minutes.¡± Mark collapsed to the floor at my words. ¡°Come on, Mark, this is the last part of the warm-up. Class begins right after this.¡±


    The look that Mark gave me would have been censored if he¡¯d spoken it out loud on tv, but he managed to get back into plank, if only for a few seconds.


    ¡°Just think, Mark. After class you might be hungry enough to have a three or four bowls of your camp stew. I¡¯m sure you¡¯re not aware of this fact but working hard can make you hungry. It has something to do with replenishing the energy that you used up.¡± I gave him my sweetest smile and proceeded to do some push-ups, just to rub it in a bit. I¡¯d pay for that tomorrow, but right now I wasn¡¯t feeling the pain at all.


    ¡°You may think that you¡¯ve won, but this isn¡¯t over, Abby.¡±


    ¡°You¡¯re right. It¡¯s not over, this is just the warm-up. Also, it¡¯s only your first class. I¡¯m expecting you to be here at least three times a week, every week, week after week after week.¡±


    Mark let out a low groan and kept his mouth shut after that.


    On the drive back home after class, Uncle Magnum and I had a good laugh at Mark¡¯s pain. He also explained that Sifu Zhang was coming to visit about a week before school would start.


    ¡°I know I¡¯ve been pushing your hard these last few weeks, Abby, and I want to thank you for all the effort that you¡¯ve been putting in. This visit with Sifu Zhang is not a normal visit. When you agreed to be tested by him, I fully expected us to be heading back to Raleigh for the evaluation. That¡¯s how it¡¯s always been. I took Charlie out there for his red belt testing, as well as all the others. He¡¯s never come here before.¡±


    ¡°You¡¯ve got a great school, Uncle M. I¡¯m sure he¡¯s going to be impressed with the place.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m not worried about the school. I¡¯m worried about Sifu Zhang. He¡¯s not just coming to evaluate you and heading back. He has asked if he could stay for a month. This is a man who hasn¡¯t left Raleigh in over a decade. Even then he only left for a few days to attend a funeral back in his home country. He officially closes his school for two weeks a year, during Christmas, but his students are still welcome to join him for daily training, since he doesn¡¯t travel anywhere. I once asked him why he doesn¡¯t go away for a vacation and he answered, ¡°Paul, this is my vacation. Any break that I took would be work¡±, and now he¡¯s going to take a month off? Something''s going on and it''s not good.¡±


    ¡°Ok. I can see why you¡¯re worried. It does sound out of character. I still don¡¯t understand why you¡¯re working me so hard, when it¡¯s him that you¡¯re worried about.¡±


    Uncle Magnum sighed. ¡°Abby, compared to Sifu Zhang¡¯s teaching style, I coddle you guys. Your generation doesn¡¯t seem to take well to the tough love approach. I teach the same techniques the I learned from Sifu Zhang, but in a much softer way. I don¡¯t jump on your stomachs during abdominal breathing exercises and I don¡¯t stand on your backs during plank. If Sifu¡¯s going to be here for a month, I want to toughen you up a bit before he gets here.¡±


    ¡°I see. I noticed that you didn¡¯t put that in the brochure when you asked me about the testing. Sounds like a typical bait and switch scam to me. You sold it as, ¡®Hey Abby, want to get your red belt?¡¯ but then you changed it to, ¡®Hey Abby, want me to torture you for six weeks and then get tortured some more by my old Sifu for a month?¡¯ You really need to work on your communications skills.¡±


    ¡°You¡¯ve just proved my point. You¡¯re too soft.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s what she said.¡± Oh shit, did I just say that out loud to my uncle?


    Uncle Magnum laughed. Yup, I said it out loud. I need to work on my inside voice more. Time to move this conversation along.


    ¡°So where is Sifu staying while he¡¯s here?¡±, I deflected.


    ¡°Uhm. Well, you haven¡¯t been using your room at my place that much lately.¡±


    ¡°Just to shower and change and keep clothes in and lots of my other stuff. You¡¯re seriously kicking me out of my room?¡±


    ¡°For a month. You can shower and change in my room when you need to.¡±


    I blew out a breath and made it seem like it was a serious inconvenience. It wasn¡¯t. I make a lot of sense and I hadn¡¯t stayed overnight in my room for months. I¡¯d been trying to give Uncle Magnum and Margaret all the alone time that I could.


    ¡°Fine, but you¡¯re going to have to make it up to me somehow and somehow needs to include less horse-stance and much less plank when this is all over.¡±

 Chapter 29: A Date with Bobby

    What I really wanted to do this Saturday was hop on a plane to Venezuela and see if I could find Samuel. What I ended up doing was preparing to go on a date with Bobby. What does it say about me that I¡¯d prefer breaking into a prison in a foreign country and facing down men with machine guns, to going on a date with a cute boy that might end up being my boyfriend?


    Seriously though, I¡¯m seventeen already. A date shouldn¡¯t be that big of a deal to me. I should have had a whole bunch of them by now. Eva and James had been together forever and almost all my friends had had boyfriends or girlfriends by now. Dating someone just never seemed that important. Eva said that it was a combination of me being too busy to get to know anyone and me being clueless about boys.


    I¡¯d given up on the idea of taking Bobby to Mary¡¯s soup kitchen for our first date. I didn¡¯t want that many eyes and ears watching my every move and listening in. Wait, did I say first date? That implied a second date. I was getting ahead of myself. Anyways, I decided that I¡¯d save Mary¡¯s for a future date, if there was one. This put the date planning back in Bobby¡¯s court and he decided to make a surprise of it all and simply said that he¡¯d pick me up at seven and to dress casually.


    Eva came over in the afternoon and helped me pick out an outfit. I didn¡¯t think that I needed any help. Jeans, a flowy blouse and slides wasn¡¯t rocket science, but Eva insisted and I didn¡¯t really care much. If it made her happy, I could play along. Twenty outfits later, I wasn¡¯t so keen on the whole thing anymore and I ended the process. Jeans, a different, more summery, blouse and sandals.


    She also made me swap out my ever-present scrunchie pony-tail for a few well place hair clips and applied some very minimal makeup. I¡¯d never been much for makeup. Makeup and blacksmithing or makeup and Kung Fu don¡¯t go well together, so Eva had to put it on for me. It was one of those times where I really missed my mom. I thought about how she should have been the one to teach me about makeup and help me pick out clothes for my first date. Then again, if she¡¯d never gone missing, I wouldn¡¯t have appreciated her as much as I should and I would have gone full teenager on her and not let her participate. I almost started crying just thinking about her, but I managed to hold it in and keep the light layer of mascara from running down my face.


    Bobby pulled up at seven and somehow dad managed to answer the door before I could. He also managed to answer the door in his blacksmithing gear. Work boots, jeans, t-shirt, safety goggles, and a heavy leather apron. He looked huge compared to Bobby and he was definitely going for the whole intimidation angle. Dad only wore the apron for certain specialty work and he never, ever, left his workshop wearing his apron or his safety goggles. He also rarely answered the door before I could get there.


    I almost felt bad for Bobby and I watched him appraising dad¡¯s solid build, but Bobby managed to say his ¡®Hello Sir¡¯ in a steady voice and forced a laugh from dad as he continued with, ¡°You and your daughter are the two most intimidating people that I¡¯ve ever met.¡±


    With a smile still on his face, dad welcomed Bobby inside and soon returned to his workshop with a simple exhortation to ¡®have fun¡¯. He¡¯d gotten his message through loud and clear. There was not point in his hanging around and embarrassing me any further.


    As soon as dad left, Bobby and I shifted from being awkward because dad was around to being awkward because he wasn¡¯t. We¡¯ve hung around each other plenty of times over the past several months and it had never been strange before. Pin the label ¡®date¡¯ onto it though and everything changes.


    Bobby got us going with the old classic, ¡°You look great, Abby!¡± and the ice was broken; easing some of our tension.


    Putting on my best Valley Girl slash Southern Belle voice, I said, ¡°This ol¡¯ thing? I wore it to the Finklestein Bar-Mitzvah last year. Daddy said that it was WAY too casual, but I felt that since the Bar-Mitzvah boy was wearing a sweater instead of a suit that I could rock this chemise. I mean I know that it¡¯s like so two seasons ago, but my friend Deliah told me that her friend Christi though that it was totally rad.¡±


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    ¡°Shut up, Abby.¡±


    ¡°Ok. Sure thing. This is me shutting up. Not another word out of me. Not one peep.¡± I mimed locking my mouth up with a key and then opening my mouth to swallow it. I gulped audibly.


    I got a great facepalm from Bobby and he took my hand and dragged me to the door. I suppose that¡¯s one way to get straight to the hand holding portion of the date. Very smooth.


    ¡°We should get going. If we¡¯re not there on time, then nothing changes.¡±


    Bobby opened the car door for me and walked around to his door. Unlike me, Bobby had started the process to get his driver¡¯s license as soon as he turned fifteen and had gotten his full driver¡¯s license months ago. I¡¯d only decided to start the process to get my permit a few weeks ago and hopefully I¡¯d have it in a few weeks. I couldn¡¯t get my full driver¡¯s license for a year and half after that. Now that I wanted it, it kind of sucked that I had to wait. Besides, I¡¯d been driving my car in R2 or L2 for months and I felt that I was a great driver, as long as I didn¡¯t have to obey any speed limits or watch out for other cars and could ignore nearly all the road signs.


    ¡°Where are we going?¡±, I asked as I put on my seat belt.


    ¡°Can¡¯t tell you. It¡¯s a surprise.¡±


    ¡°Really?¡±


    ¡°Yup. I wracked my brain trying to figure out where we could go on our first date and I couldn¡¯t think of anything truly spectacular, so I decided to go in the other direction.¡±


    ¡°So our date is going to be tremendously boring?¡±, I asked. Don¡¯t think for a moment that I missed his use of ¡®first¡¯ before date.


    ¡°No. Not boring. I¡¯m going with clich¨¦.¡± As he said this last bit, he gestured up in the air as if the word was being displayed up on giant billboard lights.


    ¡°Wow. You really know how to sweep a girl off her feet. You¡¯re such a charmer.¡± I delivered all that in my best deadpan voice.


    ¡°Hold on. Hear me out. Clich¨¦s are clich¨¦ for a reason. Clich¨¦ dates are the meat and potato of dates. They¡¯re the best kind of dates because every time you see them in a cheesy Christmas movie or read about them in a book, you¡¯ll think back and remember our date. A clich¨¦ date connects you to society. If we were do something awesome, then we¡¯d probably forget all about it over time because we¡¯d never be reminded of it in popular culture.¡±


    Now it was my turn to facepalm. ¡°Truly, you have dizzying intellect.¡±


    ¡°Wait ¡®til I get going!¡±, Bobby replied enthusiastically. And there was the real reason that I¡¯d agreed to go on this date. Bobby was able to quote lines from the Princess Bride almost as well as I could.


    ¡°Seriously, now that you¡¯ve successfully lowered my expectations about this date and referred to me as either meat or potatoes, would you care to tell me which of the many clich¨¦ date locations we¡¯ll be going to. Dinner and a movie. Movie and dessert. A stroll along the beach, a walk in the park under a full moon. Your house for dinner to meet your family, including your quaint Nana that says all sorts of curmudgeonly things that we¡¯re supposed to be scandalized about but in reality find hilarious, all while your little sister giggles at us, making kissing sounds, and your puppy Snowball begs adorably for scraps and yips all around the room?¡±


    ¡°Holy shit. That was descriptive. You sure you don¡¯t write Christmas movies in your spare time? Anyways, no, none of those cliches. For you, only the best clich¨¦ will do. We¡¯re going to a carnival. The state fair is two counties over and I¡¯m going to buy you a hot dog, take you up on the Ferris wheel, check out the bearded lady, win you a stuffed animal, get upset when the guy in the dunk tank insults you, and hold you while you¡¯re terrified in the haunted house.¡± He beamed with pride at his mediocre plan.


    I couldn¡¯t help laughing. It was the most clich¨¦ date I could think of and it sounded wonderful. He even managed to pull off most of the things he¡¯d planned to do. We ended up changing the hot dog to two slices of greasy pizza, the bearded lady wasn¡¯t there so we settled on seeing the world¡¯s smallest horse, and he did dunk the rude guy in the dunk tank, only the guy insulted Bobby¡¯s manhood and not me, so Bobby was defending his own honor.


    One other difference was that I won my own stuffed animal, a fluffy red lion that I named Red. It was at the balloon dart game and I may have bent the rules just a smidgen and used my field to break the balloons when my dart throw was off by an inch or two. Some might call it cheating, but I can definitely say that it takes more effort and skill to fake a successful balloon pop using a field that it takes to successfully pop a balloon the normal way.


    Other than that we walked around, holding hands, and went on lots of rides. I even pretended to be scared in the haunted house ride so that Bobby would hold me tighter. Not that there was a chance of my being surprised on the ride, as I¡¯d sent out my field all around me and could see where all the ghouls and ghosts were going to ambush us. The giant spider surprised Bobby quite a bit and he held me more tightly for awhile after. Yay giant spiders!


    Bobby ended the night at my front door by holding me again and kissing me in a way that was movie style clich¨¦, yet still amazing.

 Chapter 30: Recon

    The next morning, I woke up early and headed off to Venezuela. I wasn¡¯t ready to rescue Samuel or anyone else, but I needed more information and I couldn¡¯t wait anymore. I¡¯d left things too long with Evan and I didn¡¯t want to make the same mistake again. I left dad a note that I¡¯d be out all day running errands and drove my borrowed car to the airport. My R1 backpack was sitting insubstantially on my shoulders and I had filled it the morning before with prepared meals, snacks, water, and some of Howie¡¯s gadgets.


    With tensions between the United States and Venezuela running high these days, I was surprised that there were still any flights to Caracas out of Charlotte. Sure, they only had direct flight on weekends, but given all the troubles going on in Venezuela, I couldn¡¯t understand why anyone was going there at all. Those direct flights were a lifesaver though, as they took only a little over four hours. With stopovers the travel time would have been over fifteen hours and there was no way that I could disappear from home for two days. As it was, I was going to have to hurry to make it back in time for the return flight. I had just over five hours to get to the prison, get the information I needed, and get back to the airport. Since I wasn¡¯t on the passenger list, no one was going to hold the plane on my account.


    I spent the entire flight in L1. With rock hard seats, it wasn¡¯t comfortable, but it was quiet and I did manage to sleep for a few hours. I made a note to bring a pillow next time. The rest of the time I looked out the window and marveled at the fact that I was in a plane that to all appearance was flying itself over a world where humanity did not exist. It was still strange to me how fixed layers of reality combined to form a reality where change was possible and those changes forced change to occur in the layers. Each layer built upon the last layer until we had a world where people lived. Those people were able to move and create objects that then appeared or moved within their respective layers. L3 was a layer that had none of these objects but provided the base for them to exist. L2 contained more immovable structures, such as houses and buildings that appeared in L2, as if by magic, as they were constructed in reality. L1 had the base, the immovable structures, and the moveable elements, such as cars and buses and these would move around in tandem with the ones in reality. In practical terms that meant that I could go to a construction site in L2 and watch a building come into existence out of thin air. Every day it would just get a little taller or a little more finished. It was massively cool to watch portions of a building simply appear out of nowhere.


    The plane landed safely and I shifted to R1 to follow my fellow passengers as they gathered their belongings and made their way off of the plane. I could have just stayed in L1, but I¡¯d never been to this airport before and it was easier to simply follow the crowd to the exit, especially since my Spanish wasn¡¯t very good and I couldn¡¯t ask anyone for directions.


    Eventually I found my way to the rental car area of the airport and after watching how the rental agencies operated for a several minutes, I used a field to shift a set of car keys to R1. The keys were to a small sedan that was schedule for pick-up in an hour and it was already gassed up and ready to go in their small lot just outside the rental office. I found the car and when no one was looking my way, I shifted the car to R1, got in and drove away. Yes, it was technically stealing, but my plan was to return the car in a few hours and leave some money behind for its use. Maybe the rental company would get the money or maybe it would go into the pocket of one of its employees. I can¡¯t be held responsible for someone else¡¯s theft.


    As soon as I was out of sight of the rental company, I shifted myself and the car to reality. I would have liked to spend my entire time in Venezuela in one of the layers, but I couldn¡¯t get directions from my phone if I was in one of the layers. Waze was able to get me close to the prison in less than half an hour.


    With two miles of curving narrow road left until I reached the prison, I slipped back into R1. I¡¯d been driving through a forested area for the past few minutes and I hadn¡¯t seen any other cars for awhile. I figured that a lone car passing by a prison might attract the attention of any guards. I watched the odometer count off the miles and the prison quickly came into view.


    A sixteen-foot grey stone wall, topped with razor wire and surveillance cameras, surrounded the prison. Over the edge of the wall and seemingly set at least two hundred feet inside the perimeter, I could make out the tops of a few buildings and several manned guard towers. I parked the rental (Can you still call it a ¡®rental¡¯ when you¡¯ve stolen it? Maybe it¡¯s a ¡®stolen¡¯.) at the main gate and shifted it to L2 while I walked past guards with machine guns. A shift to R2 and I was through the entry gates and heading across a cleared area towards a squat two story building that seemed to be the prisoner intake and administration building. The lack of bars across the windows was the best clue that it didn¡¯t house any prisoners.


    Looking around, I could see six other buildings in two neat rows of three. These long buildings were all identical to each other except for a letter over the entrance. The building were labelled A through F and were each five stories tall with steel bars across all their windows. Judging by the barred windows that were set at ground levels, each building also had a basement level. The prison had a military feel to it and I wondered if it was a repurposed army base. There were certainly an army of guards keeping watch over the place.


    Spending the next few hours running from building to building and floor to floor looking for Samuel didn¡¯t seem like a good way to spend my time. The administration building would surely have a list of all the prisoners and their locations and would probably have a record of why they were here. That¡¯s what I was after. Those records would let my team back home figure out how many people we needed to rescue. Maybe, if I were lucky, the place would be filled solely with rapists and murderers and I¡¯d only need to get Samuel out. Somehow though, I knew that wouldn¡¯t be the case. The Venezuelan government had detained and imprisoned a lot of foreigners during their roundups and there was a good chance that if Samuel were here, then at least some of the others would be as well.


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    Having broken into dozens of offices and a few police stations in the past, I had developed a general plan of attack. My first priority was finding the computer server and getting the administrator password. Once I had access to the server, I¡¯d set up Howie¡¯s miracle hard drive to start copying it and I¡¯d let that run while I looked for any physical files that might be of use.


    The prison server room was surprisingly clean and well organized. My preconceptions of Venezuela had led me to expect a rats nest of wires and cobbled equipment all held together by duct tape. I¡¯d forgotten that Venezuela, before socialism had set in and ruined everything, had been one of the wealthiest nations in South America. The server room obviously harkened back to those days of less limited budgets. I¡¯d seen quite a few fortune 500 companies with server rooms that didn¡¯t compare to this one and I started to wonder what a prison would need such an impressive bank of servers for. I guess that a lot of the servers were used for the security cameras, but even then, there were far too many racks.


    Putting aside those thoughts for later, I found the administrator on duty and set up my video camera to watch his every keystroke, waiting for him to enter his password. I set my phone alarm for half an hour. If he didn¡¯t put in his password by the time the alarm went off, I¡¯d have to take a chance and interrupt the power to his computer and force it to reboot. This would force him to put in his password and I¡¯d get it on video. Luckily, I didn¡¯t have to do that as the system was set to automatically prompt the user to put in a username and password every so often, probably every half hour, and I only had to wait ten minutes until the prompt came on and I had it.


    I plugged Howie¡¯s hard drive into the main server and set it to start copying. There were a lot of files and the drive let me know that it would take about two hours. That was ok. I had plenty to do.


    From Shauna¡¯s information about this prison, I already suspected that their main computer system wasn¡¯t connected to the internet at all, but I wanted to make sure that I had a way into any of computer systems that were connected and I was sure that one office in particular would have all the access I would need.


    It didn¡¯t take long to find the warden¡¯s office. Not only did he have corner office on the second floor, but his was the only office with a secretary desk and a guard post outside the door. With it being Sunday, the warden was not in and the area outside his office was empty. That allowed me to basically stroll in through the door and phase back to reality at his desk. I didn¡¯t think that he wouldn¡¯t have security cameras in his own office, but I sent out my field to make sure before I phased back in.


    The warden, Senor Juan Antonio Diaz, as his desk name plate showed, had left his computer on, but not logged in. I did a quick search, but he hadn¡¯t written his password anywhere obvious for me to find. That forced my hand a little and I had to take a chance. I took out my video camera and carefully reviewed the video of the administrator login information. When I was sure that I had the correct sequence of letters, I typed them into Senor Diaz¡¯s computer and prayed that the system didn¡¯t have an issue with multiple, concurrent, uses of the same administrator login. If it did, then I was so screwed. I held my breath as I pushed the enter button and waited the interminable three seconds until the password field disappeared. Relief poured over me as the system unlocked and no alarms seemed to go off. I quickly plugged in another hard drive and started copying this computer as well. I also put in one of Howie¡¯s thumb drives that would give me remote access to this computer and would set it up so that any information that was sent to me would not be logged by the system.


    As my hard drive copied it¡¯s contents, I scanned the computer to see what it had on it. It was all in Spanish and I gave up after a few seconds. Shauna was much better suited to the task than I was and I had a few other stops to make while I waited for the drives to finish.


    My trip to the security offices to see what the cameras were watching changed everything. It seemed that most of the prison housed two inmates to a cell. The exception seemed to be in two of the basement levels. Whereas four of the basement levels were configured like the floors above, with dual occupied cells, two of the basement levels had sections that were mostly open, only partially divided into sleeping, eating and recreational areas. What shocked me was seeing that one of those levels had children. What the hell were children doing in a prison?


    I kept watching and slowly realized that what I was seeing in that basement level were imprisoned families. Four mothers and nine children in total. No fathers. Thirteen people to rescue. How was I going to get so many people out of here?


    The problem got worse as I tore my gaze away from that building and examined the other open concept basement level. No children this time, thank God, but there were eleven adults in the large room. Most of these adults looked to be Caucasian and I figured that this was the ¡®detained foreigners¡¯ section. Now I was up to twenty-four people needing rescue! I¡¯d need a bus to get them all out of here and even then I didn¡¯t know where to take them to. Samuel I could bring with me, but what about all the others?


    One of the men in the second buildings'' basement levels had features that reminded me of Shauna and I assumed that he was Samuel. I couldn¡¯t be sure because the picture quality wasn¡¯t the greatest. He looked ok on the video feed, if on the emaciated side. With the food shortages in Venezuela, I didn¡¯t figure that feeding the prison inmates properly was high on their list of priorities. Except for the children, who were running around and playing with a soccer ball, all the prisoners looked worn out and hungry. None of them looked sick though and that was good because it meant that I had time to get this information to the team back home and come up with a plan. I already knew how I¡¯d get them all out of the prison. I just didn¡¯t know what to do with them afterwards.

 Chapter 31: Rescue Planning

    Getting back to the airport wasn¡¯t hard and I had about an hour until takeoff as I pulled up to the rental agency. I changed a few settings on my phone and used the time to call Eva from a secluded section of the airport, to give her an update on my date with Bobby. She was a bit miffed that I¡¯d waited so long to call her but I made up for it by recounting the date in detail and all was forgiven.


    ¡°Wow. That sounds so nice. I¡¯m starting to think that James had been neglecting me. He hasn¡¯t taken me anywhere like that in awhile. I¡¯m going to have words with that boy.¡±, Eva sighed.


    ¡°Take it easy on James. It¡¯s not his fault. He¡¯s taken you out plenty of times. It¡¯s just that you guys have been together for so long and all the magic is gone by now. You fit each other like an old cozy sock and a worn in shoe. Nice, snug, comfortable. There¡¯s no reason to put in any effort anymore. It¡¯s almost like you¡¯re married already and the kids have gone off to college.¡± I smiled inwardly because I knew she was not taking kindly to my words.


    ¡°The magic is gone? Sock and shoe? Married couple? Abby Smith, you are going to pay for each and every one of those words. I think I just signed you up for a few private fitness training courses with me. The first one starts in one hour.¡± Hah! She sounded just like me. I wonder if I¡¯d learned to be so vengeful from her or she from me.


    ¡°Oops. Sorry, I¡¯m a little busy right now. I¡¯ll be home late tonight though. Maybe we can do that tomorrow. Oh no, I¡¯m teaching in the morning and I have to be at Hannah¡¯s Home in the afternoon. I also have Kung Fu at night. Hmmmm, I seem to be full up. Have your people call my people and we¡¯ll do lunch sometime!¡±


    I was about to hang up and revel in the win, when Eva replied, ¡°Yeah, I¡¯ve got to get off anyways. Bobby is calling me. I¡¯m sure he wants to tell me all about your date. I¡¯ll let you know what he had to say during our private training session. Bye Abby!¡±


    Damn. She¡¯s good. She was probably making up that stuff about Bobby calling. Wasn¡¯t she? Probably.


    I decided not to return my ¡®rental¡¯ car just yet. Having to borrow another car would waste time when I came back for the rescue, so I left the car in L2 at the rental place with the doors unlocked and the keys on the seat. I felt a little bad for the rental company, but then again, I had brought the car back to their lot. I¡¯d even parked it in the exact spot that I¡¯d taken it from. Was it my fault if they couldn¡¯t find it?


    On the flight back my mind raced with different options for the rescue. I¡¯d decided that it had to be next week. There was another direct flight next Saturday afternoon and I could catch a return flight on Sunday night. How was I going to explain an overnight absence to dad? Ugh! I was going to have to ask Eva to cover for me again. That meant a training session. I had done the fun thing in teasing her, but my timing was lousy.


    This time when the plane landed I didn¡¯t wait for the other passengers. I raced off through them and to my car. Since it was in L2, I¡¯d left it inside the terminal. No sense in having to park it outside. The large revolving doors didn¡¯t exist in L2 and the car could easily pass through the opening. Fifteen minutes after the plane landed, I was racing down the highway towards home.


    As usual, I found dad in his workshop. He was so completely focused on the piece that he was working on that he had lost track of the time. Since neither of us had eaten, we cooked up a bunch of noodles and prepared a simple salad for dinner. I drew dad out to talk about the piece he was working on. It took his mind off of asking me about my day and I was always interested to hear him talk about his new art pieces. Tonight though, as he spoke my mind kept flashing to those families in the prison. The father had probably been speaking out against those in power and their families had been taken away in retaliation. Whatever the reason for their imprisonment, at least some of them were together. The parents wouldn¡¯t see that. I was sure that they¡¯re rather know that their children were safe somewhere else. I knew better though. Families weren¡¯t safe even when they were free. That was life. My mother was out there somewhere, probably dead, and I¡¯d give almost anything to be with her, even if it meant being imprisoned. I guess that was the difference between fearing that you¡¯d lose someone you loved and having already lost them.


    My somber mood continued into the night and I slept poorly. I don¡¯t remember what I dreamed about, but my twisted covers and the sheen of sweat on me as I jerked awake told me that it wasn¡¯t something good. There was no way that I was getting back to sleep, so I got up, showered, and got ready for the day. Unfortunately, it was still a quarter to six in the morning and it was too early to call anyone. I kept busy by cleaning my room and getting breakfast ready for dad. It was still too early so I sat down and worked on a list of all the things that I¡¯d need to get ready for Saturday.


    <ul>


    <li>Prepare outfit</li>


    <li>Talk to Howie about Exosuit</li>


    <li>Learn to use Exosuit</li>


    <li>Bus transportation from the prison</li>


    <li>Find out who I¡¯m rescuing</li>


    <li>Arrange for food and money for the prisoners</li>


    <li>Find a safe place to hide the prisoners</li>


    <li>Get Eva to agree to be an excuse again.</li>


    <li>Bring Samuel back to Hannah¡¯s Home</li>


    <li>Prepare a story with Shauna about his return</li>


    </ul>


    That last item was important. Once Samuel was back, he would be questioned thoroughly by the army about his escape from the prison and he wouldn¡¯t have any answers for them. We needed to give them something.


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    I did some stretching exercises until I heard dad start to stumble around and it was finally late enough to call Howie. He didn¡¯t sound like a morning person so I kept it quick and pushed him for the exosuit. He mumbled something about Tuesday afternoon and I thanked him and hung up before he could. Finally, I beat him to it. I didn¡¯t even say goodbye. The next call was going to be fun.


    ¡°Hi Shauna. I hope I didn¡¯t wake you.¡±


    ¡°Hey Abby. No, my body is stuck on army time. I get up every morning at five am. It¡¯s actually something that I enjoyed in the army. That line in the old commercial about ¡®we do more before nine am than most people do all day¡¯ is very true. This isn¡¯t normal for you though. What¡¯s up?¡±


    ¡°I had a delivery from Roger this morning. Three hard drives from the prison in Venezuela. Lots of Spanish on them and he doesn¡¯t speak Spanish. He figured that you¡¯d like to take a look and see what you can find out about the prisoners there.¡±


    ¡°How did he get them? Are they really from the prison?¡± Shauna was a bit shellshocked and I could tell that she trying to keep her excitement in check.


    ¡°He said that he broke in, got the passwords to their system and copied the data. One drive is from their main server, one is from the warden¡¯s office and the last is full of security footage. He¡¯s thinks that your brother is there, but said you¡¯d need to watch the videos to be sure. Anyways, he said to tell you that he can get whoever we want out of there this coming weekend, but once they¡¯re out, he doesn¡¯t have a way to keep them safe. That¡¯s our part, I guess. I thought you¡¯d like to come pick up the drives this morning and you can get a start on them before I join you this afternoon.¡±


    Silence on the line. I could hear her breathing, but she wasn¡¯t saying anything.


    ¡°Shauna? Are you ok?¡±


    ¡°Yeah. I¡¯m just trying to take in what you¡¯re saying. You¡¯ve just told me several things that I though were impossible. I need to see these drives. I¡¯ll be by to get them in fifteen minutes.¡±


    She was there in ten minutes, just as dad and I were sitting down for breakfast. I realized that dad had never met Shauna and so I introduced her to him as the head administrator for the Hannah Foundation. They made small talk while I got the drives and then she was off. I didn¡¯t think that anyone else could tell, but I could see that she was almost in a panic to watch the security videos.


    The next five hours passed by slowly. I enjoyed helping dad work with his students, but my mind was on those drives and on what information the team could get from them. Again, I was appreciating that these were not beginner students and that I didn¡¯t have to keep them from burning themselves or others. I merely had to offer advice or help correct a technique. They didn¡¯t need my full attention today.


    Usually Shauna picked me up after class, but I suspected that today would be different. I figured that she¡¯d be poring over the data. To my surprise, she was parked right outside the building waiting for me like always. I got in and was shocked to see Shauna in tears. She hugged me and said, ¡°He¡¯s there! I saw him on the video. He¡¯s looks tired and he¡¯s lost a lot of weight, but he¡¯s alive. Abby, thank you!¡±


    I hugged her back and said, ¡°I¡¯m so happy for you Shauna, but what are you thanking me for? Roger¡¯s the real hero here.¡±


    ¡°Yes, he is, but you¡¯re the one who asked him to find Samuel. So thank you!¡±


    ¡°In that case, you¡¯re welcome, Shauna. Now tell me what else you¡¯ve learned. I take it that we have a lot of work to do, if Roger¡¯s going to be breaking Samuel out this weekend.¡±


    The rest of the week was full of planning our support for Roger. The team had found the files for all the prisoners and determined who needed to be rescued. The four families were the wives and children of four political opponents to the current Venezuelan government. They were being held hostage to ensure the support of their husbands to the existing socialist regime. Of the eleven foreigners, one was Samuel, two were US soldiers, three were South American tourists, one was a diplomat from Germany, two were an oil executive from France and his assistant, and two were undercover CIA operatives. They¡¯d all been swept up over the last three years by the Venezuelan intelligence agency and were being used as political pawns in one way or another. Of the eleven, we¡¯d only needed to rescue eight of them. The files showed that the three ¡®tourists¡¯ were prison informers and ¡®Roger¡¯ was going to leave them behind.


    Next was finding a place for ¡®Roger¡¯ to drop off the families where they¡¯d be safe. From her intensive search for her brother, Shauna had developed a list of solid contacts in Venezuela and through them she¡¯d made arrangements for the families to be taken to a safe location. However, safe was a relative term in Venezuela. In this case, safe meant a village under the control of a crime boss that hated the current government. Being so short on time, we didn¡¯t really have any other option and at least the government couldn¡¯t get their hands back on the families and the families would be well fed and cared for. One drawback to the deal was that we¡¯d have to free two other inmates as a down payment for their safety. Two of the crime boss¡¯s nephews were being held in the prison and as our prison records showed that they were in there for ¡®theft of government property¡¯, I had no issues in releasing them. Had they been locked up for a violent crime, I¡¯d have told Shauna to find another way to get the families to safety. There was no way that I¡¯d let murderers or rapists go free.


    Transportation from the prison turned out have an unexpected problem. Shauna arranged for a bus to be waiting for ¡®Roger¡¯ near the prison. He was supposed to drive the families to a secluded area where someone would be waiting to drive them the rest of the way to the village. From there, a pickup truck would be waiting for Roger to use to take the ¡®foreigners¡¯ to the airport. It was a great plan. Simple and straightforward. Only I didn¡¯t know how to drive a bus. I¡¯d only just learned to drive a car, and only in R2 so far. I couldn¡¯t even tell Shauna about my worries, since it was expected that ¡®Roger¡¯, who was an extremely resourceful person who could break into and out just about anywhere, would know how to drive a bus! Ugh. I didn¡¯t even know if the bus would have automatic transmission. If it was manual transmission, then I was totally screwed.

 Chapter 32: Exosuit

    While I was panicking over having to drive a bus, my powered exoskeleton suit arrived. It was exactly what I needed to take my mind off of my worries and I raced over to meet with Howie at his warehouse. Howie actually had several warehouses, each under a different company name and each buried under an avalanche of shell companies so deep that you¡¯d never know that Howie owned them all. Howie was a little bit paranoid and given the sorts of things that he procured for his clients, I didn¡¯t blame him one bit. Especially since I was one of those clients and life would be much harder without the toys that he supplied me with.


    ¡°You¡¯ll notice that this suit didn¡¯t come in a box. That¡¯s because it¡¯s one of the company¡¯s five prototypes and they didn¡¯t need it anymore. It doesn¡¯t have the snazzy bells and whistles that the final version has, but it¡¯ll get the job done. Plus, you got it at a discount.¡± Howie smiled in pride at this last bit. He loved getting a good deal.


    ¡°What kind of bells and whistles could I have had?¡±


    ¡°Never mind them. I checked them out and you they¡¯re not worth tripling the price. What you needed was long battery life, mobility, low unit weight, and the capacity to carry up to 250 pounds. This is the closest thing you¡¯re going to find to those requirements. Most suits can only handle a few of those specifications. Most long battery life units are bulky and restrict mobility too much. The lightweight suits are much more mobile, but they can¡¯t handle the carrying capacity that you need. Almost none of the other units can carry such a heavy weight, much less climb stairs while carrying it.¡±


    ¡°So, this can do all of it?¡±, I asked.


    ¡°No, but you won¡¯t find anything better out there. This suit weights thirty-two pounds, with the battery. Twenty-five without. A true light-weight suit would normally be around fifteen pounds, but that¡¯s for an unpowered suit with no battery. The battery on this suite can last up to eight hours, depending on the load that you put on it. I got you an extra battery, just in case, and there¡¯s a charging cable if you have the time.¡±


    Howie went on, ¡°Now, you can see that the unit isn¡¯t bulky at all. I¡¯m told that it¡¯s so flexible that you can even do yoga in it. I don¡¯t do yoga, so I can¡¯t tell you if that¡¯s true or not, but it doesn¡¯t look like you¡¯ll have trouble moving in it.¡±


    I couldn¡¯t argue with Howie on that. The suit, currently strapped onto a mannequin, didn¡¯t look like it would impede most of my Kung Fu moves. Without any armor, the exosuit was just a bunch of straps, metal joints and motors. You put it on like a harness and it provided support to key areas of the body; namely along your lower back, across your shoulders and surrounding your knees.


    ¡°The one drawback to this powered suit is the carrying capacity isn¡¯t quite what you wanted. The electric motors and hydraulics will reduce up to sixty percent of the weight that you¡¯ll be carrying, but only up to two hundred pounds. Over two hundred pounds, you¡¯ll feel every pound. That means that a two-hundred-pound weight will feel like eighty pounds, but if you go fifty pounds over that, you¡¯ll feel the eighty pounds plus the entire fifty pounds on top of that.¡±


    Howie looked almost apologetic about this, but I was thrilled. Two hundred and fifty was the extreme end of what I thought I¡¯d need to carry. Given what I¡¯d seen of the prisoners, I wouldn¡¯t need to carry more than two hundred pounds. All the prisoners had lost weight since entering jail and their clothes hung on them like they were wearing their much larger brother¡¯s hand-me-downs.


    ¡°This is perfect, Howie. I¡¯ll rarely need to go to two-fifty and even when I do, I can handle a hundred and thirty pounds for short distances.¡±


    This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it.


    After that, it was all about the practice. Howie had planned ahead and prepared several duffel bags for me, each pre-stuffed with items weighing between fifty and two hundred and fifty pounds. I put the suit on, adjusted the straps and got the feel for it. When I felt comfortable, I lifted the fifty-pound duffel and held it across my body, as if it were a person, and started walking around with it. The duffel was easy to carry and I didn¡¯t get tired at all as I walked up and down a set of stairs.


    Soon I graduated to the hundred-pound bag and then the hundred and fifty pounder. Now it felt like I was carrying a sixty-pound load. It wasn¡¯t as easy anymore, but it wasn¡¯t hard either. Walking for three hundred feet and up a set of stairs wasn¡¯t causing too much strain. However, at two hundred pounds, or effectively eighty pounds, it was getting much tougher. I could still do though. I had carried Mark down the stairs of his house and around the house after all, but that was a life and death situation, and I was exhausted for hours afterwards from the overstrain.


    I took a short break before trying the last bag. It felt like a hundred and thirty pounds and it was a thoroughly unpleasant experience. However, it was doable. The motors in the legs helped a lot with the lifting and my lower back was saved from destruction by the way the load was spread across the harness and driven into the ground by the leg supports. I wish I¡¯d had this for when I had to carry Mark.


    I left Howie with my thanks and several bundles of cash. I took my new exosuit home, where I planned to practice with it everyday until Saturday. This had been one of the last undone items on my list. All that was left was talking to Eva and getting her to agree to be my alibi. That was going to suck.


    __________


    ¡°Hi Eva!¡±, I said cheerily as she answered her phone.


    ¡°Are you calling to set up and appointment for some personal training?¡± No hi, no how are you. This wasn¡¯t good. She hadn¡¯t forgotten our last conversation. I sighed.


    ¡°I¡¯m good, thank you for asking. And you?¡±


    ¡°Hmmph! Don¡¯t try to sweet talk me. You called me a dirty sock last time we spoke and then you didn¡¯t call for five days. Now you¡¯re calling and being all nice. You want something. What is it?¡±


    ¡°Can¡¯t a girl just call her best friend in the whole world and just talk to her because she wants to?¡±


    ¡°Nope. I know you. You need something from me. It¡¯s in your voice. It gets slightly higher pitched when you¡¯re about to ask for something.¡± I heard the laughter in her voice and I knew that I was safe. She might still make me work out until I dropped, but at least she wasn¡¯t mad at me.


    ¡°I¡¯m changing your name to Sherlock Holmes. How¡¯d you even notice that?¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s a gift. Now spill it.¡±


    ¡°I need an alibi from Saturday afternoon to Sunday night.¡±


    ¡°What¡¯s if for?¡±, she asked.


    ¡°You¡¯re not supposed to ask. You¡¯re just supposed to say, ¡°I got your back, girl. Whatever you need, I¡¯m there for you.¡±


    ¡°Uh huh. Pretend I said all that, again. Now where are you really going?¡±


    ¡°Do you ever get the sense that we¡¯ve had this conversation before?¡±


    ¡°Didn¡¯t you just ask that? Seriously, what¡¯s it for this time? Also, what was it for last time? You never did tell me.¡± Last time was to free the people from Serpentine Logistics and I wasn¡¯t going to tell her that.


    ¡°Fine! I give up. I¡¯m meeting up with a boy that I like and we¡¯re going to spend the night together at his place in the mountains. I think he might be ¡®The One¡¯ and I might go all the way with him.¡± I said it in the most deadpan and monotone voice that I could make.


    Eva giggled. ¡°That didn¡¯t work last time, but I¡¯m impressed that you remembered your own excuse. You¡¯re very consistent. I know you¡¯re lying though because Bobby doesn¡¯t have a place in the mountains. Hey! You know who does have a place in the mountains? Mark. That¡¯s who. Are you going to shack up with Mark at this grandad¡¯s place?¡± Eva tone was way too excited at the prospect of a juicy gossip.


    ¡°No! First of all, Mark and I are just friends. Second, I thought you were Team Bobby.¡±


    ¡°I am, I am. But you know what a sucker I am for drama and a sizzling romance.¡±


    ¡°So, can we do the fake dinner and a movie thing with James and then a pretend day trip somewhere this weekend?¡±


    ¡°Don¡¯t we have a shift at the hospital this Sunday?¡±


    ¡°Oh shit! I forgot about that. I¡¯ll need to call Pierce right after you say yes. Can I book us both for a shift for the week after?¡±


    Eva huffed out a long-suffering breath. ¡°Yeah. I guess so. If it¡¯s important enough for you to blow off the hospital, then all I can say is I got your back, girl. Whatever you need, I¡¯m there for you.¡±


    ¡°Thank you, Eva. You¡¯re the world¡¯s best best friend. I¡¯ll call you later. I need to call Pierce right away. Bye!¡±

 Chapter 33: The Rescue

    It was almost ten o¡¯clock at night when the plane landed just outside of Caracas and I made my way to my favorite rental car agency with my two large duffel bags slung over my shoulders. One carried my gear and the other the supplies that I needed for the rescue. The rental was still waiting for me in L2 and I headed straight for the secure area where the bus and the pickup truck were waiting for me. I¡¯d memorized the directions and reviewed them diligently using satellite view so that I wouldn¡¯t have to leave L2 at all. The plan was to stay in one of the layers or sub-layers almost the entire time that I was here.


    I left the rental a few blocks from the secure area and walked the rest of the way on foot. I was done with the car and I shifted it back to reality so that it could be returned to the rental company. An envelope was already waiting at the rental counter with directions of where to find the car, as well as a payment for the use of the car and gas. It wouldn¡¯t make up for all the trouble that was caused by having the car go missing, but it was enough to assuage my guilt for having to ¡®borrow¡¯ the car.


    The secure area was a fenced-in building and parking lot that belonged to a friend of one of Shauna¡¯s contacts. The bus and pickup were parked at the end of the lot and as per the plan, the keys were secured by magnets to the underside of the back bumpers. I shifted to R1 and used my field to scan the surrounding area for people and cameras. There was only one person in the building. He was walking around and I figured him for the night security guard. There were cameras watching the building, but none of them pointed towards the parking lot, so I shifted the truck to L2 and tossed my duffel with the gear into the back. The other duffel I left in L2, next to the bus. It would be safe there until I returned with the families.


    The prison was half an hour away and I drove straight to the administration building, bypassing the gates that didn¡¯t exist in L2. Inside the building, I headed for the security station and shifted to R1. My giant computer specialist, Jenny, had created a program that would overlay a loop of a recording from last week to the security monitors instead of showing the live feed. For the next seven hours the guard on duty would be watching the inmates sleeping in their cells, regardless of whether they were actually there or not. All ¡®Roger¡¯ had to do was insert the thumb drive and wait ten minutes for the program to start running. I used those ten minutes to don my powered exoskeleton suit and put on my ¡®Roger¡¯ outfit over it. The extra padding that I used to make me look bigger, along with the voice modulation mask, shouldn¡¯t be necessary since I¡¯d be in L2 most of the time, but if something went wrong, I wouldn¡¯t have time to change later.


    I drove the truck up to the building that held Samuel and parked it with the back facing the doorway. The less distance I needed to carry everyone, the better. There were seven steps leading up to the front door of the building. From there it was forty steps down the corridor to the stairway leading to the basement level. I counted twenty-four steps by the time I reached the bottom. All the climbing was really going to put the exosuit through its paces. I hoped it could take the punishment. Hell, I hoped I could take it. Between the eight people in this building and the thirteen in the next, I¡¯d be going up the stairs twenty-one times.


    Before I got to the point where I was carrying all those people, I had to shift them to L2. Once that was done, the prison-break was effectively over with, except for all the stair climbing. No one would be able to find them or get to them in L2. A search of the grounds and surrounding areas wouldn¡¯t turn up anything and any roadblocks erected wouldn¡¯t stop us from driving through in R2 or L2.


    I walked inside the cell that was holding Samuel and the other foreigners. They were all asleep and it was a simple matter to shift them all to L2. I shifted the three tourists as well, because I couldn¡¯t take the chance of them waking up and alerting anyone just yet. I ran upstairs and to the next building over to shift the kids and their mothers and then I had to run over to yet another third building to shift the mobster¡¯s nephews. They shared a cell on the third floor of building F.


    The nephews appeared to be in their early twenties, slight of build, and covered in tattoos. I didn¡¯t think the ink was doing them any favors. Then again, maybe in a prison environment, the tattoos helped. At the moment, all that really mattered to me was that they were both short and weighted less than a hundred and fifty pounds. I had practiced with more weight than that. I picked up the first one from his cot and walked him downstairs. Not bad. I didn¡¯t feel any back strain so far. In fact, since I¡¯d shifted him to L2 and removed the field, his body was in stasis and as rigid as a board. I didn¡¯t have to think about floppy arms or legs. It felt more like carrying an irregularly shaped piece of wood than it did a person.


    I placed him on the ground by the front of the building and went back for his brother. A few minutes later I¡¯d returned to Samuel¡¯s building and started emptying out that cell. I started with the lighter inmates and made my way up to the marines. They were the biggest ones and even they were just a bit over two hundred pounds. I was confident that they weighed considerably more before prison. I¡¯d have to remember that. Prison is the new diet. Maybe I¡¯d open up a chain of ¡®diet¡¯ prisons for people who just couldn¡¯t be bothered to stay fit.


    Going up the stairs with the marines wasn¡¯t a picnic. I felt some strain, but it was their height that was the main issue. I couldn¡¯t hold them sideways without banging their heads or legs into a wall, so I either walked at an angle or had to hoist them over my shoulder. That last option would require that I grab hold of them in..uhm¡­interesting places. I chose to walk at an angle and saved myself from blushing beet red.


    The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.


    As I brought out each prisoner, I loaded them into the open cargo area of pickup truck. I¡¯d need to stack the bodies on top of one another to fit them all in. Samuel and his fellow cellmates were loaded first, as they¡¯d be coming off last. It felt weird to be thinking about ¡®stacking bodies¡¯.


    I drove the truck over to the nephews and tossed them gently onto the pile. I was almost sure that nothing could hurt them while they were in stasis in L2. Almost sure isn¡¯t the same as sure, and that¡¯s why I did it gently. I¡¯ve very caring that way. Really, I am.


    Compared to the marines, the kids and their mothers were a breeze to carry and load into the truck bed. By this time the pile of bodies had risen over the lip of the cargo area and I worried that I might lose a few if I took a turn too quickly. Luckily, I¡¯d come prepared for just such an eventuality. I brought rope with me! When I¡¯d realized that I couldn¡¯t drive the bus, I came up with this plan to use the pickup trucks¡¯ cargo area. Originally, I¡¯d only planned on taking Samuel and his cellmates in it. I was going to drop off the bus with the families at the secure area and then come back in the pickup to get the rest of the prisoners. Not being able to drive the bus had changed things. Now I¡¯d take them all back to the secured area and load the families onto the bus.


    With everyone secured in the back, I shifted the three tourist informers back to reality and drove out of the prison. It had taken me a little under two hours to get them all out and no alarm had been raised yet. If things stayed quiet in the prison for another hour, then we were home free. The families would be safely outside of any potential search area by then.


    Back at the secured area, I parked next to the bus and started loading up the women and children onto the bus. Using the pictures from their files, I matched up the mothers with their children and sat them together. I had to put a field around each of them in turn and shift them to R2 in order to be able to arrange them into a comfortable sitting position. They were still unconscious though and I suspected that other people couldn¡¯t function in any of the layers of reality or the sub-layers. The field that was an innate part of me was what allowed me to function in the layers.


    I put the nephews at the back of the bus, because that¡¯s were all the bad boys go, and left several empty rows between them and the families. Next, I needed to prepare to wake them up. That involved two steps. The first was going to get the duffel of supplies that I¡¯d left outside. In it were fifteen backpacks, one for each of the ex-inmates. Each pack had a change of clothes, extra underwear and socks, and a pair of shoes, all based on my team¡¯s best guess of their sizes. We¡¯d also put in a few bottles of water, meal bars and snacks for the kids.


    The mothers¡¯ backpacks also had ten thousand US dollars and five thousand Bolivars. Although they weren¡¯t technically victims of human trafficking, they had been taken from their homes and imprisoned. That was close enough for me and I chose to give them some restart-up capital. It also gave them the means to move somewhere else if they didn¡¯t appreciate the crime bosses¡¯ hospitality. I suspected that their husbands would try to find them an alternate secure location.


    I placed the appropriate backpack on everyone¡¯s lap and then I took out six burner phones and put one in each of the adult¡¯s hands. Each had a note attached to it, written in Spanish, directing them to call their husbands, or their uncle, and let them know that they were free. It also explained that they their escape had not been noticed yet, but that it would be soon and the bus needed to leave quickly before any roadblocks were put up. The note explained about being under the protection of the crime boss as payment for releasing his nephews, who were in the back of the bus. The nephews had a similar note, written by their uncle this time, telling them to behave and treat the families well.


    With the stage all set, I shifted to reality and sent the first ¡®all-clear¡¯ signal to Shauna. Shauna acknowledged and a minute later sent a message confirming that the driver would be there in five minutes.


    Now came the tough part. Waking everyone up. I couldn¡¯t see a way around it. I¡¯d have much rather shifted them back to reality as I drove away, but they¡¯d been through enough already and they needed to understand what was happening and I needed to make sure that everyone read and followed their instructions. I made sure that my hoody and voice changing mask were on properly, took a deep breath, and shifted everyone en masse to reality.


    Nothing happened. They all just lay there and it took me a few seconds to realize that they were still asleep. It was two o¡¯clock in the morning. Hmmm. Maybe this could work out for the better. I stepped over and nudged the closest mother awake. She was groggy and it took her a few moments come awake. I backed away a few steps and put a finger across my lips in the universal sign to keep quiet.


    ¡°Hola Senora. Eres libre. Lee la nota, por favor.¡± Hello ma¡¯am. You are free. Read the note, please. I whispered these words in my very poor Spanish, wondering if I¡¯d conjugated the verb correctly.


    The woman¡¯s eyes widened at my words. ¡°Libre? De Verdad?¡± Free? Really? Her panicked looked eased as she looked beside her and saw her children.


    ¡°Si. Libre. Lee la nota, por favor.¡± Yes. Free. Read the note, please.


    ¡°Que nota?¡± What note?


    I pointed to her hand and she followed my finger to her hands in surprise. A look of astonishment came over her as she read the note and tears flooded her eyes.


    ¡°Puedes despertar a las otras?¡± Can you wake the others?


    ¡°Las otras?¡± She stood up a bit and looked around. ¡°Si Senor!¡± She made her way around her sleeping children and started mimicking what I had done. Meanwhile, I woke went over to the nephews and started the process with them. They were much quicker to come awake and it was touch and go there for a second when it seemed that they were going to attack me, but the repeated words, ¡°Llama a tu tio¡±, had the desired effect. ¡®Call your uncle¡¯ snapped them to attention and they read the note that he¡¯d written them. They smiled and relaxed into their seats and placed the call.


    That was my cue to leave. I walked past the joyful women and out of the bus. The driver was just pulling up on the other side and before he could see me, I was back in L2.

 Chapter 34: Back Home

    I unloaded Samuel and the others at the airport and drove back out of the airport grounds where I left the truck parked next to a gas station and shifted it back to reality. I would forward the truck¡¯s coordinates to Shauna right before my flight took off and she¡¯d arrange for someone to get it.


    It was a half hour walk back to the airport, but I wasn¡¯t in any rush. The flight back home wouldn¡¯t leave for another four hours and the only thing I had left to do was gather up the people I¡¯d freed and move them onto the plane.


    Even though I¡¯d spent most of the day in L2, I found it eerie and strange. I¡¯d been too busy to notice it until now. L2 was so quiet. Sound existed, only there was nothing around that could make sounds. My footfalls, normally completely unnoticed by me, were louder to my ears than the beating of the tell-tale heart. There were no other sounds to compete with them. I like the quiet. It¡¯s soothing and I stopped to take it in and appreciate it.


    That pause of utter quiet was what allowed me to notice that wrongness coming from nearby. Like the last time I¡¯d had this feeling, it wasn¡¯t a wrongness that was scary or evil in nature. It was of something not fitting in. I¡¯d felt this feeling once before, on the day that I¡¯d discovered how to get into L2 for the first time. The pen that I¡¯d sent into L2 had felt that way and I was wondering if the feeling was coming from the people that I¡¯d left at the airport. They probably were giving off that wrongness, but I was too far away from the airport for this feeling to be coming from them.


    I spun in a circle, trying to figure out from which direction the feeling was coming from. I still couldn¡¯t pinpoint it so I took a few steps in different directions until I knew where to go. It was coming from my right side and I headed slowly in that direction, unsure of what I¡¯d find. Wondering why I hadn¡¯t thought of it right away, I sent out my field in that direction to see what was there. I found something about two hundred feet away. It was a rock. Why would a rock be giving off an ¡®I don¡¯t belong here vibe¡¯? It was roughly circular in form with a diameter that the field was telling me was twenty-two inches. I kept my scan on it and couldn¡¯t determine what type of rock it was. It wasn¡¯t like any other rock I¡¯d ever scanned and I¡¯d scanned loads of different ones at the Galt Geology Center back home and on my trip to the mines.


    As I got closer, I could see that the rock was dark gray in color and was pitted. It looked like a meteorite. I brought my hand closer and didn¡¯t feel any heat coming off of it. Like everything else in L2, you couldn¡¯t tell if it just got there or if it had been there for all of eternity. I wondered how it could have gotten into L2. Although the meteorite was sitting there as if it had been placed there specifically, I didn¡¯t think that it had been. If the meteorite had somehow broken into L2, then gravity would have pulled it down. So far, gravity, air and light existed in all the layers and I idly wondered if there were layers without them. The impact of the meteorite couldn¡¯t have even scratched the ground in L2. Meanwhile, the meteorite would have been in stasis as soon as it entered L2 and so could not have been damaged in the fall. Like an immutable object meeting another immutable object. Perhaps the meteorite bounced upon impact and rolled around, much like the pen I had sent into L2 had rolled when I kicked it, but it and the ground were undamaged.


    I touched the rock and pushed on it a little. It moved and did a full revolution before it stopped. What the hell? I¡¯d barely pushed on it. It¡¯s movement suggested that the meteorite wasn¡¯t composed of a heavy metal. Also, my scans showed that it wasn¡¯t hollow. Using both hands, I lifted up the rock easily and felt like I was holding up a movie set prop. At almost two feet in diameter, this rock shouldn¡¯t be this light.


    I scanned the rock again, trying to get some clues as to what it was made from, but didn¡¯t get any new information. I mentally shrugged and placed the meteorite in my supply duffel bag. I¡¯d forgotten to leave it with Samuel and my gear at the airport and I¡¯d grabbed it before leaving the truck. I continued walking back to the airport while I sent scans out for miles in all directions, looking to see if there were any more of the meteorites around. The scans didn¡¯t find anything interesting and I wondered at the odds of the only person on Earth who could get into L2 almost stumbling upon an object in L2 that didn¡¯t belong there. It seemed more than unlikely and the idea opened up a couple of possible explanations. Maybe there were lots of things in L2 and I¡¯d just never looked for them. I was pretty new to all this. Alternatively, it could be exceeding rare for anything so foreign to be in L2 and I was somehow drawn to it, subconsciously or by fate. I could have taken the truck and parked it in any number of places and I had randomly chosen this one, or so I thought. Maybe the wrongness called to me.


    You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.


    Reaching the airport, I put away from my ruminations on the meteorite for the moment and got back to my rescue operation. I still had eight people to haul to the boarding gate. A quick snack from the supply bag and a re-donning of my exosuit and I was ready. I scooped up my first customer, the oil executive¡¯s assistant, and started walking her to the gate. Of course, the flight back was set at the furthest gate possible and after five minutes of walking my own stupidity finally dawned on me. Why didn¡¯t I just load everyone onto a cart?


    Twenty-five minutes later, I had everyone at the gate, still loaded like cord wood on the ¡®oversized baggage cart¡¯ that I¡¯d found. They kind of looked like a stack of mannequins and I giggled at the though. Oh-oh. Giggling meant that I was tired. I hadn¡¯t slept last night and I was starting to feel the effects of that lack of sleep. Maybe that¡¯s why it had taken me so long to think of using a cart, at an airport. I still had a few hours until the flight, so I set seven alarms on my phone and lay down for a nap with my head on my duffel bag.


    The fifth alarm did the trick and I woke up with half an hour to take-off. A check in R1 showed that greyed-out people were already in line boarding the plane. It also showed a ton of security all around, inspecting the plane and every person boarding it. It seemed that the escape had finally been detected. I ignored all that by shifting my loaded-up cart and myself into L1 and walking to the plane. Soon I had Samuel and the others in a neat pile at the front of the plane and I¡¯d stowed the cart behind some bushes near the terminal.


    Six hours later, we were all back on American soil and I was driving my truck, with the passengers stuffed in the back, to Hannah¡¯s Home. I had set up one of my unused cottages on the property with extra blow-up beds from Wal-Mart. I didn¡¯t think that any of the freed people would stay with us for longer than a few hours, but I wanted them to know that they had the option to stay until they could re-establish themselves. I gave Samuel and the secretary their own rooms and doubled up the rest or set them up in the common room. I¡¯d also had the kitchen fridge and pantry stocked with some food, in case anyone wanted to make their own meals for a change. Finally, I laid out a set of clean clothes for everyone.


    With everything prepared, I called Shauna.


    ¡°Hi Shauna! Roger just brought everyone back.¡±


    ¡°Really? Where¡¯s here? He never told us how he was getting them back or where or when.¡±


    ¡°Oops. I guess I forgot to tell you that. We planned for him to bring them to Hannah¡¯s Home and set them up in cottage three. I got extra beds and stocked the fridge last week.¡±


    ¡°You forgot to mention that? You just forgot to mention one of the most important details of the whole plan? I¡¯m sitting here with literally no clue about my brother and you just forgot??¡± Shauna was right to be angry. I had kept her on pins and needles for the last ten hours, wondering if Roger got her brother out of the country and if he was ok. There was a reason for it though. If Shauna had known the when and where of Samuel¡¯s return, then she¡¯s have been waiting there for him and I would have had a much harder time sneaking him and the others in. However, even if she was right to be angry, there was no sense in letting it go on. Time for a guilt attack.


    ¡°Sooo¡­ you don¡¯t want to come see him and be there for him when he wakes up? Cause, I can stay with him for awhile, I guess. I was going to get together with my friends, but Samuel is your brother and for your sake I can make the sacrifice.¡± I made sure to sound very hesitant and put-upon. It worked like a charm.


    ¡°Which cottage was it again? I¡¯m in the admin building. I¡¯ll be there in five minutes.¡±


    I told her and while I waited for her to show up, I shifted all eight of my guests back to reality. A few of them shifted positions in their sleep, but none of them woke up. From their perspective, they¡¯d only been sleeping for a few hours before I shifted them to L2. I didn¡¯t know if twelve hours of stasis in L2 counted as sleep time and so I didn¡¯t know if they¡¯d wake up quickly or in six hours. Of course, that presupposed that Shauna would let them sleep.


    A few minutes later, Shauna came running up to the cottage.


    ¡°Did you say they were all sleeping?¡±, Shauna asked disbelievingly.


    ¡°Roger said that he had to drug everyone for the escape and he¡¯s kept them sedated since then. He administered a counter-agent before he left, though. We can let them sleep or wake them up whenever we want.¡±


    I led Shauna into the cottage and into Samuel¡¯s room. She sat down next to him and just looked at him for a minute.


    ¡°It¡¯s real, Abby. I knew it was happening and I got news from my contacts that those families were safe and sound, but¡­I didn¡¯t want to get my hopes up. I kept expecting to hear that he was recaptured or that something went wrong. He¡¯s really here and he looks so peaceful.¡± Shauna wiped tears from her eyes.


    ¡°Since Roger drugged him, he doesn¡¯t even know he¡¯s free. The last thing he¡¯ll remember is going to sleep in a jail cell. Just take it slowly with him. It¡¯ll be quite a shock to him.¡±, I said.


    Shauna nodded and gently woke up her brother.

 Chapter 35: Questions

    By the time I met up with Eva and James, I was physically and emotionally wrung out. Physically because I¡¯d only slept for a few hours in the past day. Emotionally because I¡¯d just witnessed Shauna¡¯s reunion with her brother and then the cheering and crying and celebrations as the others were woken up and told of their new status as free people. Shauna and I were hugged and thanked and hugged some more. The phone conversations to loved ones was especially heart wrenching. Watching trained battle-hardened soldiers break down as they talked to their wives, children and mothers left me in tears on several occasions.


    Everyone was full of questions and Shauna and I answered them as best we could. However, most of what we had to say was ¡®Roger did it¡¯, ¡®He didn¡¯t say how¡¯, and ¡®I have no clue¡¯. After the questions, everyone took showers and changed into their new clothes, while Shauna and I prepared some food.


    When the last bite had been eaten, Samuel brought up a practical matter.


    ¡°Shauna, I¡¯ve got to check back in with my base and let them know the situation. I¡¯m sure the others here will have to make similar calls. It¡¯s going to raise a major shit storm. We¡¯re going to be in debriefings for the next month and we don¡¯t even know how we got out of there. As much as they¡¯ll appreciate you getting us out of there, they¡¯re going to be coming to you for some answers. We haven¡¯t talked about it between ourselves, but if you need us to, then I¡¯m sure that we¡¯d all agree to leave you out of it completely.¡±


    I answered for Shauna. ¡°That¡¯s a real nice sentiment, Samuel, but not necessary. Shauna told me what would happen if Roger managed to get you out of there and we¡¯re prepared for it. You need to be completely truthful in what you report. All of you. If they try badgering us, we¡¯ll be telling them to suck it. We¡¯re civilians and we¡¯re not in their chain of command. We¡¯ve already spoken to our lawyers and they¡¯re ready to get them to back off, if it¡¯s necessary. Besides, Roger told me that if they give us too much grief, he won¡¯t ever help them out again if they come asking.¡±


    That last statement drew some nods and I finished with, ¡°We also have one more thing to offer them, if they leave us alone. Roger liberated a copy of the prison hard drive and videos. There¡¯s proof that they were holding children as hostages in that prison and I¡¯m sure that the state department will have field day with that information.¡±


    At this the German diplomat laughed out loud. ¡°If I could have a copy of that as well, Abby, my government would be most appreciative.¡±


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    ¡°I¡¯ll see to it.¡±, Shauna replied.


    The group talked some more about their experiences in the prison, Samuel questioned Shauna about why she wasn¡¯t in the army anymore, and everyone wanted to know where they were and what Hannah¡¯s Home was. This last led to me sharing my story of how my mother was taken and how I¡¯d set up the charity in honor of her.


    ¡°The property is like a retreat. We¡¯re not fully set up yet, but when we are the people that stay here will have a safe and calm place where they can get the help they need to put back the pieces of their lives. I don¡¯t think that many of you will have the option to, but I¡¯m officially inviting any of you that want to stay here for awhile and get your bearings. You don¡¯t need to decide right now. Think about it and let me or Shauna know. If you go back to your lives and feel the stress start to build and need a break, you¡¯ll still be welcome. Right now though, Sister Clara is waiting to give you a check-up and make sure that you¡¯re all healthy, so please follow Shauna to the clinic.¡±


    I¡¯d already scanned all of them and made sure that nothing was seriously wrong with them. Sister Clara would make sure though and she¡¯d be able to tell them how to deal with their malnutrition. The group trooped out after Shauna to get poked and prodded. I took up the rear of the group and soon found myself next to Travis McKinley. He was the oil executive and Shelley was his niece and assistant. They¡¯d been assured safety by a minister in the government while they were working on a deal in Venezuela, but the minister had run afoul of Maduro and their safety had disappeared. They were under house arrest for over a year before being brought to the prison. That was two years ago. His company had insurance to deal with these situations, but the Venezuelan government decided to make an example of him and hold him up to the public as the face of the imperialists who were trying to steal the wealth of the Venezuelan people.


    ¡°Abby, I just want to thank you again. It was bad enough that I was stuck in that hellhole, but to have Shelley there as well was killing me. I¡¯m her godfather and ever since my brother and his wife were killed in a car accident five years ago, I¡¯ve been looking after her. I shouldn¡¯t have brought her with me on this trip. I don¡¯t even remember how she talked me into it. Anyways, Shelley had a real tough time over there. I worried for her and I tried to keep her spirits up, only it got harder every day and she started slipping away from me. I think that this place might be good for her. I¡¯ll need to go back home and see my wife and kids, but Shelley needs your kind of help. If she decides to stay, I¡¯d like to cover all the costs for her time here and I¡¯m hoping that my family and I could come visit her.¡±


    ¡°Travis, if Shelley wants to stay, she can. There isn¡¯t anything to pay for because people like Shelley are the reason that we¡¯re here. She wasn¡¯t abducted to be sold into slavery, but she was abducted and imprisoned. We¡¯ll help her all that we can. You and your family are welcome to come visit her anytime. If she stays here, she¡¯ll keep the room she¡¯s in and your family can stay with her when you visit.¡±


    With tears in his eyes, Travis shook my hand and thanked me as we sped up to catch up to the others.

 Chapter 36: An Unpleasant Discussion

    My expectations of a quick departure for most of those we rescued were set aside as Sister Clara examined them. She gave each of them a full medical exam, checking out their reflex reactions, their heart rate, blood pressure, skin elasticity, and taking blood and urine samples. While there wasn¡¯t any one glaring issue with them, like broken bones or cancer, the combination of malnutrition, dehydration, exhaustion, and lengthy exposure to an unhygienic environment caused her to worry for their health. She set everyone up on a rehydration plan and made them drink different solutions, some with certain salts added and some with vitamins that they were lacking in their systems.


    When Sister Clara pronounced them unfit to leave for at least two days, she was met with resistance. The soldiers and the CIA agents explained that their superiors wanted them back immediately. Sister Clara plowed through their objects like a machete through butter that had been sitting outside in the hot sun all day. ¡°I don¡¯t care what they want. Your health is my only concern. They left you to rot in a prison for years and now they can¡¯t wait a few days to hear your prison experiences? If they¡¯re so keen to hear how many guards were in the prison or how big your cells were, they can come here and talk to you. But they better not come here before tomorrow evening. You¡¯re all on bed rest until then.¡±


    Sister Clara normally had a barely noticeable Scottish accent but when she was angry, she turned full Scotty, minus any swearing of course. She cleared out the last objections by calling up the soldier¡¯s and agent¡¯s superiors and letting them know how things stood. I didn¡¯t know if she had any legal grounds to hold anyone here for the two days, but it seemed that no one wanted to cross her. They all agreed to send someone tomorrow evening. With that taken care of, Sister Clara ushered everyone back to the cottage where she decided to split the group into two cottages and give everyone their privacy. I smiled as I realized that she¡¯d effectively created eight treatment rooms for her and her fellow sisters to work in.


    When everyone was squared away, Shauna drove me to Eva¡¯s house. She was so excited to have her brother back that she never asked me how I¡¯d gotten to Hannah¡¯s house in the first place. I¡¯d have to ride my bike over there later on tonight and swap it for my truck.


    The following morning I was back at work with Dad, overseeing students and helping them work on their techniques. At the end of class, I asked him for a ride out to Hannah¡¯s Home.


    ¡°Sure, but doesn¡¯t Shauna usually pick you up?¡±


    ¡°She does, but she¡¯s a bit busy today. We broke her brother out of a Venezuelan jail yesterday and I¡¯m sure that she wants to spend some time with him before the army comes to take him back.¡±


    Dad¡¯s left eyebrow rose on its own, as he gave a questioning look. I wonder if he learned it from Spock or if Spock learned it from him. ¡°You¡¯re going to need to elaborate on all that, Abby. You had left me with the impression that you had spent your weekend with Eva and James. Did they fly out to Venezuela to participate in the jailbreak as well?¡±


    ¡°No. That would be crazy. Eva and James don¡¯t know the first thing about international espionage and rescue operations.¡± It was a weak deflection and I knew that it had no chance to sideline the explanation. I thought it was funny. Dad didn¡¯t. He simply waited me out and eventually I caved and told him the story. Not the whole story, of course. I pretty much blamed everything on ¡®Roger¡¯ and minimized my part to calling Roger, allowing Shauna to help arrange for the secure locations and transportation, packing a few bags full of food and clothes, setting up the cottages for our guests, and arranging for Sister Clara to be available to examine them.


    Dad listened intently and didn¡¯t interrupt me once. At the end of the tale, he smiled at me and said that he was proud that I was using my foundation to help others. It felt great to have his approval and I beamed inside. And as the glow of self-satisfaction was reaching its peak, he added, ¡°I noticed how you completely glossed over the fact that my seventeen-year-old daughter has been in contact with a very resourceful and dangerous man for months, much less how she got in contact with him in the first place, and why she never saw fit to mention it, even in passing, to her kind and saintly father.¡±


    I closed my eyes and sighed. So much for the glow. I opened my eyes and was about to start in on my explanation, but we had just turned into Hannah¡¯s Home and saw a jeep parked in front of the clinic and several people were standing on the clinic steps having an argument. Shauna and Sister Clara were standing at the top of the stairs, their bodies positioned in such as way as to physically block the two men in army uniforms. In the background I could see Sisters Olivia and Amelia and the German diplomat, Gerhardt Strudel.


    Yes, his name really was Strudel. Apparently, he came from a long line of bakers. At least that¡¯s what he said and I had no reason to believe that he was lying to me. Not really. Except for the smile on his face when he told his name. Damn! I¡¯d been played and until now I¡¯d been too tired to realize it. I¡¯d be having some words with Herr Strudel after I broke up this little spat.


    Dad parked next to the Jeep and I got out slowly. I tried to project a calm demeanor. Sometimes that¡¯s what makes the difference in diffusing a bad situation. As I took the few steps over to them, I could see that Shauna was pissed. She was glaring at a medium height, army guy, sporting the standard military buzz cut and pristine uniform. He was glaring right back at her. At his side was a much taller and beefier guy in uniform, with the same hairdo. He wasn¡¯t glaring at anyone. He was there for physical intimidation and support.


    I placed myself facing Shauna and the smaller army guy, with the big beefy one on my left and Sister Clara to my right. I was guessing that the little army guy was insisting that the soldiers had to go back to base right away and that Sister Clara and Shauna were refusing to let them go.


    Before I could say anything, the smaller guy barked out, ¡°Go away little girl. The grown-ups are talking.¡±


    Well now. That was not a polite greeting. It was easy to see how he¡¯d gotten underneath Shauna¡¯s skin.


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    ¡°She¡¯s the boss, you idiot.¡± Shauna was not helping matters, but I appreciated her saying what I wanted to.


    ¡°And you are?¡± I trailed the last word to give him a chance to fill in the blank. He did. Mostly because I was sure that he loved the sound of his own name and title.


    ¡°Major John Covington, US Army. I¡¯m here to take Captain Martinez back to base for debriefing.¡± He pointed to Samuel.


    ¡°Hello Major Covington. I¡¯m Abby Smith. I think that there¡¯s been a misunderstanding. Samuel is suffering from the lingering effects of malnutrition and dehydration and is under the medical care of Sister Clara at the moment and your base was advised of all this. It was agreed that he would convalesce here for two days before he returns to base. I understood that arrangements had been made for any initial debriefings to be done here tonight and that someone from your base would be coming over this evening.¡±


    ¡°Ms. Smith, I¡¯m Captain Martinez¡¯s superior officer. I wasn¡¯t on duty yesterday when all these ¡®arrangements¡¯ were being made and I didn¡¯t approve them. If Captain Martinez can get all the way from Venezuela to here, I¡¯m sure that he¡¯s well enough to sit in a car for a few hours and return to base. We have excellent medical care back at the base and our officers won¡¯t have to be inconvenienced by coming all the way out here to get their report from the Captain. Now be a good girl and run along and fetch Captain Martinez and we¡¯ll be on our way.¡±


    His condescending tone and dismissive behavior really grated on my nerves and I pictured myself kicking him in the face. The image made me smile and I calmed down, a little.


    ¡°Major Covington, do you see those gates over there? Those gates are along the line that separates this property from the public road. You are currently on private property. My private property. We are not on your army base. You are on my property and you have no authority whatsoever here. You have one right and one right only. You have the right to get yourself and your colleague off of my land. Immediately. Or I will be forced to have you removed.¡±


    The major gave me a hard stare full of contempt. ¡°I¡¯ve had enough of this bullshit. Sergeant Price, go check the clinic and see if Captain Martinez is in there.¡±


    The beefy Sergeant moved towards the clinic and I positioned myself to block his way. I also shifted my legs ever so slightly into combat stance, but I kept my arms loose and ready by my sides so as not to escalate the conflict. He looked over to the major for instructions and the major issued his orders.


    ¡°Sergeant, Ms. Smith is impeding you in the fulfillment of your duty. Please remove her and proceed.¡±


    The sergeant reached out and grabbed my shoulder to move me aside. Once he grabbed me, I had all the excuse I needed to take him out. As my left hand moved to break his hold with a block to his forearm, my right hand shot out and jabbed him in the neck with curled fingers. His hands went to his neck and I stepped in closer to him and swiped my right elbow across his face. I stepped back and delivered a front kick right below his sternum. He was a big guy and I knew that any hits to his arms or chest wouldn¡¯t do much. I had to hit him where it hurt. Places that weren¡¯t protected by layers of muscle. Places that Uncle Magnum had drilled me to exhaustion to hit and hit hard. My job was to take him out of the fight before he had a chance to be in it. As the sergeant double over from the pain below his sternum, I finished him off with a whipping hand strike to his temple. He wasn¡¯t knocked out, but he fell to the ground, rolling in pain.


    Overall, I¡¯d compromised his ability to breath, given him significant knocks to both of his temples, and kicked him in the area below his sternum. He was a mess. If done correctly, any one of those could end a fight. I¡¯d done them all correctly and he wasn¡¯t getting up by himself anytime soon.


    ¡°Major Covington. You are trespassing on private property. You have been asked politely to leave and you¡¯ve refused. Instead, you ordered your colleague to assault me. If you don¡¯t leave in the next sixty seconds, my next call will be to the sheriff. You will leave the sergeant here. Sister Clara will patch him up and give him some medication for the pain. When your investigators come to debrief Captain Martinez later tonight, they can take the sergeant back to base with them. Now go.¡±


    Major Covington seemed confused for a few moments as he looked from me to his sergeant and back again. I tapped my wrist a few times to let him know that time was running out and even though I wasn¡¯t wearing a watch, he got the message and climbed into his Jeep and drove off. I was sure that he¡¯d be causing me more trouble very soon, but at least he was gone for now.


    Since I was the cause of his injuries, I helped Sister Clara get the sergeant into the clinic and onto a bed. She gave him a shot for the pain and proceeded to give him a full exam. I hadn¡¯t fully caved in his windpipe, but his breathing was labored. My abuse of his lower chest region wasn¡¯t helping matters there either. Sister Clara also check to see if I¡¯d given him a concussion with my head strikes. Throughout this process, Sister Clara didn¡¯t say a word to me and I wondered if she was upset at the way I¡¯d handled Sergeant Price. At a worried look from me, Sister Clara smiled and said, ¡°Thank you for not giving him any permanent damage.¡± I smiled back at her.


    I left the sergeant to Sister Clara¡¯s tender mercies and walked out to the hallway. I heard Shauna and my dad talking in the reception area around the corner and I slowed to listen.


    ¡°I didn¡¯t even know she took Kung Fu. That was incredible. Sergeant Price instructs self-defence in basic training. He¡¯s very good. Abby took him down in six seconds.¡± Shauna¡¯s was impressed, but I knew that if the sergeant had time to prepare, the fight wouldn¡¯t have been so quick. I¡¯d have still won, I felt sure, but it would have been much harder and I¡¯d have taken a few painful hits. The whole point of learning Kung Fu was to end the fight as soon as possible and not give the other guy time to prepare.


    ¡°Her uncle Paul has been working with her since she was four and was kidnapped along with her mother. Learning Kung Fu gave Abby the confidence to face the world again. I remember him telling her that if she worked hard, no one would be able to take her away so easily again. It seems that he was right. I¡¯ve seen Abby training before, but I have never seen her fight for real. I¡¯m going to buy Paul a beer and congratulate him on doing a fine job.¡± I could hear the pride in dad¡¯s voice and I almost teared up. I held in my emotions because right now we needed a plan for when Major Covington or someone like him came back and tried to have me arrested or to take Samuel away.


    ¡°I thought I was a decent fighter. Now I¡¯m not so sure. Maybe I¡¯ll give Kung Fu a try.¡±, Shauna mused.


    ¡°You should. The style that she uses is called Wing Chun. It was created by a woman and it was designed for women to be able to defend from and attack larger and stronger opponents. Paul is an excellent teacher.¡± Aha! He had been paying attention. He always made it seem like he couldn¡¯t remember anything about Kung Fu and kept calling it Karate. It drove me nuts for years.


    Having had enough eavesdropping for the day, I came around the corner and started making plans with Shauna. She was going to call our lawyer and give her an account of what had just happened and find out what our rights were, what Samuel¡¯s rights were and how we could stall the authorities if we needed to. I brought up my thought of Covington trying to get me arrested and Shauna barked out a laugh.


    ¡°I like to see him try. It would be his word against all of ours. Also, Sister Olivia was kind enough to record the entire encounter on her phone. Would you like for me to send you the video?¡±


    I groaned loudly and buried my face in my hands. ¡°There¡¯s another video?¡±

 Chapter 37: Negotiations

    Dad decided to hang around to watch the meeting later on so I took him on a tour of the grounds in the meantime. When we got to the cottages, I introduced him to those guests that were awake. Shelley and her uncle Travis, along with Herr Strudel, decided to join us on the tour. Shelley was considering staying and wanted to know where everything was, while Herr Strudel wanted to stretch his legs.


    ¡°Also, I can¡¯t think of anywhere safer to be than with you, Abby.¡±, he said.


    I felt my cheeks heat up in a blush and changed the subject by starting the tour, taking my new guests through the various buildings and all the way to the lake. Along the way I explained how every part of the grounds tied into the rehabilitation process of survivors and their families. Shelley loved it and I could almost see the waves of stress and worry leave her body. When we got to the lake, she sat down on the dock and hugged her knees to her chest. Travis sat down next to her and she buried her face in his chest and cried. He held her as tears streamed down his own face. Sometimes freedom of the mind takes longer to achieve than freedom of the body.


    Strudel, dad and I gave them their privacy and continued our walk in silence until we found our way back to the main sanctuary. Shauna and the team had set up a few tables with finger food and drinks along the wall closest to the meeting rooms. We¡¯d be using the main conference room for out general discussion and the various agencies could use any of the adjacent offices to debrief their soldiers or agents.


    With about an hour until the various organizations were set to arrive, I got a call from Jake.


    ¡°Hi Abby. Is everything ok?¡±


    ¡°Hi Jake. Yes, why do you ask?¡±


    ¡°An old friend just called me asking about the Hannah Foundation and about you specifically. He saw on your website that I was a director for the foundation. I wasn¡¯t able to take the call at the time and I figured I should talk to you first because I can¡¯t figure out the connection between him and you.¡±


    ¡°Who¡¯s your old friend?¡±, I asked. I had a funny feeling I wasn¡¯t going to like his answer.


    ¡°Colonel Joseph Brickman. He¡¯s in charge of an army base a few hours away from you. I forget which one. I met him when I was a much younger man and he was a lowly captain. The army hired me as a consultant for one of the mining projects their corps of engineers was evaluating. Eventually my business grew too large for me to spend so much time with them and I had to quit working with them. Brickman was my main contact there for several years. He¡¯s a good man, but I don¡¯t like it when the Army takes an interest in the foundation or in you. Do you know what it¡¯s all about?¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m afraid that I do. One of his subordinates came by today and had a bad attitude. I sent him away and I guess he went crying to his boss.¡±


    ¡°I see. Do you know what rank the man you sent away was?¡±


    ¡°Major. Major John Covington. He seemed like the type of person who gets a kick out saying his full name and rank.¡±


    ¡°Brickman asked that I call him back before a certain meeting tonight. What time are you meeting him?¡±


    ¡°In about an hour. There are a few agencies coming and I don¡¯t know if they¡¯ll try to play any power games by coming late. I¡¯m guessing that none of them show up on time, just to show me how powerful they are and how their time is so much more valuable than mine.¡±


    Jake laughed loudly at that. ¡°In this case, it works in my favor. I¡¯m on my way to Hannah¡¯s Home and I¡¯ll need about an hour to get there. Don¡¯t start without me, ok?¡±


    ¡°Sure. I¡¯ll stall them until you get here. See you soon!¡±


    ¡°Wait, Abby? Who are the other agencies that you mentioned?¡±


    ¡°Uhm, besides Brickman there¡¯s a major from Fort Bragg, a regional director for the CIA, a man from the state department and someone from the German consulate in Charlotte.¡±


    ¡°Only you could have a meeting with such a strange group of people and still tell me that everything¡¯s ok over there! I¡¯ll see you soon.¡±


    That was weird. I wondered what Jake had to do with any of this. Then again, he was wondering the same thing about me, so we were even.


    The man from the state department showed up a bit early. I appreciated that. His name was Ethan Helms and either he was just a regular nice guy or he was so good at politicking that I couldn¡¯t tell that he was doing it. Regardless, I liked him and I spent a few minutes chatting with him about the Hannah Foundation and our goals. He wasn¡¯t sure why he was called to this meeting. He¡¯d only been told that there had been some developments regarding Venezuela and it would be worth his while to show up. I assured him that his time wasn¡¯t being wasted.


    Next to arrive was the deputy head of the German embassy in Washington, Councillor-Minister Alexander Muller. If I understood the title correctly, he was the number two guy for all of Germany in the US. Holy shit! What was he doing here? I was so going to have a serious talk with Studel after the meeting. Having Muller here was overkill. It was interesting to note that he arrived on time. He wasn¡¯t here to play games either.


    Major Perkins from Fort Bragg arrived only five minutes late and was followed by Agent Smythe from the CIA. Colonel Brickman and his aide walked in fifteen minutes late. I was prepared to stall the meeting further, but Jake had texted me that he was two minutes out, so I had Shauna usher everyone into the conference room. Was it petty of me to be glad that Brickman and his aide didn¡¯t get to have any refreshments? I don¡¯t think so.


    Shauna had placed name cards at each seat so that there wouldn¡¯t be any jockeying for position. It also allowed each of the participants to address each other by name. Dad, Jenny, and Sister Clara were already seated on one side of the table and soon everyone was settled in. I noticed that Alexander Muller embraced Strudel before sitting down.


    Colonel Brickman started to say something, but I politely interrupted to say, ¡°I¡¯m sorry Colonel, there¡¯s one more attendee coming in. He¡¯ll be here in a moment.¡± As if on cue, Jake walked in, followed by Mark.


    ¡°Excuse me everyone. I only learned about the meeting a little over an hour ago. Thank you for waiting, Abby.¡± Jake and Mark took seats next to dad.


    ¡°Jake! What are you doing here? Are you here to sort out this mess?¡±, Colonel Brickman asked.


    ¡°Not at all, Joe. When I got your call and heard about the meeting, I knew that I couldn¡¯t pass up the opportunity to watch. I¡¯m here strictly as an observer and in my capacity as a board member of the Hannah Foundation.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m not sure what there is to watch, Jake. One of my majors was here earlier today with a sergeant to escort one of my captains back to base. He was denied access to the captain, verbally abused and then the sergeant was assaulted by someone named, Abby Smith, who said that she owns the place. I¡¯m here to get my captain and my sergeant back and to decide whether to press charges against Ms. Smith.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s not what happened, sir. You¡¯ve been misinformed.¡±, Shauna interjected.


    ¡°Are you Ms. Smith?¡±, he asked.


    ¡°No, sir. She is.¡± Shauna pointed to me and I gave a little wave.


    ¡°You¡¯re the one that put Sergeant Price in the hospital?¡± He looked skeptical.


    ¡°Technically, Colonel Brickman, it¡¯s only a clinic and Sister Clara and I pretty much carried him in. He wasn¡¯t in any condition to walk at the time.¡± For some reason Mark covered his face at this and Jake let out a snort of laughter.


    ¡°It¡¯s not funny, Jake. One of my men was assaulted.¡±


    ¡°You¡¯re right, Joe. You¡¯re right. Sorry for the outburst. It won¡¯t happen again. Please go on, Abby.¡± There were a few confused looks on the faces of the people at the table.


    ¡°Before I address Colonel Brickman¡¯s concerns, I¡¯d like to bring everyone up to date on where things stand and why you¡¯re all here. A few months ago, I was searching for an administrator for my charity foundation. I met Shauna during the interview process and I learned that she had recently resigned her commission in the army in order to search for her brother, Captain Martinez, who had been detained in Venezuela six months earlier. Part of my agreement with Shauna was that she could continue to work on finding her brother and that when she found his location, I would assist her in getting him freed. Two weeks ago, Shauna informed me that she had significant intelligence suggesting a possible location for her brother and I passed on the information to an associate of mine. Five days later, my associate contacted me and confirmed that Captain Martinez was imprisoned in a facility located outside of Caracas. He had infiltrated the prison and copied their data servers, as well as their surveillance servers. I understand that several of our intelligence agencies had previously tried and failed to accomplish this task.¡± At this comment, I looked over to Agent Smythe and a nod of his head confirmed my understanding.


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    ¡°My associate informed me that he would be returning to the prison to release Captain Martinez the following week and that he would be able to release any of the other prisoners that were with him. Shauna and I, along with my administrative team reviewed the prison records and the videos and found that there were ten other foreign prisoners being held in the same cell as the captain. We also found evidence showing that women and children were being held in another building of the prison.¡± At these words, I saw that I had Ethan¡¯s and Alexander¡¯s undivided attention.


    ¡°The prison records showed that the women and children were the families of prominent political opponents to Maduro. Over the next week, we helped plan and coordinate the rescue of the foreigners and the families. Shauna used her contacts to find a secure place for the families to hide once they were released and she was able to secure the transportation that was required to exfiltrate the prisoners. In addition, we gathered food, clothing and phones for the families and for the others. Yesterday, my associate entered the prison facility at around midnight and was somehow able to release all the prisoners that we had asked him to. Three of the inmates in the cell with the captain were not released, as their records showed them to be paid informants. The families were delivered to a bus that was waiting for them and they all made it safely to the village. Shauna has gotten confirmation of their safety. Last night, the remaining eight inmates were delivered here. Their physical condition was evaluated by Sister Clara and she diagnosed them with severe malnutrition and dehydration and immediately started to treat their conditions. She recommended that everyone stay here for forty-eight hours, after which they could all return to their various bases or agencies. This information was communicated to everyone¡¯s supervisors and it was agreed to.¡±


    I paused to give everyone a chance to take all the information and then I continued.


    ¡°That was the extent of our involvement with the rescue operation. No one here knows how the rescue operation actual took place. We don¡¯t know how my associate, who goes by the name of Roger, got in or how he got out. We don¡¯t know how he managed to get the inmates out of their cells or into the United States. We certainly don¡¯t know how he managed to do that without even waking them up. Their last memory was of going to sleep in the prison on Saturday night and then they woke up to find themselves here. Roger did mention applying a counter-agent to them once he dropped them off, but I have no further knowledge of it. I¡¯m stressing our lack of knowledge about Roger¡¯s methods so that you don¡¯t waste time trying to interrogate any members of my team. You¡¯ll get no further information from us about the rescue because we don¡¯t possess any other information. I¡¯m hoping that you also won¡¯t browbeat your soldiers and agents for information that they can¡¯t possibly have.¡±


    Alexander cleared his throat and spoke up. ¡°Thank you, Abby, for the summary of events. Before I ask you my question, I have some official business to take care of. The German government would like to extend its appreciation to you and to your team for arranging for Gerhardt¡¯s release. There will be an official function recognizing that appreciation in Washington and we hope that you and your team can attend. You have done an admirable job in underplaying your part in all this, but it is obvious to me that none of this would have happened without you, Abby. On a less official note, I wanted to let you know that Gerhardt is not only a valued member of the German diplomatic service, but he is also my brother-in-law. I would like to extend my thanks to you from myself, my sister and her children. Please know that you and your team will always be welcome guests in my country and in my house.¡±


    ¡°Herr Strudel is your brother-in-law? Really?¡± It was payback time. I could already see the color start to drain from Gerhardt¡¯s face.


    ¡°Herr Strudel?¡± Alexander¡¯s confusion almost set me off laughing.


    ¡°Gerhardt Strudel. He told me that he comes from a long line of bakers.¡± I couldn¡¯t hold in my smile anymore.


    A stream of German passed back and forth between Alexander and Gerhardt and then Alexander shook his head in resignation. ¡°I apologize for Gerhardt¡¯s attempt at a pun. His last name is Becker, which translates as baker in English. The German people are not well known for their sense of humor and Gerhardt is living proof of why.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯ll admit that he had me going there for awhile, but it¡¯s only because it seems so fitting. Perhaps it could be mentioned as a possible nickname for him around the office?¡±


    Alexander¡¯s face perked up. ¡°That is an excellent idea, Abby. Thank you for suggesting it.¡± Gerhardt¡¯s expression of despair was not lost on anyone at the table and several people tried unsuccessfully to hide their smiles.


    ¡°Now that my sister will soon be known as, Mrs. Strudel, I want to get back to the discussion and to ask you why we¡¯re all here. Besides saying thank you, Gerhardt told me that it would be in my best interests to hear what you have to say. I¡¯m assuming that others here were assured of the same thing.¡±


    ¡°Yes, Alexander. I want to make a deal with you, Mr. Helms and with Agent Smythe. I¡¯d like to give you each copies of the servers that were copied from the prison in exchange for your cooperation in two areas. First, the mission of the Hannah Foundation is to help victims of human trafficking. Occasionally, we will discover information about traffickers or Roger will come across some evidence of criminal activity and we¡¯ll need to call someone in authority who will listen and be able to act on this intelligence, without us wasting a lot of time proving who we are and answering a bunch of questions that we don¡¯t want to answer. It might be here in the US or in Europe. Slavery is a worldwide problem. I¡¯m hoping that you, Mr. Helms and Agent Smythe can get Shauna in touch with the people who will listen to us and I¡¯m hoping that you¡¯ll vouch for us. Second, when you encounter victims of human trafficking, I¡¯d like your agents to let us know, so that we can try to help them. We don¡¯t have the organizational reach to work in Europe yet, but I plan to change that over the next several years.¡±


    Alexander, Ethan and Agent Smythe all agreed to my terms and Jenny left to go get them the servers.


    ¡°Shouldn¡¯t you get this agreement in writing, Abby? Make it official?¡±, Mark asked.


    ¡°I thought about it, Mark, but decided that the juice wasn¡¯t worth the squeeze. I¡¯d never be able to enforce an agreement to cooperate in court and I¡¯ll never know to what extent they¡¯re cooperating. It all boils down to whether they want to help out or not. If they don¡¯t want to help victims of slavery, I can¡¯t make them and they¡¯re not the type of people that I would want to deal with anyways. Besides, when word of the jailbreak hits their higher levels, everyone is going to be clamoring for Roger¡¯s services. Pissing off the one person on the planet who can reach him is never a good idea.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s something that I don¡¯t understand. This man, Roger, is able to do incredible things. He¡¯s extremely resourceful. How did you meet him and why has he chosen to work through a sixteen-year-old girl?¡±, Colonel Brickman asked.


    ¡°Seventeen. My birthday was a few weeks ago. Also, I¡¯ve never met Roger. I have no idea what he looks like, except from his description in the police report.¡±


    ¡°I really admire the way she does that, Grandpa. She seems to be answering your question, but then she drops a small bomb off at the end of the answer and makes you ask follow-up questions. She controls the information and you¡¯re forced to play catch-up. It makes her seem all knowing.¡± Mark said this sotto vocce to Jake and I glared at him.


    ¡°Why are you here again?¡±, I asked.


    ¡°Jake said it would be fun. I should have brought some popcorn. Way better than Netflix.¡±


    ¡°Well keep quiet. I¡¯m trying to have meeting here.¡±


    ¡°You were saying about the police report?¡±, Colonel Brickman prodded to get us back on track and I told them about how Roger worked with the police to free the victims at Serpentine Logistics.


    ¡°Ok. So why did he contact you?¡±


    ¡°He said that I¡¯d impressed him and he felt that I was the right person to work with.¡± I didn¡¯t want to elaborate, so hoped that they would leave it there. They didn¡¯t.


    ¡°You impressed a man who can break into a foreign prison at a moments¡¯ notice and liberate over twenty people by himself? How did you do that?¡± This was from the major. What is it with majors and giving me a hard time today?


    ¡°That¡¯s not important. What is important is that...¡± I didn¡¯t get to finish as Shauna interrupted me.


    ¡°I can answer that. Jenny, can you put up the video on the big screen, please?¡± When did Jenny get back with the servers? What the hell?!


    ¡°Shauna! Don¡¯t you dare.¡±


    ¡°Too late, Abby. Consider this my revenge for keeping this from me.¡± She stuck her tongue out at me and blew me a raspberry. In a serious meeting with all these important people! I just buried my face in my hands and waited for it all to end.


    I suffered through the entire viewing and when it was over there was silence. No one said anything. Until Gerhardt said, ¡°Was zum Teufel haben Sie sich dabei gedacht?¡± and Mark started laughing.


    ¡°You speak German?¡±, I asked him.


    ¡°No, but I know what he asked you. It¡¯s what everyone asks you. What the hell did you think you were doing?¡±


    ¡°Was that real?¡±, Colonel Brickman asked in disbelief.


    ¡°Yes, it was. I was the guy slung over Abby¡¯s shoulder like a sack of potatoes.¡±, Mark answered.


    ¡°Running into danger like that and risking your life for a friend is what we give our highest medals for. In the army, you¡¯d have gotten the Silver Star for such an act of bravery.¡± Brickman¡¯s tone was somber and thoughtful.


    ¡°Oh, she didn¡¯t do it for a friend. I¡¯d never met her before that day. She was just nearby and saw the smoke.¡±


    ¡°I think I need to re-evaluate the report that I was given by Major Covington. His report doesn¡¯t match up with what I¡¯ve seen here tonight.¡±


    ¡°I can help with that too. Jenny, please pull up the other video.¡± Damn Shauna and her videos. It¡¯s strange how someone who has the ability to never be seen on camera keeps getting caught on camera.


    The video started before dad and I got there and showed Major Covington being very aggressive with Shauna and Sister Clara. Colonel Brickman visibly flinched when the major was dismissive of me when I arrived and he got red in the face when the major ordered the sergeant to remove me. Several people leaned forward in their chairs to watch as I took the sergeant down and I started second-guessing myself. Had I been too quick to action? Should I have taken it easier on Sergeant Price? Maybe given him a warning?


    ¡°Jenny, can I see that last bit again, please?¡± Mark asked.


    ¡°No, you can¡¯t, Mark! I think we¡¯ve all seen quite enough videos for today.¡± That boy was getting extra plank for a month.


    Colonel Brickman cleared his throat and looked visibly embarrassed. ¡°Abby, please accept my apologies for the actions of Major Covington and Sergeant Price. They were extremely out of line and not adhering to the army code of conduct. This matter will be brought up for review before a military tribunal and I doubt that the major will enjoy it. If I could get a copy of that video, the army¡¯s case against the major will be much stronger.¡±


    ¡°Ok, as long as I have your word that the video will not make its way onto the internet. The fire video is bad enough.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s easy enough to give. Covington¡¯s actions bring shame on the entire army and the negative publicity would be painful. Trust me, Abby. I don¡¯t want this video to get out there.¡±


    ¡°And I¡¯ll be sure to make Shauna available for your investigators and their hours and hours of questions. I¡¯m sure she¡¯ll be just as happy talking to them as she was in showing you all that fire video.¡± I turned to Shauna and gave her a sickly-sweet smile as she scowled at me and then I stuck out my tongue at her and gave her a raspberry.


    As we all got up from the table, I saw Jake approach Brickman and say, ¡°That¡¯s why I came, Joe. Because watching that girl pole-axe someone is so much more fun than being on the receiving end of it and I was so tired of being on the receiving end it. You look like you could use a beer, Joe. How about it? I¡¯m buying.¡±

 Chapter 38: Tyler

    By the next evening, everyone was gone, except for Shelly, Travis and Strudel. Instead of going to see their families, they arranged for their families to come to them. Travis¡¯ family came in from Texas and Mrs. Strudel and the little Strudels journeyed from Berlin. Each family moved into their own cottage. Reconnecting with their families lifted everyone¡¯s spirits and they all had a great time getting to know each other. When it was time to go home at the end of the week, Shelley stayed on. She needed more time to heal and Hannah¡¯s Home was happy to have her. She decided that for now, she¡¯s help Gabriel with kitchen duties and maybe work with the sisters in the clinic.


    For me, things finally started slowing down a few weeks later when my teaching assistant position and my accelerated Kung Fu training both ended within days of each other. The teaching position ended because the summer semester was over. The intense Kung Fu ended because Sifu Zhang showed up two weeks early. Both occurrences led to awkward situations.


    On the final day of class, each of the students was supposed to present their projects to dad for evaluation. In actuality, Dad and I had been following the progress of each of the students and the evaluation had already been made and a grade decided on. While everyone had passed to one degree or another, I highly doubted that three of the students would ever do any serious blacksmithing in the future. Dad had basically given them a pity grade instead of failing them outright.


    On the other hand, Tyler was getting the top grade in the class. He had put in considerable effort and made a lot of progress with his skills. I went over to congratulate him on his success.


    ¡°You¡¯ve come a long way, Tyler. Your hard work definitely paid off.¡±


    ¡°Thanks, Abby. It really doesn¡¯t feel like work. I enjoy working with the metal. You know, now that the your dad had given out the final grades, you¡¯re not technically my teaching assistant. Can I take you out for some coffee? There¡¯s something important I¡¯d like to get your opinion on.¡±


    That sounded strange. If he¡¯d have just asked to go for coffee, I would have said no. By asking for my opinion on something, he¡¯d piqued my curiosity. Dad had let the class out early so I still had an hour before Shauna picked me up. I graciously accepted and once we¡¯d gathered our things, we set off for the student bookstore a few buildings away. It had a Starbucks nested inside. I liked going there because I could get hot chocolate instead of coffee.


    We found an empty table and settled down with our drinks. Tyler took a few sips of his coffee but didn¡¯t say anything. He just looked down at his hands holding the cup. I got the sense that he was building himself up and I didn¡¯t rush him. He¡¯d get to it eventually and he did buy me the hot chocolate. That counted for a lot.


    ¡°I wasn¡¯t always the hard-working student that you see before you. I grew up in a rough neighborhood. Not Chicago rough, with drive-by shootings every week and gangs controlling whole areas, but we had more than our share of wannabe gangsters. My father ran out on us when I was seven and my mother had to work long hours. This left me alone after school and I mixed in with the wrong crowd. Over the years school took a back seat to my after-school activities. I found that I was good at fighting and stealing cars and I enjoyed doing both. The future wasn¡¯t something that I thought much about.¡±


    ¡°My attitude used to drive my mother crazy. She¡¯s a good woman that got knocked hard by life and my choices didn¡¯t do anything to ease her burden. That¡¯s my biggest regret in life and my greatest shame. The woman who gave me life and who worked herself ragged to keep me fed and clothed was the person that I respected the least. I cared more about the opinion of the street trash gang leader who never lifted a finger to help me than I did about her.¡±


    Tyler paused to sip his coffee. I didn¡¯t understand why he was telling me all this. I¡¯m not a priest and the confession of his sins was making me a bit uncomfortable. It seemed like an intensely personal story and I wanted him to move the story forward.


    ¡°What finally made you turn from the dark side?¡±


    ¡°My mother made friends with the woman in an apartment down the hall from us. She had a son that was a few years younger than me and our mothers would send us off to school together. He was a scrawny little kid, with shaggy hair and ears that stuck out from his head like an elf. He didn¡¯t look it, but he was incredibly smart. If he¡¯d had the chance to be tested, I think he¡¯d have been classified as a genius, but he lived in my neighborhood and ¡®advanced placement¡¯ wasn¡¯t really a thing there. Anyways, I walked him to and from school everyday and kept him out of trouble. A kid like that would have gotten his lunch money beat out of him before he even got to school.¡±


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    ¡°He was really a great kid and had the potential to get somewhere in life. I knew that I didn¡¯t, so I figured that I might as well help the little runt. He talked the whole way to school and the whole way back. Every day. I rarely had to say anything. He was full of thoughts and ideas and plans and I had none of those, so I just listened. Sometimes someone would approach us, but I would back them off with a threat or fight them off. When we got to school, sometimes I¡¯d go in for the day and sometimes I wouldn¡¯t.¡±


    ¡°Anyways, one day we were walking back from school and five older guys from one of the street gangs ambushed us and demanded he give them his shoes. He took one look at them and started getting ready to hand them over. See he was smart. His mother had saved for months to buy them for him and he loved those shoes, but he saw a beating heading our way and figured that it is better to be barefoot than to be bleeding. He made a smart, calculated decision. Only it wasn¡¯t the street-smart decision. Giving in would mark the both of us for life. We¡¯d never have a moment of peace from the second that he gave up those shoes. If these guys knew they could take what they wanted without consequences, they¡¯d be back again and again. So, I stopped him and told him to run while I held them off. I managed to put three of them down before the other last two took me down. On the ground I still fought hard and I know I hurt them. In the end, though, the police showed up a few minutes later and found me lying on the ground with a broken arm and leg and covered in blood.¡±


    ¡°I spent a month in the hospital and the kid came by on the first day to thank me. I never saw him again. His mother moved them down to Florida somewhere to live with her sister before I got out of the hospital. It was a safer area. When I finally got back to the neighborhood, the kids uncle was waiting for me. He was a Raleigh PD officer and he explained to me that from now on he was going to protect me the way that I¡¯d protected his nephew and for the next year and half, he made sure that I got to school and back. With him always watching and asking about school, I couldn¡¯t skip class anymore. I also couldn¡¯t hang out with the street gangs. Having the police always hanging around meant that they didn¡¯t want anything to do with me. So my grades improved and I graduated. The kid¡¯s uncle used to work in a local community center and was on very good terms with the guy that used to run it. Turns out that guy left the center and went on to become the dean of Galt University. The uncle wrote a recommendation for me and I got in on a working scholarship.¡±


    ¡°My mother used to work with Dean Kronin at that community center. The dean is the reason we moved here years ago. He offered my dad his teaching position.¡±


    Tyler smiled. ¡°All roads lead back to the dean. It¡¯s a small world, Abby. Getting back to the story, I¡¯ve worked hard at my studies over the last three years and I¡¯ll be graduating at the end of this year. I¡¯m a business major and it¡¯s ok. I can leave here and get a good job and build a career. That was the plan. Only last summer I took a blacksmithing course that was recommended to me by the dean and everything changed. For the first time in years, I found something else that I loved doing. Even more than fighting and stealing cars. The idea that I could picture something in my head and then create it was incredible to me. I started looking into everything about blacksmithing and decided to take every course in it that I could. I¡¯m signed up for two more courses this fall and another two in the spring.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s great Tyler. I¡¯m really glad that you¡¯ve found your calling, but why are you telling me all this?¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m telling you all this because I want you to know who I am and why this is so important to me. I want to ask your dad to take me on as his second apprentice when I finish school.¡±


    Ok. I wasn¡¯t expecting that. It did get leave me with a question though. ¡°Uhm, who¡¯s this first apprentice?¡±


    ¡°You!?¡±


    ¡°Nope. I¡¯m his daughter. As far as I know, he¡¯s never taken on an apprentice.¡±


    ¡°But you know so much and you¡¯re very good. I¡¯ve seen some of pieces that you¡¯ve created.¡±


    ¡°My dad is really into his work and so the best way to spend time with him is at the forge. I guess if you look at it from another angle, you could say that I was his apprentice, but that¡¯s not how it seems to me. We just hung out and made stuff and I learned over the years. I enjoy making things, but it¡¯s not a calling. I just love hanging out with my dad.¡±


    ¡°Oh. I guess I¡¯m still making wrong assumptions about you. Do you think that he hasn¡¯t taken on an apprentice because he doesn¡¯t want one?¡±


    ¡°I don¡¯t know. It¡¯s never come up. I doubt it though. He really enjoys teaching and I know that he respects the hell out his own mentor. He¡¯s a big believer in ¡®paying it back¡¯, so I think you have a good shot of him saying yes. You should definitely ask him. Worst comes to worse, he says no and you find another teacher. I¡¯ve gotten to know a few blacksmiths over the years and I can recommend one or two to try. You¡¯ll have to ask him yourself, but if you want, I can speak to dad and put in a good word for you.¡±


    ¡°That would be great, Abby. I can¡¯t thank you enough. I¡¯m still nervous around him because of the way I treated you at the start of that first course.¡±


    ¡°You made a mistake and apologized for it. You¡¯ve been great ever since. That shows character and he sees that. You shouldn¡¯t worry about it. There is however something that you should be asking yourself.¡±


    ¡°Myself?¡±


    ¡°If you¡¯ve enjoyed fighting so much, why did you give it up? I happen to know a place where you¡¯re encouraged to fight.¡±

 Chapter 39: Testing

    Eva laughed her ass off. ¡°You have Bobby and Mark already taking Kung Fu classes and you¡¯ve convinced Tyler to try it too. Tell me again how none of them like you, Abby. Go on. I¡¯m waiting. Also, tell us how this ends well.¡±


    ¡°Well, Bobby does like me, so you were partially right, but Mark and I are just friends and Tyler is not into me. He wants to apprentice with my dad and become a blacksmith.¡±


    ¡°I get it. You¡¯re right, Abby. Tyler will just be coming over everyday and working out back with your dad in the forge where it¡¯s all hot and he¡¯ll come out all sweaty and take his shirt off and his muscles will glisten in the hot sun and you¡¯ll run over and help him draw some water for the well to quench his thirst.¡±


    ¡°What kind of trashy romance novels are you reading? Besides, we don¡¯t even have well in the yard! I¡¯d just bring him some water from the kitchen. So there!¡± I stuck my tongue out at her and we both giggled. James, on the other hand, was less than amused at our discussion.


    ¡°Don¡¯t mind Mr. Sourpuss over there. He¡¯s not used to having a job and he¡¯s tired.¡±, Eva said.


    ¡°I am tired, but it¡¯s not because of work. I¡¯m tired of hearing about Mark and Tyler. Abby¡¯s with Bobby. The only thing we need to discuss is when he¡¯s going to get here and what we¡¯re going to do. My vote is still for the water-park.¡±


    ¡°James, just because you¡¯ve made a choice, doesn¡¯t mean that the other options simply disappear. It¡¯s always fun to let your imagination soar. Speaking of which, I think we should go to the carnival and soar on some of the rides. Also, I want a stuffed lion like Abby¡¯s, except I want a blue one.¡±


    ¡°Abby and Bobby just went last week. I don¡¯t think they¡¯ll want to go again.¡±


    ¡°Don¡¯t be too sure about that, James. The whole point of going there for their first date was that they¡¯d be reminded of it every time they saw a carnival. Maybe Bobby will want to relive the experience.¡±, Eva countered.


    This Saturday was my first chance to relax in what seemed like forever. Summer break was finally here! It was August, so of course football practice season was set to start next week and my time with Bobby would go down to almost nil, again. We¡¯d still text and facetime, but we wouldn¡¯t get to actually see each other that often until school started.


    To James¡¯ delight, Bobby showed up and voted the for the water park. He said something about seeing me in a bathing suit, but I was too busy not blushing to notice. Bobby drove us all out to the park and we had a blast. Since this was a double date, Eva and James relaxed their no PDA rule and Bobby and I had no choice but to follow suit. We didn¡¯t want them to stand out in the crowd. The slides were fun too and I only had to cheat a little, by slipping into R1 once or twice to bypass some slow mover, to beat Bobby down the innertube slide. Winner got a kiss, so I don¡¯t think he¡¯d have minded even if he¡¯d known.


    The next afternoon, Sifu Zhang showed up at Uncle Magnum¡¯s. Uncle Magnum and I were going through our forms when the door opened and an older Asian man walked in. He was stooped a bit and he walked like his stomach was in pain. He immediately sat down in one of the chairs from which the parents would watch their children and Uncle Magnum was at his side asking Sifu Zhang if he was ok.


    ¡°I¡¯m as fine as I¡¯m going to be. Continue your forms, Paul. I¡¯ll watch from here.¡±


    I expected Uncle Magnum to ignore his request to continue and help him to a more comfortable chair, but he didn¡¯t. He came back and we continued our forms as if some sick dude hadn¡¯t just walked in. Uncle Magnum started us back at the first form, Small Idea, and we worked through all the others, including all the weapons forms. We did each form twice before Uncle Magnum moved us on to kicking exercises and finally to sparring.


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    This was the big test. Not the red belt test to become a master, but more important in some ways. This session was the reason that Uncle Magnum had been working me so hard and I knew that I needed to be shine in this evaluation. Uncle Magnum wasn¡¯t going to go easy on me today.


    It wasn¡¯t about winning, as I had no hope of that given the disparity in our levels, but I had to give Sifu Zhang an appreciation for what I was capable of. I gave as good as I got for the first round and for the second round Uncle Magnum stepped it up a notch and soon another. It was all I could do to just keep up, but I wanted to show Sifu Zhang that I had more in me so I wrapped Uncle Magnum in a field and used the information I was getting to up my defense and then go on the attack. It worked for about thirty seconds. After that, Uncle Magnum raised the bar again and I was outclassed by his experience, speed and power. I managed to finish out the round in full on defense, not my favorite style of fighting, and I was completely spent. I¡¯d left it all out on the sparring floor. Uncle Magnum had us end the sparring with our salutes and took me over to meet Sifu Zhang. Once he¡¯d introduced us, he sent me off upstairs to the shower and told me we¡¯d talk when I came back down.


    I walked down the hallway and up a few stairs before shifting to R1 and going back to listen in. Uncle Magnum would fill me in later, but I didn¡¯t want the filtered version.


    ¡°Enough about my health. My health had been all consuming for far too long. We¡¯ll have plenty of time for that later. Let¡¯s talk about your student.¡±


    ¡°Did you see what I was talking about? After the second round?¡±, Uncle Magnum asked in a serious tone.


    ¡°Yes. She is as you described and I haven¡¯t seen anything like that. Many people can lower their level of fighting, very few can suddenly increase it. She had reached her maximum and she was good, good enough to test for her red belt, but then a change came over her and she was better. Much better. I can see why you called me. There is something else that you may not have realized, though.


    ¡°Really?¡±


    ¡°You mentioned that her forms had improved. What you didn¡¯t mention is that her forms are the same to yours.¡±


    ¡°Well, she¡¯s been learning from me since she was four. How else would she do them?¡±


    ¡°I don¡¯t mean that her moves are just similar to yours. Your moves are similar to mine, but they are different. You have your own way within the form. Charlie¡¯s style is very different from both of ours. It is not bad. Everyone has their own idiosyncrasies. However, Abby¡¯s moves are identical to yours. She moves her hands and fingers to the exact same position every time. If you practiced with her for hours every day, for months, I doubt you could have choreographed your moves so well together.¡±


    ¡°I didn¡¯t notice that, but now that you mention it, I can see that and I¡¯m sure that it wasn¡¯t always like that. I clearly remember that I used to have to correct her hand placements. I haven¡¯t done that for awhile. Maybe since last year sometime. I¡¯ll have to check my notes, but I¡¯m betting that it was around last summer. Something about her changed then. She knows what it was and she doesn¡¯t want to talk about it.¡±


    ¡°It is her choice to tell you about it or not. You¡¯ve done well in not forcing the issue. Our job now is to figure out how to move her forward.¡±


    ¡°You¡¯ve decided then? You¡¯ll work with her?¡±


    ¡°For the time I have left, yes. I¡¯m afraid that it won¡¯t be very long. That is why I came early. I still have enough energy for teaching Kung Fu a few hours a day. I will give her that time and it will have to be enough.¡±


    I raced back upstairs, tears streaming down my face. Not again! I¡¯d scanned Sifu Zhang while he was talking. He had late-stage pancreatic cancer and it had spread to his lungs and his kidneys. I¡¯d seen this cancer a few times in the hospital and he had a month or two to live, at best. What struck me as incredible was that he had such dedication to his Kung Fu and to his student that he was willing to spend his last days helping him. Helping me. Someone he¡¯d never met before today.


    I let the hot water stream over me and it helped calm me down. The downpour put to shame what my eyes could produce so there was no point in crying. I needed a plan. I wasn¡¯t going to let Uncle Magnum¡¯s teacher die if there was something that I could do about it. I¡¯d waited too long with Evan because I¡¯d overestimated how much time I had to work with and I¡¯d been too busy practicing instead of doing. This time I would start right away. I just needed to find a way to do it without giving away my abilities.

 Chapter 40: The Plan

    The plan was simple. Make up an experimental cure, get Sifu Zhang to agree to take it and then remove the cancer into L2. As usual, the hard part was implementing the plan. I spent all of Sunday night working out each step and creating alternatives for when things didn¡¯t go according to plan, just like I¡¯d seen Shauna do. My biggest stumbling block was that I didn¡¯t know enough about Sifu Zhang and it¡¯s much harder to manipulate someone when you can¡¯t guess how they¡¯ll react to certain information. Hell, I didn¡¯t even know his first name.


    Waking up at six am on Monday morning really sucked. I¡¯d had a good eight hours of sleep, but I still felt like I¡¯d been run over by a truck. A shower woke me up and I was soon out the door and heading to the McDonald¡¯s on Finley Avenue to get five vanilla milkshakes. I was lucky because their milkshake machine was working so I didn¡¯t have to drive to the one in the mall and see if their machine worked. Once I had the shakes, I placed them in the passenger seat of my truck and shifted them to L1, where they¡¯d stay cold and frosty until I brought the back to reality. That was one of the perks of the stasis effect in L1 and L2; hot stays hot and cold stays cold. I could leave a crisp apple in L1 for ten years and it¡¯ll be just as crisp when I brought it back to reality. I¡¯d been using that trick when drinking hot chocolate at home lately. It was soooo good.


    By this time, I only had to wait a few minutes until the hardware store was open and I went in to buy a roll of plastic tarp. Having everything I needed to get started, I shifted the car to L2 and drove to Uncle Magnum¡¯s. At the school, I walked in through the front window facade which was absent in L2 and I unrolled the tarps across the front section of the main classroom and also covered the front of the smaller training room. I didn¡¯t know for certain where Sifu Zhang would be sitting for our meditation sessions, but I covered the most likely places.


    It wasn¡¯t much in terms of preparation. Milkshakes and a tarp. However, those were just the physical elements of the plan. Most of the plan involved my sales pitch and the cancer removal. As it was, this was a much more complicated plan that I needed. I could have easily slipped into Sifu Zhang¡¯s room while he was sleeping, brought him into L1 and removed the cancer over the course of a week. No one would have been the wiser. If Sifu got better, it would be hailed as a miracle and he would stay a bit longer before going back to Raleigh and his old life.


    Only, I didn¡¯t want him to go back to his old life. I wanted him to stay here where I could make sure that the cancer didn¡¯t come back and where he and Uncle Magnum could work together again. Uncle Magnum left his teacher to join us when dad and I moved here and I always felt bad that he¡¯d given up that part of his life for me. This was my chance to even the scales a bit. Also, I had some other plans for Sifu Zhang. Yes, I was manipulating the course of Sifu¡¯s life, but it was a life that he had prepared himself to leave already.


    Since I was already in the perfect place for it, I shifted to R1 and started my stretching routine. The shower had done a good job in waking me up, but my muscles were still stiff from yesterday¡¯s evaluation and the warm-up would loosen them right up. The field that I¡¯d wrapped around the living area upstairs soon showed me that both Uncle Magnum and Sifu Zhang were up and moving around and I had only done a few knee bends before they came downstairs and started their own warm up.


    I watched the greyed-out versions of them go through the usual warm-up routine and I followed along. Despite his physical deterioration, Sifu Zhang moved well. A lifetime of muscle memory showing through the pain and fatigue that he must be felt. Before I knew it, they had moved on to their forms and I wrapped them each in field to evaluate their styles and how they differed from each other. I was probably setting myself up for more raised eyebrows from them the next time they saw me doing the forms, as I planned to incorporate Sifu Zhang¡¯s movements into my own.


    Much like the field could send me scanned data on thousands of feet of rock and I¡¯d be able to remember it fully, I was absorbing the information about their movements and could review those movements later with perfect recall. The field acted as an external hard drive that gave me a seemingly photographic memory for anything that I scanned with it. Unfortunately, photographic memory was not the same as muscle memory and I still had to practice a lot to turn my knowledge into mastery. I¡¯d noticed though that I only needed a fraction of the practice time that I used to need to reach mastery. That was like a huge bonus on top of an already massive bonus and I truly appreciated it.


    The exciting part for me happened when I got to watch them do a series of forms that I¡¯d never seen before. Uncle Magnum always made it a point to only let me see the forms leading up to red belt. He said that he didn¡¯t want me to get distracted and that I¡¯d see more forms when I was ready. I guess the cat was out of the bag now, because I was effectively recording each of the new forms and could practice them whenever I wanted to. I even got to watch Sifu Zhang correct Uncle Magnum¡¯s forms and proceed to do several forms on his own, ones that even Uncle Magnum hadn¡¯t learned yet. It felt like I had discovered a lost treasure chest full of books that had been presumed lost for all eternity.


    After the forms, Uncle Magnum and Sifu Zhang did some attack and defend exercises, including ¡®sticky hands¡¯, and finished off with some practice on the dummies. I followed all the movements with my field and learned a lot. They had such fluidity to their movements. Watching them made me feel that my movements were like those of a troll at a ballet recital. I had a feeling that Sifu Zhang would be keeping me busy for quite awhile.


    Having finished my spying for the day, I reappeared in reality just outside the front door to the school and walked in. My plan had been to talk to Sifu Zhang alone, but I changed my mind over the past hour as I¡¯d watched them training together. Where Sifu Zhang was concerned, I didn¡¯t want to sneak behind Uncle Magnum¡¯s back. He¡¯d know everything up front, except for the part where it would be my abilities removing the cancer and not some experimental drug. Oh, and I¡¯d have to create a whole convoluted lie to make him believe it. Yeah, no contradiction there.


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    I¡¯d caught the two of them sitting down cross-legged and about to start a cool down meditation. ¡°Before you start, Sifu Zhang, I was hoping to take a few minutes of your time and make you an offer.¡±


    ¡°You have my complete attention.¡±


    ¡°Thank you. Last night you explained that your cancer had spread to some of your other organs and there wasn¡¯t anything more the doctors could do for you. You transferred your school to your successor and you¡¯ve said your goodbyes. We are your last stop and you don¡¯t expect to be here long.¡±


    ¡°That is a fair summation, Abby.¡±


    ¡°What if there¡¯s a small chance for another outcome? Would you take it? Or have you accepted your fate?¡±


    Uncle Magnum interrupted. ¡°Abby! This is not something¡­¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s ok, Paul. I will answer her. Abby, I have been a student of Kung Fu all of my life. At it¡¯s most basic level, Kung Fu is a disciple that requires dedication and perseverance. You are in constant battle with yourself; to overcome your fears, your worries, your doubts, your laziness, and all of the other obstacles that you put before yourself. In this regard, I have fought my whole life against myself, for I am my greatest opponent. This cancer is my own body fighting me and I have fought it using every technique that I¡¯ve learned over a lifetime. Unfortunately, I cannot use willpower and perseverance to force the cancer away and I¡¯ve exhausted all the medical options available. With chemotherapy and drug cocktails I can extend my life a few more months, but it will not be a life worth living. At least not for me. Fighting is what I do and if I had the opportunity, I would continue to do so.¡±


    With a mental deep breath, I began my spiel. ¡°A few months ago, I watched a seven-year-old boy with cancer, my friend Evan, wither away and die from cancer. At the time, I didn¡¯t know enough or have the resources to stop it from happening. Now though, I know more and I have a lot more resources. Since Evan¡¯s death, I¡¯ve been using those resources to find out more about new experimental drugs being developed. I¡¯ve made contacts in research labs all over the world who let me know if they have anything interesting. For your type of cancer and the late stage that it¡¯s in, there is nothing in development that would work, but there is something that has already been developed and mostly abandoned that might work.¡±


    ¡°I don¡¯t understand. If it worked, then it wouldn¡¯t have been abandoned.¡±, Uncle Magnum said.


    ¡°Oooh, look who knows so much. There¡¯s a big difference between mostly abandoned and all abandoned.¡± I paused for a moment for Uncle Magnum¡¯s facepalm at yet another Princess Bride reference. ¡°Four years ago, a research lab in California created a drug that was tested on three late stage pancreatic cancer patients. One patient survived and got better.¡±


    ¡°The chances of surviving from this cancer is effectively zero. One in three is much better. Why would they abandon the drug?¡±, Sifu Zhang asked.


    ¡°Because they couldn¡¯t make it in large quantities, and it was extremely expensive and time consuming to make in the gram quantities. They tried for over a year, but there was not way to mass produce it. One course of treatment took over three months to produce and the final price would bankrupt most people.¡±


    ¡°If they are not producing it and it takes three months to make, I cannot see it doing me any good, Abby. I do not have three months.¡±


    ¡°Yes, but the story doesn¡¯t end there. When the drug failed, the company went bankrupt and one of their researchers bought the equipment for next to nothing and set up the equipment in his basement. He wanted to have the means to create the drug if anyone he knew ever needed it. Once he had one course of treatment ready though, he decided to keep making more and sell it to people who wanted a thirty-three percent chance at surviving.¡±


    Uncle Magnum asked the key question. ¡°How expensive is it?¡±


    ¡°Very. The entire course of treatment is over half a million dollars.¡±


    ¡°Even before I gave my school away, I could not have afforded this treatment.¡±


    ¡°I can and that¡¯s where my offer comes in.¡± At these words, Sifu Zhang looked questioningly at Uncle Magnum, who nodded solemnly. Sifu raised his eyebrows in surprise and turned back to me.


    ¡°Please go on.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯ll buy the drug and you take it. You¡¯ll have a one in three chance of survival. If you survive, I¡¯d like you to stay in town and spend half your time teaching with Uncle Magnum and half your time teaching at Hannah¡¯s Home, the charity organization that I started. I can¡¯t speak as to what you¡¯d get paid here, but the foundation can offer you an ok salary and a place to live.¡±


    ¡°What does the foundation do?¡±


    ¡°Hannah¡¯s Home was named after my mother, who was kidnapped over twelve years ago. The foundation was designed to help the victims of human trafficking and their families get back to their old lives or to start new ones. Among other things, we¡¯ll offer counseling services, medical evaluations, career training, housing, documentation, and legal assistance. We¡¯ll even assist with travel expenses to get the survivors back home. I was hoping that you could design and teach a targeted self-defense class so that the survivors will have a better shot at defending themselves if they¡¯re ever in a similar situation to the one where they were taken. At the very least it will help them get regain enough confidence to move forward with their lives. I¡¯d also like you to teach classic Kung Fu to those that want it, including our staff. I don¡¯t expect many of our guests to stay longer than a month, but some may take to it and decide to continue when they go back home.¡±


    ¡°Your foundation has a worthy mission and if the treatment works, I agree to your terms.¡±


    ¡°Really? Just like that? You don¡¯t want to think about it?¡±


    ¡°I did. If I survive, I will be doing exactly what I¡¯d like to be doing. The only person who has a downside here is you. If I don¡¯t survive, you will have wasted a lot of money.¡±


    ¡°Not true. I will have spent it trying to save my uncles¡¯ friend and mentor. I can make more money. I can¡¯t make another Sifu Zhang.¡±


    ¡°In that case, I really hope I survive, if only to see what you¡¯ll do next.¡±


    ¡°Hold on a minute, Sifu. You don¡¯t know Abby that well. Before you see what she¡¯s going to do next, you need to see what she just did now. I suspect that you¡¯ve been had. Abby, what would you have done if he¡¯d refused your offer?¡± Uncle Magnum was looking me straight into the eyes and I could see a the corners of his lips twitch into a smile before he got them in control.


    ¡°Well¡­the treatment doses are arriving by special courier this afternoon, so I suppose I would have had to come over everyday and sneak it into whatever he was drinking at the time.¡±


    ¡°You would have disregarded my wishes on the matter?¡±, Sifu asked, astonished.


    ¡°You could look at it that way, but I prefer to think of it like this. Do you force your students to do horse-stance and plank? Do you make them do push-ups? Hell, yes you do. You do it because you know that it¡¯s good training for them, even if they can¡¯t see it. This is the same thing and just because you would have been too stupid to decide to do the right thing, that doesn¡¯t mean that I have to be stupid too.¡±


    Uncle Magnum shook his head in amazement. ¡°That¡¯s my Abby! A facepalm from Sifu on your very first day with him. I¡¯m impressed.¡±

 Chapter 41: Progress

    Most of the work to rid Sifu Zhang of his cancer was done in the first session that night. I returned to the studio after spending the day at Hannah¡¯s Home and I handed Sifu one of the milkshakes. He didn¡¯t look pleased.


    ¡°Vanilla? The chocolate is better.¡±


    ¡°The chocolate is contra-indicated with the medication, which is already mixed in. Drink up. That may possibly be the most expensive milkshake in the history of the world.¡±


    Sifu drank it down and I took him into the training room. ¡°You may experience some disorientation after taking the medication so it¡¯s recommended that you sit down. At the same time, you¡¯re not supposed to fall asleep. I figured that we could relax and meditate for twenty minutes and let the medication settle in. After that, you¡¯re good to exercise, but you¡¯re supposed to stop if the feeling of disorientation kicks in again. I think that after today, we should do this first thing in the morning, so that you¡¯re fully recovered by the evening.¡±


    Sifu agreed and we sat down to contemplate our energies or something like that. I still didn¡¯t really get the whole mediation thing and I wondered if everyone else was just faking it too. After a minute of pretend relaxation, I shifted Sifu and myself to L1 and set up a trigger field to alert me if anyone came within three feet of the door.


    With Sifu in stasis, I got to work removing sections of the cancer by shifting them to L2, where they fell on the plastic tarp that I¡¯d set up earlier in the day. I love it when a plan comes together! With only fifteen minutes to work with today, I took out all the easy to remove cancer and left behind anything close to an artery or anything vital. I made sure to take the inside of the cancer and leave the shell intact. By the time I was done, eighty percent of the cancers were gone. I found that it was much easier to remove the cancer while he was in stasis, as I didn¡¯t have to deal with moving cells. Tomorrow morning I¡¯d start with the more detailed, painstaking work.


    Sifu Zhang didn¡¯t notice when I snapped him back to reality. For him, those fifteen minutes didn¡¯t happen and he looked surprised when I told him a few minutes later that the time was up.


    ¡°I think that the medication has played with my sense of time. It only felt like a few minutes to me.¡±


    ¡°Well, I did warn you. Although, if that¡¯s as bad as your side effects get, you¡¯re very lucky.¡±


    ¡°What else can I expect?¡±


    ¡°Not much more than you already have. Fatigue and achiness mostly. The medication does stimulate your body to work harder so you might find yourself getting hungrier than you¡¯re used to.¡±


    ¡°That would be a welcome change. Even the small milkshake was hard to finish.¡±


    Sifu stopped following my lead once we left the room. That was only as it should be. He was the Sifu and I quickly learned what Uncle Magnum meant when he said that he¡¯d been coddling us all these years.


    Getting up early on Tuesday sucked even more than on Monday, because I was now sorer (Is that a word?) than I¡¯d been the day before. Now it felt like I¡¯d been run over by a truck that then reversed and run me over again. I caught Sifu and Uncle Magnum as they were heading to warmup and I sent Uncle Magnum back upstairs so that Sifu and I could meditate in the training room. I¡¯d thought about having Uncle Magnum join us, but it wouldn¡¯t make sense if both of them had the same time disorientation.


    Today I had enough time to remove the kidney cancer almost completely. There were still some cancerous cells along the edges of where the cluster was and I¡¯d get back to them in a few days. All three of the cancer clusters had shriveled up since last night and I was going to make sure that they didn¡¯t make a comeback.


    After the meditation, I left the two of them to train. Of course, I came back right away in R1 and followed their workout. My last year of high school was starting in a few weeks and I wouldn¡¯t be able to come here every morning. I was going to take advantage of this unique opportunity.


    At Hannah¡¯s Home later that day, Shauna and I discussed the security arrangements that we wanted to put in. Major Convington had reminded us that anyone could just drive in and cause trouble. Many of the people that would be staying with us needed a place that they could feel secure in. It was going to be a challenge to give them that sense of security, without making them feel that they were prisoners. We¡¯d decided to add a security wall along the entire front of the property and cover it in ivy on the inside. The rest of the property would be fenced in and bushes would be planted along it so they would eventually mask the fence. The front gate would be strengthened and controlled remotely.


    ¡°I think we¡¯ll need to add more cottages in a few months. Word is slowly filtering out about us and several organizations have reached out to us. I expect our cottages to fill up quickly once those organizations have had a chance to come by and make sure that we¡¯re real. Your friend Mary at the soup kitchen says that she knows several people that she¡¯ll be sending out way when she sees them again.¡±


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    ¡°Are we ready for to take on more survivors?¡±, I asked dubiously. Starting up Hannah¡¯s Home required a lot more planning and preparation than I¡¯d expected. Some days it felt like the to-do list was never ending.


    Shauna thought about my question for a few moments before answering. ¡°I think we¡¯re ready. Maybe not ready to ramp up to full capacity in the next few weeks, but we can definitely handle up to 12 people. Having Shelley here as a trial run has let us see what we were missing and we¡¯ve fixed most of the issues we discovered. We¡¯re nowhere near where we plan on being in a year, but we can start with what we have. Just a safe place to stay, regular meals and someone to talk is more than many organizations can offer. We¡¯ve got a hell of a lot more and as we take in more people, we¡¯ll be able to provide even more, such as full-time teachers for different age groups, child care assistance, and job placement.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m excited to see all the hard work that we¡¯re doing coming together. This place is going to help a lot of people. How are Jenny and Gabriel doing with the first list of accounts that I gave them to look into?¡±


    ¡°From the five accounts that you gave them, they¡¯ve been able to identify three buyers so far. They think that they¡¯ll be able to uncover enough information on five more buyers this week, but the other twelve transfers had multiple layers of protection and Gabriel says that he¡¯d need access to the bank¡¯s systems to follow the trail properly. For the three buyers that they¡¯ve managed to identify, they¡¯re all on the west coast and I passed on the information to the new contact that your CIA friend arranged for us at the FBI. His name is Kevin Mayner and he and his team followed up on the leads that we gave him. One of the leads led to four arrests and freed six children from a farm in rural Oregon. They were being used as manual labor. Over the next two weeks, Kevin expects to be able to make arrests on the other two leads that we gave him. We are officially his favorite people right now.¡± Shauna was practically glowing at the news and I shared her joy.


    ¡°Is there anything we can do to help the children?¡±


    ¡°All of them have been returned to their parents, except one. It turns out that her parents were two of those arrested. She¡¯ll be turning eighteen next year and asked to stay with her aunt until then. All of the families were given information about us and Kevin put in a good word for us. None of them have reached out to us yet, but they may in the coming weeks.¡±


    ¡°We¡¯ll need to have a little party to celebrate our first success. Also, please have Gabriel send me a list of what he information he would need from the banks to find the other buyers. I¡¯ll need the name of the bank and the branch. If Roger is ever in the area, he should be able to access their systems.¡±


    ¡°With anyone else, I would have serious doubts about what you just said. Roger is in a category all his own.¡±


    ¡°Yes, he is.¡± I felt like I was tooting my own horn, but saying nothing would seem weird. ¡°Oh, that reminds me of something he told me. I can¡¯t believe that I almost forgot. He said that we should contact Captain Stevens in Wilmington and ask him about one of the survivors out there that seemed to have taken charge of the others while they were being held captive. He said that when the police released the victims, she talked to each one and exchanged contact information. We need to tell Stevens that this woman was the one he had to send officers back in for and find in the offices. If Stevens can give this woman our contact information, Roger feels that she¡¯d help us reach out to the other survivors.¡±


    ¡°I also have a few ideas for Hannah¡¯s Home. I¡¯ve spoken to Dean Kronin at Galt and he¡¯s agreed to put us on the list of organizations for which volunteer work will count towards the university¡¯s community service requirement. Since he¡¯s on our board of directors, he wasn¡¯t hard to convince. With school starting up again in a few weeks, we should be getting some calls from interested students. We¡¯ll need to make a list of tasks that they can help us with. I¡¯ll check with Sister Clara to see if she¡¯d like some help as well. Galt has a medical program and having a few of the upcoming doctors and nurses on hand to help out might be useful.¡±


    ¡°I don¡¯t doubt that she¡¯ll be able to fill up their time. Having seen the masses of patients the sisters care for during a regular clinic day, I can imagine that she¡¯ll welcome the help.¡± Shauna had spoken to me in awe at the dedication of the sisters.


    ¡°I¡¯m going to call the dean again this afternoon and see if he¡¯s willing to take the volunteer idea to a higher level. I¡¯d like to see if some of Galt¡¯s schools could use us as a semester project. The professors would oversee the work and grade it and the students would get real world experience. The school of architecture can design our new cottages. The business school could work on a marketing campaign for us or help us source new suppliers. Maybe their school of education can send us teachers for the children.¡±


    ¡°I like the way you think, Abby. I get on that list for the volunteers and I¡¯ll review the list of schools Galt has. One other thing, though. I know that Hannah¡¯s Home was created for the victims of human trafficking, but would you mind if I use it to help another group of people?¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m all for helping people, Shauna, but I¡¯m not keen on splitting our focus.¡±


    ¡°Oh, no, it¡¯s not that kind of helping. I just want to put in place a hiring policy where we give preference to companies owned by military veterans when we have contracts to give out. Many of these contractors are smaller companies and they don¡¯t have the resources to compete with the larger firms in terms of marketing and presentation styles.¡±


    ¡°I wholeheartedly approve of giving back to those who give us so much. Their prices would have to be competitive though.¡±


    Soon after, I returned to my grueling training with Sifu Zhang. I was happy to be learning so much by training twice a day, but at the same time, I was so looking forward to the start of school.

 Chapter 42: School Starts

    Sifu Zhang was a new man by the time he drank his fifteenth milkshake. He stood straighter, he had more energy, and the lack of constant pain relaxed his features. He looked and acted twenty years younger than the day he practically stumbled into the school and had to take a seat or collapse on the floor. It¡¯s amazing what removing cancer can do to a person and it pained me to think about how Evan could have had a similar recovery, if I¡¯d only moved faster.


    I had finished taking out the last of the cancer a few days earlier and I¡¯d stop with the milkshakes in another week. The extra calories were good for him and I didn¡¯t want him to feel that the cure worked too fast. I don¡¯t think he cared anyways. He¡¯d keep drinking the milkshakes every day if it meant he could fell this good again. He felt strong for the first time since his diagnosis and he started thinking about his future again.


    ¡°This afternoon, I would like to go with you to Hannah¡¯s Home. I need to see what¡¯s there and figure out where I will teach. You also mentioned a place to live, if I remember correctly?¡±


    ¡°Yes. I thought that one of the cottages would be good for you, but I think that one of the rooms in the old rectory would be better suited to you. I¡¯ll ask Shauna, the foundation¡¯s administrator, to set up one of the rooms for you. Are you sure that you¡¯re ready to leave this dungeon of torture?¡±


    ¡°Since I am no longer dying, I don¡¯t have an excuse to keep interfering with Paul and Maggie¡¯s courtship. He had been alone for too long. I am also excited to build a new dungeon of torture and spread the pain to new students.¡±


    ¡°Great. I already have victims¡­uhm¡­students for you to torture¡­uhm¡­teach.¡±


    I signed Shauna, Jenny and Gabriel up for lessons, but I was surprised when all three of the sisters wanted to join as well. ¡°We need the exercise, Abby. We¡¯ve all gotten too soft lately¡±, Sister Clara explained.


    I was glad to see that Shelley also wanted to try out the class. She¡¯d be a great role model for others like her and I thought that the defense techniques would help her get over the sense of helplessness that was weighing her down and give her some feelings of control over the direction of her life.


    With Shauna¡¯s help, over the next few weeks Sifu Zhang was able to open his new school at Hannah¡¯s Home. He ended up choosing to use a part of the large industrial building that housed all the equipment needed to run the property. Fred, our caretaker, was barely using a quarter of the space and by moving things around we were able to section off a large room for Kung Fu and create its own entrance.


    While all this was going on, I started my Senior year in high school.


    I thought I¡¯d be excited about my last year, but I really wasn¡¯t. I felt empty and lost in school. Outwardly nothing had really changed. I went to classes, took my notes, met up with friends, even found some time to sneak into a corner or two and kiss Bobby. Inside though, it all felt pointless. Not the friends part, that was great. It was school itself, sitting in classes learning things that I didn¡¯t even want to know and that I couldn¡¯t imagine using in my life. With the exception of the advanced biology class and chemistry classes that I¡¯d signed up for, I found myself resenting the waste of time more and more. There was so much I could be doing that was a better use of my time. I could be mapping out future mines for Jake, following up on leads for the foundation instead of handing them off to the FBI, and there was always something that I could do at Hannah¡¯s Home. Hell, I still didn¡¯t know all the uses to which I could put my abilities and I wasn¡¯t pushing myself enough with them these days, becoming stronger or better in my techniques.


    Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.


    On top of all of these feelings, I also had to put up with all the college talk, again. The non-stop future planning of my classmates was driving me up the wall. It was bad enough last year when they were taking the SATs and charting their futures, but this year I got to hear all the details. The gritty, grimy, useless, little details. Coupled with the endless chatter about which schools were better for what professions and which ones had nicer campuses, they also obsessed about their chances of getting into these schools and phrases like ¡®first choice¡¯ and ¡®fallback school¡¯ were being thrown around incessantly.


    If it wasn¡¯t for my ability to take out all my anger and frustration out at Kung Fu every night, I might have strangled someone during that first month of school.


    ¡°Are you ok, Abby?¡± Eva found me sitting by myself behind our usual tree in the park across the school.


    I was about to give my standard, ¡°Sure. I¡¯m ok¡±, answer but it died on my lips. I wasn¡¯t ok. Something was wrong and I didn¡¯t know what.


    ¡°No. I feel a long way from ok, Eva, and it won¡¯t go away. It just keeps getting worse.¡±


    ¡°What¡¯s getting worse?¡±


    ¡°I feel angry. Angry and frustrated. It¡¯s boiling up inside me and I have to hold myself back from sniping at everyone around me. The worst part is that I don¡¯t know why. Everything in my life is going great. I have great friends like you and James, I have a boyfriend, and the foundation is up and running and is already helping people. Even my Kung Fu is progressing much faster than usual. All should be well. I should be happy. Yet everyday I wake up and come to school and I¡¯m on edge and ready to snap.¡± Tears were running down my face and Eva sat down next to me and took my hand.


    ¡°Would you like some help in figuring it out?¡±


    ¡°I would love some help.¡±


    ¡°Ok, then. Let¡¯s see if we can narrow down the problem. Do you always feel that way or just at school?¡±


    I took a moment and thought about it. ¡°Well, I don¡¯t wake up feeling that way. It seems to start when I get to school and builds all day. By the time I¡¯m at Kung Fu, I¡¯m ready to beat the crap out of the bag. I¡¯m usually there early so I spend fifteen minutes relieving the stress by going all out in the training room. I¡¯m mostly better after that and the class.¡±


    ¡°Are you sleeping well at night? Any bad dreams? Do you find that you¡¯re angry at home or at the foundation?¡±


    ¡°Yes, no, no and no.¡±


    ¡°Wait, I was just throwing out questions and wasn¡¯t keeping track.¡±


    ¡°Yes, I¡¯m sleeping well. No, no bad dreams. I¡¯m not angry at home. I¡¯m not angry at the foundation.¡±


    ¡°Ok, so we¡¯ve narrowed it down to school. Something is bothering you about school.¡±


    ¡°No shit! Sorry, Eva. I meant that to come out sarcastic, not angry.¡±


    ¡°No problem. So, what¡¯s bothering you about school?¡±


    ¡°I don¡¯t want to be here!¡± I practically shouted it at her. ¡°I¡¯m wasting my time. I should be out there. I should be¡­¡±


    ¡°What should you be doing?¡±


    ¡°I don¡¯t know.¡±


    ¡°You were about to say something but held yourself back. What was it?¡±


    I shook my head as if to deny the question.


    ¡°Abby, what did you think of? What should you be doing?¡±


    ¡°It was just a stupid, impossible thought. It doesn¡¯t make any sense.¡±


    ¡°Ok, then tell me and we¡¯ll laugh about it together. What should you be doing, Abby?¡±


    ¡°I should be out there¡­finding my mother. I miss her Eva. I can barely remember her, but I miss her so much. I¡¯m graduating this year and she won¡¯t be there to watch me get my diploma and I want her to be there. I want her to help me figure out what I should do with my life, because I¡¯m lost, Eva, and I want her for my dad because he¡¯s lost too. He¡¯s more lost that I am. I created a whole foundation just so I could find her, to help her, but I¡¯ve only found other people¡¯s mothers, other people¡¯s wives and children. Why am I here when she¡¯s somewhere out there?¡± I¡¯m sobbing and Eva is holding me and I can¡¯t stop.

 Chapter 43: Printing Issues

    ¡°Guess what I have for you?¡±


    I¡¯m about to take out a batch of white chocolate-chip cookies from the oven when dad walks in. How does he always know? He¡¯s holding something behind his back and without thinking about it, I send out a scan to see what it is. I didn¡¯t mean to, it was just instinct. If I¡¯d have thought it through, I wouldn¡¯t have done it. The way dad had asked it, it sounded like a good surprise and that¡¯s the kind I like. So why spoil it. Only it was too late for that.


    I almost blurted out, ¡°A check for one thousand five hundred and thirty-seven dollars and twenty-two cents.¡± Instead, I just barely managed to play along, ¡°Is it a pair of socks?¡±


    Dad chuckled and told me to try again. I took a second to remove the cookies from the oven, because burned cookies are sad cookies. ¡°An ancient map leading to buried treasure!¡± This guess somehow wasn¡¯t right either. Apparently, it wasn¡¯t a puppy, Elmo, or a fireman.


    Dad handed me the envelope and I opened it as we sat down for cookies. It was a check from the university for my work as a teaching assistant, minus some taxes. It¡¯s funny how a year ago I would have considered it a fortune and yet today the amount only registered because I¡¯d known it without opening the envelope.


    My scan had read the amount off of the check. Not just the amount either. It had read the account number and the banking institutions address. When did my field learn how to read? I quickly looked around for something else to read and saw a box of cereal that I hadn¡¯t put away yet. The scan showed the box and its contents. No writing, no reading.


    I got up and scanned the few cookbooks that dad kept in the kitchen. Nothing besides the paper and cover material from them either. I tried focusing harder and was rewarded with more nothing. Wait. It wasn¡¯t all nothing. There was a faint something and it came to me that I must be sensing the ink. I knew that ink had some amount of metals in it, but each individual letter didn¡¯t have much. As a whole though, my field could sense the metal content, but couldn¡¯t read the text. It seemed reasonable to assume that there weren¡¯t enough metals in the letters to be able to read them. If that were true, why was the scan able to read the check? What was different about it?


    The internet is a wonderful research tool. I should use it more often. It took five seconds to get my answer. Checks were printed using MiCR printers. Magnetic ink character recognition. As the name suggested, check printing used a magnetic ink that the banks were able to scan right into their systems. It had all sorts of anti-fraud measures, but I didn¡¯t bother reading further into it. I was entranced by the idea that machines could recognize the ink and my field could too. More importantly, without looking at the check, I could still remember the account number at the bottom, the amount of the check to the pennies, and the bank¡¯s address. Everything printed on the check was clearly set in my mind. Just like the information I got from scanning hundreds of meters into the ground, as well as my forms in Kung Fu, my mind could better retain and understand what I scanned with the field.


    It was Saturday, almost a full twenty-four hours since my breakdown, and Eva had suggested that I take the entire weekend off. No Kung-Fu, no foundation, no work of any sort. I was supposed to relax and recharge. Read a book, binge some Netflix. A trip to a local printing shop to test out some theories about my field probably wasn¡¯t what she had in mind.


    ¡®In Print Condition¡¯ was in Belmont and it took me about twenty minutes to get there. I liked the name, but it was the fact that they were the only ones nearby that advertised MiCR printers for sale as well as custom metallic ink printing that made it my first stop. I wanted to know more about how my field could read metallic ink and this seemed like a good way to compare the different printing styles.


    I came prepared with two files on a thumb drive. One had the first two pages of ¡°A Tale of Two Cities¡±. I needed two pages because I wanted to test printing on both sides of the page vs printing on just one side. Would the ink on the other side of the page ruin my ability to scan the text? Would I be able to scan both sides of the page at once?


    The other file had two pages from the Mayo Clinic¡¯s website about the heart, complete with a high-resolution picture. I wanted to see how the different inks handled the high-resolution pictures and how the colors came out. Again, I prepared two pages here and the goal was to see how my scanning was affected by two-sided printing when a color picture was involved on one side of the page.


    Walking into the store, I was the only customer and the salesperson, Anthony, was at my side in moments offering his assistance. Either he was super bored, or he was very good at his job. I rarely got such attentive service anywhere I went. I explained that I wanted to print out some test pages in both metallic ink and in magnetic ink and see the differences.


    The genuine version of this novel can be found on another site. Support the author by reading it there.


    ¡°I don¡¯t think that anyone¡¯s every asked me that before. I can do it, but I¡¯ll have to charge you for the printing.¡± I gave him the go head, describing how I wanted each file to be printed twice for each ink type; once one sided and once two-sided.


    He opened my files up on his computer and started setting up the printing. ¡°The metallic ink will do a great job on the photo, but I can only do the MiCR ink in black. Most people only use it for check printing. You can use it for any printing, but the ink is more expensive that regular printer ink so most people don¡¯t bother unless they have a very specific application. Also, you¡¯ll need to choose the type of paper you want to print on. Different paper stocks will make the ink pop more and give you better results.¡±


    Since I didn¡¯t know if my test would even work, I chose the cheapest paper for the trial. Anthony finished his setup and within a few minutes I was scanning each of the four sets. To my relief, both types of ink scanned wonderfully. However, the metallic ink was my clear favorite, as it was much more vibrant to my eyes and, more importantly, it could reproduce crystal clear color pictures. Two-sided printing for either ink choice was definitely out. The scans read the back-side metal content right through the paper and all my scan got was a confused jumble of both sides.


    I took a moment to let the implications of this success sink in. I¡¯d spent over a month last year scanning myself and learning all the bones of my body. Using my new scan-reading ability, I could achieve the same results in minutes? I couldn¡¯t believe it, but to prove it to myself, I started reciting the first two pages of ¡°A Tale of Two Cities¡± in my head, without looking at the printed copy. ¡°It was the best of times, it was¡­¡± Holy shit! I knew the first two pages by heart and I knew all the parts of the heart by heart as well. This was a real game changer and I already had some ideas of how I wanted to use this new ability.


    ¡°Anthony, do you sell metallic ink printers?¡±


    ¡°No, I¡¯m sorry. I don¡¯t know of any models for the home yet. We can print things for you though.¡±


    ¡°How much would it cost to print out one my school textbooks? It¡¯s around two hundred pages.¡±


    ¡°Uhm. I¡¯m not sure if we¡¯re allowed to do that. It might be copyright infringement.¡±


    ¡°Ok. What if I showed you the receipt for my purchase of the electronic version of the book? Would you be able to print out the book for me in metallic ink?¡±


    ¡°Maybe. I¡¯ll have to check it out. It would be very expensive though. Most people just want metallic highlights on their marketing materials. Full page printing could cost you between three and four dollars per page.¡±


    Six to eight hundred dollars for a regular sized textbook. That would mean that some college level textbooks would cost me more than I¡¯d made for being a TA this summer. Then again, who wouldn¡¯t pay that amount or more to instantly download knowledge directly into their brains? I could easily afford it but that didn¡¯t mean that I shouldn¡¯t look for a better deal. After all, there were going to be a lot of books that I¡¯d want and a printing shop like this was going to ask questions that I didn¡¯t want to answer. I needed to check out the competition.


    I paid Anthony for my printouts and thanked him for his help, before getting back in my car and making a call.


    ¡°Hi Howie. How are you today?¡±


    ¡°Abby! What request are you going to surprise me with today? Wait. Don¡¯t tell me. I¡¯m keen to guess. Uhm, you¡¯re calling because you need a tank. A pink one. With laser mounted turrets and ammo that explodes into sparkling dust.¡±


    ¡°No Howie. Hold on. Can you get me a pink tank? That sounds cool.¡±


    ¡°That would be a no, Abby. I was trying to make a point. Besides, where would you park the tank anyways?¡±


    ¡°Well, how about in front of my house? It would be really useful in keeping away all those encyclopedia salesmen that keep dropping by.¡±


    I heard Howie snort. ¡°Have you ever even seen an encyclopedia, much less a salesperson that sells anything door to door?¡±


    ¡°Nope. And with a tank out front, I¡¯ll never have to¡±.


    ¡°No tank for you, Abby. Next!¡±


    ¡°What are you, the Tank Nazi?¡± I smiled at his Seinfeld reference. It was a good show and Uncle Magnum and I had gone through the whole series a few years ago. Thinking back on it, I missed binge watching shows with Uncle Magnum. Since I¡¯d gotten my abilities and he¡¯s gotten Margaret, we hadn¡¯t hung out as much as we used to.


    ¡°What¡¯ll be today, Abby?¡±


    ¡°What do you know about metallic ink printing?¡±


    ¡°Why can¡¯t you want normal things anymore? How about a nice AR15 or an EMP hardened computer? I can even get you a great deal on some land mines. Barely used! Why the hell would I know anything about metallic ink printing?¡±


    ¡°Howie, whatever happened to your no questions asked policy?¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s completely your fault. Everyone else asks me for normal things, so I don¡¯t have to ask. Besides, I¡¯m not asking questions, I¡¯m complaining in question form.¡±


    That got a laugh out of me. It was so true. ¡°Ok. Here¡¯s what I need. I want to give you a list of books that I¡¯ll need printed in color using metallic ink. One side only, no binding. Most of the books will be textbooks. If you need, I¡¯ll buy the electronic version and sent it to you. I already have a price from a printing store, but its high and they¡¯re going to give me trouble over copyright issues and they will eventually start asking questions to which the answers are none of their business.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯ll see what I can do, Abby.¡± He hung before I could. Damn it!

 Chapter 44: Back to School Again and a Conversation with Shauna

    Eva met me outside of school on Monday morning. She didn¡¯t say anything. She was just there for me and I appreciated her. We walked in together and I expected to start feeling anxious like before. I waited for it and then I waited some more. I let out the breath I¡¯d been holding and relaxed. Maybe figuring out what was bothering me was the key. Maybe it was having talked to someone about it that released all the anger. Maybe it was the ¡®time-off¡¯ that I¡¯d taken over the weekend. Whatever the reason, it was really nice. I was going to enjoy it and be happy while it lasted.


    Being able to talk to people without grinding my teeth at their first mention of college felt like having a whole new superpower. I even managed to listen to what they had to say and give them my thoughts on what they were saying. My goodness. An actual conversation at school. How weird is that?


    Eva had changed her mind, yet again, about her future. Over the past year she¡¯d considered going into accounting, dentistry, and graphic novel creation (aka drawing comic books). I¡¯d once suggested that she join the army since she liked her ¡®Boot Camp¡¯ fitness classes so much. That had earned me a glare from Eva and a laugh from James. This time she said that she had made her final decision and she was going to apply for entry into the Sports Medicine program at UNC, majoring in Exercise Science or Athletic Training or both.


    As soon as she said it, I agreed that it seemed to be the perfect fit for her. Sports nutrition, biomechanics, and injury prevention were all things that she spent her free time learning about anyways. James was also applying to UNC. He wanted to get accepted into their business program and major in finance. This was not a surprise at all since that had been his plan since I¡¯d met him.


    All the college talk forced me to reconsider my own options. Did I want to go to university? What would I study there? What about The Hannah Foundation? The foundation was great and I loved the mission, but I¡¯d gotten it going and put quality people to run things. I was effectively overseeing everything through Shauna now and I wasn¡¯t needed there often. I could take the time now to do something else.


    Did I want to do something else? From the beginning, my plan had been to grow the foundation and put Hannah¡¯s Homes all over the world. Had my goal changed? No, it hadn¡¯t. My recent freak out with Eva had shown me that my main motivation for the foundation was to find and help my mother and even though it didn¡¯t seem like that would ever happen, the foundation still felt like something that I had to build. That meant that university was out. It would sideline the growth of the foundation for these last nine months of school and then I¡¯d get it up and running at full stride.


    It wasn¡¯t like I couldn¡¯t learn things on my own, especially with the discovery of my new scan-reading ability. Actually, I¡¯m not sure what the point of regular classes would be anyways when I could learn an entire course load of material in a few hours. Sure, I¡¯d still need instruction when it came to application of the knowledge, such as science labs or situational problems, but I could hire tutors for that part, if I was interested enough.


    I met up with Shauna and the team at Hannah¡¯s Home after school. This weekend had been physically relaxing, but I hadn¡¯t been able to get thoughts of saving my mother out of my head. Through the bank accounts and their transactions, we had a small portion of Serpentine¡¯s client list, as well as a list of some of their ¡®supplier¡¯. We should be able to find out where she¡¯d been sent to. So far, I¡¯d only given the team five accounts to work with. It was time to ramp up our game.


    ¡°Gabriel, these are the folders with the information and passwords for the other twenty accounts that Serpentine used. They have dates on them and I figure that they changed accounts a few times a year for security reasons. I want you to go through them and find all the easy pickings. Anyone that can be identified without needing bank access. I¡¯ll need you to get me a list of all the accounts that you need banking access to uncover who they are. Breakdown that list by bank and I¡¯ll have Roger start with the banks that have the most unknown accounts. Access to a single banks¡¯ systems could help identify dozens of clients. These files are the string that we¡¯re going to pull on to unravel the entire Serpentine supply and demand chain. Anything you need to get this done as soon as possible, you let Shauna know. If you need more people, we¡¯ll get it for you. If you need faster computers, you¡¯ll have them.¡±


    Gabriel nodded and took the files. ¡°I can get you the list of accounts and banks in a few weeks, Abby. Jenny and I laid out a lot of the groundwork for how to get the information we needed while we worked on the first accounts you gave us. My worry is how Roger will be able to get us into the banking servers. Banking servers are some of the most secure computers in the world. They have insane protections built in. I know that Roger can do amazing things, but this would be on a whole other level and if he can hack the banking systems, then he can get all this information without our help.¡±


    ¡°Roger won¡¯t hack their computers. He¡¯ll hack their people. Think about it. Why break into a place if you can get someone to give you the key and the alarm code? Roger¡¯s specialty is getting into places that he shouldn¡¯t be able to get into. Once inside, he has ways to get the administrator password and he uses that to gain access to the files he needs. That¡¯s how he got into the prison servers. Roger says that no matter how sophisticated a system is, the human element will always be the weakest link.¡±


    Gabriel looked dubious at this so I consulted my phone for a few seconds, walked over to his computer and logged on as Gabriel. Then I logged onto Jenny¡¯s computer. The stunned looks on their faces were priceless.


    ¡°How and why do you have their passwords, Abby?¡± Shauna asked.


    ¡°How is easy. Roger sent them to me this morning. The why has to do with Roger¡¯s paranoia and what I told him I¡¯d be speaking to you guys about today. You see, besides those twenty-five accounts, Serpentine had a master bank account where they offloaded the money from the other accounts. I¡¯m simplifying things a bit because the money was routed through a series of other accounts before it finally made it to the master account. I want Gabriel to work with me to create a series of our own accounts and I want to move the money in the master account to our account. From our master account, I¡¯ll transfer some money into an operational account for Shauna to use. The current master account had just over fifty-one million dollars in it. Roger doesn¡¯t know you guys and his having your passwords was his way of letting you know that he¡¯s keeping a close eye on things and that he is expecting the money go where it¡¯s supposed to without any shrinkage. You should also know that his email had Shauna¡¯s password and my own, so please don¡¯t take this personally.¡±


    Jenny was the first to speak. ¡°Fifty-one million dollars? I guess I¡¯d be paranoid about it too. I can see a problem though. It¡¯s going to be hard to spend. Any transaction that we do can be traced through the bank and we can¡¯t just go to the bank and take out fifty thousand dollars to pay for things in cash. Banks have reporting requirements for large amounts.¡±


    This story is posted elsewhere by the author. Help them out by reading the authentic version.


    ¡°That¡¯s another reason Gabriel is here. He¡¯s the expert. How do we solve this problem?¡± I turned my gaze to him and raised my eyebrows questioningly, just like dad always did to me.


    ¡°It¡¯s really two problems. One is spending it without being traced and the other is how you explain any assets that you purchased with it. The mob and the cartels have teams of people working all sorts of money laundering schemes and they¡¯re incredible creative about it. They take money earned illegally and funnel it into a legitimate business. They pay taxes on his legal income and they¡¯re free to use it any way they want to. I don¡¯t think that we¡¯re looking to do that here. From what Abby has said, we¡¯ll be using the money to do mostly clandestine work and not for buying assets. That takes care of one of the problems.


    As to spending the money without being traced, we¡¯ll set up our own series of accounts and hide in the maze of international banking. Most people won¡¯t care where the money is coming from, especially since we won¡¯t be asking where they got their merchandise from. For the cash we have several options, including working within the legitimate banking world, if we take the time to set things up properly. However, the easiest way would be to convert some of the money into Bitcoin. It¡¯s a completely anonymous currency that is outside of the government¡¯s control. The value fluctuates much more than the US dollar, but no one can trace your transactions. I suggest that we use both off-shore banks and Bitcoin.¡±


    Gabriel gave us a tutorial on cryptocurrencies, like Bitcoin, and explained things like ¡®Bitcoin mining¡¯, ¡®cold wallets¡¯, and how to make transactions. At the end of it all, he ordered a few Trezor cold wallets for us to use. Cold wallets were little gizmos that gave out a passcode that would authenticate your Bitcoin transaction. Now we just had to create our accounts, transfer in the money from Serpentine¡¯s master account and funnel some of into other accounts from which we could buy some Bitcoin and tie it to the Trezor thingy. My head hurt with all the new details but this was important and I couldn¡¯t simply delegate it to Shauna. When it was all set up, I would be the only one with the passwords to move the money around.


    After the meeting, Shauna asked me to join her in her office for a few minutes. The way she said it sounded a bit ominous and I briefly wondered if she was about to quit. Had she changed her mind about rejoining the army now that her brother was free? I really hoped not. I¡¯d come to rely on her so much over the past months.


    ¡°Abby, there¡¯s something I¡¯ve been meaning to talk to you about for a few months and I couldn¡¯t bring myself to do it until now. I¡¯ll start by saying that I appreciate the hell out of Roger. He rescued Samuel and I¡¯ll forever be grateful for that. That doesn¡¯t mean that I don¡¯t have a responsibility to make sure that you understand the implications or consequences of what you¡¯re doing with Roger.¡±


    Well, at least she wasn¡¯t quitting. However, I wasn¡¯t sure what she was getting at so I asked, ¡°What are you talking about, Shauna?¡±


    ¡°Do you remember when Alexander thanked you on behalf of the German government for making the rescue of Strudel possible?¡±


    ¡°I do. How could I forget? We all have to go to Washington next month for a ceremony.¡±


    ¡°Ok, and do you remember when I also thanked you after seeing the video of Samuel and you said that Roger did all the work and you only talked to him about it?¡±


    ¡°Sure. He did do all the work.¡±


    Shauna let out a frustrated breath. ¡°When you point a gun at a target and press the trigger, do you say that the gun did all the work? No, you don¡¯t. Abby, Roger is a loaded gun and you pointed him at the prison. You are ultimately responsible for saving my brother and all those others. The thing about loaded guns though is that you have to handle them very carefully because they can kill people too.


    When Roger freed those slaves at Serpentine, he saved forty people and killed five others. The way I read the report, he didn¡¯t have to kill them. He could have taken them out with broken bones like he did with the higher ups or he could have used that drug he used on Samuel. He chose to kill them. You need to remember that. He is helping our cause, but he is a very dangerous man.


    Now, you weren¡¯t directing him at the time, so none of those deaths are on you, but what if the next time you send him out to save someone he ends up killing other people. That will be on you. Is that something you think you can handle? Because once you point the gun and fire, you never know what the bullet will tear through on the way to your target.


    You need to consider how forgetting to take safety precautions can lead to you shooting yourself in the foot or the head. He might mess up and end up killing one of the people that you¡¯re trying to rescue. I don¡¯t know how you¡¯d handle that. I¡¯m not sure if I could.


    The last question you need to ask yourself is where does this all end? Today you¡¯re sending him against slavers. Will you be sending him out against rapists and murderers and spousal abusers next?


    I¡¯m not telling you to stop, Abby. I fully support your mission. I just want to be sure that you¡¯ve thought all this through and understand that things can and will go wrong and the longer you do this, the more chances there are of you becoming more like the people that you¡¯re targeting.¡±


    Shauna¡¯s words hit hard and if I hadn¡¯t already asked myself a lot of those questions, I¡¯d probably try to deny some of it and argue with her. I had considered those points though and I¡¯d already made my decision. After all, there was no Roger. I had killed those five people and I¡¯d done it deliberately. It wasn¡¯t a ¡®misfire¡¯ and I felt no guilt about it at all. Play stupid games, win stupid prizes. As far as I was concerned, the slavers didn¡¯t get enough of what they deserved.


    ¡°I really appreciate your concern, Shauna, and I want you to know that I have considered everything that you¡¯re telling me. However, you and everyone else focused on why Roger picked me and how I impressed him. Only it wasn¡¯t like that at all. You see, I don¡¯t need Roger for the foundation. I was already building that before he contacted me. We can even do the rescuing part without him. We¡¯d have to hire a team and they wouldn¡¯t be half as good as he is, but it would work. What you should have been asking me is why I accepted to have him work for my foundation. The answer is that he told me exactly what happened in that warehouse and if he hadn¡¯t killed those animals who were about to rape their captives, then he wasn¡¯t the right man for the job. His killing them, or at least hurting them so badly that they wished they were dead, was what recommended him to me.¡±


    Shauna let out a sigh of relief. ¡°I¡¯ve never been so glad to have misunderstood a situation or a person. I was worried about you having second thoughts once things turned violent.¡±


    ¡°You don¡¯t have to worry on that account. You should also know that I¡¯ve never bought into that argument of ¡°becoming what you despise¡±. I despise people who prey on the weak and the innocent and who treat them like they¡¯re property. No matter how many slavers are killed, I won¡¯t become like that. It¡¯s funny, my friends and I have had this same conversation in different terms. They¡¯re comic book geeks and we¡¯ve had long arguments over why Batman doesn¡¯t kill the Joker. In the comics, the Joker has killed hundreds of people and each time Batman has the opportunity to kill him, he doesn¡¯t. He ties him up and leaves him for the police to put in an asylum, from where he eventually escapes or is released, only to have him go out and kill more people. I always argue that Batman is complicit with every murder committed by the Joker because he had the chance to put a stop to the Joker and didn¡¯t.¡±


    Eva says that the Batman doesn¡¯t want to kill the Joker because it would be the first step down a slippery slope and over time he¡¯d get used to the killing and become like the Joker. Maybe he¡¯d end up justifying killing common thieves like the one who¡¯d killed his parents. I felt that the ¡®maybe¡¯ was worth the ¡®for sure¡¯ killing that was already going on and I trusted the disciplined mind behind the mask to retain his humanity and not become a predator of the innocent. I had no issues with him becoming a more deadly predator of scum.

 Chapter 45: Guests!

    The next weekend, Hannah¡¯s Home hosted twelve survivors from the Serpentine warehouse facility, and I finally met Diane Greer. She was the person that ¡®Roger¡¯ had saved from being raped at Serpentine. She was only 5¡¯4¡± tall, a few inches shorter than I was, but her attitude and confidence made me feel that I had to look up at her. Her hair was longer than I remembered, but that could just be that the last time I¡¯d seen her she¡¯d been a prisoner and her hair was matted and dirty.


    Without the chains, both literal and figurative, Diane was a force of nature. She got off the bus that the foundation had chartered for her and the others and came over to introduce herself to Shauna and me. ¡°I¡¯ve got to tell you, Abby, when Captain Stevens called me and explained that Hannah¡¯s Home was inviting us over to see how they could help us out, I was skeptical and told him that it was probably some sort of a scam. Then he tells me that Roger¡¯s involved and I told him that he should have started with that and I called Shauna right away. I want to thank you for what you¡¯re doing for us. These women have been having a hard time re-integrating back into their lives and I¡¯m hoping that getting them together to talk about it and to learn how they can re-start their lives will help them get started.¡±


    ¡°I just wish we¡¯d been around to help them all right after they were freed. I hope that this initial trial will get more of the survivors to come see us.¡± I really did hope more would join, especially the kids. Some of them had been near catatonic when they were released.


    Shauna and Diane had planned this weekend retreat in great detail and there was a lot to do. With introductions over, Diane re boarded the bus and got her charges moving and soon we had everyone assigned into three cottages. Over the next two days, the women had the chance to talk to councilors on an individual and group basis, sharing their stories with people that understood exactly what they¡¯d been through and talking about the troubles they were having in adjusting to regular life. Most of them had families that expected them to be ecstatic about being freed and to just pick up where they left off, as if nothing had happened to them. Being able to share these stories with each other and with the councilors eased a lot of their tension about not being able to meet the expectations of others.


    One of the most interesting sessions for me to watch was the career counseling session. The women had decided to take the session as a group. The councilor asked everyone what their occupation was and if they had been happy doing that work prior to their abduction. I was amazed to discover how many of them were in jobs that they didn¡¯t care for or not in careers that they had studied in school. For a few, the opportunities in their chosen field had not materialized and they¡¯d taken temporary jobs doing whatever was available at the time. Over time, they hadn¡¯t left those jobs. Others had given up their positions when they¡¯d gotten married or had children and then taken any jobs that came along to make ends meet. Not one of them was doing what they¡¯d planned on or studied for. This idea was in such stark contrast to the hope and aspiration of my classmates that it boggled my mind. It is said that life is what happens when you¡¯re busy making other plans, but this was ridiculous. I wondered if the men in their classes had similar experiences.


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    The women were given questionnaires to fill out that helped them understand in which direction their interests lay in terms of careers. I heard several of the women say, ¡°I always wanted to do that but...". A few had found other interests and many had been discouraged from pursing careers in those directions because they weren¡¯t lucrative enough or didn¡¯t meet with the expectations of their parents or siblings. I had no siblings and my father had always supported me in whatever I wanted to do, so these reactions to their plans were thankfully unknown to me. As the councilor explained to them how most people ended up having three or four careers during their lives and how they could pursue their, I saw the light of hope enter their eyes. These women had been through hell and back and were only now realizing that their lives could be different. They could change and become what they¡¯d always wanted to be. When the session ended, I announced that the Hannah Foundation would pay up to ten thousand dollars for tuition and expenses related to schooling or re-training for anyone that wanted to change careers. This news was greeted with tears and hugs and Diane even picked me up and swung me around. She¡¯s pretty strong for someone in such a small package.


    By the end of the weekend, my heart was full. I finally felt like my foundation was real and doing the work that I¡¯d wanted it to do. The women had come here broken and feeling trapped by their lives and had left with some hope and excitement about their future. None of us believed that the two days would magically make everything better, but it was a start and they were all invited back to stay with us for longer, with or without their families.


    Overall, we¡¯d given the women a chance to relax for a little bit and helped them regain their balance. Most just appreciated having a meal that they didn¡¯t have to cook themselves. They¡¯d been amazed at Gabriel¡¯s culinary skills and a few had suggested that he could give cooking classes as a form of therapy. Sister Clara and her team had given each of the women a thorough examination and suggested supplements and vitamins in some cases and written out prescriptions in a few. Our education councilor had worked individually with each of the women and shown then how they could pursue their new career goals online and how to find physical classes in their area. We also gave the women a binder with information about what government programs they could take advantage of and how to apply for them. These programs covered everything from housing to starting their own businesses.


    However, our biggest hit, pun intended, was Sifu Zhang¡¯s self defense course. The women loved the idea of learning how to fight back. Sifu gave them some basics in how to carry themselves so they weren¡¯t seen as ¡®prey¡¯ and focused on five techniques that they could use to break someone¡¯s hold on them. Gabriel and I figured prominently in all of his demonstrations, with little ole¡¯ me as the damsel in distress and huge muscle-bound Gabriel playing the mean attacker. Two hours of classes left them wanting more and Sifu Zhang helped them find classes in their area before they left.


    When all the goodbyes had been done and everyone was getting back on the bus, Diane wiped tears from her eyes and thanked us once again. She handed me an envelope and promised to return with a larger group very soon, once she¡¯d had a chance to share her experiences with the ones who didn¡¯t make it out this weekend.


    As the bus drove off, I showed Shauna the contents of the envelope. It was Diane¡¯s career questionnaire. It showed that she had a high aptitude for helping others and that her dream job would be to work for Hannah¡¯s Home. She¡¯s attached her c.v to the questionnaire.


    ¡°It looks like you¡¯re going to have a new helper very soon, Shauna. Think you¡¯ll be able to keep up with her?¡±


    ¡°No, but it¡¯ll be fun to try.¡±

 Chapter 46: Books!

    ¡°I¡¯ve got two choices for you.¡± Howie didn¡¯t bother with hello this time.


    ¡°Hi Howie! How are you?¡± I could still be polite and he might learn something. Nah. It was Howie.


    ¡°I got a guy who¡¯ll print for you at two and a half dollars a page and a guy who will do it for free.¡±


    ¡°What¡¯s the catch on the second guy? As my grandpappy used to say, ¡®There ain¡¯t no such thing as a free lunch¡¯.¡± My southern drawl needed some work.


    ¡°You never had no ¡®grandpappy¡¯, Abby! You were put on this earth to try my patience and so were sprung full grown from the ground.¡± Now that was a southern drawl. I wonder where he grew up. It sounded authentic.


    Howie continued in his normal voice, ¡°You¡¯re right about the lunch. He wants you to invest in his printing upgrades to handle the metallic ink, among others. In exchange for seventy-five thousand dollars, he¡¯ll print all the books you¡¯ll want for free and cut you in for twenty-five percent of his profits.¡±


    ¡°Wow. That¡¯s weird. Shouldn¡¯t he be getting a loan from a bank or something?¡±


    ¡°Most of my contacts can¡¯t get bank loans and wouldn¡¯t take them if they could get them. They¡¯re paranoid of the government and big corporations. They live their lives off the grid and have almost no social media footprint. They just want to be left alone to do what they want to do and they don¡¯t want the taxman knocking at their door.¡±


    ¡°That makes things difficult for me though. How would I pay him the money? If he made some profits, how would I know that he was giving me the right amount? How would I enforce the twenty-five percent if he changed his mind? How would I explain where the profits came from if he did send them to me?¡±


    ¡°Bitcoin and trust. I can sell you bitcoin for at a good exchange rate and you¡¯ll have to trust me that he¡¯s a good guy that won¡¯t screw you over. I won¡¯t tell you that he¡¯ll make any money, but assuming you need enough books, you¡¯ll get your money¡¯s worth.¡±


    ¡°If you vouch from him, I¡¯ll take his deal. I have access to bitcoin, but it¡¯s not money that¡¯s earmarked for my personal use. Withdrawing so much money from my personal account to pay you would set off alarm bells somewhere. Howie, in your underground, off-the-grid, darkwebby world are there any auctions? I have some diamonds and gemstones that I¡¯ve found.¡±


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    ¡°When you say found, do you mean found in the possession of someone else and liberated or found while you were digging?¡±


    ¡°Found while digging and the finds are unknown to anyone but me. No one will come looking for these. They¡¯re raw and uncut. Some are decent sized and a few are world class. I¡¯m planning on shipping the larger ones out to Europe for auction next year, since I don¡¯t need the funds now. I¡¯d be willing to part with the smaller ones though.¡±


    ¡°How small is small?¡±


    ¡°25 carats.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s a good size. After it¡¯s cut, it won¡¯t be too flashy. You¡¯ll get at least enough at auction to cover your investment in the printer. Here¡¯s my offer, Abby. I¡¯ll send the printer, Gerry, the money. You get me the stone and I¡¯ll put it up for auction. The auction guy takes five percent of the fee and I¡¯ll take a two percent finders fee for all the money above what you need for Gerry. Sound fair?¡±


    ¡°Well, it¡¯s less than what Christie¡¯s charges in fees, so that part sounds fair but I¡¯ve heard that because of the¡­uhm¡­illicit nature of these sales, the prices are deflated from their actual values.¡±


    ¡°You heard half right. Stolen goods are sold at a steep discount to their full value. Some of that has to do with not being able to openly show what you¡¯ve purchased to most people. Some of it has to do with the fact that someone might come looking for it. Your diamond though should get a premium in this type of auction, because you¡¯ll be the one what can¡¯t use the money openly, while the buyer doesn¡¯t have to worry about anyone coming around looking for their diamond back. Some buyers may also be using this purchase as part of a money laundering scheme and they¡¯ll pay even more because of that. For those reasons, and the fact that these types of diamonds don¡¯t show up too often, you¡¯ll get a lot of interest and could very well double the value that you¡¯d get at a regular auction.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m sold. Just let me know where to drop off the diamond. Anyways, I¡¯m sending you the list of the books I¡¯m looking for. You should have it in a few minutes.¡± I hung up. Yes! Point for me.


    A few minutes later, I sent him the following list:


    Atlas of Human Anatomy, by Frank Netter


    Gray¡¯s Atlas of Anatomy


    First Aid for the USMLE, Steps 1, 2, and 3


    Harrison¡¯s Principles of Internal Medicine


    Medical Physiology, by Guyten and Hall


    Pocket Medicine: The Massachusetts General Hospital Handbook of Internal Medicine


    The Anatomy Coloring Book


    Oxford Handbook of Clinical Medicine


    To these medical textbooks, I added several of my school textbooks, two general language learning books and two of the most highly recommended German Language Learning books that I could find on the internet. The medical textbooks were all recommended reading or reference books for medical students and they were going to be my first steps in learning how to better use the medical applications of my field. The German books were to learn German. I hoped to be fluent by the time of the ceremony with the German ambassador.

 Chapter 47: Books 2, The Sequel.

    The rest of October passed by in what seemed like an eye blink. Diane organized another weekend with a different group of survivors. This time three of the children came with their families. They had arranged to stay for a few weeks and we made sure that we had the resources to ensure that they could continue their homeschooling. None of them had returned to regular school yet. A few of the women who had come to the last weekend came to stay for a week as well. Beside these groups, Mary had finally contacted a few survivors that frequented her soup kitchen and they were coming in to see how we could help them. Things were picking up at Hannah¡¯s Home.


    On the rescue front, Gabriel and Jenny had scoured all the accounts and had found twenty-one more buyers so far and were keeping Kevin and his FBI team very busy. The FBI was ecstatic about his results and the positive publicity that he was generating. Kevin had been given the authorization to expand his three-person team to twelve. True to his word, Kevin had informed each person that they freed of our offer of assistance and we were starting to get calls from a few.


    Shauna and Diane had even gotten to go in on the aftermath of one of Kevin¡¯s raids a few hours away and assist with organizing the survivors. All of them were college girls that had been abducted within that last three months. We chartered a bus to take them back to Hannah¡¯s Home and we were able to care for all eleven of them until their families could pick them up. Of these eleven girls, three were still with us a week later. No one came for them and they didn¡¯t have anywhere else to go.


    On the home front, the football team was demolishing most of their rivals and I saw more of Bobby in class, at his games and at his practices than I did otherwise. Between his football schedule and my active life, finding time to go out on dates wasn¡¯t easy. We facetimed a lot, but it wasn¡¯t the same as seeing him in person.


    I was getting to see a lot of Mark and Tyler though. They were showing up regularly at Kung Fu and the contrast couldn¡¯t have been more acute. Mark was a geology major who needed to get fit. Tyler was going to be an apprentice blacksmith and he was a natural fighter. Tyler was focused, coordinated, and driven. Mark, not so much. He was just happy to get a good workout and learn something new. Mark put in his time and went home. Tyler often stayed and watched the higher levels sparring and he was fast becoming Uncle Magnum¡¯s and Charlie¡¯s favorite student.


    ¡°You¡¯ve finally brought me a warrior, Abby! He learns like a sponge and he¡¯s fast. I can¡¯t wait ¡®til he¡¯s ready to spar.¡± Uncle Magnum¡¯s pronouncement made me groan internally. Eva was going to have a field day with this news. I could just imagine what she¡¯d say when she heard that Tyler might be at my house all day and at Kung Fu in the evening. Well, he would be at my house, if he ever asked dad about the apprenticeship and if dad said yes. Neither of those things had happened yet. Who knows, maybe dad would say no or someone else would ask to be his apprentice before Tyler did. Yeah, right!


    My own Kung Fu was progressing slower than it had in the summer. Now that school was in full swing, I couldn¡¯t secretly join Uncle Magnum and Sifu when they practiced in the morning. I also couldn¡¯t practice anything that I¡¯d learned from them until they ¡®taught¡¯ it to me. Going back to the learning piecemeal really sucked and the glacial pace was frustrating the hell out of me.


    In contrast to the slow pace of Kung Fu learning, my books arrived from Gerry, by way of Howie, in the form of eight cardboard boxes a week and a half after I ordered them. Considering that Gerry had to order the equipment and set it all up, that was fast. I handed Howie the diamond and he helped me carry the boxes into my truck. A few hours later, in my room, I had my Matrix moment when I said to myself in awe, ¡°I know German!¡±


    I kind of got carried away after than and made that my go-to phrase every time I finished a book. ¡°I know Physiology! I know Anatomy! I know Chemistry! I know clinical and internal medicine. I know First Aid!¡± I was Keanu Reeves on steroids. I was repeating these phrases at the end of each book and had anyone else been there, they would have gotten pretty annoyed with me. I didn¡¯t care though. I was taking a week to learn what would take anyone else months or years to lean and I was retaining all of it. Once I¡¯d finished scanning a book, I didn¡¯t need it anymore. I could recite the whole book from memory, page by page, and in any order, and I could understand it.


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    The process was simple. Each book was tied with a string, as I¡¯d specified not to have the books bound. I would take out a book stack from a box, untie the string, and hold up the first page while I scanned it with my field. Each page took a second to scan, two or three if it had pictures on it, and then I¡¯d go on to the next page. Page after page, until I was done. Some of those books were over six hundred pages long and I found that after each book, I needed a long break. I guess my field and my mind needed to shut down and integrate the knowledge.


    Unlike Neo and his process of learning Kung Fu, I wasn¡¯t actually downloading knowledge and skills directly into my brain. I only had the written word and pictures to work from and I¡¯d need to supplement my learning with actual application of the knowledge. For example, I could now read German as I knew the grammar and vocabulary, but I would have trouble understanding or holding a conversation in German because I¡¯d never really heard the language being spoken, other than a few phrases in movies or internet parody videos. Until I could supplement the information in my brain by watching movies in German or listening to German language podcasts, I¡¯d be mispronouncing words a lot. The movies and podcast practice would help me go from translating the German to English in my mind to being able to think in German. It was a subtle difference, but one that was crucial if you wanted to master a language. It was the difference between learning a new kick and actually being able to use it effectively in a fight.


    Regardless of the limitations, learn-by-scan was incredible and after the first day of cramming in books, I slowed down and decided that one or two books a day were enough. I¡¯d scan one before school, and one right before going to bed. Within a week I had finished all the books and started working on my next list of books. I wondered if there was a limit to how much information I could pack in my brain and I questioned whether I really wanted to retain certain books in my head. Did I really want to be one of those obnoxious people that could quote passages from Shakespeare¡¯s plays or from popular poetry? ¡°It is the east, and Juliet is the sun and I, I took the road less travelled, quoth the Raven, Nevermore.¡± Ugh! That really wasn¡¯t my thing.


    The bible was another book option that I wasn¡¯t going to take. Too much information on who begat whom and how many cubits long certain buildings were. There were so many options that it was hard to know where to continue my studies. I could become an expert in almost anything or even everything. I needed to narrow my focus. Over time, I might get to it all. For now, I¡¯d continue with my medical homeschooling because it would enhance the information that I was getting from my people scanning.


    A few more languages wouldn¡¯t hurt either. Not being able to understand Spanish in Venezuela had slowed me down and as I travelled to other countries on foundation business, I would run into that problem more and more. Spanish and French were at the top of my list, but Russian, Chinese, Japanese, Hebrew, Arabic, and Yiddish interested me as well. I didn¡¯t fool myself into thinking that I¡¯d need Yiddish for the foundation. I just wanted to understand all those strange sayings that my grandparents would spout out and laugh over occasionally.


    I did some more searching on the internet and created my next list of books to consume. While I waited on them to be printed, I downloaded several Hollywood movies that had been dubbed over in German. I would work my way up to authentic German films. ¡®When Harry Met Sally¡¯ sounded so different in German. Fortunately, I now knew enough to be able to understand most of it and I corrected my pronunciation of so many words. The German language has some extremely long words with unfamiliar combinations of vowels and consonants and it would take a lot of practice to master the language.


    Watching the movie did show me another area of the language that I was lacking. While the books taught me the vocabulary and grammar of the language, the use of idioms, adages, and curses were sadly lacking. Certain phrases in the movie were composed of words that I understood, but when taken as a whole had an entirely different meaning. That led me to another internet search. This time, I copied all the information onto a word document and sent it to Gerry to get printed.


    One of the more complete German language sites that I¡¯d visited to get these colloquialisms had a button next to each word and phrase that allowed you to listen to how it was properly pronounced. My Neo envy kicked in and I began looking for ways in which I could scan sounds. If I could manage to do that, then I could simply listen using my field and integrate the proper pronunciation with my book scanning knowledge. I tried all the ways that I could think of and I tried several ideas that I got from the internet when I searched about sounds. Nothing worked. I got to watch tons of very cool videos about sound waves, but in the end I gave it up as a lost cause. I just didn¡¯t know enough about sound engineering.


    Oh. I facepalmed at what I¡¯d just thought to myself. This new ability was going to take some getting used to. I quickly added a list of three sound engineering textbooks to Gerry¡¯s ¡®to-print¡¯ list.

 Book Note - Not a chapter

    I was traveling last week and posting chapters from my phone, instead of from my computer. Somehow I grabbed the wrong chapter from my advanced chapters and skipped over a few chapters.


    To fix the issue, I''m going to try to insert those five chapters, one chapter per day, and reorder them.


    Hopefully it will work. I''m sorry for any confusion this may cause and I hope you''ll bear with me during this reorganization.


    Did you know this text is from a different site? Read the official version to support the creator.


    Thank you for your understanding!


    There is now a new chapter 38: Tyler.


    I tried to reorder it and it worked! Only I think that it''s then harder for current readers to find. So I put it back for now and in reorder the chapters later.


    This chapter will self destruct once the problem has been fixed.


    Edit: Problem is now fixed! All missing chapters have been inserted. Reordering now.

 Chapter 48: Washington Gala

    The official function that Alexander had invited us to in Washington was being held in an extremely swanky hotel a few blocks away from the White House. Usually, the embassy would have hosted this soiree, but they were in the middle of renovations. Maybe the marble foyer wasn¡¯t glitzy enough or maybe there were installing a new lederhosen display. Who knows? The upshot was that Alexander footed the bill for the team and I to stay at the hotel during our stay.


    No one from the team had been to Washington before and they had created an itinerary for themselves with all the places they planned on visiting. Monuments, parks, museums, statues, and river cruises. They packed as much as they could into their three days. They¡¯d even managed to squeeze in a tour of the White House.


    I was very happy for them but when they invited me, I demurred. I had my own itinerary and it included trips to several new companies for my investment portfolio, as well as a visit to the basement archives where Congress was required to list all of their personal insider trades. It couldn¡¯t hurt to take a look at what the people in the know knew. After that, I was going to take a private tour of the server rooms of a dozen banks around the city that were part of Gabriel¡¯s list of banks that held information about Serpentine¡¯s clients or suppliers. I¡¯d had Howie prepare a few dozen of his special external hard drives just for this occasion.


    Time permitting, I¡¯d also check out the White House. A visit there in R1 would be way cooler than any arranged tour. I hear there are secret tunnels under the place and even a private subway station that can get the President out in a hurry in case of attack.


    My invitation had come with an ¡®and guest¡¯ and I¡¯d given serious thought as to who I could ask to join me on this adventure. Bobby was out. He couldn¡¯t miss the football practice. Dad was out too. He had his teaching duties and he hated these types of functions. He¡¯s not very sociable. Eva and James were working on their college applications. Uncle Magnum was busy with his classes and he had some get together with Margaret¡¯s family. Given that it was a birthday party for an eleven-year-old girl, he probably would have preferred to be with me. He didn¡¯t seem to have a choice in the matter though. That left Mark and I think he would have agreed to come, only I made the decision not to ask him because I needed time alone to get through my list of break-ins.


    One by one I checked off my to-do list in Washington, except for the White House as I ran out of time, and before I knew it, it was time to get ready for the party. Shauna and I had gone dress shopping a few weeks ago and she¡¯d helped me pick out a slinky black dress with cap sleeves. We¡¯d also found a matching purse and pair of mid-heel pumps. I was more of a jeans and super-hero t-shirt kind of girl and getting all fancy like this was outside of my experience. Half an hour before the party was called for, Shauna came in and helped me with my makeup. I still sucked at putting in on and I really liked Shauna¡¯s ¡®less is more¡¯ attitude towards it.


    Shauna was wearing a sleeveless dress with tasteful sequins and an uneven hem and she¡¯d had her hair done so that it framed her face in gentle curls. She looked great and I was sure that she¡¯d turn quite a few heads at the party. She blushed when I told her this and I had the sudden insight that Shauna wasn¡¯t very experienced in these things. When I thought about it further, I realized that like me she¡¯d never had to go to something like this before. I¡¯d heard about social functions in the army, but I guessed that you just wore the fancy uniform to that instead of your regular uniform. It made me feel better thinking that I wasn¡¯t the only one that had never been to one of these before. At the same time, it made me feel worse because it¡¯s easier to survive these things if you have a seasoned professional showing you the ropes.


    Staying at the same hotel as the party turned out to be a great idea, as we heard that traffic all around the White House was snarled like crazy because of some protest against the upcoming G-20 meetings. These protests had been getting increasingly violent over the past five or six years and watching them on the news I got the impression that a lot of the violence was caused by a small group of professional protesters who came out to set things on fire and get more press coverage. They certainly seemed well organized. No one goes out for a peaceful day of protesting with all the ingredients to make a Molotov cocktail.


    I was glad that I didn¡¯t have to make my way here through all the traffic and demanding people. A simple thirty second trip in an elevator took us down to the main floor where the embassy had reserved one of the medium sized halls. The ushers, who were obviously embassy security guards dressed up for their alternate rolls tonight, carefully examined our invitations and waved us through to the event. Gabriel and Jenny followed Shauna and me inside the hall and we all stopped just inside the door for our eyes to adjust and to get our bearings. The room was elegantly decorated in what I would call ¡®Standard Wedding¡¯ with tables arranged in a semi-circle around a dance floor. Behind the dance floor was a raised platform with a band already playing some Eighty¡¯s classic. To the side there was a podium set up with the flags of Germany and the United States in the background.


    Before we could take a step further into the hall, we were met by Strudel and his wife.


    ¡°Hello Mr. and Mrs. Strudel. It¡¯s good to see you both again.¡±


    Mr. Becker facepalmed and his wife smiled warmly. ¡°They¡¯ve been calling him that at the office for the past few months. Ever since Alexander told the story of how he got that nickname. For some reason, everyone but Gerhardt thinks it¡¯s hilarious. I heard that even the ambassador had to correct herself when she used it once. She apologized, but she was smiling the whole time. I don¡¯t really care what they call him. I¡¯m just glad to have him back.¡±


    Mrs. Strudel, Emilia, greeted each of us like family and showed us to our table. With our purses set tastefully aside, she took us around the room and introduced us to various people whose names and titles I immediately forgot. There was a fair amount of embassy staff in the mix, along with important German nationals who represented large German corporations here in the US. Various ambassadors from other countries were present as well and somewhere in all the chaos we even managed to run into Ethan from the State Department. This wasn¡¯t part of his normal duties, but he and Alexander had worked together on how they would use the server information that I¡¯d given them from the prison and they¡¯d developed a good working relationship. It was enough to get Ethan invited to this party and for Ethan¡¯s boss to consider promoting Ethan and making him the State Department liaison to the German embassy.


    The evening got off to a slow start, as the protest caused many of the attendees to be even later than they planned on being. The German ambassador herself was a full hour late and she came in full of apologies and stories of her adventures in the great Washington traffic jam. She didn¡¯t have a kind thing to say about the protesters.


    Hors d¡¯oeuvres had been served while everyone had mingled and waited for the ambassador. Shortly after her arrival the guests took to their seats and the ambassador welcomed everyone and thanked us all for coming, in both English and German. She made some allusions to a ceremony after the dinner and invited everyone to eat and dance and enjoy the evening.


    The dinner was ok, but I made a mental note to save an Italian diplomat next time. A nice ravioli in rose sauce beats schnitzel in a lemon sauce any day. As the dinner plates were taken away, the Ambassador walked up to the podium and started her speech. She spoke in English and peppered her words with the occasional German phrase, which I happily understood. She talked about the importance of service. Service to your family, to your community, and to your country. She explained that tonight was a celebration of those that had provided outstanding service to the Federal Republic of Germany and there were three individuals being honored tonight.


    She followed this up by calling up the first recipient, one of the businessmen that I¡¯d met earlier. He was awarded the Order of Merit for his entrepreneurial achievement and helping drive the growth of German interests into new markets. She looped the medal of his head and he gave a one minute speech where he thanked the Ambassador and extolled the virtues of his great country. The second recipient was a woman that spoke for way too long about the scientific work that earned her the award. Normally, I would have tuned her out, only I was next, and I didn¡¯t want to miss my cue. Luckily, the ambassador was up to the task of interrupting her politely and ushering her back to her seat.


    ¡°Finally, I would like to call up Ms. Abigail Smith. Ms. Smith has earned the appreciation of the German people through her humanitarian efforts that led to the release of our very own Gerhardt Becker from political incarceration. In addition, her activities have contributed to the enhancement of relations with our host country and have resulted in improving German¡¯s standing abroad. What is of extra significance is that Ms. Smith is only seventeen and has already created a foundation that is dedicated to providing assistance to those that have suffered from the devastating effects of human trafficking. It is rare to see such humanitarian achievements in one so young and the German people would like to show their appreciation by presenting to her the Order of Merit.¡±


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    I walked to the ambassador and shook her hand before I bent down a little so she could put the medal around my neck. I began my speech in German and I registered the surprise in the ambassador¡¯s face. ¡°Thank you, Ambassador. Please excuse me if I mangle your language a little. I¡¯m still learning it. I¡¯ve never been to any official function, much less a German one, and I didn¡¯t know what to expect. Part of me was hoping that I¡¯d get to meet David Hasselhoff or Boris Becker. But this was nice too.¡± That got a lot more laughter than it deserved and I took the opportunity to end my comedy routine and switch to English as I thanked my team by name and gave a quick plug to the Hannah Foundation.


    Following the ceremony, I was mobbed with people congratulating me and asking me more about the foundation. I was happy to give them more information and expressed my hope to eventually have several branches in Europe. Ethan and Alexander made their way over as the well wishers dispersed and added their congratulations.


    ¡°Abby, I¡¯m curious about something. You didn¡¯t speak German at the Hannah¡¯s Home meeting, yet here you are, barely two months later, delivering a short speech in German, with almost no detectable English accent. You even managed to make a funny joke in German. Most Germans couldn¡¯t even do that.¡± That earned Ethan a light smack across the head from Alexander and Ethan pretended that it hurt. Boys! Even when they were high level diplomats, they were still boys.


    ¡°What Ethan is trying to ask is how did you manage to learn German so quickly?¡±


    ¡°Uhm¡­I read a few books about it and watched some movies. Oh, and I listened to German podcasts too. I guess I¡¯m just good with languages.¡± Ethan shook his head and wished he was good with languages as well.


    With dinner and the ceremony finished up, the dancing began in earnest. Shauna got asked to dance a few times, but Jenny was far more popular and spend most of her time on the dance floor. I guess German men like tall women. Gabriel and his muscles also garnered a fair amount of interest from the women. I was invited to one dance each by Gerhardt, Alexander and Ethan, but everyone else kept their distance. I was below the age of majority and I supposed that none of the men wanted to be viewed by their colleagues as predators. That left me with Shauna standing beside the dance floor sipping a ginger ale when the first shot hit my outer shield and passed through, sending the bullet harmlessly into R2 before I even registered what was happening.


    My habit of keeping my shields up all the time had just saved my life. I honestly didn¡¯t expect to need the shield for personal protection. After my trip to the mines this summer, I¡¯d seen how valuable it was for me to be able to send out my field great distances and I¡¯d resolved to build up my field strength further using constant shield practice. I was at the point where I kept the field on all day, every day, and I barely noticed that it was on when it was within ten feet of my body.


    My hearing registered another two shots, but neither came near me. Someone yelled for everyone to get down and the crowd dropped down into a crouching or kneeling position. I looked around and saw that one person, a man who was at the other end of the dance floor, was lying on his back and blood was seeping onto the floor from under his right shoulder.


    I thought about which direction the first bullet had come from and sent out my field in that direction, just like I had done at the mine sites. This time I was looking to see if I could find any people with guns and I found them almost immediately. A block away, there was a squad of what I assumed to be policemen wrestling a man to the ground. His gun was on the ground, twenty feet further from him.


    Coming out of my crouch, I ran over to the man who¡¯d been shot. I ignored Shauna¡¯s frantic shout for me to get down. Kneeling beside the injured man, I opened his jacket to look at the wound. There was blood staining his upper chest and I opened his shirt to find what I had already seen with my scan. The bullet had penetrated just below his right rear deltoid, specifically the infraspinatus muscle, and had come out of his upper chest. His right lung had collapsed and his plural cavity, the space between his lung and his rib cage, was filling with air and blood. This was very bad. He was either going to bleed to death from the wounds or he¡¯d eventually die from lack of oxygen. My scan-reading had taught me all about this condition, called tension hemopneumothorax, and how to treat it in the field, but that description had assumed that I had all the necessary equipment. I had nothing.


    ¡°Shauna! I need a first aid kit. I need to stop this bleeding. Also, call 911 and tell them we¡¯ve had a shooting and that we need an ambulance right now. See if the hotel has an infirmary or nursing station and raid it if they do. Gabriel, I need towels or anything that will help me staunch the bleeding. Jenny, find me some scissors.¡±


    I didn¡¯t check to see if any of them had even heard me. I had to slow down the bleeding. I covered the chest wound with my hands and applied pressure. The books had said that I¡¯d need to apply more pressure that I expected and they were right. I put more of my body weight onto my hands and the blood flow slowed further, only my scans showed that the man was still losing blood from the entry wound in his back.


    I needed more hands. I looked around and saw that Ethan was right next to me.


    ¡°Ethan, I need you to reach under this shoulder and put pressure on the entry wound.¡± Ethan didn¡¯t hesitate and kneeled beside me. I walked him through what he needed to do. It was a very awkward position for him and after a bit of trial and error, he found that he could cover the wound with one hand and use his other hand in a closed fist position to brace it from underneath. This, combined with some of the victim¡¯s body weight helped apply the required pressure to slow the bleeding from that end.


    Jenny came in with the scissors and I had her cut away the man¡¯s jacket and shirt. For his sake, I sure hoped it wasn¡¯t a rental. Then again, he¡¯d be lucky if he had the chance to pay that bill. Gabriel and Shauna ran in together with the first aid kit and towels. I switched places with Gabriel and instructed the men on placing the towels properly and then applying more pressure. As I rummaged through the first aid kit for gauze to clean wounds and dressing to close them up, Shauna told me that they didn¡¯t have an infirmary in the hotel.


    ¡°The ambulance is stuck in traffic. Between the protest and the shooting, they can¡¯t get through.¡± Alexander¡¯s normally impeccable English had been replaced with a German accent so thick that it would have fit in perfectly in one of the old World War II movies. At his words, I took a second to lean over and place my ear against the victim¡¯s chest. I was supposed to be listening for the crackling sounds or wheezing, but it there was too much ambient noise. Instead, I used the few seconds to deepen my understanding of what was going on. The bleeding had been contained, but the trapped air needed to be let out.


    ¡°He¡¯s going to need needle decompression to remove the air and blood from his chest. I don¡¯t have the tools to do that. Find out where the nearest ambulance is and get me the needle. It¡¯ll buy him some time for the ambulance to get here and take him to the hospital, but we need it now.¡±


    I left the details to Alexander and I started sealing the wounds. The back wound I cleaned with gauze and sealed over completely. I wanted to pack it with the gauze, but my readings had specifically admonished not to do that. The chest wound I sealed by taping a plastic bag over the wound and taping it closed on three sides. The idea was that air could escape, but the internal pressure of the sucking chest wound would help the seal to keep air from getting in. However, the plastic I had was too rigid and I ended up having someone go get some saran wrap. It was flexible enough and did the trick.


    Over the next several minutes, I monitored his breathing and reviewed all the things that I could do. With no experience in this and no equipment, there wasn¡¯t much. I briefly considered if there was anything more that I could do with my field to help the guy. If things got bad enough, I could remove some of the blood from his thorax, but it would be replaced by air in short order. Could I remove air? I¡¯d never tried something like that before and this wasn¡¯t the place to do it. Accidentally killing the guy while trying to save him would really suck.


    I did roll the guy over onto his damaged side, though. Supposedly this would help his breathing by putting less pressure on his uninjured lung. My instincts told me that putting more weight on the injured side was wrong, but I suppressed them. Whoever wrote those books had dealt with hundreds of cases like this and my trauma experience involved putting a band-aid on a paper cut, so I listened to the voice of experience.


    The door burst open and one of the embassy guards came running in at full tilt. He had a medical kit in his hand and he handed it to me. As I ripped open the protective bag holding the needle, I heard the guard speaking to Alexander in German and explaining that he caught up to an ambulance a few blocks away that was about to leave to take another gunshot victim to the hospital. They couldn¡¯t spare the paramedics, but they gave him the kit once he told them that there was a doctor on site that knew how to use it. I wondered what doctor he was talking about before it dawned on me that he was referring to me. Shit! For a second there I had hope that someone would take over for me.


    With no one else around to lift the burden off of my shoulders, I kept going. I mentally reviewed everything that I¡¯d read about inserting the needle into the lung area and realized that there was some disagreement as to the best place to insert it. I tried tossing a mental coin in my head and found that it kept landing on the side that I was leaning towards anyways. Funny that. The coin toss was overseen by three impartial referees, so there was no denying it. The text also warned that only trained medical personnel were legally allowed to perform this procedure and I hoped that they wouldn¡¯t take my pretend medical license away from me after all this. Joking aside, I couldn¡¯t see any other options except letting this guy die from asphyxiation. I¡¯d just have to hope that if this guy lived, he wouldn¡¯t try to sue me for trying to help.


    Using my field scanning as a guide, I slowly plunged the needle into between the guy¡¯s ribs and into this thorax. When my scan showed that the needle was at the correct depth, I flipped open the one-way valve on the needle and air escaped. I carefully monitored the guy¡¯s breathing over the next few minutes and it seemed to me that the guy¡¯s breathing eased. He wasn¡¯t out of the woods by a long shot, but at least he wasn¡¯t getting any worse and he had a chance to get to the hospital where they could do a proper tube thoracostomy and repair the damage caused by the bullet.


    A call to ¡®clear the way¡¯ was shouted from the entrance to the room and a pair of paramedics entered and headed straight for me. I rose from the floor and gave them a synopsis of the wound and the measures I¡¯d taken and then they took over. They had him on the gurney and hooked up to an IV in no time at all and on the way to the ambulance, followed closely by Alexander and the Ambassador.

 Chapter 49: Aftermath

    With the emergency over, my body stopped producing adrenaline and I was suddenly feeling very tired. Shauna was abruptly by my side and she used a towel to wipe away the blood from my arms and legs. I hadn¡¯t even noticed that I was covered in the stuff and I had the sudden urge for a long shower. I heard Shauna ask Jenny to get our purses from the table and she started leading me upstairs to my room. I was a bit out of it during all this and I think I was in shock. A half hour ago, I was standing by the dance floor and now I looked like an extra in the filming of Carrie.


    I woke up the next morning in my bed at the hotel. I was clean and in my pjs so I must have showered. Everything after the paramedics showing up was kind of hazy in my memory. Despite being clean already, I showered again to help me wake up and got dressed. Our flight home was scheduled to leave this afternoon and so I packed up my things and got them ready by the door before I called up Shauna to see if she wanted to go out for breakfast. I was also hoping that she had some news about the guy who¡¯d been shot last night.


    I met Shauna and the team downstairs at the hotel restaurant for breakfast. It had been a busy few days and none of us had the energy to go breakfast hunting. Shauna didn¡¯t have any news about the shooting victim from last night yet. She¡¯d left Alexander a message this morning asking for information about the guy and she hoped he¡¯d call to let us know. While we waited for his call, we ordered our meal and talked about all the places the team had visited. They all agreed that the White House tour was the highlight of their trip.


    ¡°Although, watching your run through a hail of bullets to go save that guy was pretty spectacular.¡± Gabriel said cheerfully and was soon massaging his leg from the kick that Shauna gave him under the table. The glare she was giving him was cold enough freeze water in an instant.


    ¡°Hey, the shooting had already stopped by the time I ran to the guy. There was no ¡®hail of bullets¡¯. And Shauna, why¡¯d you kick Gabriel just now?¡±


    ¡°Because I asked him not to tease you about last night since you¡¯re so touchy about things like that and he said he would behave. He didn¡¯t behave, so he got a swift kick to the shin. He¡¯s lucky we were sitting.¡±


    ¡°What do you mean? I¡¯m not touchy at things like that.¡±


    ¡°Is that so? I¡¯ve got some memories of a meeting at Hannah¡¯s Home that say otherwise. You set me up for hours of interrogation after I showed a few videos of you saving the day.¡±


    My face turned red at the memory and the team laughed at my expense. I sighed and gave in with a smile. She was right. I was touchy. I seemed to have a problem accepting praise for my efforts. Maybe it was because I didn¡¯t do those things for praise or special attention. I just did them.


    My musings were cut short as Ethan and Alexander walked into the restaurant and joined us at our table. They were together again and I started to wonder if they were a couple. There was no overt reason for me to think that, but they kept showing up together. I¡¯d have to ask Shauna later. They¡¯d probably get offended if I asked them and they weren¡¯t.


    ¡°Good morning, gentlemen. Do you have any news about the guy that got shot last night?¡±, I asked as they grabbed some unused seats from the table next to ours and sat down.


    ¡°Yes. Good news. Stephen made it out of surgery early this morning and is still asleep. His vitals are strong and barring anything unforeseen they expect him to make a full recovery. It was touch and go for awhile though. He was nearly dead when they got him to the operating room. The surgeon credits the quick work of whoever stabilized Stephan and eased his breathing with saving his life. Without those measures, Stephen wouldn¡¯t have survived to get to the hospital or had enough strength to make it through surgery. It seems like the German people are in your debt yet again, Abby.¡± Alexander¡¯s smile turned to concern when he saw my expression.


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    ¡°Please, not another ceremony. The last one was too stressful, and I¡¯ve already got one of those merit medals things. It¡¯s very nice.¡±


    Shauna and the team burst into laughter again and I pretended to be upset about it. However, I was disappointed that no one seemed to have picked up on my Monty Python and the Holy Grail reference. Where was Uncle Magnum when you needed him? Then I noticed Ethan shaking his head in resignation and when his eyes met mine he said, ¡°Now go away, before I am forced to taunt you again!¡± and we both laughed at our shared reference. Ah popular culture. I love it! Ethan was obviously a man of refined tastes.


    Jenny changed the subject. ¡°So, what was the deal with the shooting anyways? Was someone trying to get to the ambassador?¡±


    Ethan shook his head again, this time in negation. ¡°No. It was just bad luck that any of the bullets found their way into the hotel room. One of the protestors pulled out a gun when the police came to arrest him. He got off two bursts of automatic fire before the police were able to subdue him. He hit three other people. Stephen was the only one that got hit in a critical area and had to be hospitalized overnight. My bosses over at the state department were going crazy last night with worry about a possible international incident. Don¡¯t be too surprised if they want to hand you a shiny trinket as well, Abby. Not only did you save Stephen¡¯s life, you also single-handedly saved American ¨C German relations from potential disaster.¡±


    ¡°Whoa there, Ethan. I just stabilized the guy. Let¡¯s not make a mountain out of molehill. Besides, why would Germany blame the United States for the accidental shooting death of a party guest? There was no way they could have prevented it.¡±


    ¡°That may be so, but logic doesn¡¯t always prevail in these circumstances and someone would find a way to say that the Americans were negligent in how they handled the protesters. The death of the ambassador¡¯s son would not have been taken lightly in Germany and certain elements in the German government would have seen this as an opportunity to rail against the Americans.¡±


    It took a few moments for what he said to sink in. ¡°Stephen is the ambassador¡¯s son?¡±


    ¡°Yes. Didn¡¯t you know? I thought I saw Gerhardt introduce you to him earlier on in the evening.¡±


    ¡°He introduced me to dozens of people. I forgot who they were before he finished saying their names.¡±


    ¡°Oh. Well, he is and you saved him so you can expect quite a bit of attention to come out of this. I have a feeling that you¡¯re not happy about that, but try to look at it as an opportunity to tell more people about your foundation and about the problem of human trafficking.¡±


    My horror at the memory of all the attention I¡¯d had at school after the fire incident was somewhat mollified by Alexander¡¯s suggestion. He was right. If I had no choice, I might as well make the most of it and turn it to my advantage.


    Alexander continued, ¡°Abby, you impressed the hell out of the ambassador with the way you took charge of her son¡¯s care. She was wondering where you learned so much. Did you take courses to become a paramedic or something like that? Are you pre-med?¡±


    ¡°No. None of those things. Uhm,¡­I¡¯ve been reading a lot of medical textbooks lately. One of them is all about first aid and a few of the others talked about trauma situations like last night.¡±


    ¡°Wait. You haven¡¯t had any medical training whatsoever?¡± Alexander sounded stunned by the idea.


    ¡°I volunteer at the hospital every other weekend with my friend, Eva. We play games with the children on the cancer ward. Does that count?¡±


    ¡°No, it doesn¡¯t. Not even a little bit.¡± Alexander¡¯s calm demeaner was slipping again and his German accent was showing.


    ¡°Well, I¡¯m still in high school. I haven¡¯t really had time to go to get any training yet.¡± I was feeling defensive by this point.


    ¡°Then what made you think that you could help Stephen?¡± Exasperated. That¡¯s what he sounded like.


    ¡°He needed help and no one else had any better ideas. I knew what had to be done.¡±


    ¡°From your reading.¡± He said this as a statement, not a question, but I answered him anyways.


    ¡°Yes, I guess.¡±


    Alexander pinched the bridge of his nose as if trying to stave off a headache. ¡°Abby. I¡¯m going to ask you for a very big favor. Please never mention any of this to the ambassador or to anyone at State or the embassy. Ever. You¡¯ll give people heart attacks. I think I might be having one now.¡±


    I knew he was joking, but I couldn¡¯t help but pretend to take him seriously. ¡°Do you have chest pain or discomfort? Shortness of breath? Nausea?¡±


    ¡°HaHa, Dr. Abby. Very funny. You may think this is all amusing now, but I know that you won¡¯t think it so funny when the video from last night finds its way to the networks.¡±


    I could feel all the color drain from my face. ¡°Video? Someone was recording last night?¡±


    As I stalked off towards my room a minute later, Shauna and the team were still laughing at me.

 Chapter 50: A Conversation With Dad

    Shauna let me simmer about the video until we got to the airport where she revealed to me that the only video that was taken last night was by the official photographer of the German embassy and that the ambassador had prohibited the release of any part of it. I had been so focused on stabilizing Stephen that I hadn¡¯t seen that the ambassador was standing a few feet away from me watching everything unfold. No one had dared pull out their phones to record anything for fear of upsetting her as she watched her son struggle to live.


    Relief swept over me at the news and I was torn between elation and the almost overwhelming desire to punch Shauna for not telling me earlier. Alexander was also on my shit list for that. Ethan too. Did Jenny and Gabriel know? I¡¯d have to find out and take appropriate action. My mind had been buzzing with worry over the reporters I¡¯d have to fend off for the next month and I¡¯d wondered if I¡¯d get grief from someone over my unauthorized use of a restricted medical procedure. With my brain finally able to relax, I fell asleep on takeoff and woke up a few minutes before landing.


    I parted ways with the team once we landed, explaining that Eva was picking me up, and slipped into L2. My car was parked just inside the terminal and I took off for Hannah¡¯s Home. I wanted ¡®Roger¡¯ to have already dropped off the new servers by the time the team got back. There was going to be enough questions about why Roger was in Washington at the same time as we were. There was no way to hide that the servers had been copied on the same dates that we visited Washington and that I wasn¡¯t with the team for most of our stay. Having me casually drop off the drives would have added even more suspicion in some of their minds. Finding the drives already stacked neatly on the corner of Jenny¡¯s desk might surprise the team enough that they didn¡¯t make those pesky connections.


    Dad was still at work when I got home. I texted him that I was back to let him know that I was safe and sound. Although the protest and shooting had made the news, no mention had been made of the German embassy party so dad would have had no reason to worry, even if he did watch the news. Which he didn¡¯t. I¡¯d have to give him the whole story when he got home though. For him to hear about it from someone else wouldn¡¯t go over very well.


    While I waited for dad to come home, I booted up the laptop that I¡¯d bought from Howie last year and I started logging on to corporate servers one after another, looking to see if there was any information that I could find that would have a significant impact on their share value. It wasn¡¯t earnings report season, but not all companies followed that season and I found that three of the over seventy companies that I now had insider access to were preparing to file their earnings. One of the three companies had gotten unofficial confirmation that the permit for their new construction project would finally be granted in two weeks. The two years of delay on getting the permit had hit their stock hard and with the project now getting the green light there was huge upside.


    I wrote a summary of the situation to James, along with a my ¡®speculation¡¯ about a half dozen other companies. He¡¯d been directing the trades since the summer and between my insights and his understanding of how best to trade on those insights, he¡¯d already grown the initial twenty million dollars by eleven percent! That was huge. In four months, he¡¯d almost grown the funds to recover the entire cost of buying Hannah¡¯s Home. Of course, this was before taxes, so we weren¡¯t quite there yet. My own portfolio wasn¡¯t doing too badly either. I was earning a lot more that I was spending.


    It was getting late so I started getting dinner ready. Pull some ready-made dough out of the fridge, roll it out, slather sauce all over the top side of it, sprinkle on a layer or two of cheese, and slap it in the oven for fifteen minutes at 450 degrees. Et Viola! Pizza! Food of the gods. As if on cue, dad walked in just as the pizza came out of the oven. It wasn¡¯t just with cookies that dad had impeccable timing. All baked goods yielded similar results.


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    Dad ate his pizza while I told him all about getting the Order of Merit, my speech and about the shooting. He stopped eating when I got to the shooting part and I had his undivided attention throughout the rest of my story. He only relaxed enough to start eating again after I¡¯d told him about how the video wasn¡¯t going to be released. He didn¡¯t want the reporters calling any more than I did.


    ¡°It sounds like you took charge when no one else knew what to do and I¡¯m really proud of you for saving Stephen, Abby. Not many people would know what to do in a situation like that. You did though and you didn¡¯t panic.¡±


    ¡°You know, Abby, if someone had asked me before if you knew anything about medicine, I¡¯d have told them quite confidently that you had no interest in it at all. The same goes for your speaking German. Have I been working too much and neglecting you so badly that I don¡¯t know my own daughter anymore?¡±


    Dad was joking and not joking at the same time. It¡¯s his defense mechanism. He says something that he really means only in a joking manner so that it seems like its not important. He was also giving me an out. I could continue the joke and keep my secrets, or I could talk to him. I chose a middle ground.


    ¡°I¡¯ve been more interested in medicine since Evan died and I¡¯ve been reading some medical textbooks over the past month. So this is new and you haven¡¯t been neglecting me at all. You¡¯re still the best daddy in the world!¡±


    ¡°And the German?¡±


    ¡°Oh. I knew I had the party at the embassy, so I read a few German language learning books. You know, ¡®when in Berlin¡¯ and all that.¡± I tried to pass it off as nothing special.


    ¡°I recall that three years ago I needed to hire a tutor to help you with your Spanish course. Now you can read a few books on German and you can understand it enough to make jokes in it to a room full of Germans? All this in the weeks since you received the invitation and while you were also busy absorbing several medical textbooks, going to school for eight hours a day, working almost every night on your Kung Fu and texting with your boyfriend.¡± He had set his trap and closed it right on me. He had me dead to rights. There was just no way I could dance my way out of this one. It was time to come clean. Well, partially clean. Cleaner?


    ¡°For a neglectful father, you sure seem to know a lot about my activities.¡±


    ¡°For a dutiful daughter, you sure seem to have a lot of secret activities.¡±


    ¡°They¡¯re not secret. I just hadn¡¯t gotten around to mentioning them yet.¡±


    He just looked at me and waited me out.


    I sighed and told him a partial truth. ¡°Lately, I¡¯ve been able to retain most of what I read. I can also integrate it faster. I don¡¯t just remember the words. The information is organized in my brain so that it feels like I learned it years ago. I can also do it in Kung Fu. Uncle Magnum has seen a difference in my Kung Fu, but when he tried to ask me about it, I changed the subject.¡±


    Dad took a few moments to collect his thoughts. ¡°I have heard that some people can have a photographic memory, but I have never met anyone who does. Until just now, I didn¡¯t think it was real. I don¡¯t know what could cause you to develop such an ability, but it is a gift, Abby, and you should take full advantage of it. What comes without warning may leave without warning. Take the time to learn as much as you can about anything that interests you and maybe some things that don¡¯t interest you right now. Perhaps you could brush up on your Spanish while you¡¯re at it.¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s already next on my list.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s good. Also, you shouldn¡¯t keep this from Paul anymore. He¡¯s not only your uncle, he¡¯s your teacher and he needs to know what you can do in order to push your skills to their maximum.¡±


    ¡°Ok. I¡¯ll tell him soon.¡±


    ¡°Now, is there anything else that you¡¯d like to share with me that you haven¡¯t gotten around to yet?¡±


    ¡°You mean besides Tyler wanting to be your apprentice?¡±


    With that one question, I¡¯d caught him completely by surprise and suddenly all thoughts of whatever secrets I might me hiding dissolved into dust. I love deflection!

 Chapter 51: Christmas Break!

    For our Christmas Mom Project this year, Dad and I built an outdoor firepit for the backyard. My grandparents used to have a firepit in their yard and mom and Uncle Magnum would sit outside for hours and talk about their future plans. When mom and dad started getting serious, she¡¯d invite him over to sit with her by the fire. Dad said that she could be out there without saying a word for long stretches at a time, mesmerized by the waving fire. I hoped that some day she¡¯d get to sit by this firepit, but she¡¯s been gone for thirteen years already and despite my decision not to give up on finding her, I didn¡¯t really hold out much hope.


    Choosing what to make for dad this year was a lot harder than usual. I had tons of ideas, but nothing that screamed, ¡°Yeah! That¡¯s the one.¡± I ended up making him a metal pillow to use to take naps at the forge. Dad laughed when I explained what it was for. He got the contradictions right away and appreciated them. Dad had never taken a nap in the forge in his life and if he did, a metal pillow would not be anyone¡¯s choice for comfort. He did take the time to appreciate how I¡¯d basically created two heavily modified interlocking armor breastplates and latched them together to form a hollow ¡®pillow¡¯. I¡¯d added a fur trim all around the edge of the pillow to soften the effect. It looked good enough to sleep on.


    For his part, dad forged a giant metal syringe for me that you could actually fill with water and spray out through the tip. It was his interpretation of the ¡®needle¡¯ from the needle decompression that I¡¯d used to save Stephen. It didn¡¯t look anything like the one I¡¯d used, but that didn¡¯t matter. I was a really cool piece of art and it would get some prominent display space in my room.


    Just like last year, dad left right after Christmas morning to spend a week with his parents and siblings. He knew how I felt about his family and didn¡¯t suggest that I join him. He also didn¡¯t try to get me to go stay with Uncle Magnum and I took that as a sign that he was seeing me more as an adult and that he trusted me to take care of myself. His daily phone calls to check up on me did nothing, much, to dispel that impression.


    With the exception of Uncle Magnum, I was all alone again this year. Margaret had gone home to Georgia for the holidays and Uncle Magnum had decided to stay here and keep Sifu Zhang company by training with him every day. Meanwhile, Eva and James were off visiting family again. I didn¡¯t know why their families couldn¡¯t come here to visit them once in awhile.


    Even Bobby was away. At least in his case, he wasn¡¯t visiting family. He was touring several west coast universities that had invited him to see their campuses. Bobby and I hadn¡¯t talked much about our futures and I think that we were just trying to ignore what we both knew. In the fall, he¡¯d be playing football at a university out west and I¡¯d be running my foundation out here. We didn¡¯t have a future together, but we did have the next six months. We enjoyed each other¡¯s company and had a good time together. Double dating with Eva and James was nice too.


    The day after Christmas I headed out to Hannah¡¯s Home and surprised Uncle Magnum and Sifu Zhang as they were about to start their morning training. Since Sifu Zhang usually spent the evening teaching at Uncle Magnum¡¯s school, as per my deal with him, Uncle Magnum decided that he¡¯d train with Sifu at the foundation in the mornings.


    ¡°Abby! I thought you¡¯d be sleeping in during the holidays.¡± Uncle Magnum greeted me with a big hug.


    ¡°No time, uncle. Too much to do. I¡¯m going to be helping Sister Clara at the clinic for the next few weeks. The other sisters are on holiday visiting with their families. With the clinic opening at ten for the holidays, I have enough time to join you old timers in a bit of stretching.¡±


    ¡°Old timers, huh? We¡¯ll see about that you young whippersnapper.¡±


    ¡°There¡¯s also something I wanted to talk to you about.¡±


    ¡°What¡¯s that?¡±


    ¡°Let¡¯s start and you¡¯ll see soon enough.¡±


    We started stretching and moved into forms once we were warmed up. Sifu Zhang led us through a few of the early forms and then paused, as if he were wondering what forms I should work on while they did theirs. However, this was the main reason that I was here this morning and I took advantage of that pause to continue with their normal sequence of forms, which I knew by heart from when I used to join them in R1 before school started.


    Uncle and Sifu stopped their own forms and watched. I flowed from one form to the next, not giving them the chance to interrupt, performing each move with precision and grace, exactly as I¡¯d learned from watching the two masters. At the end of the last form that Uncle Magnum usually did, Uncle Magnum was about to say something, only Sifu Zhang¡¯s light touch on his shoulder stopped him. Sifu Zhang nodded to me once and I continued with the forms that I¡¯d learned from watching him perform while he trained alone.


    ¡°I¡¯m guessing that display was what you wanted to talk we me about?¡± Uncle Magnum asked me when I finally stood still.


    ¡°Yup.¡±


    ¡°Yup? I¡¯m going to need more that ¡®yup¡¯, Abby. How about where and when did you learn all that? How about an explanation of how you¡¯re able to do forms that I haven¡¯t even learned yet?¡±


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    ¡°She learned them from us, Paul. For the forms that you know, her movements are an exact copy of yours. For the ones that you don¡¯t know, her movements are a copy of mine. At one point, she has watched us doing our forms and I suspect that even seeing the forms once is enough for her to know them forever. It is a form of eidetic memory. Some people are born with it, others can develop it in their teenage years. A few have been known to get it as a direct result of a head injury.¡±


    ¡°Is he right, Abby?¡± Uncle Magnum was looking a little bewildered.


    ¡°Yup!¡± This time I got a laugh out of both of them and I continued, ¡°It¡¯s not just Kung Fu. I¡¯ve been able to absorb whole medical textbooks lately and I¡¯m fluent in German, Spanish, and French. I can pick up a language in a few weeks. That¡¯s why you¡¯ve seen some strange jumps in my learning over the past year. The enhanced memory isn¡¯t just an ability to pull up facts. I¡¯ve been able to integrate the knowledge and with a little practice it becomes second nature. I seem to understand my opponents moves better and understand what move is coming based on slight adjustments in their body movements.¡±


    ¡°Holy Shit, Abby. That¡¯s awesome! Now I understand why you said that it wasn¡¯t something that I¡¯d be able to use to teach anyone else.¡±


    ¡°Yes. It also presents us with a unique challenge in training up Abby¡¯s Kung Fu. Usually a teacher will have time to balance the student¡¯s fighting experience with the forms, ensuring that the new moves used in the forms are incorporated into the student¡¯s fighting style. In this case, she already knows considerably more from the forms than she uses when fighting. In addition, she will need to work on her stamina, speed, muscle strength and flexibility.¡±


    I groaned at those last words. More stamina training. Ugh! Do something cool, get punished for it.


    It turned out that the groan was not a sufficiently invective reaction to the next hour of training. I¡¯d thought that working with Uncle Magnum and Charlie was tiring. Working with Uncle Magnum and Sifu Zhang was way worse. At least with Charlie I had someone who would take pity on me every now and then and give me a second to rest. Charlie was also a newer master of Kung Fu and wasn¡¯t nearly as inventive in the ways of torturing students.


    I had just enough time to shower and change before meeting Sister Clara at the clinic. She hadn¡¯t realized that I¡¯d had any interest in medicine but was happy to have any help. We had a few minutes before the clinic opened and she gave me an exclusive backstage behind the scenes look at the glamorous life of the medical professional. In layman¡¯s terms, she showed me where the bandages and supplies were kept and taught me how to sterilize instruments.


    As I grew familiar with the supplies, Sister Clara gave me a short course in triage, the art of managing which patients could wait and which ones needed help right away. I also learned how to answer the phones, schedule patients, create a chart, fill out the chart and take a patient¡¯s history. Billing was trickier, as the clinic was a non-profit medical center that provided health care on a sliding scale that started at free for those that couldn¡¯t afford it to full price for those that could.


    By the third day, I had learned to take a patient¡¯s vitals and I was occasionally assisting Sister Clara with some of her procedures. She even showed me how to put in an IV on a willing patient. Much of the work involved writing out prescriptions for various medications or diagnosing the flu, but it was necessary, and our efforts were rewarded with mostly thankful patients. One of the women who had brought in her four children for a checkup even baked us an Oreo pie. It was heavenly and didn¡¯t last to the end of the day.


    Everyone that came into the clinic underwent one of my scans and between the clear descriptions in the books that I¡¯d absorbed and the insights from Sister Clara, the scans no longer presented as a series of noisy alarms. Now the scans produced results that were closer to the ones that I got when I scanned for minerals in the ground, except with the body scans the field would only highlight anything that was outside the range of normal human tolerances. How the field knew what was and wasn¡¯t normal was still a mystery to me, but for now I was just accepting the fact that it did. Once something showed up as abnormal on my scan, I could focus on that abnormality and get even more information on it, actually see it in 3D in my mind.


    As before, the trouble for me would be how to deal with a scan that showed a life changing problem in the patient. I couldn¡¯t just tell the person that their liver wasn¡¯t working properly or that they had hypothyroidism. I was just a volunteer and had no status. Even Sister Clara would have her doubts about anything that I said so I had to learn to ask the patients the right questions in order to get them to remember symptoms that they¡¯d forgotten to mention. For example, if a patient was complaining of fatigue and weight loss and I detected hypothyroidism, I¡¯d ask them about the other symptoms for hypothyroidism such as an increased sensitivity to cold or constipation, things they may not have noticed so much, and put those down on the chart. With the extra clues, Sister Clara would order up the blood work to confirm what was suspected.


    This worked well most of the time. On a few occasions though, a patient came in for regular checkup and wasn¡¯t showing any symptoms of illness, yet my scans would detect a problem that could be life threatening if left untreated. Luckily, a standard checkup included many of the tests required to discover these illnesses in advance, but in a few cases, the clinic¡¯s standard blood test wasn¡¯t enough and I¡¯d have to sneak in more tests on the blood work form. That worked fine for the fifteen year old girl with gonorrhea who needed an STD profile added to her testing and the thirty year old guy with very early stage prostate cancer who needed a PSA test added to his. It didn¡¯t work for Nathan, a retired police officer with lung cancer. He wasn¡¯t a smoker and there was no reason to suspect that he had lung cancer. There was even no history of it in his family. At best the blood test would hint at the problem.


    There wasn¡¯t any way for me to make him aware of his condition without sounding crazy. ¡°Excuse me sir, but I¡¯m Abby and I¡¯m a volunteer with no medical training whatsoever, but I can scan people with my mind and you have lung cancer. You should go get it checked out.¡± Nope. That wasn¡¯t going to fly. I needed to think of a way to make that believable or the cancer would continue to grow inside of him until it was too late to do anything about it. The cancer might even metastasize and travel to other parts of his body, precluding surgery as an option.


    I though about the problem constantly for several weeks without finding a solution. I was on the verge of calling the guy anonymously and blurting out that he has lung cancer when I got a call back from Howie and I finally had my solution.

 Chapter 52: Another Conversation with Howie

    Winter break ended and it was back to school for me. School was a mixed bag. It was great to see my friends again and it was incredible to get away from doing morning training with Uncle Magnum and Sifu Zhang. Sitting through classes though had reached previously unheard-of levels of boring. Whereas before I was sitting through useless classes that I needed to force myself to pay attention in so that I could pass them and get my diploma, now I was sitting through useless classes in which I knew as much as or more than the teacher teaching the class. Even the less useless classes, such as biology and chemistry, were dumbed down so much that it was mentally painful to listen to the lectures. Imagine yourself watching the Paris Opera Ballet one night and then having to sit through your six-year-old cousins¡¯ ballet recital the next. The six-year-old was still watchable because she was cute and she was your cousin, not because of her performance.


    Despite the growing chasm between what was being taught at school and my level of knowledge, I still wanted to learn more. Who wouldn¡¯t, when learning was so easy? I called up Howie to set up my next knowledge fix and he promptly called me back.


    ¡°It¡¯s funny. I was on the phone with Gerry talking about you when you called.¡± Again, no hi, no hello.


    ¡°Hi Howie, how have you been?¡± Maybe someday he¡¯d catch on.


    ¡°Good. Gerry was asking if you need these books to last? He says that he can seriously cut down on the cost of printing the books, if he uses cheaper paper and less metals in his inks. He wants to know if it¡¯s ok to do some experimenting on the books he sends you. Do you care?¡±


    ¡°I don¡¯t think it¡¯s a problem, as long as he¡¯s willing to replace any of the books that don¡¯t end up being satisfactory to me. If the books are good for at least one reading, then I¡¯m fine.¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s a go then. Make sure to keep me advised if any don¡¯t make the grade. Gerry also wanted to know if you minded if he were to put in some books that you didn¡¯t ask for.¡±


    ¡°Gerry doesn¡¯t approve of my choices of books?¡±


    ¡°Well, no, not really. He says that your selection relies too much on western medicine and that you¡¯re completely ignoring eastern medicine. He feels you need a better balance between the two. Also, Gerry loves fiction books and thinks that all work and no play will seriously stunt your growth as a person. He wants to send you some classic and modern sci-fi and fantasy books to read. Maybe a few mystery titles.¡±


    ¡°I won¡¯t say no to a little light reading. Fine. Tell him to print as many as he wants. I¡¯m a fast reader. In fact, I have another list for you. I¡¯m sending it to you now.¡±


    I pushed send on my new list:


    Textbook of Physiology by Gabriel C. Ezeilo


    Basic and Clinical Pharmacology by Bertram G. Katzung


    Harper¡¯s Illustrated Biochemistry


    Textbook of Human Histology by Inderbir Singh


    Medical Terminology by M. Mastrenbjork


    On Rounds : 1000 Internal Medicine Pearls


    Essential Cell Biology


    Surgical Recall


    Handbook of Clinical Skills by Jane Dacre and Peter Kopelman


    Essential Surgery by Burkitt, Quick and Reed


    On a whim, I added in MCAT Complete 7, which is a test preparatory guide by Kaplan. If you were applying to medical school, you needed to take the MCAT test and do well. I didn¡¯t know if I would ever bother going to medical school, but I remembered dad¡¯s words about learning for things that I may not be interested in now. Being able to scan people with my field, coupled with my ability to remove cancers that couldn¡¯t be removed using normal surgical methods, gave me a strong interest in medicine. However, becoming a doctor would take between eleven and fifteen years and I don¡¯t know if I had the patience to wait that long. Four years to get my undergraduate degree, four years to get my medical degree, and three to seven years of residency. That was close to my entire life thus far and all that before I could help anyone! I had to see if there was another way. One that didn¡¯t involve going to one of those Caribbean medical schools.


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    ¡°Got it. He should get those out to you in a few days. He wants to butter you up because he¡¯s hoping that you¡¯ll put in another hundred thousand dollars into the business.¡±


    ¡°What!?¡± My surprise brought my voice up into the upper registers.


    ¡°Hold on now, don¡¯t get your knickers in a twist. It only sounds bad if you don¡¯t know the context. The business is doing very well and he want to expand and get some paper making machines as well as another industrial printing machine. He¡¯s got a line on some used machines that he knows how to run and upkeep himself.¡±


    ¡°How had he been able to generate so much business in just three months?¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s the easy part. He¡¯s been in the business for over thirty years and he¡¯s well respected. That and the fact that he¡¯s able to undercut the competition by twenty-five percent. He¡¯s offering to bring up your share of the profits to 45%.¡±


    ¡°Do I have enough money left from the sale of the diamond?¡±


    ¡°That much and more. If you ever have more to sell, there¡¯s a really strong underground market for diamonds and gemstones; especially uncut ones.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯ll keep that in mind. I guess since you got me more for the diamond than I expected and I¡¯ve got nothing else to do with the money, I might as well fund Gerry again.¡±


    ¡°I know he¡¯ll be ecstatic. He¡¯s having a great time running his own show. He was telling me that he used to work half the year just to pay his taxes and he didn¡¯t get anything for that. Now he¡¯ll be working a little less than half the year for you, but you¡¯re the investor and you¡¯ve made it all possible.¡±


    ¡°Howie, what am I going to do with the money that I¡¯ll eventually be making? I have no way to account for it. It¡¯s not like I can spend it on just anything.¡±


    ¡°This from the girl that calls me every other week for something strange and exotic? In the past year you¡¯ve asked me to get you specialized mining software, personnel recruitment, an exoskeleton suit, metallic ink printing, thumb drives, customized external drives, and a parachute. You¡¯ll think of something, I¡¯m sure, and if I can¡¯t buy it for you, I¡¯ll know someone who can build it for you.¡±


    ¡°I could use some more map packages for the mining software. Maybe even some European maps. I¡¯ll probably have to get out there once I graduate. Hmmm¡­to bad I can¡¯t use the software to map out people.¡± I don¡¯t know why I said it. I just knew how well the mining software how turned out and my body scanning was essentially the same thing.


    ¡°Don¡¯t see why you couldn¡¯t. Well, not the same software, but something like it. There¡¯s a bunch of body scanners on the market. Some of them use digital cameras to create a 3D model of your body and others use infrared cameras to get your body shape. They don¡¯t tell you what¡¯s going on inside though. You¡¯d need x-rays, ultrasound, CT scanning or an MRI to see what¡¯s inside.¡±


    As soon as he said it, my mind started working in overdrive. That¡¯s exactly what I needed. Only I couldn¡¯t use any of those methods for scanning, because you needed a license for them. Not the ultrasound though. I¡¯d heard that you can buy ultrasound machines for the home that would let you listen to the heartbeat of your unborn baby. I would use my scanning ability to fill in the details. I just needed everyone to think that I was using ultrasound or something like it, something non-invasive and completely safe and that emitted no radiation, to get the information.


    ¡°Howie. You¡¯re a genius! I need you to build me an experimental ultrasound scanner that can scan a person through their clothes from ten feet away and provide a map of their body. I¡¯ll also need software that can provide a 2D and 3D map of a person¡¯s body with overlays for the skeletal structure, organs, and muscle groups along with a way to input information or structures using precise measurement tools.¡±


    A long pause from Howie. ¡°I don¡¯t think that type of scanner exists. The software does and I can get you that no problem.¡±


    ¡°Just do the best you can on the scanner. I need it to look good though. I need to plug it in and have lights go on and some whirring powering up sounds for effect. For the software, I also need to be able to print the information in color and with measurements.¡±


    ¡°I can build or modify a scanner for you, Abby, but I can¡¯t invent things that don¡¯t exist. Are you sure you want to do this?¡± Howie sounded very skeptical about the whole thing.


    ¡°No problem, Howie. The scanner just has to look hi-tech, but it¡¯s mostly for show. It¡¯s the software that I really need. Plan on the scanner being for a room that¡¯s approximately twelve feet wide by eighteen feet long. I¡¯m thinking that of a system that puts an ultrasonic scanner on each of the four walls would look very impressive.¡±


    ¡°If the scanner is more for show, then what¡¯s the point of it all? What¡¯s the point of the software if there¡¯s no input from a scanner?¡±


    ¡°What happened to no questions asked? Will you build it for me? Please?¡±


    ¡°Fine! I¡¯ll call you tomorrow with a timeline for when it¡¯ll be ready and a price.¡±


    With that pronouncement I was holding a phone with no one on the other end of the line. I wasn¡¯t upset at all this time. Howie had led me to a solution to my problem. Now all I had to do was wait for it to be built and figure out a way to get Sister Clara not to ask too many questions about it.

 Chapter 53: Sister Clara

    ¡°Clara, do you ever take confessions?¡± It was nearing the end of January and Howie was almost ready with the scanner.


    ¡°No Abby, I could listen to your confession, but I can¡¯t offer absolution. You¡¯d need a priest for that. Strictly speaking, if you told me your confession, what you tell me wouldn¡¯t have the same legal protection that you¡¯d get from confessing to a priest. Do you have something you¡¯d like to confess, Abby?¡±


    I killed five scumbags when I was freeing women and children from slavery and I don¡¯t feel bad about it at all. No. Saying that out loud wouldn¡¯t go over very well with Sister Clara. Besides, I wasn¡¯t angling for a confession.


    ¡°No. I¡¯m not looking to confess anything to you, but I need to talk to you about something in strict confidence. Since the confidentiality rules don¡¯t apply, then I¡¯d like your permission to lie to you instead.¡±


    Sister Clara gave me a long penetrating look. ¡°I can¡¯t say that I¡¯ve ever been asked that before. You¡¯ve certain got my curiosity piqued. I¡¯d have to know why you wanted to lie to me.¡±


    ¡°I don¡¯t want to lie to you, Clara. It¡¯s just that telling you the truth isn¡¯t an option. For now, I have to keep certain things secret, yet I¡¯d like to have your cooperation for a project that I¡¯m working on. To get your cooperation, I¡¯ve made up a story that will make sense to you at first glance, but will totally fall apart if you ask too many questions. Which you will. However, I believe that this project will help people, especially those that come to your clinic, and I¡¯m hoping that you¡¯ll allow me to lie to you so that we can go ahead with the project. I¡¯m hoping that by allowing me to lie to you, you won¡¯t ask those penetrating questions and just accept the project at face value.¡±


    ¡°Wow. There¡¯s quite a lot of convoluted reasoning going on there and yet I think I understand what you¡¯re getting at. Can I hear the lie before I decide?¡±


    ¡°I suppose so. Only I won¡¯t be able to answer any questions about the lie. Ok?¡±


    ¡°Ok. Let me have it.¡±


    I got up and left the room, only to return a second later, with an hyper-cheerful expression on my face. ¡°Clara! I¡¯m so glad I caught you. I have some great news. I have a friend who works at Galt University in Biological Imaging and he¡¯s come up with a new way to use ultrasound to scan people. He¡¯s created a proto-type and he¡¯s been working hard on its development. He thinks his new technology can end up replacing x-rays and MRIs. It uses sound waves so it¡¯s completely safe to use on people. They use ultrasounds on pregnant women and their babies all the time. There¡¯s no radiation whatsoever. In fact, the process is so safe that the technician will be in the room with the patient, often standing right beside the patient. Anyways, I told him about working at your clinic and he wants me to ask you if he could use your clinic as a beta site for testing out the machine. Right now, his algorithm can identify cancers and a few other illnesses, but he needs more data in order to learn to identify other ailments. By scanning the people and later attaching a diagnosis to the scan, no names required, he¡¯s hoping to be able to identify other disorders. As the device is experimental, anything found in the scan would need to be verified with traditional imaging at the hospital. If you¡¯ll agree to be a testing center, he¡¯ll have the unit installed and it won¡¯t cost you anything to get your patients scanned. The only downside to the whole project is that my friend is very paranoid about someone stealing his invention so he¡¯s insisting that I be the only one to run the machine. He¡¯s already trained me in its use and I can run the machine either before or after school or on Saturday mornings, if you want.¡±


    Clara was silent for a long moment and was about to say something, but then stopped herself. She visibly calmed herself and said, ¡°That¡¯s a very interesting story. I have about a thousand questions and I¡¯m not allowed to ask any. However, I won¡¯t even consider approving the use of the equipment if the part about the imaging being safe was a lie.¡±


    ¡°Nice! You just asked a question without asking a question. This one I will answer. The part about the scanning being completely safe is true.¡±


    ¡°In that case, I¡¯ll approve the project with a few provisions. First, I will test the machine¡¯s accuracy with several patients that are known to have cancer and compare the results to their actual scans. Second, the experimental nature of the imaging device must be explained to any patient that it is used on and they must sign a waiver if they are to be scanned. Third, I¡¯ll need to check with the insurance company if we¡¯re allowed to do this. It may be that they won¡¯t allow the technology on the premises, in which case we¡¯ll have to see about putting it just outside the clinic and then you¡¯ll have to check with your insurance company if you can have it on your premises. Finally, I¡¯ll need to see if there are any legal or regulatory issues with using the machine.¡±


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    Yes! ¡°Agreed. I can assure you though that since the machine itself is just a glorified ultrasound machine, you shouldn¡¯t have any problems with insurance or any regulatory agency. The real breakthrough is in the software that reads the images.¡±


    It took another three weeks from that conversation to get the machine installed. The paperwork involved seemed endless. The guy that Howie found to build the machine for me was not happy with having to find creative ways to satisfy all the bureaucrats and I gave him a sizeable bonus for his trouble.


    The ultrasound machine was installed in the last room of the clinic. It consisted of a boxy structure that was placed in one of the corners and it had four thick wires attached to it that terminated in panels that were placed in the center of each wall. The three-by-three foot panels were covered in acoustical tile, except at the center where there was a cut-out for a red piece of glass that would light up when the scanning was activated. It looked really cool and super-techy. Just what the fake doctor ordered!


    For her initial testing of the device, Sister Clara had personally called in eight patients to participate. All of them had cancer. In order to make sure that I couldn¡¯t bias any of the results, she didn¡¯t let me see their files. I suggested that we also pick eight patients who didn¡¯t have cancer as a control group and Sister Clara agreed. I¡¯m not sure what we were controlling for in this case, but I wanted to get that retired cop, Nathan, in for a scan and using the term ¡®control group¡¯ sounded sufficiently science based to get away without further questioning. All science needs a control group or it¡¯s not real science. Everyone knows that.


    The extra three weeks of paperwork did have one positive note. I had a lot of time to practice with the body scanning software and it got to the point where it would only take me a minute to input the data in a way that would seem like the software was doing all the work. Basically, I cheated. I didn¡¯t wait until the patient was in the room to start the work. I¡¯d simply fill in the data while they filled in the forms and signing the waiver. If I needed more time, I¡¯d just spend a minute ¡®calibrating¡¯ the machine. Doing the work beforehand allowed me to show the patient, and Sister Clara, the image immediately after I turned off the scanning unit.


    Compared to other imaging technologies, this one provided an image that was easy for anyone to understand. The main reason for that is that the image simply showed the shape of the cancer inside a generic male or female body. The shape could be seen in 2D or 3D and had very specific measurements listed at the bottom of the image. If the cancer surrounded a blood vessel, then the picture would show that. If the cancer was embedded in the brain, then the image showed that. You didn¡¯t have to try to interpret shadowy things inside the body to understand these images.


    The ability to print out the images right after I turned off the scanning and hand the image to Clara for review made the system seem almost magical. It took less than half an hour to run through all sixteen patients and Clara and I sat down to review them. Of the eight cancer patients, seven had scans that matched their medical files. The eighth patient scan showed that the cancer had metastasized from her breast and was now in her liver. The liver cancer was still very small and catching it this early was very lucky. It also meant that the current treatment wasn¡¯t working and the doctors needed to get more aggressive with her treatment. I suspected that once the findings of the experimental scanning were corroborated by the hospital, the patient would be quickly scheduled for surgery.


    Although the findings were unfortunate for that eighth patient, they were not unexpected. Cancer often metastasizes. However, Clara was very surprised at Nathan¡¯s results. With no symptoms and no family history of lung cancer, it was completely unexpected and she was very careful to tell him that the scan was still experimental and that he should verify the information by getting a scan of his lungs done at the hospital. Nathan left the clinic in stunned disbelief, but he assured Clara that he would get another scan immediately.


    I let out a sigh of relief. It had worked. For the past year I¡¯d always had this worry at the back of my mind of what I¡¯d do if I scanned someone and found out they had cancer or something else that was life threatening. I didn¡¯t want to reveal my abilities to the world, yet I couldn¡¯t live with myself if I let someone die in order to keep my secret. With this ¡®experimental imaging¡¯ I could pass of my extraordinary ability as another modern-day technological miracle and no one would be the wiser.


    At least that¡¯s what I thought at the time.

 Chapter 54: Spring Break

    Apparently, Nathan went straight to the hospital to get a new scan and Sister Clara received a very rude call from one Dr. Sinclair expressing how unprofessional it was to offer diagnoses using untested equipment and that Sister Clara had scared a patient half to death based on ¡®quack science¡¯. He was livid and threatened to report her conduct to the appropriate medical body and get her license revoked. She asked him if he had done a new scan and he refused to allow it. It was a waste of the hospital¡¯s limited resources.


    As Sister Clara worked to calm her nerves from the Dr. Sinclair¡¯s abuse, I called Pierce and explained the situation. Pierce was very aware of Dr. Sinclair and his ego and found another doctor to order the imaging to be done. I told Pierce that if Dr. Sinclair raised the issue of limited resources again, then I¡¯d be happy to pay for the scan myself.


    A tense hour later, Pierce called to tell us that their scan had confirmed the small lump of lung cancer and that Nathan had been admitted to the hospital. Surgery was being scheduled for the day after tomorrow. Catching the cancer so early meant that the chances of a full recovery were very high and Pierce thought that our scan had probably saved his life. He also filed a complaint with the hospital on Sister Clara¡¯s behalf about Dr. Sinclair. When Sister Clara tried to get him to revoke it, Pierce explained that Dr. Sinclair¡¯s abusive attitude had been going on for far too long and that without Sister Clara¡¯s complaint, he would continue to belittle and abuse other nurses. His closed mindedness could also have ended up killing Nathan. Reluctantly, Sister Clara allowed the complaint to stand.


    As usual, solving one problem opened the door to another. Kind of like no good deed goes unpunished. Nathan left the hospital a week later and stopped by to thank Sister Clara. The cancer had been completely removed and he only needed to occasionally verify that it wasn¡¯t coming back. He praised her for her foresight in trying out the new technology and he told her that he¡¯d given a full account of his experiences to the other guys on the force and to his union rep. They all loved the idea of a five minute scan that you couldn¡¯t even feel and the union rep was going to work with their insurance company to see if they could get everyone¡¯s scans paid for by the insurance.


    That led to a whole new round of testing with the insurance company and to negotiations for the price of each scan. Before I knew it, my first week of Spring Break was totally booked with scanning hundreds of police officers and Sister Clara¡¯s budget was secured for the next six months. It wasn¡¯t all bad. I did get to meet a lot of¡­uhm¡­very physically appealing men and it gave me time to regret that I hadn¡¯t required the scans to be shirtless. I also felt like I was doing something to give back to the people who put their lives on the line to protect the public.


    While the scans didn¡¯t turn up many full blown cancers, it did turn up a few in the early stages that were dealt with at the hospital. Thanks to ¡®my friend¡¯ having downloaded some software updates that could detect new diseases, I was able to diagnose over twenty officers with various stages of coronary artery disease, three with hepatitis, and one with a slightly inflamed appendix.


    I drew the line at giving up my second week of Spring Break. I needed some downtime and Rose had called a few weeks ago and explained in no uncertain terms that I had to come gemstone mining with them again this year. I tried to get out of it only to receive a call from Jake five minutes afterwards.


    ¡°Abby.¡± He said my name with a sigh and I knew why he was calling.


    ¡°Don¡¯t you Abby me, Jake. I¡¯m tired. I need a break. I worked through my summer last year and then through Christmas and now half of my Spring Break. When I get tired, I get cranky and angry. Don¡¯t make me angry, Jake. You won¡¯t like me when I¡¯m angry.¡±


    ¡°I don¡¯t know about that, Abby. I think that green would suit you just fine. Not sure if the boys would appreciate all those muscles though. It might intimidate them.¡±


    ¡°Nah. Strong women are all the rage these days.¡±


    ¡°So you identify as the Hulk. What are your pronouns? Me and Smash?¡±


    I couldn¡¯t help but laugh. I tried not to, but the idea of old school Jake asking me for my Hulk pronouns was just too funny.


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    ¡°Ah good. Now that you¡¯re not angry, how about you make me a hero with my granddaughter and come on out for some gemstone mining with me and the grandkids? I¡¯ll make sure to ride herd on them and keep them in line. It¡¯s your fault really. You did such an impressive job helping Rose and Connor with finding gems last year that now all of their cousins are clamoring to come this year.¡±


    ¡°Wait a second. How many kids are we talking about? I thought it was just Mark, Connor and Rose.¡±


    ¡°I have eleven grandkids, Abby.¡±


    ¡°No good deed goes unpunished¡±, I muttered.


    ¡°What was that, Abby?¡±


    ¡°I was just saying how you¡¯re going to owe me big time for this, Jake.¡±


    ¡°I already do, Abby. What¡¯s a little bit more?¡± He barked out a laugh and we made the arrangements for the last two days of Spring Break. I did manage to squeeze Eva, James and Bobby into the trip, so at least my misery would have some company. I just wasn¡¯t sure how hard the company would laugh at my misery.


    Uncle Magnum was the next one to try and take away my hard-earned rest. He¡¯d heard that I wasn¡¯t booked solid this coming week and figured that I¡¯d like to start morning training again with him and Sifu Zhang. Not a chance!


    After that call I wrapped my bed in a field and shifted us to L2. Finally, uninterruptible peace and quiet. I slept like the dead for twelve hours straight. Waking up completely relaxed for the first time in months I shifted myself, and the bed, back to reality and started my day of relaxation. That lasted five minutes as I realized that dad could have come in anytime during the night and noticed that both me and my bed were missing. Me I could explain. The bed, not so much. That led me to thinking about setting up a room for myself in L2 and packing it with all sorts of things that I might need if I were to stay there for a long period of time. Food and water were at the top of the list, along with a bed. Clothes, books, cooking stuff, a generator, a computer? This was starting to feel like work and I gave up the list. I¡¯d just get a bed for L2 and some snacks. I wondered if I could use my bitcoin for that.


    An hour later, I was on my way to Eva¡¯s house. I took my bike, since no one knew about my truck. I¡¯d been using the truck for almost a year now and I always made sure to keep my bike in the back so that I could lean it against a wall somewhere and no one would question how I got there.


    Eva finished her ¡®Boot Camp¡¯ just as I arrived and I waited for her to shower before telling her of our plans.


    ¡°So what¡¯s the plan for today?¡±, she asked as she dried her hair.


    ¡°Today, we set out to help the course of true love!¡± Melodramatic, but essentially accurate.


    ¡°You¡¯re in love? Does Bobby know?¡±


    ¡°No! Not me. Uncle Magnum and Maggie. They¡¯re the ones who are in love and we need to help them move things along.¡±


    ¡°What¡¯s the rush?¡±


    ¡°You¡¯ve met Uncle Magnum. How long do you think that he can keep up the whole dashing Kung Fu Master routine before Maggie gets tired of his references to the 80¡¯s? We need to help him seal the deal and get her to the alter before she gets tired of him.¡±


    ¡°You have a very skewed version of true love.¡±


    ¡°Fine! I found a shiny yellow diamond last summer and I think it would be perfect if Uncle Magnum were to give it to Maggie as an engagement ring. I think it would be fun to go to a few jewelry stores and check out settings. We also need to drop off the diamond at the gem cutter¡¯s place and suggest the type of cut we want.¡±


    ¡°Abby. Next time, start with that. I¡¯m all for spending the day looking at jewelry. Besides, it¡¯ll freak James out when he finds out about it.¡± An evil smile twister her face and she gave out a maniacal laugh. ¡°Mwahahaha!¡±


    I gave her the facepalm that she so richly deserved and we set off for our day of looking at shiny things. Under the cover story of ¡®helping my uncle¡¯ choose a setting for an engagement ring, which was kind of true, Eva and I wasted salespeople¡¯s time at three jewelry stores before we found a setting that we were happy with and I took pictures of it to ¡®show my uncle¡¯. The pictures were really for one of my artist friends who made stunning jewelry. She would take the picture and use it to create something more spectacular. The best part about it was that she accepted Bitcoin.


    With the setting contracted for and the diamond safely in the gem cutter¡¯s hands, Eva and I met up with James and Bobby at Big Julie¡¯s Pizzeria. As Eva had predicted, her mention of the jewelry store outings made James take a sudden interest in the contents of his backpack and he only returned to the conversation once we had safely moved on to another topic of conversation. I wondered what was causing his discomfort and I made a mental note to ask him about it.


    Just before the pizza arrived, I remembered to invite them all on the gemstone mining trip and the conversation quickly turned to last year¡¯s trip and Eva showed off her necklace with the peridot pendant on it. She explained to Bobby how she found the peridot, with a little help from my field scan, during our gemstone mining trip last year. With the visible fruits of last year¡¯s labor in front of them and the knowledge that I¡¯d set up my foundation using the funds from selling off the gemstones that I¡¯d found last year, everyone jumped at the chance to try their luck. When I mentioned that we¡¯d be spending two days in the company of Jake¡¯s eleven grandchildren, most of whom were under the fourteen years old, some of their enthusiasm died.

 Chapter 55: Mining

    ¡°Jake, where are their parents?¡± I was in Jake¡¯s kitchen overlooking his backyard where ten kids were running around, playing games or talking too loudly.


    ¡°I don¡¯t let them come on these trips anymore. I tried it once and never again. Too many rules. They end up micromanaging all the fun out of it. ¡®Don¡¯t go there, it¡¯s too dirty.¡¯ ¡®Why are you digging there, we tried that already.¡¯ They won¡¯t let kids be kids and they end up crippling their interest in mining. Everything they find has to be shared with their brothers or sisters, regardless of how much effort they put in to finding it. I¡¯m looking for the next generation to run my mining company. I¡¯m not looking for someone to run a commune and make sure that everyone¡¯s feelings are taken into consideration.¡±


    ¡°Don¡¯t hold back on me, Jake. Tell me what you really think.¡±


    ¡°Yeah, yeah, laugh all you want now. Someday you¡¯ll want to hand-off your life¡¯s work to your grandchildren and find that the children you raised are messing everything up and you¡¯ll wonder where you went wrong. Not having their parents around let¡¯s the kids be themselves and not simply a reflection of the expectations of their parents. With some of them, I can almost see them relax as their parents drive away.¡±


    ¡°With their parents away, how do you keep them in line?¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s the easy part. If they cause too much trouble, they¡¯re off the list for next year. No appeal possible. I¡¯ve done it twice already. I don¡¯t have a lot of rules, but they learn not to break the few that I do have.¡±


    ¡°That makes sense. You got any rules you need me and my friends to follow?¡±


    ¡°No, Abby, I¡¯m sure you¡¯ll behave. You should know though that at my request Rose and Connor didn¡¯t tell their cousins about how you helped them find gemstones last year. That means no one will be hounding you to find anything for them and you¡¯re free to help or not help as you see fit. That goes for Rosie and Connor as well. I¡¯ve talked to them about it already.¡±


    ¡°Thanks Jake. I appreciate that. I¡¯ll keep an eye out and see how things go. Maybe I¡¯ll see a chance to ignite a love of mining in one of your grandkids besides Mark. He¡¯s going to need help to run all those new mines that we¡¯ll be opening up over the next few years.¡±


    The next morning we were all arrayed in front of Steven and Susan Manning wearing rain boots and holding our shovels and picks. Steven and Susan greeted me like a long-lost daughter. Apparently, their business had really taken off after I found the rubies last year and they were hoping that lightening would strike twice and I¡¯d find another once-in-a-lifetime gemstone. I had no intention of doing that as I didn¡¯t want to make the headlines again, but there was no sense in killing off their hope. I just smiled and gave them my best, ¡°I¡¯ll do what I can¡±, expression.


    With the huge influx of business they had since last year, Steven had opened up several new areas to mine from and he let us choose which one we¡¯d like. They were all close to each other and we could look them over before choosing. This time the walk to the site was even longer and I was glad that we¡¯d packed lunches and wouldn¡¯t have to walk back mid day.


    It was a matter of a few minutes for us to survey the three sites and I scanned each of them quickly. While everyone was discussing their preferred site, I caught Jake¡¯s attention and held up three fingers. Even though the consensus had leaning towards the first site, Jake somehow managed to get everyone over to the third site without any trouble.


    Jake¡¯s words from the previous night stuck in my mind and instead of digging right in I watched the children. I noted which ones were more interested in their conversation and which ones sifted carefully, examining interesting rocks to see if they were really gemstones in disguise. Some of them would lose interest quickly when they didn¡¯t find anything and they¡¯d keep wandering off and trying different spots to dig in. In an hour of on and off watching, I¡¯d narrowed Jake¡¯s candidates for future heads of McKenzie Resources to two children; twelve-year-old Rose and ten-year-old boy named Zach. This was by no means definitive. It just seemed to me that they had the right temperament for this type of work.


    Like with anything else though, temperament was only one small piece of the whole. Without proper focus, that temperament could lead the kids in variety of different directions. You needed to stoke the fire and get it to the correct temperature, depending on what you wanted to create in your forge. Jake had the right idea in bringing his grandchildren here to experience mining firsthand, but I thought he could use a little help in actively encouraging their interest.


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    Rose and Zach were sitting about five feet apart, each panning in the creek bed, and I sat down between them. Rose looked up at me hopefully. She wanted some of my ¡®special¡¯ help. Instead, I got her to show me what she¡¯d found so far and I helped her identify the bits of beryl and quartz that she¡¯d found. Soon, Zach had moved closer to us and I identified his stones, telling them about the properties of each, just as Mark had taught me at the geology center. As they continued to pan, I told them about all the ways in which the minerals and stones found the ground were used in everyday life; how metals are used to make everything from their iPhones to the shovels that they were using to scoop up more minerals and how stones like granite, slate and limestone were used in the construction of homes. I didn¡¯t monologue for long. Just a minute or two. If what I said interested them, they¡¯d ask questions.


    Zach was the first to break the silence and given his dinosaur t-shirt, I should have expected it.


    ¡°Do you think that we¡¯ll find any fossils here?¡± Clearly, Zach viewed digging for gemstones and mining as a secondary interest.


    ¡°There always a chance. You¡¯ll find most of the fossils in North Carolina in the eastern part of the state in what¡¯s called the coastal plains. Aurora has the most famous fossils around there, huge shark teeth.¡± Zach eyes glowed with interest as I recited from the mental copy of a geology book that I¡¯d scan read a few months ago.


    ¡°If you¡¯re really interested in fossils, you should ask Grandpa Jake to take you out to see the T-Rex he¡¯s digging up.¡±


    Zach sat up straight and focused on me like a bird dog sensing its prey. ¡°Grandpa Jake found a T-Rex?¡±


    ¡°Yup. His company is going to open a mine in Arizona and they found a T-Rex fossil on the property. It¡¯s a complete skeleton. I think Jake has one of the local universities supervising the dig site.¡±


    Zack was off like a shot, making a beeline for Jake and leaving his shovel and pan in the creek bed. I grabbed them before they slowly drifted away and aimlessly continued his work.


    ¡°You found the fossil, didn¡¯t you, Abby?¡± Rose asked with a smirk on her face.


    ¡°I may have pointed Jake in the right direction.¡±


    ¡°Uh huh. I know that you went on that trip with Mark last summer.¡±


    Rose grew quiet after that and we spent the next few minutes sifting before she caught me off guard with a mining question.


    ¡°Does Grandpa Jake¡¯s company hurt the environment?¡±


    ¡°Why are you asking, Rose?¡±


    ¡°I¡¯ve heard my mom talking about cleanup regulations and environmental assessments for mining permits.¡±


    ¡°Well, mining as an industry can be very harmful to the environment. It can scar the landscape and poison nearby groundwater. It¡¯s even dangerous for the miners themselves. The key thing to remember though is that its necessary. Our civilization needs the metals and minerals that mines produce. People need homes and tools and transportation and medical equipment. There¡¯s just no way around it. However, we can minimize the negative effects of mining. When a mine is closed, the mining company can re-landscape the area and plant trees. Polluted water that¡¯s pumped out of mines is stored in tailing ponds and those ponds can be build better so that none of the water can leach into the ground and pollute rivers and streams. There are a lot of laws and regulations that mining companies have to follow to keep the harm down to a minimum and your mother makes sure that McKenzie Resources follows them and even exceeds them at times. You should talk to her about it. You might also want to talk with Mark about his ideas.¡±


    ¡°Mark? Really? I didn¡¯t think he noticed the environment. He¡¯s always going on about rocks and geology stuff.¡±


    ¡°Yes, he does love his rocks, but there¡¯s more to him than that. He¡¯s knows that he¡¯s going to be following in Jakes¡¯ footsteps and he has some ideas of his own. I think he¡¯ll end up surprising Jake with some of them. I think he wants to create a division inside McKenzie Resources that will try to find ways to remediate or clean up those tailing ponds that I mentioned. There are thousands of them all over this country, most of them abandoned by mining companies that either went bust or just left them there for someone else to deal with.¡±


    ¡°He told you that he wants to do this?¡±


    ¡°Not directly, no, but I can put clues together. On our trip he talked a lot about the tailing pond problem and how he was going to try to avoid them in the future. He always paid special attention to the proposed location and construction of the pond. He mentioned that mine site clean up is a whole industry onto itself and that we needed to find new ways to deal with tailings. He¡¯s also been taking several chemistry courses. You take all that and mix it with the Jake telling me that Mark was keeping a secret from him and there you go. I could be wrong, though. You should ask Mark about it. In front of Jake.¡±


    ¡°Oh, I will. You can bet on it.¡± Rose gave me conspiratorial look and reached over to scoop up more dirt and rocks from the creek. I lightly guided her hand over a foot to the left and she raised her eyebrows questioningly at me.


    ¡°Three or four scoops down.¡± I told her and she took to it with a will, placing each scoopful on the sifter.


    ¡°It¡¯s beautiful! What is it?¡±, she exclaimed as she drew the orange-pink rock from the sifter two minutes later.


    ¡°Imperial topaz. This color isn¡¯t common and given its size it should be worth a lot.¡±


    ¡°Like your rubies?¡±


    ¡°No. Not nearly that much. Thousands though.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m going to go show Grandpa!¡± and she ran off. I secured her equipment next to Zach¡¯s and went off in search of Bobby, James, and Eva. I wondered how long it would take the Rose-bomb that I¡¯d set to explode all over Mark and his secret plans. I sure hoped that I was there to see it.

 Chapter 56: Bad News, Good News

    The gemstone mining trip was a huge hit and over the course of the day, I helped almost everyone find a special gemstone. One of the grandkids found a nice stone all by himself and another would need to learn some manners before I¡¯d even think about helping him. That one ended up sulking all the way home and everyone ignored him.


    With the exception of Rose, Eva, and Mark, I managed to help everyone without making them aware that they were being helped. For some of them I merely suggested that they dig in an area that seemed to have more stones and then marked off the spot for them. For others, I had to slip the gemstone into their sifter while they were distracted.


    My own finds were more modest than last year. I picked up several gemstones that would satisfy Howie¡¯s unregistered auction house and help me bolster my Bitcoin account. Even if Gerry didn¡¯t need me to invest further in his printing business, I was considering the idea of asking Howie to find other off-the-grid entrepreneurs that I could invest in. It still didn¡¯t feel real that spending a very pleasant day out with friends digging for rocks could result in making other people¡¯s dreams come true. It literally cost me nothing to invest in Gerry¡¯s company. I just handed over a rock that I¡¯d found. So bizarre.


    School started the day after our return and I was back to being bored in class. Just a few more months and I¡¯d be free. Being able to see the light at the end of the tunnel was the only thing that made classes tolerable. I was definitely going to travel. Travel for fun, to get more company information for my investment, to steal client information from banks, to personally go after some of the human trafficking customers that we were finding. Europe was also on my list. Maybe I¡¯d take Alexander up on his offer to stay at his place for a bit.


    Daydreaming carried me through to the end of the day and soon I was off for the clinic. We still had loads of police officers to scan and word was spreading. Sister Clara was taking calls from the firepersons union and the paramedics union. Their insurance company, which handled the police officers as well, was insisting that they enroll their members in the scanning program, stating that the savings in lost manhours and decreased hospitalizations were significant, not to mention the lives saved.


    The upshot of all of this is that I was booked for two hours every day after school for the next few weeks. That meant that I¡¯d be getting a lot of practice scanning people. It also meant that I was at Hannah¡¯s Home when Kevin arrived with some disturbing news.


    With fifteen minutes left in my shift, Shauna came over to let me know about Kevin¡¯s unexpected arrival. I finished up the last few scans and walked over to the rectory where Kevin was waiting, along with Shauna, Jenny and Gabriel. Kevin barely made it through the pleasantries before dropping his news on us.


    ¡°We have a mole. Someone is tipping off the clients before we can get in and arrest them.¡±


    ¡°Shit!¡± Gabriel¡¯s outburst was mild compared to Shauna¡¯s and Jenny¡¯s reaction.


    ¡°Two weeks ago, we were raiding the home of a lawyer in Tennessee. We had a man watching the house and just before we got there with our warrant, our guy sees the lawyer pull out of his garage and race away. We found the car abandoned several miles away from his house in a parking lot. We think he was picked up by someone at that point. Our search of his house found two women locked up in the basement. There¡¯s a warrant out for his arrest, if he¡¯s ever found again.¡±


    ¡°Yesterday, the same thing happened. Only this time the guy had more warning. About a half hour. He managed to pack up some of his things, including his computer, and empty his wall safe. He also killed the fourteen-year-old girl that was chained up in his basement.¡±


    None of us said anything. I felt like I¡¯d been kicked in the head. That girl was minutes away from being rescued. Minutes away from getting a second chance at life. One phone call had ended her life. Whoever the mole in the FBI was, he or she was equally responsible for her death and I wanted the mole to pay.


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    Kevin continued into the growing silence. ¡°We have three clients left to go after from the list that you¡¯ve given us. We¡¯re going to set a trap for the mole. Outwardly, we¡¯ll continue as we have before. Internally, my original team of three agents will conduct the raids a day early, without informing anyone, even our boss. The trickiest part will be obtaining the warrants without tipping anyone off. I¡¯ve spoken to a judge about it and it can be done. So, unless someone is following my team, or if my team or the judge are compromised, then we should be able to raid the client and see who calls to warn him at the last minute.¡±


    ¡°I hope you catch the mole quickly, because until you do, I can¡¯t give you any more client names.¡± I held Kevin¡¯s gaze as I said this and he nodded his understanding.


    ¡°Abby, we were about to send over our latest list of clients. There are women and children that can be saved. You heard Kevin. He¡¯s putting in new procedures. We can¡¯t just sit on the information.¡±


    ¡°Jenny, Roger had me sit on the information for over five months, until Shauna was able to build up this team. The fact is that human trafficking is very profitable, and great wealth attracts people with power. Roger was worried that if the police or the FBI had the files, then these powerful people would apply pressure to make the files disappear or to at least make certain names in those files disappear. Roger warned me that something like this could happen. If Kevin¡¯s trap works, then we can continue to send him information until someone else starts to interfere. My guess is that Kevin will catch the mole only to have one of his boss¡¯s bosses get upset that they weren¡¯t kept current and he¡¯ll be ordered to follow normal procedures, at which point another mole will appear and another girl will die. If that happens, we will stop working with the FBI in a proactive way.¡±


    ¡°What does that mean?¡±, Kevin asked.


    ¡°Simply that instead of giving you information to act on, Roger will go after the clients himself and call you or the police once he¡¯s secured the premises, if he feels like it.¡±


    ¡°Abby, that can¡¯t happen. Each client gets us one step closer to finding the network that¡¯s suppling the slaves. We¡¯re getting close. If Roger goes in there and starts killing the clients or if he ruins the trail we¡¯re following, we¡¯ll end up with nothing and the traffickers will keep on selling slaves. Give us a chance, Abby.¡±


    ¡°I am. Find your mole and make sure that someone higher up doesn¡¯t interfere and we¡¯ll share all of the client information that we discover.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯ll find the mole and I¡¯ll do what I can about my bosses. You should be aware though that I¡¯ve heard rumblings in some of the meetings where I make my reports. There are people at the FBI who don¡¯t like the fact that we have to get all this information from an undisclosed source. They want us to tell them who our source is and take the information. This isn¡¯t a threat. I¡¯m just telling you things I¡¯ve heard.¡±


    ¡°Thanks, Kevin. I appreciate your¡­information. I can assure you that if they find out who we are and come after our information, then Roger would go and get them back. From experience, once Roger is in your offices, he¡¯ll copy everything on your servers and he might decide that you don¡¯t need your copy anymore. This isn¡¯t a threat. I¡¯m just telling you what will happen.¡±


    There really wasn¡¯t much to say after that and Kevin left. He didn¡¯t look very happy. That¡¯s ok, because I wasn¡¯t either. A fourteen-year-old girl was dead.


    ¡°Would Roger really do that?¡±, Jenny ask.


    ¡°Yes, he would and more. He¡¯s going to be pissed when I give him the news about the girl.¡±


    ¡°Well, I have news that might cheer him up.¡± Gabriel wasn¡¯t smiling, rather he looked determined. ¡°Jenny and I do have a list of another eight clients ready, but we think that we also found another link in the supply chain. Another Serpentine!¡±


    This was news to Shauna and she practically pounced on Gabriel. ¡°Why didn¡¯t you tell me before? Who, what, where? Spill it Gabriel.¡±


    ¡°Jenny and I just figured it out from the data before Kevin showed up. We haven¡¯t even confirmed it yet. Remember Abby told us to keep an eye out for any company that had the initials MTC or PDC? Well, using the banking information that Roger got for us from Washington, we found a payment, a very large payment, from a Pearl Dragon Corporation. PDC. We think that it¡¯s one of their suppliers. We looked them up and found out that they¡¯re a freight forwarding company and that their logo has the same styling as Serpentine¡¯s logo. Almost like the same person designed them both.¡± Kevin¡¯s excitement was contagious and I felt elation coursing through me.


    ¡°One last thing, Abby. Pearl Dragon Corporation¡¯s headquarters are located in a warehouse in Raleigh, about three miles from where you were found on the day that you were kidnapped.¡±

 Chapter 57: Raleigh

    The next three days were absolute agony. After thirteen years, there was finally a clue to finding my mother and I desperately wanted to rush off and chase it down. The only thing stopping me was the cold logic that after all this time, she wouldn¡¯t actually still be in the warehouse and that I¡¯d need as much time as I could get to go through everything in that warehouse. This was my best chance to find out what happened to her and I wasn¡¯t going to rush it. For that, I needed to wait until I could leave for awhile and not be missed. So, I sat through three more days of school and worked at the clinic and went to Kung Fu. Everything was normal, except that I was dying inside.


    Being in school felt like it had at the beginning of the year all over again, only much worse. This time, I could barely keep my anger in check and I kept having to stop myself from simply getting up in the middle of class and walking out. Eva noticed my change in attitude right away this time, having seen it before, and told me that I needed to take the weekend off again. She was right, only not in the way she intended. I would take the weekend off from being Abby and let Roger do some work.


    I told Sister Clara that my ¡®friend¡¯ needed to do another software update on the imaging system and that it would be offline for the weekend. This led to a half hour of rescheduling all the patients and it freed me from my only Saturday obligations. Raleigh was only an hour away by plane, but when you factored in the time going to the airport and from the airport, it made more sense to drive. Driving also meant that I wouldn¡¯t have to carry all my gear with me by duffel. Everything that I might need could be stuffed in the back of my truck. The exosuit, the ¡®Roger¡¯ outfit with the oversized hoodie and protective gear, the slightly used baseball bat, a few of the guns that I¡¯d found in the Serpentine offices, cameras and computer gear, money and food.


    On Friday night, dad and I had an early dinner followed by a few hours of working together out back in the forge. Since working on the Christmas pillow for dad, I¡¯d spent very little time blacksmithing. Finding a solution to my scanning problem had taken up all of my energy. I¡¯d almost forgotten how calming working at the forge could be. It forced you to put all other thoughts away as you concentrated on shaping the metal to match the image in your head. It was a welcome relief from this week¡¯s constant frustration and anticipation, and it left me feeling relaxed for the first time since I heard about the Pearl Dragon.


    Dad went to bed at ten o¡¯clock and I was on the road by ten fifteen. Once dad went to bed, he was usually out for the night and I hoped tonight was no exception. I¡¯d warned him that I¡¯d be getting up and heading out very early and that I¡¯d be gone for most of the day. I even remembered to shift my bike to L2, so that he wouldn¡¯t get suspicious if he saw it.


    With no traffic and no speed limit issues in L2, I managed to get into Raleigh a few minutes after midnight. Making my way to the Pearl Dragon warehouse took another fifteen minutes and all of a sudden I was parked in front of what looked like an abandoned building. It sat at the edge of Raleigh¡¯s industrial district and was surrounded by a chain link fence. Unlike my memories of the Serpentine warehouse, the warehouse fence wasn¡¯t cared for and had vines growing at various places. There were no cameras set back from the fence and there was no guard shack out front. My heart sank when I saw the broker sign out front proclaiming that the property was for sale.


    The google street view images hadn¡¯t shown the sign, but there could be a delay of six-months between the times that the google people would upload new images of an area. I sat in my car and swallowed my disappointment. My dreams of finding my mother were slowly disappearing as my one clue turned to ash. All the anticipation and planning had been for nothing and I slammed my palm against the steering wheel in anger and frustration.


    I don¡¯t know how long I stayed there. Eventually, I got out the car and walked through the greyed-out fence and front doors. I¡¯d scanned the building already and the emptiness was not a surprise. My powerful flashlight cut through the darkness and I walked the entire building searching for anything that would let me continue my search. I don¡¯t know what I expected to find; a plea for help scratched into the wall or maybe a note hidden under a loose floorboard? It was just an empty warehouse with some offices out front. Pearl Dragon Corporation had probably abandoned the place after the raid on Serpentine Logistics, fearing a similar raid on their premises and they¡¯d scoured the place of every trace of their slave trade.


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    That thought stopped me in my tracks. There was no evidence of the slave trade in the building. Not at all. No basement, no cells, no hidden areas at all. No elaborate security systems. With Serpentine, even the delivery truck had a hidden area and a place to keep the slaves in chains. This building had none of those things. That meant that it hadn¡¯t been used to keep slaves. Only why close it up if it wasn¡¯t connected to the slave trade? With no slaves around, what could a raid have found? Computer records? Blood and hair DNA? Wouldn¡¯t it have been easier to buy new computers and bleach the floor?


    There had to be something here. The initials PDC matched up perfectly with Len¡¯s journal. He dropped off dozens of victims here. Those victims weren¡¯t kept here though. This had to be a transfer point. This brought me back to the question of why close the place up. Preparing for a raid would take a few hours of work and then you could just go on with your legitimate business until the you were raided or you were sure that no raid was coming. Why close the place down? What were they trying to hide or to keep anyone from finding?


    I scanned the building again and came up with nothing, so I moved my scan outwards into the truck loading area and parking lot. Jackpot! At the low point of the loading area there was a drain that took the rainwater away to the city storm drains. However, instead of having the water run through the drainage sewer cover directly into the water pipe, the water first fell into a four-foot-deep pit with an open water pipe on the side for the water to flow into. I was no drainage expert and couldn¡¯t tell if this drainage system was common or not, but the sealed off shaft running under the pit definitely didn¡¯t seem normal.


    The shaft, which had ladder rungs all the way down its twenty-foot drop, was completely filled in with concrete. At the base of the shaft there used to be a tunnel that ran to the edge of the property. That tunnel was also filled in with concrete. Someone really didn¡¯t want the tunnel to be used anymore. It seemed that when Serpentine was exposed, the owners of Pearl Dragon had decided that the risk of a raid on their warehouse and the potential for the discovery of the tunnel were too big to allow operations to continue. By closing down the company and blocking the tunnel, they were presenting the police or the FBI with a dead end.


    And they would have gotten away with it too, if it weren¡¯t for my meddling field and it¡¯s ability to scan deep underground and see where the tunnel led.


    At the end of the warehouse parking lot the tunnel continued under the parking lot of the neighboring property. From there the tunnel turned to the left and crossed under the street for another two city blocks before linking up with the underground parking lot of an eight-story office building. I scanned the building and my heart grew cold as I saw the rows of prison cells on the seventh floor. Offices and a connecting corridor ringed the perimeter of the seventh floor while the entire center of the floor was dedicated to the cells. Most of the cells were full of men, women and children of all ages. Sometimes up to six prisoners would be squished into a cell that was only big enough to fit four comfortably.


    My field counted seventy-two prisoners and most of them were in terrible shape. Nothing immediately life threatening, just malnourished and dehydrated. I found a secluded area and shifted back to reality to call Shauna. I changed the voice setting to my Roger voice and waited for her to pick up. It was almost one in the morning, but she picked up on the second ring and sounded alert.


    ¡°Shauna. It¡¯s Roger. I¡¯m in Raleigh following up on a lead that Abby sent me. There are seventy-two prisoners here that are going to need the foundation¡¯s help come morning. You and your team should make your way down here.¡±


    ¡°Are you at the Pearl Dragon warehouse?¡±


    ¡°No. That warehouse is closed down, but I found a clue there that led me to these prisoners. Call your FBI contact and tell him that he should join you for the drive. Don¡¯t tell him where you¡¯re going, not even the name of the city. What he doesn¡¯t know, he can¡¯t pass on to the wrong person.¡±


    ¡°Are you sure I should bring him?¡±


    ¡°You¡¯ll need him to vouch for you with the police and get access to the prisoners once they¡¯re freed. I¡¯ll call you with more detail once I¡¯ve finished securing the premises.¡± I took a page out of Howie¡¯s book and hung up without saying goodbye.

 Chapter 58: Raleigh 2

    The building directory listed the top three floors as belonging to a company called The Basilisk Group. Somebody was having too much fun mining the serpent family for company names. I walked up the stairs to the sixth floor and started poking around the empty offices. The Basilisk Group was a marketing firm and everything on the floor looked legitimate. I was sure that the FBI had the time and resources to sort out if anyone on this floor was involved in what was going on in the floor above and decided to leave that job for them. I was going to focus on the upper floors.


    There was a guard in the stairway leading to the seventh floor. He was pacing around, bored with his duty and trying to remain alert. I watched him for a few minutes and he soon left the stairway and returned to making rounds of the seventh floor. I followed him as he made his rounds. He covered half the perimeter and met up with another guard, who covered the other half. Their meeting point was a guard station that was manned by a third guard who was seated at a desk, watching the prisoners on camera.


    ¡°Don¡¯t get lax, boys. The head honcho is still upstairs. Joe said his car is still in the lot.¡± This was from the guard at the desk. My scans had picked up five people in the building, besides the prisoners. Four guards were now accounted for and the fifth person was the president of the company.


    ¡°Why the hell is Edward still here at one in the morning? If I were the president of the company, you wouldn¡¯t see me working on a Saturday night.¡±, my guard said.


    ¡°That¡¯s why you¡¯ll never be more than a security guard. Getting to the top requires long hours and hard work. You work just enough to pay for your video games. You¡¯re not going to get anywhere in life playing video games.¡± Desk guard answered.


    My guard grumbled and went back to his rounds. I circled around the guard station and watched the cameras carefully. The view wasn¡¯t great for seeing faces and I really wanted to see their faces. I needed to be sure that my mother wasn¡¯t one of the prisoners. There was almost no chance that she would be in this transit station. The prisoners here had no beds or clothing other than what they were wearing. This was not a long-term facility. Mom may have been here for a short time thirteen years ago, but not now. However, almost no chance wasn¡¯t the same thing as no chance. I had to be sure.


    The door leading to the cells was made of steel and had no window in it. It wasn¡¯t necessary since there were cameras watching both sides of the door. Those cameras were set high enough so that no one could reach up and obscure them. I shifted in and out of R2 to get past the door and walked the floor, going from cage to cage, examining each sleeping face to confirm what I already knew. None of them was mom. They were someone¡¯s mom though, and sisters, brothers, wives, husbands, and children and even though they weren¡¯t mine, they would be freed today. Right after I made sure that the people running this vile place couldn¡¯t take anyone else prisoner ever again.


    With that thought, I made my way to the top floor and started looking for Edward, the warden of this prison. In the movie Pretty Women, Edward is the good guy who sees past Vivian¡¯s sex worker exterior to her inner beauty and falls in love. Here, Edward was a sleeze that sold people into slavery.


    I found said sleeze in the corner office with an expansive view over the city. Downtown, with its skyscrapers was miles away. This building was one of the tallest in the area, affording it an unobstructed view from both sides of the office. It wasn¡¯t one of those new fancy offices, with floor to ceiling windows, but it was still managed to scream out the importance of the man who sat in the comfy chair behind the large oak desk.


    Despite it being past one in the morning, Edward was talking loudly into his phone when I walked in. I listened in as I went around his desk to set up my camera on the shelf behind him to record his password and everything that he did on his computer.


    ¡°Phil, you¡¯re not listening to me. I¡¯m almost done. Everything will be ready for the eight AM auction. We spent all day getting their pictures, measurements and information and I only have a few left to input in to the system. We¡¯re good. Relax. This is a bigger group than we¡¯re used to but the process is still the same. Tomorrow we¡¯ll be sitting around wondering what all the fuss was about.¡±


    Edward had been on the phone long enough that his screensaver had come on. There was a very good chance that he¡¯d have to type in his password once he was off the phone. My ears had perked up at the mention of the auction that was to take place in seven hours. I wondered if there would be a live portion to it and if so, would we be able to arrest all the bidders. My heart warmed at the thought of getting so many of the bastards at one go.


    ¡°Ok. We¡¯ll do it your way. No bells and whistles. Just the pertinent details. Less work for me. Anyways, I¡¯ve got five more minutes here and then I¡¯m going home for five hours of sleep before the main event. I¡¯ll log in one more time before bed to make sure everything got entered properly. Give me a wake up call at a quarter to seven, just in case I oversleep. Night, Phil.¡±


    He hung up and sighed before putting in his password and finishing up his work. I wrote down his password, 3Dw@rd82, and plugged in one of my external drives to copy his computer. Knowing that I had at least ten minutes, I left his office to find the office server. Usually, I¡¯d have the administrator password and that assured getting access to the data within the copied server. In this case though, there was no IT guru around to steal the password from and I¡¯d have to hope that Edwards¡¯ password would be enough to get in. Otherwise, Howie had sold me a few software programs that should be able to crack into the copied server in time.


    Leaving the server copying the files, I returned to Edward¡¯s office and watched him work. He was accessing a website called Agora, which according to the internet was Greek for marketplace or public square. He¡¯d scan in a picture of one of the prisoners and then enter in their physical characteristics, age, profession, and skills. If I hadn¡¯t seen the seventh floor, I¡¯d have assumed that this was some sort of job fair website.


    True to his word, Edward finished inputting the last prisoner into the system and closed his computer. I had just enough time to remember to pull out a sheet of tiny black stickers from my pocket, peel one off and place it over the cameras on his phone, which he¡¯d left beside him on the desk. In the low lighting of the room, the square was almost invisible. Taking his phone with him as he left the office, Edward took the elevator down to his car in the underground parking lot. I stayed with him the whole time in R1 and when he headed towards the lone car in the lot, a red Dodge Viper, my eyes bulged. I¡¯m not much of a car person, well not a car person at all, but this car was nice. A sports car had never been on my wish list and I realized that I might have to update my list.


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    Thank God it was a convertible and that the top was down, or I wouldn¡¯t have had a chance of getting into it without sending both the car and Edward into L2 for a few moments. As it was, I only had to stay in R1 and hop over the door and settle in. Moment later, Edward joined me in the car and he plugged in his phone and set it up on his dash. He frowned as the phone didn¡¯t recognize his features and he was forced to put in his password. I noted it and phased the sticker that I¡¯d placed over his camera into L2. The next time he tried his phone, the face recognition worked. He shrugged, shifted the car into gear and waved to the guard, Joe I guessed, as we left.


    It felt weird not to be wearing a seat belt, especially in a convertible. Thankfully, Edward drove sedately and didn¡¯t have to make good on my plans to shift us to L2 or L3 to avoid any collisions. I soon relaxed and had a chance to examine him without thoughts of all the things that I still needed to get done. He looked to be around thirty-eight years old, given his password, and was much younger looking that I¡¯d anticipated for a president of a company. No grey hair and few wrinkles. I had trouble reconciling this attractive man, with the pale blue eyes, and a mane of sandy brown hair, who¡¯s employees called by his first name, with the piece of shit slaver that he was. Why did someone who seemed to have it all need to abuse other people?


    The drive wasn¡¯t a long one and we were pulling up to and into his garage within ten minutes. I¡¯d expected a mansion and instead found myself in a modest two-story suburban house. While not large, it had more than enough room for a man living alone and as he got ready for bed, I snooped. First, I used my field scan to make sure that no one else was around. Next, I scanned the house for any interesting hidey-holes where Edward would keep valuables and important documents. Beside a gun locked in the upper right-hand drawer of his desk, a metal tube in the garage ductwork, and a wall safe installed in his office closet, the house was shockingly mundane.


    Wandering around for a few minutes, I began to wonder if the house was a rental. Besides his clothes, there was almost nothing in it of a personal nature. No framed photographs, no sports equipment, no pictures on the walls. To round out the picture, just inside of the garage was what I could only describe as a ¡®go-bag¡¯; an emergency bag packed ahead of time that contained everything vital if you needed to leave at a moment¡¯s notice. Survivalists and preppers usually had one of these bags packed with emergency supplies that would last them for at least seventy-two hours after an emergency such as an earthquake or a flood. Seventy-two hours was supposed to be the time that it took emergency services to get their act together and restore power and water and for the national guard to start deploying and ensure peace. Contrary to the traditional go-bag, packed full with a first aid kit, candles, water, matches, flashlights and batteries, this bag had a change of clothes, fifty thousand dollars in cash, a small velvet bag with an assortment of gemstones, some gold coins, a handgun with several boxes of ammunition, and a passport under a name that wasn¡¯t Edward. In the side pocket, I also found a list of addresses, a spare phone and a thumb drive. I wondered if my efforts at Serpentine had driven Edward to this level of paranoia or if he¡¯s always been this careful.


    Leaving the bag where it was, I returned to Edward¡¯s side as he finished getting ready for bed and headed to his office. He logged on to his laptop and I noted that he used the same password, only inverting the case of the letters so that the upper-case ones became lower-case and vise versa. He logged onto the Agora to review his work and then logged off, returning to his room and going to bed, exactly as he¡¯d told Phil. I got the feeling that Edward was very organized and precise in nature.


    Edward was asleep within five minutes. I wrapped him in a field to make sure that I¡¯d know the moment he stirred and followed through on my own set of plans. The phone was my first target as I took it from his bedside table and unlocked it using his passcode. I didn¡¯t bother looking through any of his contacts or messages. Instead, I plugged a thumb drive with a lightning cable connector into the phone and it proceeded to make a copy of the entire phone¡¯s contents. I¡¯d be able to download it to my phone later into a separate directory and examine the contents at my leisure. I¡¯d done this before with various phones and the process usually took up to twenty minutes if the phone was full. In this case, the copy was finished in less than two minutes. At least I wouldn¡¯t have to spend hours and hours going through everything on his phone.


    Moving to my next objective, I returned to Edward¡¯s office and opened his computer. I plugged in another external drive to copy the computer and then I logged on to Agora and started searching for my mom. My big worry was that they wouldn¡¯t have had this system back thirteen years ago and I wouldn¡¯t be able to track her down. That wasn¡¯t the case though. A search through the archive showed that Agora had records dating back over twenty years.


    There were no records for any variation of Hannah Smith. I even tried removing both ¡®h¡¯s and still found nothing. Taking the search in another direction, I tried by searching by date and then I tried searching by area. I searched by age, both when she was taken and now, and I tried looking by physical characteristics such as eye color and height. None of these search criteria brought up records of my mother. She either wasn¡¯t in the system or someone had messed up her intake forms so badly that she wasn¡¯t recognizable to any possible search. After twenty minutes of fruitless searching, I tried for a Hail Mary search and simply put in the criteria of female and over eighteen, and I started scrolling through the pictures, one at a time.


    All those people. The pictures went on and on. Woman after woman. It was hard for me to believe that this was just one human trafficking organization and that organizations like this existed all over the world. I was cycling through around forty pictures a minute and ten minutes flew by before I got a message from my field that Edward was up. I didn¡¯t know what woke him, but I unplugged the external drive, quickly closed the computer and shifted back to R1.


    I heard him before he came into the room.


    ¡°That can¡¯t be, Phil. I¡¯m home alone and I put the alarm on before going to bed. Hold on.¡± Edward came into the room and turned on the overhead light before continuing his one-sided conversation. ¡°I¡¯m looking at my computer right now. It¡¯s exactly where it¡¯s supposed to be and there¡¯s no one here.¡±


    Edward sat down at his desk and logged back on to Agora. ¡°Can you see me logged in now?¡±. Pause. ¡°I don¡¯t know what to tell you. I¡¯m alone. You know that I never bring anyone inside this house. I even do my own cleaning.¡± Pause. ¡°I have no idea how I could be logged on and sleeping at the same time. Maybe it¡¯s a mistake.¡± Pause. ¡°No Phil. You can¡¯t do that. We¡¯ve worked to hard for this.¡± Pause. ¡°What do you mean it¡¯s out of your hands. Call someone and tell them that it¡¯s all a mistake. Tell them to send the signal to deactivate the bomb. Jesus, Phil, the auction is in six hours. Do you know how much we¡¯ve spent gathering all that merchandise? Not to mention my company? If we had some proof that we¡¯ve been made then I¡¯m all for blowing it all up, but all we have is a false log on. At least reset the timer to give me more time to drive down and see what¡¯s going on. You can¡¯t blow up the entire building based on one anomaly.¡± Pause. ¡°It¡¯ll take me ten minutes just to get down there. I need more than ten minutes.¡± Pause. ¡°Fine. I¡¯m leaving in two minutes.¡± Edward was already heading to his room to get dressed. ¡°Find some way to deactivate the bomb, Phil, or at least to put it on hold. Even for a few minutes.¡±

 Chapter 59: Raleigh 3

    Holy shit! Somehow my unauthorized logging on to Agora had set off a chain of security measures that would blow up the Basilisk Group building, along with all seventy-two of the prisoners and the four guards. These guys took their security seriously. They¡¯d rather blow up all the evidence than get caught. This was an unintended consequence of my vicious taking down of Serpentine. Maybe they¡¯d have been willing to go to jail, but hearing about the Serpentine personnel being beaten to death and brutally maimed had made them realize that it is better to cut their losses than get caught.


    Edward was dressed in record time, but he paused before heading downstairs. I almost saw the gears turning in his head. If the building blew up, he couldn¡¯t ever come back here again. He swiftly came to a decision and ran to his office and emptied the contents of his safe into a bag from the bottom of the closet. Mostly it was more cash, but some paperwork and computer drives were in there as well. He grabbed his laptop on the way out and ran for all he was worth.


    The ¡®go-bag joined the contents of the safe into the trunk of the Viper, along with the tube from the garage duct. Of the ten minutes that he¡¯d had, Edward had blown through four of them already. He called Phil and put him on speaker.


    ¡°Did you get me a delay?¡±


    ¡°No. I couldn¡¯t reach anyone with enough access. The one guy I did manage to speak with said that there¡¯s a way to add a five-minute delay, but it¡¯s on-site at the building.¡±


    ¡°Shit! There¡¯s no traffic, but I can¡¯t risk the police catching me. I¡¯m not going to make it in time. Keep trying.¡± He kept Phil on the line.


    Edward kept driving and we weren¡¯t that far when we reached the train tracks and found the barriers down and the train lumbering across our field of view. Edward put his head on the steering wheel and repeated the same word again and again, ¡°Shit. Shit. Shit. Shit.¡±


    For my part, Edward had done enough. He¡¯d gotten us close enough for my field to reach the building. I started scanning it from bottom to top, verifying the locations of twenty-six strategically placed bombs and studying how they were connected to each other. Most of them were on the building support columns and when they went off they were guaranteed to take down the building. Four of the bombs were on the seventh floor, ready to make sure that even DNA evidence would be difficult to find. My field had picked up on the bombs during my initial scan of the building, but I hadn¡¯t been paying attention. I was searching for people and it never occurred to me that anyone would think about blowing up the building. However, the information had all been in my head when I¡¯d looked for it in my memories of the scan. Like my scan-reading, I could recall everything I scanned. I just had to think to look for it.


    The train finally passed and Edward took off. ¡°How long do I have, Phil? I¡¯m three minutes away.¡±


    ¡°Eighty-seven seconds. You¡¯d better stop soon. You don¡¯t want to be anywhere near the building when it goes off. I¡¯m packing now. I¡¯ll meet you at safehouse number three. We should be able to rejoin the network in a month or two.¡±


    ¡°Yeah. Safehouse three. I¡¯ll be there.¡± Edward sounded dejected as he hung up. I didn¡¯t feel bad for him at all and as we rolled to a stop at the next light, I shifted the Viper and Edward into L2. I only stayed there long enough to turn off the car and put it in park. It, and Edward, were both in stasis now, but I didn¡¯t want to forget that the car was on when I eventually brought it back to reality.


    Shifting back to reality, I could see the top five floors of the Basilisk building over the treetops. I estimated that I had about a minute left until the bombs went off and I started to run. I counted off the seconds in my head and was in full view of the building when my internal clock reached ten seconds.


    I stopped running and sent out my field to encompass the entire building. I made sure to include every part of it, including the underground parking and the water, sewage and electrical pipes leading into the building. I sent the whole lot of it in L3, where it was the only thing in the landscape for as far as the eye could see and much farther.


    Now I had to hurry again. People would take notice of a building disappearing, so I needed to have it back as soon as possible. In reality, I noticed how the bombs were connected to each other and I¡¯d worried that if I removed one bomb at a time, then I might set off the others. I¡¯d shifted multiple objects before, but never twenty-six at once. Instead, I shifted the building, which in essence was one object, into L3 and once there I shifted each of the bombs to L2. The process took less than a minute and the building was back in reality the second the last bomb was disposed of.


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    I took special attention to see what happened to the connections where I¡¯d removed and brought back the pipes. I hadn¡¯t wanted to the building to lose power and on the ride over I¡¯d thought of a possible solution. The key was to wrap the remaining pipes, those sections that would stay in reality, in their own fields and then bridge the parts together with a field. This was similar to the technique that I that I used when I¡¯d be in R1 and pickup an object in reality; by connected the two fields. With the building not having moved at all in the intervening minute, everything lined up perfectly. As I watched the connections, the water and sewage started flowing again, both having stopped during the intervening minute. I¡¯d need to think about that some more later, but I already thought of some great uses for this phenomenon.


    Unlike the water and sewage, electricity moved too fast for me to see if it had stopped and then restarted and I didn¡¯t know if the building had lost power or not. I¡¯d need to go in to one of the kitchens and see if the clock on the microwave was blinking. For now, all that mattered is that the buildings lights were on, just as they had been before I¡¯d shifted the building.


    I scanned the building to make sure that everyone was alright. The prisoners were still asleep and the guards weren¡¯t aware that anything had happened. The final things on my to do list were securing those guards and Edward. It only took a few seconds to send all four guards into L2 and then I ran back to where I¡¯d left Edward and his car. I immediately saw that I had a slight problem. Edward was sitting in the driver¡¯s seat and I¡¯d left my exosuit in my car. I didn¡¯t feel like picking him up and dragging him to the passenger side of the car. Instead, I shifted the car to R2 where Edward would be more pliable, opened the door, removed Edward¡¯s seat belt and dragged him to the ground. I left him there as I got in the car and drove to my truck.


    Over the next ten minutes I unloaded Edward¡¯s go bag and the rest of Edward¡¯s things into my truck, donned my exosuit and Roger outfit, and returned to pick up Edward. Back at the Basilisk building, I maneuvered Edward up the elevator and tied him up in his office chair. I¡¯d bring him back to reality when the police entered the building. After I¡¯d done the same thing with the guards, it was time for the police and the FBI to take over. I¡¯d done all that I could and despite knowing that in a few hours seventy-two people would get their lives back, I felt like I¡¯d failed again.


    Mom wasn¡¯t here and there was no record of her having been here. I was back to square none. I¡¯d have Shauna and the team pore over all the data that I¡¯d copied and the FBI would have the originals to work from. I didn¡¯t hold out any hope though. Thirteen years was a long time.


    Putting aside my despondency, for the moment, I called Shauna. She answered and told me that I was on speaker. I really appreciated her reminder.


    ¡°The building is secured. There¡¯s one security guard on the main level and three more on the seventh. They¡¯ve all been tied up. The president of the company is in his office on the eight floor in a similar condition. How far out are you?¡±


    ¡°We¡¯re about ten minutes out of the city. Thanks to Kevin having given us a free pass on breaking the speed limit, we¡¯re way ahead of schedule. Can you give us the address now and let us know how many ambulances we should call for?¡±


    I gave her the address and added, ¡°You¡¯ll need medical personnel to handle the dehydration and malnutrition of the prisoners. Other than that, there are no injuries.¡±


    It grew quiet on the other end of the line and I started to wonder if I¡¯d lost connection. Kevin broke the silence. ¡°I¡¯m not complaining, but last time you¡­uhm¡­helped¡­in this type of situation, there were quite a few injuries and even more fatalities. What¡¯s changed?¡±


    ¡°Two factors were different. In this instance, there is no visible evidence of the prisoners having been physically abused, nor was there a situation where they were in the midst of being abused and requiring intervention on my part. The second factor is that this building had been wired to blow up should the operation be exposed. Rather than being caught, the traffickers had decided to erase all evidence of their involvement and start again somewhere else. I suspect that the level of violence that I used last time may have convinced them that this was a better course of action than being apprehended by me. Although, it could simply be that they were hoping to blow me up along with any evidence. Either way, I¡¯ve decided to try a change of tactics and see where that leads.¡±


    More quiet from the other end of the line. This time Shauna spoke up.


    ¡°Do we need to call in the bomb squad to join us?¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s up to you. There were twenty-two bombs wired to collapse the building and four bombs set on the seventh floor to make sure that there was nothing left of the prisoners to identify. I left the wires in place, but I¡¯ve already disposed of the ordinance. The building is safe. Otherwise, I would not have left the prisoners sleeping in their cells.¡±


    ¡°How can you be sure? You¡¯ve only been on site for a few hours. For that matter, how were you able to disarm twenty-six bombs and capture the guards in such a short amount of time?¡± Kevin sounded more awestruck than upset.


    ¡°It doesn¡¯t matter, does it? You¡¯re welcome to check the building if it¡¯ll make you feel better. I need to go now and report to Abby about her mother.¡±


    ¡°Wait! What about her mother? Did you find her?¡± Shauna sounded so excited. I hated having to give her the bad news.


    ¡°No. She¡¯s not one of the prisoners and there¡¯s no record of her being held by this group. You¡¯ll have a chance to go through their server databases and hopefully find something that I missed.¡±


    As I lowered the phone from my ear and pressed the disconnect button, I heard Shauna swearing in frustration. I knew how she felt.

 Chapter 60: Epilogue

    In a masterful stroke of timing, Shauna¡¯s car pulled into the Basilisk Group building¡¯s parking lot just ahead of the first of several police cars. As the police started to secure the area and restrict all movement around the building, Kevin and the police captain discussed the situation. Kevin explained about Roger already having incapacitated the guards and how the captives were on the seventh floor. When Kevin mentioned the bombs, the captain immediately had the perimeter moved farther back from the building and called in his specialized team. He wasn¡¯t taking any chances with his men.


    It would take another half hour for the bomb squad to arrive and another hour for them to confirm that all the bombs had been removed. During this time, I returned to my truck and got out Edgar¡¯s go-bag. Taking out the list of addresses, I scanned to the third one and typed it into Waze on my phone. From a sheltered area beside the building, I returned to reality to see how far away it was. I could be there in twenty minutes. With nothing else pressing to do, I drove out to safehouse three.


    Phil had already unpacked his few belongings and was trying to reach Edgar on this phone, while simultaneously checking his laptop for any information on any explosions in the area. My mental picture of Phil didn¡¯t match up with reality. From his panicking voice on the earlier phone call with Edgar, I¡¯d been expecting a geeky pajama boy with a pale complexion and greasy hair. Instead, I found a man dressed like he was ready to model for the cover of next month¡¯s ¡®Captain¡¯s Yacht¡¯ Magazine. Tearing my eyes away from the way too attractive man, I went through my usual routine of getting his passwords before sending him to L2 and copying the data on his computer and his phone.


    I left Phil tied up, much in the same way I¡¯d left Edgar, and called Shauna to let her know where Kevin¡¯s team could pick him up. He was another thread for the FBI to pull on and it was possible that with both Edgar and Phil in custody, no one else in their organization would know what had happened tonight. Kevin might be able to catch some of them before they disappeared.


    Phil¡¯s go-bag was more of a go-trunk. It¡¯s contents were similar to Edgar¡¯s bag, but more plentiful. More gold, more jewels, more cash and a lot more clothes. No t-shirts and jeans for our Phil. He was designer all the way and had a fondness for Cucinelli suits. Who packs suits when they¡¯re on the run? I left the clothes behind, but took everything else for my collection.


    By the time I got back to the Basilisk building, Kevin¡¯s team had shown up and were preparing to enter the building with the police. I checked on the prisoners, making sure that they were still sleeping and shifted Edgar and the guards back to reality. I wouldn¡¯t want them to miss out on all the fun. I spent the last few minutes before the show picking up all the bombs in L2 and disconnecting the explosives from any wiring or detonation devices. I¡¯d put the devices somewhere the police would find them. The explosives though would go into my personal stash of goodies. You never know when you might need some explosives.


    Emergency services had been called in and they¡¯d already set up aid tents and processing stations when the first of the survivors were brought out by the police. Shauna and the Hannah¡¯s Home team were right in there with them. While Shauna had been racing over here, she¡¯d contacted Diane to call up our team and gather supplies for the survivors. Besides blankets and water, they also had stacks of clean clothes, and food. We¡¯d also set up our own tent, where our councilors could provide advice in what needed to be done and phones for anyone wanting to call their families or friends.


    I watched all this from R1, moving among the survivors and the team. The survivors were trying to take in their newfound freedom and come to grips with everything that they¡¯d been through. Some of them had only been taken a few days ago, while others had been captive for months. None of them would come out of this experience unscathed in some way. Whether it was simply a fear of going out alone or the inability to stop reliving their captivity, all of them would need help to move on. I was proud of my team and their handling of the survivors with compassion and assurance. Shelley and Diane, having been captives themselves and both now free thanks to ¡®Roger¡¯, were especially effective in illustrating that the survivors could re-start their lives.


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    With the coming of dawn, the FBI were still hard at work, the police were packing up their perimeter and the survivors had all made their statements. Many of the survivors had been met by family or friends. These reunions were joyous and tearful affairs, full of introductions between family members and various survivors who had helped them survive the ordeal. Shared adversity and simple human kindness had made strangers into lifelong friends.


    Thirty-seven survivors either had family that was too far away to get to them this quickly or had no family to turn to. Hannah¡¯s Home offered to take them all in temporarily and help them get themselves situated. All of them accepted our offer and Kevin had to step in and vouch for the foundation when Child Services tried to deny six teenagers from going to Hannah¡¯s Home. We didn¡¯t have the right credentials to take in minors. It was an oversight that Shauna would be remedying immediately, but for now Kevin would have to take full responsibility for them. Kevin didn¡¯t even bat an eye at this. After carefully reading the appropriate forms, he signed them and officially took charge of the teenagers by handing them off to Shauna with the admonition that she¡¯d better not make him regret this.


    I stayed to the end; until every last survivor had boarded the bus that Shauna had chartered for them to return to Hannah¡¯s Home. Kevin drove Shauna¡¯s car back for her, so she could be on the bus with everyone. Likewise, Shelley was driving the supply truck back by herself to give Diane a chance to help Shauna on the bus. By the time the slave auction was supposed to have taken place, everyone had left and I was still there, still in R1.


    In truth, I didn¡¯t know what to do with myself. All this energy was coursing through me, ready to be used, but there was nothing to do. The saving had already been done. The only person that still had to be saved, couldn¡¯t be. I had no way to find her.


    I faced out of the parking lot and started walking, hoping that I could walk off some of that energy and clear my head. I didn¡¯t have anywhere to go or anywhere to be. I just walked. The constant motion and noise of cars passing by kept distracting me from my thoughts so I shifted to L2 where the quiet was absolute. I kept walking and thinking.


    I¡¯d done what I set out to do. I should feel something more than the emptiness that was consuming me. I should feel something. A sense of satisfaction. Pride. Joy. Anything. Did Superman ever feel this way? He flew from crisis to crisis, saving lives, propping up buildings, catching school buses that fell off bridges. Did he feel empty afterwards? Unfulfilled? Did he feel that he hadn¡¯t done enough? Did he feel that he¡¯d let down the people he cared most about in the world? I was felling all of those things.


    Mostly though, I felt sad. I thought that this was going to be my big break. My chance to find mom. It made so much sense. The pieces had finally fit. She should have been in the Agora system. Why wasn¡¯t she there?


    I kept walking, trying to work it all out. Eventually, my cloud of self-absorption lifted enough for me to realize that I hadn¡¯t been walking aimlessly this whole time. I¡¯d googled this route when I¡¯d first heard about the Pearl Dragon Corporation and how close it was to my abduction site. I¡¯d wanted to follow mom¡¯s journey after we were separated and the church with the beautiful stained-glass windows that I¡¯d just passed was only two blocks away from the intersection where I¡¯d been found.


    I hadn¡¯t been back to this area since the kidnapping. I had no memory of it at all, just a description from the police report and another from John Buckler¡¯s stories. Curiosity swelled within me and I picked up my pace a little. My walk changed from ¡®aimless wandering¡¯ to ¡®somewhere to be¡¯ and my mood similarly changed. It wasn¡¯t much of a destination, but it was something at least.


    As I drew closer to the intersection, I started to feel something strange. There was a wrongness up ahead. I¡¯d last felt that in Venezuela, outside of the airport all those months ago when I¡¯d found the meteorite. I kept walking, a little faster now, expecting to find another meteorite and wondering how many of them there were out there. Only as I drew closer, I saw that the shape was all wrong for it to be a meteorite.


    I saw a figure lying on its side. It was in a sitting position, hunched over, with its arms wrapped around something that wasn¡¯t there, as if it had been protecting something or someone. I was still fifty feet away and my pace slowed. My confused mind was trying to figure out why a statue had been placed in the middle of the road. Who could have even gotten it into L2? What was the point of it being here?


    I walked closer still. It was a woman, strands of her hair had escaped her ponytail and were strewn across her face. Something finally broke inside me and I ran the rest of the way to her, tears blurring my vision.


    ¡°Mom!¡±

 Book 3: Chapter 1 - What Now?

    She¡¯d been here the whole time. Dad and I had searched all over for her, for years, spending weekends visiting hospitals and soup kitchens and all this time she¡¯s been here, frozen in L2. My brain was having trouble coming to grips with the idea. There had never been a third kidnapper. Mom hadn¡¯t been sold into slavery. All of the abuse and mistreatment that I¡¯d imagined her enduring had been just that; imaginings.


    I don¡¯t know how long I sat there on the road, cradling my mother in my arms and sobbing uncontrollably. Eventually, my breathing started to calm, the tears stopped running down my face and I loosened my death grip on my mother¡¯s huddled form. She couldn¡¯t feel the hug. She couldn¡¯t feel anything. Locked in stasis, even her blood cells were motionless. More than anything I wanted to bring her back to reality and talk to her, get to know her again. Only I couldn¡¯t do that. Not yet anyways.


    Thirteen years had passed by in reality, but not for her. In her mind, I was still a four-year-old girl and we were in the middle of being kidnapped. She wouldn¡¯t know who I was and she might even believe that I was part of the group that was kidnapping her. To make matters even more complicated, she hadn¡¯t aged a day in the intervening thirteen years. One look in the mirror and she¡¯d think I was lying about being Abby. How could I have aged while she hadn¡¯t? That just wasn¡¯t possible in her worldview.


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    Wiping the tears from my eyes, I gently set her motionless body back down on the road. Laying her there on her side, still hunched over and protecting a little girl that wasn¡¯t there, didn¡¯t feel right to me. I picked her up and carried her over to the side of the road and placed her on the ground, leaning against a streetlamp. I didn¡¯t want to leave her there, but she was too heavy to carry all the way back to the truck. I had to go back and get it, without her. It was an irrational feeling, worrying about leaving her in a place that she¡¯s been safe in for over a decade, only I couldn¡¯t shake it. I compromised by wrapping her in a field that would tell me if anything about her changed.


    I¡¯d barely taken a few steps away from mom when the information from the field I¡¯d wrapped around her finally penetrated my thoughts and worries. I stumbled and nearly fell to the ground as my brain hiccuped in mid-step. The field was giving me information on two people. One was very tiny.


    Holy shit! Mom¡¯s pregnant.

 B3: Chapter 2 - Plans

    As far as world records went, being pregnant for thirteen years was going to be tough to beat. I¡¯m embarrassed that my first thought was to wonder how the hell mom could have gotten pregnant in L2. Rational thought kicked in a second later and I realized that she¡¯s already been pregnant when she¡¯s been stuck in there. Dad had never mentioned anything about a baby and I wondered if he¡¯d been quietly grieving for both his wife and his unborn child this whole time.


    Thinking about the size of the baby in my scan, mom had only been three or four weeks along when she¡¯d been frozen in my own personal version of carbonite. Had dad even known about the pregnancy? Had mom known? She wasn¡¯t showing yet and that was definitely a possibility. Was I going to have to wake her up into a different world and tell her she was pregnant?


    I walked back to my truck in a daze. There was so much to process. Too much really and my brain took a short break. Well, another short break. The first was when I¡¯d realized that the body in the road was mom and I¡¯d cried for who knows how long. Now I found myself driving back to pick her up and not remembering the last twenty minutes. I needed to get a hold of myself. It was hard though. My thoughts kept jumping around. Mom¡¯s alive. I could have grown up with a brother or a sister. I¡¯d always wanted someone to play with. How do I explain all this to dad? How can mom pick up the pieces of her life when she looks more like my older sister than my mother? Will mom be mad at me when we wake her up? Will dad hate me when he realizes that it¡¯s all my fault?


    That last though stopped me cold. It was my fault. Mom didn¡¯t have a field around her that protected her. The only way she could have gotten into L2 is by me bringing her there. Four-year-old me had been scared and I¡¯d shifted just like I had in the bus incident. Only mom had been holding onto me when I¡¯d shifted and I¡¯d taken her with me. When I ran out of strength to stay in L2, I¡¯d snapped back to reality and she hadn¡¯t. I wondered if that¡¯s why Lenny had crashed the car. Had he seen us suddenly disappear from the backseat of the car? Is that why he hadn¡¯t ever spoken of the accident with anyone? Was he questioning his sanity?


    I stopped the car beside mom and went around to lift her inside. Looking at her, posed in the middle of her never-ending kidnapping, I couldn¡¯t take it anymore. She couldn¡¯t care, but I did. I shifted us and the truck to R2 and carefully re-positioned her so that it seemed she had only fallen asleep while we were driving. Without the stasis, her facial muscles unfroze as well and I was able to close her eyelids and smooth out her features into a semblance of relaxation.


    Watching her, I was surprised at how beautiful she was. My own memories of her had dimmed over the years, replaced with stories and photographs of her. Either the pictures hadn¡¯t done her justice or I¡¯d become so accustomed to them over the years that I stopped truly seeing her. In my mind, she had turned into an image of a person called ¡®mom¡¯.


    Although I¡¯d always been told how much I looked like her, I¡¯d never been able to see the resemblance. Now I examined her features and could see where I¡¯d gotten mine from. The difference was that on her, the combination of those features was striking. On me, not so much. Maybe I¡¯d grow into those features one day, but I doubted it. I was almost eighteen already. Besides, I didn¡¯t mind not being beautiful. It seemed like it would be more trouble than it was worth. It might even be why those guys had decided to kidnap us.


    I spend the two-hour drive back home trying to figure out how were we going to be able to bring mom back into our lives. Things would have been so much simpler if she¡¯d aged in L2. Although with her being pregnant, I¡¯m not even sure how that would have worked. Regardless, she hadn¡¯t aged and there was no rational explanation for that. Good genes could only carry you so far. This went way beyond that. Then there was the fact that she couldn¡¯t explain to anyone what she¡¯d been doing for the past thirteen years. For her, those thirteen years hadn¡¯t existed.


    She missed out on watching me grow up and on growing older with dad. I think that would be the hardest part for her to come to grips with. Dad always told me that family was the most important thing to her. That reminded me of her parents and I had yet another reason to be thankful that my grandparents were still with us. For her to finally come back to us but miss out on seeing them would have been tragic. She¡¯d be in for enough of a shock when she reunited with Uncle Magnum and found that he was completely bald now.


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    I started making a mental list of all the other issues that she¡¯d have trying to fit back into her life. She had no clothes except for what she was wearing. We¡¯d moved to a new city and into a new house that she¡¯d never seen. Her old job was gone. All her friends think she¡¯s dead. All her friends and family had aged thirteen years. She didn¡¯t know what an iPhone was. She¡¯d missed over a decade of movies. Not much of a loss there. She didn¡¯t even know who the current president was. She had a lot of catching up to do and through it all, she would have to raise an infant that would be eighteen years younger than his or her sister.


    The situation reminded me of the therapy sessions that I¡¯d sat in on for the women rescued from Serpentine last year. They¡¯d been through a life changing experience and everyone had expected them to be happy to be back and pick up their lives right where they¡¯d left off. However, the experience had changed them and they couldn¡¯t go back to the way things were before. They needed to make a new life for themselves. Mom situation was a bit different, in that she had stayed the same while the world changed, but the results were the same. She was going to have to make a new life for herself. Barely anything remained from her old life. She¡¯d effectively have to become a whole new person.


    That thought jarred me. Could she become a new person? If she had a new identity, that would solve the not-aging problem nicely. Given her strong resemblance to a younger version of mom, she¡¯d still have to part of the Metzstein family. Only she¡¯d have to be someone that even mom¡¯s extended family didn¡¯t know about, since we wouldn¡¯t want to have to involve mom¡¯s whole side of the family in the lie.


    I got stuck on this problem for awhile. Besides Uncle Magnum and his parents, I¡¯d never met anyone else from mom¡¯s side of the family. I knew there were great aunts and uncles and loads of cousins, but I¡¯d never met any of them. Mom¡¯s clan mostly hailed from New York and Israel. One day I¡¯d have to ask her how she¡¯d ended up in North Carolina. With no other choice left to me, my thoughts settled on Uncle Magnum. I did some math and realized that if he had had a daughter at eighteen, she¡¯d be twenty-five today, just a bit younger than mom¡¯s twenty-nine years when time stopped for her. That was close enough that most people wouldn¡¯t notice the difference between.


    With that settled, I just needed to figure out who mom¡¯s new mother would be. Uncle Magnum was not in the habit of telling his teenage niece about his past relationships. I knew about a few of his girlfriends from before Maggie, but none of those had lasted very long. A memory drifted up from my mind of Uncle Magnum and I watching ¡®When Harry Met Sally¡¯ a few years ago. I smiled as I fondly remembered the restaurant scene. Meg Ryan was giving a hell of a performance faking an orgasm and I turned to Uncle Magnum, gave him my most confused look and whispered to Uncle Magnum, ¡°What¡¯s she doing? What¡¯s an orgasm?¡± Uncle Magnum turned all shades of red and started stammering something. I tried to keep a curious look on my face throughout it all, but I ended up failing miserably and burst into laughter. It took him a few seconds to realize that I was teasing him and then the pillow fight began. He added extra minutes of plank to my warmups for weeks after than, but it was so worth it. To this day, I still bring it up occasionally, when he¡¯s least expecting it. The last time I¡¯d done it, about a month ago, we¡¯d been in the middle of sparring and I¡¯d just casually said, ¡°You still never explained what an orgasm is.¡± Needless to say, that was enough of a distraction for me to get in two solid hits and win the round. The icing on the cake was that Sifu Zhang had been watching, but didn¡¯t hear what I¡¯d said. When he asked Uncle Magnum what had distracted him so much, Uncle Magnum had turned beat red and I couldn¡¯t stop laughing for a long time.


    Although I loved that memory, it wasn¡¯t the reason that I¡¯d thought of the movie. After the pillow fight and after the movie ended, I¡¯d asked Uncle Magnum if he thought it was true that men and woman couldn¡¯t just be friends and would always want to be in a relationship. He¡¯d gotten a wistful expression on his face and answered, ¡°No. It¡¯s not true. At least it isn¡¯t always true. Growing up, my best friend was a girl named Vanessa. We were very close, but never intimate. We just weren¡¯t interested in each other in that way. Whatever it is that causes two people to be attracted to each other, we didn¡¯t have it. We were just great friends.¡±


    ¡°How come you¡¯ve never mentioned her before? Is she still in Raleigh?¡±


    ¡°No. She took a year off after high school and backpacked through Europe. When she got back, she enlisted in the Navy. Her dream had always been to become a marine. She was killed during a training exercise just off the east coast.¡±


    If Uncle Magnum agreed, I was going to suggest that mom¡¯s new identity would be as his and Vanessa¡¯s daughter.

 B3: Chapter 3 - I Suppose You鈥檙e All Wondering Why I Gathered You Here Today

    I brought mom home. Donning my exosuit again, I carried her into my room and lay her down on my bed in L2. I shifted her to R2 for a few seconds to reposition her. She looked so peaceful lying there and a part of me dreaded having to wake her up into the mess that was coming. It couldn¡¯t be helped though. I wanted my mother back and dad needed his wife.


    I hadn¡¯t slept at all last night and between the early morning rescue, finding mom, and the four hours of driving, I was exhausted. After a brief shower and a change of clothes, I set my alarm to wake me up in four hours and passed out on the couch. It didn¡¯t seem right to lay down on my soft bed in reality, while mom was relegated to a rock-hard bed in L2.


    Feeling somewhat refreshed on waking, I made my way to the kitchen for a light breakfast, even though it was early afternoon already. Dad was just finishing his lunch as I walked in and he got up to give me hug. I swear I almost told him everything right then. I only managed to hold out because Uncle Magnum need to get here first.


    ¡°I didn¡¯t expect to see much of you today. You mentioned that you had errands to run all day.¡±


    ¡°Yeah. I was able to get them all wrapped up early. What about you? Did you finish the turtle?¡± Dad¡¯s latest piece was a Galapogos giant tortoise. I have no idea what put the idea in his head to make one out of metal, but it was incredible.


    ¡°Just about. It should be done by tonight or tomorrow morning. Would you like to come out and see it?¡±


    ¡°I would, but not yet. I need to have a talk with you and Paul.¡±


    ¡°It must be serious. It¡¯s been a while since you¡¯ve called him by his real name.¡±


    ¡°It is. I¡¯m was just going to call him and see how fast he could come over.¡±


    ¡°Ok. I won¡¯t pester you with all my questions. Just let me know when he¡¯s here. I¡¯ll be out back at the forge. I won¡¯t start work on anything that I can¡¯t put down at a moment¡¯s notice.¡±


    It being Saturday, Uncle Magnum had already finished his classes for the day and was preparing to run a few errands of his own. At my request, he dropped his plans and said he¡¯d be right over. That gave me just enough time to have a bowl of Cinnamon Toast Crunch and for my nerves to get the better of me. How the hell was I going to break the news to them? I know they¡¯ll be ecstatic about mom, but there were so much more that they¡¯d need to understand for her return to make any sense.


    Before I was ready, Uncle Magnum and dad were sitting at the kitchen table with me. I stalled a bit, putting my bowl and spoon in the dishwasher and returning the milk to the fridge.


    ¡°I suppose you¡¯re wondering why I gathered you all here.¡±


    Uncle Magnum let out a groan and dad gave a little head shake.


    ¡°I have something really important to tell you both. I was going to just blurt it out, only then you wouldn¡¯t sit to hear the whole story and you really need to hear the whole story so that you can decide what to do. The problem is that the story is slightly outside the realm of what¡¯s considered believable, so I¡¯m back to not knowing where to start.¡±


    ¡°You¡¯re babbling, Abby. Just start at the beginning.¡± Uncle Magnum seemed more amused than annoyed so far. I¡¯d sidetracked his day and he was probably wondering if this was all some sort of a joke.


    ¡°First there was darkness and the Lord said, ¡°Let there be light!¡± and there was light.¡±


    ¡°Smartass teenager! Not that far back. Start at the beginning of your story. The one you called us in here to tell us about.¡±


    ¡°Believe it or not, Paul, but my story actually does tie into that other story in a roundabout way.¡± I let out a breath and continued, ¡°Almost two years ago, I was coming home from the Galt library and I didn¡¯t get hit by a bus.¡±


    ¡°I remember that day.¡±, dad interjected. ¡°You were practicing your Kung Fu with Ed when I got home and I asked you about your day. You told me that you didn¡¯t get hit by a bus. You say many strange things Abby, but that one stuck me as unusually odd for you. You defined your day by what didn¡¯t happen to you and you were specific about it. It wasn¡¯t a general statement that you didn¡¯t die.¡±


    ¡°I wasn¡¯t trying to be odd. It was literally what happened to me on the way home. A bus swerved out of the way to avoid hitting a girl and barrelled right into my path. I froze up and I was sure that it was going to hit me. It should have hit me. Instead¡­ it passed right through me.¡±


    Dad¡¯s eyebrows rose at this statement. Uncle Magnum looked confused. ¡°You mean it passed right by you, no?¡±, he asked.


    ¡°No. Right before it could hit me, I saw the people on the bus grey out and disappear. The bus did the same thing as it passed right through me. A few second later, the bus was gone and all the buildings around me faded away. In the space of a few heart beats, I was left in a silent and empty landscape. A few moments later, I snapped back to the street and the bus was parked a few feet inside the real estate agency.¡±


    Uncle Magnum looked at me skeptically. Dad just asked, ¡°Why didn¡¯t you tell us about this until now?¡±


    ¡°I thought you¡¯d think I was crazy so I decided that before I told you, I¡¯d see if I could do it again. On purpose. I wanted to get control of whatever it was that happened.


    ¡°And did you?¡±


    ¡°Yes. That¡¯s what I was working on with Ed when you came home that day. When you called out my name, you threw off my rhythm and it happened again. Instead of Ed knocking into my arm, he passed right through me. I remembered the feeling and was able to replicate it. Over the past two years, I¡¯ve learned a lot about my ability and how to use it.¡±


    ¡°What¡¯s changed that made you decide to tell us about it after all this time?¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m getting to that. I need to explain a bit more about my ability first or you won¡¯t understand what happened. I won¡¯t bore you with all the details of each discovery and all the practice time that I put in.¡±


    ¡°On the contrary, Abby. I would very much like to be bored with those details.¡± Dad¡¯s eyes bored into me.


    ¡°Ok, but we don¡¯t have time to get into that right now. Let me sum up what I¡¯ve learned. My ability isn¡¯t to go through things. It¡¯s field control. I have a field that surrounds my body at all times and it let¡¯s me shift between the layers and sublayers of reality.¡±


    ¡°Layers of reality? Sublayers? Abby, you¡¯ve completely lost me.¡± Uncle Magnum was moving past amused skepticism and into annoyed skepticism.


    ¡°You could think of reality as being like onions. Onions have layers. Reality has layers. They both have layers.¡± This time, even dad got the reference to Shrek, as he¡¯d watched it with us. They both rewarded it with a little laugh and some of the tension left Uncle Magnum¡¯s shoulders. He still didn¡¯t know where this was going, but he was more willing to listen now.


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    ¡°Seriously though, there are a few ways you can think about it. You once explained to me how computer games were made. About how they¡¯d program in each part of the game on top of the initial game kernel. They started off with a world and defined the physical laws of that world. Then they added in continents and put oceans, mountain and lakes on them. With that layer done, they programmed in the cities and finally the npc¡¯s. They build the world layer upon layer and once you add in the players, all those layers interact to form the game itself. Within each layer, nothing can happen. It¡¯s only when they¡¯re all together that you can get anything to happen. Reality was built the same way.¡±


    ¡°We don¡¯t live in a video game, Abby.¡±


    ¡°No, but video games are based on reality. They¡¯re the human attempt to replicate what God did when he created our world. It goes back to my joke earlier about starting from the beginning and the creation story in Genesis. First there was nothing and God said, ¡°Let there be light¡± and there was light, which differentiated between the dark and the light. Then he went on for six days, creating each layer of the world. He made the heavenly bodies and the world itself. Next came the oceans and the land, followed by plants and animals and finally humans. He built up our reality in layers. My field allows me to travel back and forth between those layers. The first layer, I call it Layer 1 or L1, is the same as reality but without life. The second layer, L2, has no life and no motion. Anything that moves doesn¡¯t exist. There are no cars or bikes or boats or things in general. You still have houses and buildings. Layer three had nothing in it. It¡¯s just vast expanses of landscape. However, if a house had a basement, you will see the hole in the ground where the basement was dug out. That¡¯s because interactions in reality affect each of the layers.¡±


    ¡°Can I extrapolate from this that layer four lack oceans and mountains and that layer five lacks the planet itself?¡± Trust dad to see the whole picture and not get bogged down in details like questioning my sanity.


    ¡°I don¡¯t know. I¡¯ve never gotten that far. Getting into each layer has been a process of discovery or accident. Or both. I¡¯ve haven¡¯t found the key to the next layer yet.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m not sure if you should. What would be the point?¡±


    ¡°I don¡¯t know that either. I have noticed that over time, I find new uses for each of my abilities. Every scrap of new knowledge ends up helping in the end.¡±


    ¡°Abby. I really want to believe what you¡¯re telling us and I can see that you believe it. Can you prove it though? Can you show us these layers?¡± Uncle Magnum¡¯s question was quiet and sincere. He didn¡¯t want his niece to be a crazy person.


    ¡°I can and will show you some magic tricks that will convince you, but you¡¯ve already seen my field in action.¡±


    ¡°I have? When?¡±


    Dad answered before I could. ¡°The fire, Paul. Abby used her field when she ran into the house and saved Mark.¡± Now it was my turn to looked stunned.


    ¡°You knew?¡±


    ¡°No, Abby. I¡¯m just putting two and two together now to get five. I should have asked more questions at the time, but I was too angry with you for putting your life at risk like that. After the anger faded, the relief of having you safe and sound overcame any desire to delve deeper into the issue. I work with fire everyday. The chances of you coming out of that house without being seriously injured are extremely unlikely.¡±


    ¡°I was already in another layer by the time I passed the entryway. I was never in any danger. The fire, smoke and heat didn¡¯t exist in the layer. As long as I made it out of the house before it collapsed, then I was good. Even being in the house when it collapsed would only have meant a twelve-foot drop. Actually, at the time, I hadn¡¯t made it into the layers yet. I was only in the sub-layers. The sub-layers are small pockets of the layers that exist while I¡¯m still in reality.¡±


    Uncle Magnum leaned forward, his crossed arms on the table, and insisted, ¡°Maybe inferring your abilities is good enough for Josh. I¡¯d like more. Can you show me something that will convince me?¡±


    ¡°Sure.¡± I though a moment and said, ¡°Lean back please, both of you.¡± They did and I sent the kitchen table into R1. Dad¡¯s eyes grew huge and Uncle Magnum actually jumped up and back from the table that wasn¡¯t there anymore, sending his chair skittering back and almost knocking it over.


    ¡°Shit! I wasn¡¯t expecting that.¡± Uncle Magnum kept looking at where that table had been. ¡°Is it really gone or just invisible?¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s still there. I just shifted it to R1. Since it¡¯s not in our layer of reality anymore, you can walk through the space it no longer occupies.¡±


    Taking a few tentative steps, he did just that. And bumped his head on the light fixture that was centered over the non-existent table. I couldn¡¯t help laughing at that and he rubbed his head and scowled at me. I noticed dad trying to supress a smile and that set me off once again. Uncle Magnum backed away from the table area and I brought the table back.


    ¡°I don¡¯t know if I can eat at this table ever again. It might disappear again, taking my food with it.¡±, Uncle Magnum joked. He rapped it with his hand, making loud knocking sound.


    ¡°I¡¯ve learned a lot over the past two years. I can even create multiple fields that interact between the different layers. The field is also where I get my land sense from. It¡¯s not a sense really. It¡¯s the field feeding me information about whatever it passes through or encompasses.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s how you¡¯re able to know what¡¯s in the ground miles away. Can you really send out your field that far? This ties in to your recent development of an eidetic memory, doesn¡¯t it?¡±


    ¡°Yes and Yes. It took a lot of practice to get strong enough to be able to hold the field that far away. I pretty much keep a set of fields on all day long, every day, to keep my skills up. Regarding the memory, I can remember everything that I scan. Perfectly. When I found out that metallic inks existed, I realized that I could read using the field. I¡¯ve been having books printed in metallic ink for the last six or seven months and basically memorizing them and integrating their knowledge in hours.¡±


    ¡°The forms. You¡¯ve been scanning me and Sifu Zhang to learn them.¡± Uncle Magnum said in a hushed voice.


    ¡°Yes. It¡¯s also very useful in learning breathing techniques, muscle adjustments, and fighting.¡±


    ¡°This is quite amazing, Abby. I wish you¡¯d have told us earlier. We could have helped you figure all this out. You didn¡¯t have to do this on your own.¡±


    ¡°I know, dad. I can¡¯t tell you how many times I¡¯ve wanted to. It was very lonely doing it by myself. There was no one to share the triumphs with or to get new ideas from. I guess I got into the habit of keeping it a secret and couldn¡¯t break it.¡±


    ¡°Why break it now?¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m just getting to that. There are just two more things I need to explain about my abilities and the layers first. Last summer, when I finally figured out how to get into the layers, I discovered that anything you put into the layer is essentially in stasis. Its physical form cannot be altered in any way. You can still move it around and gravity will still work on it, but you won¡¯t even be able to scratch it. If you were to go to the top of the Empire State Building in L1 or L2 and drop a bowling ball, that bowling ball would hit the ground and neither the ball nor the sidewalk would be damaged in any way. The ball would bounce around a lot, but it would remain intact. An object in stasis is in a pocket of frozen time.¡±


    ¡°The other thing I wanted to explain is that this ability isn¡¯t something that simply appeared out of nowhere a few years ago. The field that surrounds me has always been there. It¡¯s a part of me. Since the bus incident I¡¯ve learned to see it and control it, but I¡¯ve had an unknown and uncontrolled version of it all my life. It was the field that gave me the information about the impure metal ingots at the forge when I was six and all the other times since then.¡±


    ¡°Ok. Now you that you have the background story, I can move on to the main reason that we¡¯re all here today.¡± I took a deep, calming breath and went on. ¡°I was in Raleigh early this morning. The FBI and the police raided a business that was involved in human trafficking. They freed seventy-two people from the seventh floor of an office building. That office building was less than three miles from the intersection where mom was last seen.¡±


    Both of them sat up straighter and gazed intently at me, hope flashing in their eyes. Hope that I hadn¡¯t been there for years.


    ¡°I didn¡¯t think that mom would be there and she wasn¡¯t. It was only a transfer point, not a long-term slave camp. I thought I would finally find a clue to where she was taken though. Some record of her having passed through there. Only there wasn¡¯t one. They had records going back twenty years with hundreds, maybe thousands, of kidnapped people and none of them was mom. I was so frustrated. There should have been something there and there was nothing. I¡¯d finally gotten a solid lead on her and it all went up in smoke.¡±


    Dad rested hand on my shoulder as my emotions overwhelmed me and tears ran down my face.


    ¡°I started walking away from the building, not realizing where I was going. I just needed to be moving and before I knew it, I was at the intersection where mom disappeared.. and there she was. Right there at the intersection. Waiting for me to finally find her.¡±


    The two men who had raised me and loved me looked in wonder and confusion as I confirmed what I had just explained, ¡°I found mom.¡±

 B3: Chapter 4 - Options

    ¡°I don¡¯t understand¡±, Paul began. ¡°She just happened to be there when you passed by at random? What are the odds on that? How long was she waiting there for you? If she could wait on the corner, why couldn¡¯t she get to the police station or call us?¡±


    I¡¯d started to answer him when dad spoke up with an intensity to his voice that I hadn¡¯t ever heard from his before. ¡°Where is she now, Abby?¡±


    Looking away from his steady gaze, I shifted my eyes to my hands and quietly answered. ¡°In my room.¡±


    He was out the kitchen and running down the hall before I could explain further. Uncle Magnum began to rise from his chair, but I stopped him with a hand on his forearm. We could hear dad coming back from my room a few seconds later. He was moving fast and his footfalls echoed angrily in the silence.


    ¡°She¡¯s not there, Abby!¡± Accusation and pain. My heart beat faster and I almost shift away. This is what I was trying to avoid.


    ¡°She is. I placed her on the bed and sent her into L2. Just like I did with the table. She¡¯s there, but not there.¡±


    ¡°Bring her back.¡± Insistence.


    ¡°We need to talk about¡­¡±


    ¡°No more talk. Bring her back.¡± Commanding. Towering over me.


    ¡°Dad.¡± Tears fill my eyes.


    ¡°Abby, I¡¯ve been suffering with the pain of her loss for thirteen years. Please bring her back. I need to see her.¡± The desperation in his voice, in his whole being, sends the tears spilling down my face.


    I try to keep my voice steady, but it comes out as barely a whisper. ¡°She won¡¯t know who I am.¡±


    That finally got through to him. ¡°What do you mean?¡±


    ¡°You¡¯ve felt her loss for the past thirteen years. She hasn¡¯t. She hasn¡¯t even been gone for one second. In her mind, she¡¯s still in that car. She¡¯s still being kidnapped with four-year-old Abby. When I got scared, I must have shifted and since mom was holding me, she shifted too. Only when I snapped back to reality, I wasn¡¯t strong enough to bring her with me. She¡¯s been in stasis this whole time.¡±


    Dad sits down heavily in the chair. He¡¯s not in such a rush anymore. ¡°Oh my God.¡± He breathes the words out as he covers his eyes with the palms of his hands, as if closing off his sight will stop the meaning of what I was telling him from sinking in.


    ¡°Wait? What¡¯s going on? What am I missing?¡± Uncle Magnum shifts his gaze between dad and me.


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    Dad answers before I can. ¡°She¡¯s still twenty-nine, Paul. She hasn¡¯t aged at all. In stasis, no time passes. She¡¯s still twenty-nine, Abby is still four, we still live in Raleigh, and she still works at the community center with Harry.¡±


    ¡°Oh my God.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s why I had to explain everything beforehand. She¡¯s going to be in for a shock when I bring her back. Her whole life is about to change and if it were me, I¡¯d be terrified. Both of you need to make her feel safe right away. I can¡¯t help you. I¡¯ll be a stranger to her.¡± Dad moves his chair next to mine and holds me until I calm down.


    ¡°Can you bring me to L2 to see her there? It might help to get over my own shock before I help her with hers.¡±


    ¡°I don¡¯t think so, dad. Other people don¡¯t keep their consciousness in the sub-layers and they go into stasis in the layers. I¡¯d need to experiment with the different combinations of fields to see if there was a wavelength that lets you stay conscious. That could take a long time.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯ll cope as best as I can then. Do you have any thoughts about how we can deal with the age problem, Abby?¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s almost all I thought about on the way home from Raleigh. That and how to break the news to you guys. I¡¯ve narrowed our options down to two and I think that mom will have to be the one to decide which option she¡¯d prefer. The first option if for her to come back as Hannah. She looks way too young for forty-one, but she can get her hair cut shorter and styled in a more mature fashion, with a bit of grey mixed in maybe. That should add a few years to her look. We can also consult with a makeup specialist to see what she can do on a daily basis to look older. For the first few months, she can put on facial prosthetics or latex to cement her age in everyone¡¯s minds. Afterwards, she can tone it down since most people will see what they expect to see. The main problem with coming back as herself is that everyone is going to want to know her story and how she was rescued. Most of that she can deflect with a general, ¡°I don¡¯t want to talk about it¡±, but we¡¯ll still need to create a story for her escape or rescue.¡±


    I paused for a few seconds before continuing. ¡°The second option is for her to come back as someone else. We¡¯d need to create a whole new identity for her. That way she doesn¡¯t need any makeup and we don¡¯t need a story to explain her absence.¡±


    ¡°She¡¯d still look exactly like Hannah did thirteen years ago. People would notice that. How would you explain the resemblance?¡±, Uncle Magnum asked.


    ¡°We¡¯d just tell everyone that she was your daughter.¡± His reaction made me smile for the first time today.


    As Uncle Magnum sputtered, dad asked, ¡°How would that work, Abby?¡±


    ¡°If Paul fathered a daughter when he was eighteen, then she¡¯d be around twenty-five today. Mom¡¯s only four years older than that and people can¡¯t tell the difference between those ages. Being Paul¡¯s daughter would explain the incredible resemblance to mom.¡±


    ¡°Who would I have fathered this child with?¡±


    ¡°Vanessa.¡± That stopped him cold.


    ¡°Vanessa and I were best friends, but only that.¡±, he insisted.


    ¡°I know that. No one else does. You told me that she took a year off after high school to travel. She could have had a baby in that time and put it up for adoption. Anyways, it the only way that I could think of without having to rely on more people to keep my abilities a secret. As it is, we¡¯ll probably have to tell Zaidi Steven and Bubby Brandy.¡±


    ¡°Well, I really don¡¯t like option two.¡±


    ¡°I didn¡¯t think that you would. It would be awkward to have your sister pretend to be your daughter. It would also look weird for your brother-in-law to marry your daughter. Especially with an age gap of over fifteen years.¡± Now it was dad¡¯s turn to wince. He didn¡¯t like option two either.


    ¡°Perhaps your mother will have some better ideas. Let¡¯s go ask her what she¡¯d like to do.¡±

 B3: Chapter 5 - Ghost

    Dad was positioned next to the bed when I brought it back to reality with Mom laying on top of it, as if sleeping. That peaceful state lasted barely a second before mom sat straight up and looked all around her in terror. ¡°Abby!!¡±


    Dad¡¯s powerful arms wrapped around her and he kept repeating, ¡°She¡¯s ok. She¡¯s safe. You¡¯re safe too. Hannah, you¡¯re safe.¡± Mom started crying, relief smoothing out her worried face.


    ¡°Josh. There were two men. They had guns and they were kidnapping Abby and me. What happened? How¡¯d you get here? Where am I?¡±


    Dad pulled away a little and looked at mom, tears rolling down his face and a smile so big that I¡¯d thought it would split his face in two. The real difference was in his eyes. For the first time that I could remember, there wasn¡¯t any sadness in them. Even in times of great happiness, there always seemed to be a part of dad that was sad, wishing that mom could be there to share in the joy. Now that she was here, everything was right in his world again. He didn¡¯t have to hold a part of himself back anymore.


    ¡°You¡¯re home, Hannah. That¡¯s all that matters. You¡¯re home and you¡¯re safe.¡±


    Mom looked around the room until her eyes found Uncle Magnum. ¡°Paul? What happened to your hair and when did you grow that mustache? I barely recognized you.¡±


    Wiping his eyes with sleeve, Paul whispered, ¡°I¡¯ve missed you sis.¡±


    Turning back to dad, mom took a closer look at his face and runs her finger slowly through his hair and lets her fingers trail down his face as her eyes get bigger with shock. ¡°Josh. You have grey at your temples. You¡¯re older than when I left you this morning. Paul¡¯s changed too. Was I in an accident? Have I been in a coma?¡±


    ¡°Something like that, Hannah. It¡¯s a little more complicated, but we can figure all that out later. It¡¯s so good to have you back.¡± He leans in again and hugs her fiercely. Paul comes forward too now and joins them in the hug.


    ¡°How long, Josh? How much did I miss?¡±


    Dad doesn¡¯t answer her right away, so she adds, ¡°I need to know.¡±


    ¡°Thirteen years, honey.¡±


    ¡°Oh.¡± A single tear slips down the side of her face and she goes quiet for awhile. Dad and Paul sit there, letting the idea sink into her head. ¡°Thirteen years. So, this is Abby¡¯s room? She all grown up, isn¡¯t she?¡±


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    I been watching all this from the foot of the bed in R1. At the mention of my name, I get up and walk to the doorway where I shift back to reality and take a step inside. Mom¡¯s eyes catch the movement and we stare at each other. I¡¯m scared out of my mind and I don¡¯t know what to do. I¡¯ve dreamed of this moment for years and it was never this hard in my dreams. There was always a joyful reunion, not this fear and uncertainty.


    Mom¡¯s face breaks out into a smile as she makes the connection between her little Abby and the almost adult standing before her now. ¡°Oh my God! You¡¯re so big.¡±


    ¡°Is that your way of saying she¡¯s fat?¡± I was going to punch Uncle Magnum later for that, but then mom beat me too it.


    ¡°Stow it, Malph!¡±, she said as she punched him in the arm. She had good technique and Uncle Magnum was left rubbing his sore arm. He never stopped grinning though.


    ¡°Don¡¯t listen to him, Abby. You¡¯re beautiful.¡±


    Suddenly, I¡¯m on the bed, sitting next to her and we¡¯re holding each other and all the uncertainty and pain are gone. My mind flashes back to all the reunions that I¡¯ve watched over the past year when victims of human trafficking are returned to their families and I realize that this is what I¡¯ve wanted all along. This moment. Being held again in my mother¡¯s arms. It didn¡¯t even matter that I was two inches taller than her now and couldn¡¯t fit on her lap.


    When the moment ended, we each dried our eyes and collected ourselves. Dad asked mom is she was hungry and her answer of, ¡°I can¡¯t remember the last time I ate¡±, set us all laughing.


    As we all walked to the kitchen, mom asked, ¡°How come I feel fine? Shouldn¡¯t I have trouble walking because my muscles have deteriorated. That¡¯s how it was for Johnny Smith and he¡¯d only been in a coma for six years. Shouldn¡¯t I need physiotherapy?¡±


    No one else was answering her, so I explained, ¡°You weren¡¯t in a coma, mom. You were¡­uhm¡­frozen in time. You¡¯re exactly how you were thirteen years ago. That¡¯s the same outfit your were wearing when the men took us in the parking lot.¡±


    We sat down at the kitchen table and I went through the whole explanation of my abilities. All the while, dad was busy making us pasta with sauce and I switched off with him to make a salad while he explained about the day that we were kidnapped and the theory that she had been taken by human traffickers.


    ¡°This whole time, you though I was being held prisoner?¡±


    ¡°Yes. Until Abby found you this morning, we thought that it was either that or that you¡¯d been killed. You¡¯ve been legally dead for almost nine years.¡±


    I set the table and brought out the food and we continued to talk and bring mom up to date. She was touched when dad explained how Paul and her parents had essentially moved in with us to help out after she disappeared and felt awful that we¡¯d have to go through all the pain of hunting for clues for a ghost.


    Mom looked over at me and cupped my face in hands. ¡°I still can¡¯t believe all of this. Yesterday I was the mother of a four-year-old girl and now she¡¯s almost eighteen.¡±


    ¡°Yes. It feels that way for me too. They grow up so quickly.¡±


    Dad¡¯s matter of fact delivery couldn¡¯t be denied and Paul started laughing. Pretty soon, we¡¯d all joined in and when mom had herself under control, she turned to dad and with a stern and imperious voice said, ¡°You mock my pain!¡±


    ¡°Life is pain, highness.¡± Paul automatically added the follow-up Princess Bride line and when he caught my surprised look, he simply said, ¡°It¡¯s her favorite movie too, you know.¡±

 B3: Chapter 6 - The Land of the Living

    Much to Paul¡¯s relief, mom chose to re-enter society as Hannah. It was a good long-term decision but presented all sorts of problems for us right now. For make-up, I got on the phone with Howie and asked him to check with his network to see if they had make-up artist who could make someone look older. He grumbled for a few minutes, but I explained that he wasn¡¯t running a recruitment agency as this was a one-shot deal and so he was in fact running a professional services firm.


    While we waited for Howie to get back to me, we came up with mom¡¯s rescue story. It was pretty simple and relied on my old standby, ¡®Roger did it!¡¯ I started to say how we could get Roger to go with our story, but dad just looked at me and said, ¡°You¡¯re Roger, Abby, so you can drop the act. We¡¯ll be having a long discussion about ¡®Roger¡¯ later.¡± Mom and Paul were confused by this byplay but let it go as I continued explaining that we¡¯d tell everyone how Roger was going over the servers from this mornings raid and found a clue to finding mom. He followed up on it immediately, not even calling me to tell me about it and get my hopes up, and freed her. Roger wouldn¡¯t say where he found her and mom had been locked up underground and never knew where she was being kept. Mom had never seen Roger and she simply woke up at home, in my bed, where he¡¯d left her. It was essentially the same story that Shauna¡¯s brother ,Samuel, had told. The main difference was that mom would refuse to say anything about her time away. If anyone insisted on knowing more about her captors, we¡¯d just explain that there was no point in pursuing them, since Roger had taken care of them.


    ¡°Is there any death benefit payment that we¡¯d need to return to an insurance company?¡±, I asked dad.


    ¡°No. At the time, we couldn¡¯t afford the premiums and few people that young think about insurance.¡±


    ¡°Hey! I¡¯m still that young.¡±, mom protested. Dad just kissed her and kept cleaning up from lunch.


    We continued to make our plans. Once mom¡¯s new look was all set, dad would call John Buckler and tell him about mom¡¯s rescue. That would start the ball rolling on getting mom declared un-dead, which would mean a trip to the DMV for a new driver¡¯s license and to the nearest Social Security Administration office.


    Mom and dad wanted to keep her return as low key as possible. This wasn¡¯t an issue, since we were only still in touch with a handful of people that knew her from before. Harry Kronin, her old boss from the community center and my grandparents. Even Mary O¡¯reilly only knew of her because mom had helped her son Robbie. Everyone else only knew mom by her absence. Pierce, Eva and James, Bobby, Shauna and the team, Mark and Jake. None of them had ever met her and they¡¯d have no previous memories to compare her to. We decided that we¡¯d tell them all quietly, after she¡¯d settled in a bit.


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    After lunch, Paul and I went to Target for some clothes for mom. I was going to go myself, but dad and Paul hadn¡¯t caught on yet to the fact that I¡¯d driven myself to Raleigh and they assumed that I needed someone to drive me. I didn¡¯t really mind. Mom and dad needed some alone time. With mom¡¯s sizes in hand, I piled up on essentials for mom, while Paul browsed the movie section bargain bins to see if there were any worthy movies that mom needed to catch up on immediately. Besides the essential clothing, we also picked up some slippers, a bathrobe, hair products, and toiletries. Eventually, mom would have to come back herself and chose other things like make-up and other pharmaceuticals that I¡¯d seen in Eva¡¯s room. I just didn¡¯t know anything about all that stuff and Paul was just as clueless. He was one of the people who raised me after all.


    Paul¡¯s exaggerated knocking at the door wasn¡¯t necessary, but it did let dad know that we¡¯d returned and he called out to us from the yard. Mom and dad were sitting outside in the yard beside the firepit that dad and I had built last Christmas. Mom had already fallen in love with it. She sat curled up next to dad in the two-seater we¡¯d set up and I paused a few moments to watch them together. Despite the extra age difference between them, they looked so comfortable with each other that it seemed like they¡¯d never been apart.


    Paul and I grabbed a few more chairs and joined them by the fire.


    ¡°I should have known that you¡¯d be out here enjoying your Christmas present¡±, Paul said as he settled comfortably into his chair.


    ¡°Christmas present?¡±


    ¡°Yeah, Abby and Josh made this firepit together for your Christmas present this year. Didn¡¯t he tell you? No, of course he didn¡¯t. Never use two words when none will do. I swear, Josh takes the strong silent type thing to a whole new level. Anyways, every year Abby and Josh would make you a Christmas present. They¡¯d spend all their free time in December working on it. This year it was the firepit.¡±


    Mom sat up and looked at dad and me. ¡°Every year?¡±


    ¡°Abby, can you get the box from the back room please?¡±, dad asked. I was back in two minutes and soon we were showing her all of her presents. The wind chimes from last year, metal flowers and vase from the year before, the set of frames with pictures of our family, the jewelry and the videos. Dad had digitized our videos for mom and had them loaded up and ready to watch on an iPad. We watched every single one and in a small way mom got to see me growing up. Each one ended with dad and I telling her how much we missed her and loved her and hoped to see her soon. Mom cried through most of it. Silent tears running down her face, often while smiling.


    ¡°I can¡¯t believe you guys did all this for me. These gifts are amazing. I love every one of them. Thank you. I¡¯ve missed so much and wish I¡¯d have been there to watch you grow up Abby.¡±


    ¡°Well, at least you¡¯ll get a chance to watch my brother or sister grow up. I¡¯m kinda hoping it¡¯s a brother, though.¡±


    They were all staring at me like I¡¯d just grown another set of eyes on my forehead, and I realized what I¡¯d just said. I¡¯d forgotten to tell anyone about the baby.


    ¡°Abby? Would you mind explaining your last statement, please.¡± Dad was back to his normal serious self.


    ¡°Uhm¡­Mom¡¯s three or four weeks pregnant. I can¡¯t tell the sex of the baby until it¡¯s at least two months old so we¡¯ll have to wait a bit longer for that. So¡­Congratulations!¡±

 B3: Chapter 7 - Fitting Back In

    Uncle Magnum and I had to go back out to pick up a home pregnancy test. Everyone assured me that they believed me, but they just wanted to be extra sure. Uh huh. I had a strong suspicion that my scanning ability was far more accurate than a kit from the pharmacy. I didn¡¯t argue with them though. I hadn¡¯t told them much about my people scanning ability and nothing at all about its medical implication. They didn¡¯t understand just how impossible it was for me to be wrong when it came to spotting a pregnancy.


    The positive test result made the baby real to them in a way that me just saying so couldn¡¯t and resulted in a small celebration and planning session. I baked cookies while mom and dad figured out which of the extra rooms needed to be cleared out for the baby and they started on a list of things we¡¯d need to get. All of my baby things had been given away long ago.


    While the cookies were baking, I got a call from Howie. Through his network, he¡¯d found a make-up artist that sometimes worked for the film industry.


    ¡°She did some work on the first Hunger Games movie when they were filming near Asheville and on the show Homeland. She can see you tomorrow morning, if you¡¯d like. She charges by the hour and takes Bitcoin. She¡¯ll send me the bill and I¡¯ll cover it from your account.¡±


    ¡°You¡¯re incredible, Howie. Before you hang up on me again, I wanted to talk to you about my investment with Gerry. Are there other people in your network that would need that kind of help? I¡¯m sitting on quite a few gemstones. They¡¯re better off being used to help people like Gerry who need start-up capital than sitting in a drawer.¡±


    ¡°I might have a few ideas about that. Let me ask around though and see what the best options are. We¡¯ll want to take it slow so that we don¡¯t flood the market with gemstones and devalue them.¡±


    The next morning, dad drove us out to Asheville for mom¡¯s make-up appointment. We all trouped into Danielle¡¯s kitchen and mom explained that she needed to look five to ten years older for a job interview.


    Danielle studied mom¡¯s face carefully and then looked at the back of mom¡¯s hands and her neck.


    ¡°How much time to you want to spend getting ready every day? If you have few hours every day, I can teach you how to apply a latex mask that will add some fine lines and a few wrinkles to your face. If you don¡¯t have that kind of time or patience, I can teach you a few techniques that will give the impression of age, but won¡¯t hold up to close scrutiny.¡±


    Mom chose the ¡®less is more¡¯ option and Danielle kicked dad and I out while she got to work. With a few hours to kill, dad drove us to a nearby playground and parked away from all the other cars.


    ¡°Abby, I¡¯d like to get a better understanding of your abilities and how they work. I know that you¡¯ll continue going out as Roger and putting yourself in danger. Maybe if I knew more about your abilities, I wouldn¡¯t have to worry so much.¡±


    I let out a deep breath. I¡¯d been afraid that he¡¯d try to stop me from going out as Roger. This seemed much more sensible. ¡°The key thing to remember about my abilities is that although I can do many things, they all derive from a field that always surrounds my body and the ability to manipulate that field. By activating the field and increasing or decreasing the amount of power I project into the field, I can move between reality and the sublayers of reality. When I superimpose two fields, I can move between reality and the layers of reality.¡±


    ¡°I don¡¯t understand the distinction between a layer and a sub-layer.¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s not easy to explain. Think of painting. If you want to make the color green, you need to mix the primary colors yellow and blue. Each of the primary colors is a layer and you combine to get a ¡®green¡¯ reality. When I go into a layer, my physical self is there and it takes no energy to stay there. Meanwhile, a sublayer is like a bubble of those layers that exists in reality. When I¡¯m in a sublayer, I¡¯m still in reality and can see a greyed-out version of people or objects or buildings. I can even listen to what¡¯s going on around me. Being in a sub-layer requires effort from me, like I¡¯m holding a gateway open. Another difference is that besides me, everything I bring into the layers is in stasis. I can negate the stasis by not bringing the object all the way into the layer, but that takes energy too. In the sublayers, anything I bring in can still be used normally. People seem to be the exception to that. In the sublayers, people don¡¯t retain their consciousness. I don¡¯t know why that is. Left in there for a long time, they would starve and if you cut them, they¡¯ll bleed out.¡±


    ¡°Ok, but if all of your abilities derive from controlling your field, how are you able to know if a metal ingot is impure or see miles into the ground or know that your mother is pregnant?¡±


    ¡°I call that scanning. When I move between layers and reality, the field automatically scans the area that I¡¯m shifting into so that I don¡¯t shift into a solid object that exists in reality but doesn¡¯t exist in the layer. For example, if I¡¯m walking down the road in L2, where there are no cars, and I shift to reality, then there¡¯s a chance that I¡¯ll shift into a parked car. The field scans where I¡¯m going to end up and it will shift me over so that I don¡¯t end up meshed with the car. When I started projecting the field away from myself, I eventually learned how to scan everything within it. The information just appeared in my head. Over time, I¡¯ve discovered that I can send out a field for miles in any direction and see what¡¯s inside.¡±


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    ¡°One of the issues that I¡¯ve run into occurs when there¡¯s something in the field that I haven¡¯t come across before. The field will tell me that something is there, but I won¡¯t know what it is. In those instances, if I can figure out what it is, then the field will always identify it as such from then on. For example, Mark took me to see the geology display at the Roark Geology Center. I learned the names and properties of hundreds of minerals and rocks. Now my scans can associate that knowledge with the rocks that I scan and identify what¡¯s there. The same thing happened when I first scanned a person. There were so many things in the body that I didn¡¯t know.¡±


    Dad grilled me for over two hours and I explained my use of multiple field to create a shield and how I could interact with fields in other layers and sublayers. I told him the story of how I¡¯d come to realize that my field could read words printed on magnetic or metallic ink and retain everything that I¡¯d scanned. I described how I started off by scanning my own body and about my experience working in the hospital and more recently with Sister Clara. His biggest shock came when I described trying and failing to save Evan.


    ¡°Do you really think that if Evan¡¯s body hadn¡¯t been already shutting down when you started that you could have saved him?¡±


    ¡°Yes. Even a day earlier could have made the difference.¡±


    ¡°How can you know that?¡±


    ¡°Because I was able to save Sifu Zhang. He had pancreatic cancer and he wasn¡¯t going to last a month when he showed up. I convinced him to try an abandoned drug that I had access to and he got better.¡±


    ¡°You cured him with your field and pretended it was a mysterious drug. Smart. What did you really give him?¡±


    ¡°A vanilla milk shake from McDonald¡¯s¡±.


    Dad laughed out loud. I don¡¯t think that I¡¯d ever gotten him to do that before. I wonder if he was like this before mom disappeared too or if I¡¯d just caught him completely off guard.


    By the time we got back to pick up mom, three hours had passed, but looking at her as she came out of Danielle¡¯s house it seemed that like mom had aged ten years. It wasn¡¯t just her shorter hair with grey streaks running through it or the more mature outfit of a black turtleneck sweater and grey slacks. She held herself differently, more rigidly. Beside the more muted, yet heavier, makeup, Danielle had schooled her in using the subtle nuances of an older person¡¯s body language. She looked like she belonged in a boardroom. I couldn¡¯t believe the difference. Dad was kind of stunned too. He couldn¡¯t take his eyes off of her.


    ¡°I¡¯m going to go against my mother¡¯s teaching and tell you that you don¡¯t look a day under thirty-eight.¡±


    ¡°Aww. Bless your heart Josh, you say the sweetest things!¡±


    I just sat in the back giggling at their silliness.


    As we headed back home, I got an idea and asked dad if he minded taking a slight detour. Heading back to the Charlotte area via Stateville would only add about ten minutes to our trip. It was late Sunday morning and I figured that there was a decent chance of getting an extra jump on moving forward with mom¡¯s reintegration.


    Following my directions, dad turned unto a dead-end street and stopped at the end, in front of a two-story home. A couple were sitting on the front porch, enjoying the day and the remnants of their lunch. Before dad could ask me, again, who we were visiting, I hopped out of the car and walked up the path to the porch.


    ¡°Abby! What are you doing here?¡± John Buckler rose from his chair and came over to give me a hug. Despite being retired for years, he still kept himself in shape and he still towered over me with his 6¡¯4¡± frame.


    ¡°I¡¯d always heard that people shrink as they get older. You¡¯re still giving me a pain in the neck just saying hello.¡±


    John laughed good naturedly at my teasing and we were soon joined by Shannon Johnson for another round of hugs.


    ¡°I took the chance that you¡¯d be here, John. There¡¯s someone that I¡¯d like you both to meet.¡± Motioning them both to follow, I led them back down the path and to the car, where mom and dad were standing just beside our car.


    ¡°Mom, I¡¯d like to introduce you to retired police officer John Buckler and Ms. Shannon Johnson. Guys, this is my mom, Hannah.¡±


    John and Shannon paused in shock as I made the introduction. John looked like he was seeing a ghost. Meanwhile, I could see the misplaced guilt in Shannon¡¯s expression. I took her hand and squeezed it reassuringly. Mom broke the awkward moment by stepping forwards and thanking John for following us that day and trying so hard to find her all these years. Dad and I had told her the whole story yesterday.


    John snapped out of his daze, shook mom¡¯s outstretched hand. Wiping at his suddenly shining eyes, he invited us all in to sit and talk. On the way back to the house, I explained to mom and dad about how I came to she Shannon a few years ago, hoping to find some clue to tracking down mom. Dad stiffened a little when I told them that Shannon was Len¡¯s mother, but I explained how helpful she¡¯d been and how she¡¯d had no idea what her scumbag, kidnapping, son had been up to.


    We spend a pleasant half hour with John and Shannon, bringing them up to date on the saga of mom¡¯s adventures. Mom stuck to our made-up story and confirmed John¡¯s theory that there was a third kidnapper. She told them how Len and Karl had pulled up to the side of the road, next to a van and how she was ushered towards it by a third kidnapper. Just before she was forced inside, she¡¯d put me down and told me to run. I¡¯d run and the kidnappers were too busy shoving her into the van and trying to make sure that she wasn¡¯t seen to chase after me. Their rush to get away from the area was probably what made them go through that red light and get hit by the truck.


    Regarding her time being imprisoned, mom gave no details, saying only that she was trying to leave it all behind her and move on with her life. John asked about her rescue and I took over, explaining about Roger Willoughby and how he worked with the police and the FBI to take down human traffickers. John was surprised by this development and I gave him Captain Steven¡¯s coordinates for him to find out more.


    I breathed a sigh of relief as we got back in the car. We¡¯d made it through the first steps of mom¡¯s return. John had assured us that he would contact the appropriate department to get a report of mom¡¯s rescue into the system and that we could start applying to get her reinstated as a living person within a few days. Hopefully, things would go just as well when we took mom to meet people that she¡¯d been close to, like Harry and her parents.

 B3: Chapter 8 - Back to Life

    ¡°How are you feeling today? Did relaxing this weekend help with your anxiety?¡± Eva greeted me as we met by our lockers at school.


    ¡°I can honestly say that I¡¯m not feeling anxious at all anymore. I feel like a new person.¡± I really did. Finding mom had solved my anxiety issue for good. I wondered what I¡¯d need to worry about next.


    ¡°Maybe I should switch to psychology. I¡¯m pretty good at this advice thing.¡± Eva literally gave herself a pat on the back.


    ¡°Stick to sports medicine. Being right once in your life doesn¡¯t make you pretty good at it.¡± Eva took a casual swipe at me and I automatically dodged it and came back with a counter-attach. Instead of hitting her, I honked her nose and said, ¡°Danielson, ladies no wait forever¡± before heading off to class.


    ¡°Hey! You¡¯re Kung Fu girl. You can¡¯t steal lines from the Karate Kid.¡±


    ¡°Sure I can. The remake with Jaden Smith was called Karate Kid, but all the moves were Kung Fu. Also, Jaden and I share the same last name, so I¡¯m an authority on the subject.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s like saying you¡¯re an authority on gloves, because you and Anna Nicole share the same last name.¡±


    It took me a few seconds to figure out the reference. ¡°Seriously? You¡¯re bringing up OJ and the gloves that didn¡¯t fit? Boomer!¡±


    We argued back and forth until class started and our biology teacher, Mrs. Cranston, handed out a pop quiz. Thirty-five multiple choice questions and a diagram of the heart where we had to label all the parts. There was a bonus section on the last page where we could get extra points for labeling the diagram of the muscular system. It was disingenuous of her to call this a pop quiz. This was clearly of test proportions and a few of the students correctly took her to task over it. She ignored their arguments and told them they were wasting time.


    I finished the ¡®quiz¡¯ in ten minutes and spent a few more minutes adding in labels to areas that Mrs. Cranston hadn¡¯t marked off. I practically filled the page before I¡¯d gotten bored and decided to just hand it all in to the teacher. Mrs. Cranston looked up in curiosity as I dropped off my test and seemed about to say something. Instead, she looked down at my test and started going over it. I returned to my seat. With nothing else to do for the rest of class, I put in my ear buds and watched YouTube videos of surgeries. At least Mrs. Cranston couldn¡¯t accuse me of not working on biology.


    I¡¯d managed to watch a few videos before I noticed Mrs. Cranston getting up from her desk and heading towards me. ¡°Since you¡¯ve finished your test, I¡¯d like you to come sit up front and work on these for the rest of class.¡± She booted Elsa Traeger from her seat at the front of the class to my seat at the back and I sat up front with my extra work, wondering what this was all about. She¡¯d given me a packet of diagrams like the ones I¡¯d just filled out for the test, each on a different system of the body and several on cell structures. There was also three pages of words that needed to be defined.


    I looked over the pages and shrugged. I had nothing better to do, so I dug in. Like the quiz, it was all very basic, but it was still better than sitting through a regular class and waiting for it to end. By the time the two-hour double biology class was over, I¡¯d finished the packet and two more besides. These other packets were all short answer questions and so they¡¯d taken a bit longer to finish.


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    ¡°When did you become a biology genius?¡± Eva asked as we walked out together.


    ¡°In October. That¡¯s when I developed a photographic memory. It¡¯s comes in real handy. You should try it.¡±


    ¡°Smartass.¡±


    There rest of the day wasn¡¯t nearly as engaging and I found myself almost wishing for more pop-quizzes. Two more months. I kept repeating that to myself. Then exams and graduation. Two more months.


    Having rescheduled all the imaging patients from Saturday to this week meant that I was scanning people non-stop throughout my two hour after-school shift at the clinic. This week it was mostly paramedics getting scanned, along with a smattering of police officers that had been putting it off as long as they could. Next week the firemen were coming in. When she heard about that, Eva kindly offered to help me.


    ¡°I can bring them those backless gowns and slippers to change into and walk behind them as they go in to get scanned.¡±


    I laughed and answered, ¡°They don¡¯t change into gowns. The scans go through clothes.¡±


    ¡°They don¡¯t have to know that.¡±


    At home, I came in to find mom and dad cooking dinner together. That was so weird. I could easily get used to it though.


    ¡°Did we have so many of those things before?¡±, I asked mom.


    ¡°You mean pots and pans? No. You guys only had the two that you used for pasta. Your father had to take me to Walmart to get some more and to buy some real food.¡±


    ¡°Hey! We eat salads all the time. Also look, no scurvy!¡± I pulled back my lips to show her my teeth and gums.


    Mom laughed and continued breaded the chicken. Raw chicken looks pretty disgusting. ¡°Didn¡¯t you guys ever get tired of pasta and salads?¡±


    ¡°Sure. That¡¯s what the Olive Garden is for. And Domino¡¯s.¡±


    I got my very first facepalm from mom for that.


    After dinner, I started off on my plans to bring mom up to date on all the movies she¡¯d missed out on. Compared to the movies of the eighties and nineties, the past thirteen years hadn¡¯t had much to offer that was worthy, unless you enjoyed CGI superheroes. I did, dad didn¡¯t, so I started her off with the Harry Potter series. The first few had come out before she¡¯d gone into L2, but she hadn¡¯t seen them. I had been too young for them.


    Uncle Magnum tried to convince us to wait until the weekend so he could join us with Maggie, but I wanted to get started right away. I didn¡¯t want mom to miss out on all the pop culture references that I made. I already had dad for that. If I was taking the week off from Kung Fu, I wanted to make sure that it was for a good reason. Mom¡¯s education was just that important.


    By Wednesday, mom had the kitchen organized just the way she liked it. This meant that dad and I no longer knew where anything was and it was full of things that we had no idea what to do with. Who uses a spice or even has multiple spices that would necessitate an entire rack? She¡¯d rounded out her wardrobe considerably and gotten a few odds and ends to give the house a homier feel to it. She was also going stir crazy.


    ¡°I miss working at the community center and taking care of little Abby. Abby¡¯s all grown up now and doesn¡¯t need me to help her with anything. There¡¯s only so much organizing I can do around the house. I need to be doing something. Something worthwhile.¡±


    I was heading to the kitchen to grab a late-night snack when I overheard mom and dad talking in the Parlor. I already decided that I was going to stop and listen so I shifted to R1. There was no point in getting caught eavesdropping.


    ¡°There¡¯s a community center here you could volunteer at and in eight months you¡¯ll have a new baby to look after.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯ve checked out the center online. The old center had programs for at risk kids where I could make a positive difference in someone¡¯s life. This center is more like a recreation center. Swimming, basketball, yoga, fitness classes and weight training. There¡¯s nothing for me to add there. Even if they did have a program there, I still couldn¡¯t start there because I¡¯d have to stop in six months when I¡¯m closer to term.¡±


    ¡°We should move up our plans for Harry to come over. He might have some ideas for you. He is the dean of a university now. He has to have connections to various programs all over the state.¡±


    ¡°Ok. How about Friday?¡±


    I shifted back to reality and continued on my way to the kitchen. I needed to nip that dinner in the bud for now or at least delay it by a day or two. It simply did not fit into my plans for mom.

 B3: Chapter 9 - Jake

    ¡°Hi Jake. How are you?¡±


    ¡°Abby. I¡¯m glad you called. I have a bone to pick with you. What¡¯s the big idea with you getting Zack all worked up about the dinosaur in Arizona. He¡¯s been calling me everyday for the past week and a half asking for pictures and updates on the dig. His parents have even called asking if I¡¯d take him out there to see it. I don¡¯t have time for that and Mark¡¯s got school.¡±


    ¡°I can hear you laughing, Abby. It¡¯s not funny. I was hoping to get him interested in mining and you ruined it.¡±


    When I got myself under control, I answered him. ¡°Jake, you of all people should know the expression, ¡°There¡¯s more than one way to skin a cat.¡± Boys his age love dinosaurs. It tends to wear off when they discover sports or girls. You need to introduce mining to him now, purely as a side order, and let him grow into it. Take him out to Arizona. He¡¯ll worship you for it and at least humor you when you need to stop in at a mine on the way there or back. Make sure that you tell him all about the fossils that you come across while mining and the old set of bones you found years ago. If you have any fossils, be sure to have one on hand to give to him. He¡¯ll be dipping his toe in the pond, so to speak. You want his excitement for dinosaurs to bleed into mining.¡±


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    ¡°You¡¯re saying I should manipulate my ten-year-old grandson? That¡¯s evil, Abby, and I¡¯m ashamed to even know you.¡± His words said one thing, but his tone said another.


    ¡°Manipulate is such an ugly word. Think of it more as guiding your grandson to a more lucrative career choice. You don¡¯t think that it¡¯s actually a good idea to let kids make their own choices, do you? Look what happened to me. My dad let me make my own choice and I¡¯m not going to college and have no idea what to do with my life.¡±


    ¡°Ha. I think you¡¯ve lost track of your point, Abby, but I get your meaning. It¡¯s kind of like when a man is interested in a woman, so he asks her friend to dance.¡±


    ¡°Damn, now I¡¯m not sure if that was my point or not.¡±


    ¡°Regardless, I¡¯ll be taking you up on your advice. I¡¯m sure that¡¯s not why you¡¯re calling me though. What can I help you with today.¡±


    ¡°I was hoping that you could invite Harry over to your place for dinner on Friday.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s a good idea in it¡¯s own right. Why do you want it to happen?¡±


    ¡°My dad¡¯s going to invite him over to our place on Friday, but I need to delay the dinner by a day or two.¡±


    ¡°Why?¡±


    ¡°Because my plans are only coming to fruition this weekend and dinner on Friday with Harry could mess them up.¡±


    ¡°What plans are those, Abby?¡±


    ¡°Can¡¯t tell you yet. It¡¯s nothing that you¡¯ll object to, I can assure you of that. In fact, if you¡¯re not doing anything on Saturday or Sunday night, I¡¯ll see if I can wrangle you up an invite as well and you can see what it¡¯s all about.¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s a deal. I¡¯ll go call Harry. Is it ok if I bring Mark along? He loves your surprises almost as much as I do.¡±

 B3: Chapter 10 - Playdate

    Dinner with Harry was set for Saturday night, since he was already spoken for on Friday. That Harry sure is a busy guy. I also took the opportunity to get Jake and Mark added to the guest list.


    ¡°Since we don¡¯t have any plans for Friday night, is it ok to invite over some of my friends to meet you, mom?¡±


    ¡°Sure. I used to love your little playdates.¡±


    I stared at her, my face completely impassive and blinked a few times.


    ¡°Ok. So not a playdate. Got it. Just friends coming over. Yup.¡± She managed to hold her laughter in, but her eyes and pursed lips gave the game away. I did admire her ability to hold herself in check. That is, until she added, ¡°I¡¯ll just bake some cookies and make sure we have plenty of juice boxes and some of those snack-pack pudding cups. You always loved those.¡± Yeah. She was definitely amusing herself. I was not a big fan of her humor.


    I left for school with her laughter still ringing in my ears. Having mom around was going to take some getting used to. Sometimes she was mom and other times she was another version of Uncle Paul. I suppose that¡¯s what comes of him being her older brother.


    Something weird was going on in school. Every single one of my teachers called on me to answer at least one question. Often, they asked me several questions. I didn¡¯t even have to raise my hand or anything. I¡¯d just be sitting there, minding my own business, doodling in my notebook to pass away the time, and they called on me. This had only happened a handful of times over the past four years and now it was happening in every class? James noticed it and asked me about it. I just shrugged and told him I had no clue.


    When my chemistry teacher, Mr. Rayburn, gave us surprise pop-quiz, I knew something was up. First, he didn¡¯t do pop-quizzes, surprise or otherwise. All his test dates were marked off at the beginning of the year and he never varied from them. Second, his entire grading formula was spelled out clearly and there was no room for pop-quizzes.


    Despite the inconsistencies, Mr. Rayburn handed out the quizzes and we got to work. There weren¡¯t any multiple choice questions and the bonus questions seemed to be beyond what he¡¯d taught in class. There were plenty of questions involving chemical equations and even a blank periodic table to fill out. It took me a little over twenty minutes to finish the quiz and when I handed it in, Mr. Rayburn handed me a packet of extra work. Now it all started to make sense. Mrs. Cranston had been talking about my quiz results with the other teachers and they all wanted to verify her findings. I¡¯d gotten a perfect score on that test, along with all the bonus points.


    This wasn¡¯t good. I had two months left and jumping through hoops like a trained monkey was not the way I planned on spending it. If I¡¯d have caught on earlier, I could have sandbagged this test and stuck a solid eighty. I was also pretty upset that the whole class had to go through this charade. Couldn¡¯t Mr. Rayburn simply have asked me to stay after school and given just me the test?


    I handed Mr. Rayburn the packet back untouched. He seemed about to object, but I folded my arms and gave him a look that dared him to push this further. I¡¯d expected him to be upset and send me to see the principle and so was surprised when he simply pushed the packet back towards me and said, ¡°This isn¡¯t a bad thing. Please do your best.¡±


    Stolen novel; please report.


    It was the please that caught my attention and I gave in. Whatever it was that the teachers were planning, I¡¯d give it a chance. I¡¯d also mention to Mr. Rayburn that I¡¯d be more cooperative if they stopped torturing the whole class just to get me to answer a few questions.


    There was an awful lot of grumbling after the test. No one was happy and quite a few of the students stayed after class to ask Mr. Rayburn what was going on. I wasn¡¯t one of them. I needed to hurry to the clinic to do work the scanner and then I had to get home in time to shower and change before dinner.


    At home, I did take a minute to indulge in some payback for this morning. As I walked into the kitchen, I saw that mom was putting the finishing elements together for a meal for me and my friends. She must have grilled dad because several of my favorites were there. Pizza, Ravioli and garlic bread. I gave mom a stricken look and said, ¡°Oh. My friends are just coming over for a few minutes to say hi. We made reservations at the Olive Garden.¡± Mom¡¯s tried to hide it, but the disappointment was plain to see and then I added, ¡°I¡¯m kidding. Thank you for making dinner for my playdate¡±.


    ¡°I can¡¯t believe that you just did that to your own mother.¡± Mom shook her head in wonderment.


    ¡°I did warn you that Abby has an overdeveloped sense of vengeance. For awhile, I was thinking of legally changing her name to Inigo.¡± Now mom and I both stared in shock. Dad had just made a Princess Bride reference. Probably for the first time in his life.


    ¡°What?¡± Mom and I were still staring, our teasing forgotten. ¡°I¡¯ve sat through that movie dozens of times for the two of you. You don¡¯t think I can remember a few of the lines and use one when it¡¯s appropriate to the subject at hand?¡±


    ¡°Well, we didn¡¯t think that you were actually paying attention. Anyways, I need to go get ready for my playdate.¡±


    Half an hour later, squeaky clean and having donned fresh clothes, I let Bobby, Eva and James in and led them into the kitchen.


    ¡°Wow. That¡¯s a lot of food. You didn¡¯t have time to do this after school and work, and this isn¡¯t your dad¡¯s¡­style of cooking. Where¡¯d you order it from?¡± Eva was eyeing the food appreciatively and looked up as mom and dad walked into the kitchen.


    ¡°Guys, I¡¯d like to introduce you to my mom. Mom, these are my friends, Eva and James and Bobby.¡±


    Bobby was the first to shrug off the effects of the little bomb I¡¯d set off in front of them all.


    ¡°Hello Mrs. Smith. It¡¯s nice to meet you. I¡¯m Bobby Draker. Abby¡¯s boyfriend. Knowing Abby and her love for surprising people, I¡¯m pretty sure that she didn¡¯t tell you anything about me.¡±


    ¡°Hi Bobby. Please call me Hannah and no, she didn¡¯t. I apologize for her rudeness. Maybe after dinner, we can sit down and I can show you some baby pictures of Abby and tell you some embarrassing stories about her.¡± Bobby positively beamed and nodded his head in agreement.


    ¡°That wouldn¡¯t be conductive to your short-term survival, Bobby.¡±


    Bobby sighed and gave mom his best put-upon look. ¡°It was too good to last.¡± He was doing well up until that point and he had to ruin it by adding, ¡°It must be nice to be able to tease Abby and not be worried about getting kicked in the face.¡±


    Mom and dad both laughed and I pretend-simmered on the side. This whole byplay gave Eva and James a chance to process the information that my mom was really back and James stepped up to say hi and welcome her back to home. Whereas James was formal and courteous with mom, Eva rushed in and hugged her. Still embracing mom, Eva said, ¡°I¡¯m so excited to meet you. Abby is completely useless when it comes to make-up and fashion and boys and she won¡¯t listen to me. I could really use your help.¡±


    After her initial surprise at the embrace, mom hugged Eva back and said, ¡°I¡¯m afraid that it might be too late for that, Eva, but I¡¯ll see what I can do.¡±


    ¡°Okay. Enough with the pick on Abby festival. The food is getting cold.¡±

 B3: Chapter 11 - Hannah Foundation

    ¡°Josh, I blame you for this. Before I pulled a Rip-Van-Winkle for thirteen years, Abby was a late sleeper.¡±


    ¡°I remember it differently. You were the late sleeper and I took care of Abby until you managed to drag yourself out of bed and have your first coffee of the day.¡±


    ¡°No. My memories of it are much more recent that yours. It¡¯s been less than a week for me since Abby was four, so I¡¯m right and this is all your fault.¡±


    I¡¯d woken mom and dad up early on Saturday morning. Since mom had missed my childhood, I decided to give her a little taste of it by running into their room at six-thirty this morning and jumping on their bed, yelling, ¡°Time to get up. Time to get up. Lots to do today. Up and attem. Come on lazybones. Let¡¯s get a move on.¡±


    Apparently, while this passes for really cute behavior in a four-year-old, it somehow loses that cuteness when you¡¯re seventeen. Maybe it¡¯s the size difference. Regardless, mom was not amused. Dad was smiling though, and I enjoyed it immensely.


    ¡°I was always an early riser. You get to pack more into your day that way and we have reservations at eight this morning so you need to get up and have breakfast.¡±


    ¡°Reservations? Where? Why didn¡¯t you mention this last night?¡±


    ¡°Because it¡¯s a surprise.¡±


    ¡°Did you know anything about this?¡± Mom questioned dad accusingly.


    ¡°No. I would have counseled her to make it later, dear.¡± Dad got a glare for his patronizing tone. If mom had laser beam eyes, dad would have been scorched.


    ¡°I couldn¡¯t make it any later. I¡¯m working this morning from nine to noon. Then I have to go over to Uncle Magnum¡¯s for a class. I¡¯ve already missed a whole week of classes. I can feel my body sliding into decrepitude.¡±


    ¡°Uncle who?¡±


    ¡°Uncle Magnum. Your brother?¡±


    ¡°Should I even ask?¡±, mom asked while looking towards dad.


    ¡°Paul and Abby used to watch old shows together. He made the mistake of showing her Magnum P.I. some years ago. Abby thinks they have identical mustaches and now he is Uncle Magnum or Sifu Magnum. Abby appreciates the humor in this more that he does.¡±


    ¡°Hmmm. I think I¡¯m ok with that. He used to tease me all the time when we were kids.¡±


    I let out a loud sigh and hopped up and down a few times like an impatient child. ¡°Enough lying around. We have to go. Oh, you¡¯ll need your ¡®old woman¡¯ clothes and make-up.¡±


    A pillow came flying towards me, but I punched it in midair and it didn¡¯t get up again.


    Mom took her time getting ready and we didn¡¯t make it out of the house for another hour. Since I had my driver¡¯s permit, I took the driver¡¯s seat, leaving dad to be the passenger and mom to take up the back seat.


    ¡°You drive very well, Abby. Who have you been practicing with?¡±, dad asked.


    ¡°No one. I¡¯ve been driving in L2 for almost a year now. It¡¯s great because there are no other cars around. Nothing to bash into, no traffic, no traffic signs to follow.¡±


    ¡°I see. And what car have you been using?¡± Whoops.


    ¡°I borrowed it from someone who won¡¯t be needing for the next few decades.¡±


    Dad didn¡¯t respond to this statement and I took that to mean that we¡¯d have a longer discussion about it later.


    We pulled up to the front gates of Hannah¡¯s Home and I used my access card at the reader to open them up before driving to the main building. Shauna had managed to get all the security measures in place at the start of the new year.


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    ¡°What is this place?¡±, mom asked as we got out of the car.


    ¡°This is Hannah¡¯s Home, headquarters for the Hannah Foundation. I started the foundation last summer as an organization dedicated to helping the victims of human trafficking and their families. We offer temporary housing, personal counseling, career counseling, legal aid, job retraining, schooling, health evaluations, and self defense courses to survivors and to their family members that stay with them. Our goal is to help survivors learn to deal with their past and prepare for their future. For many of them, returning to their old lives isn¡¯t psychologically possible. We help them find new paths to follow.¡±


    ¡°You created this foundation? For me?¡±, mom was tearing up and dad put his arm around her.


    ¡°I wanted you to have a place that would have the resources to help you recover from your captivity and rebuild your life, if you ever made it out. I never imagined that you weren¡¯t being held anywhere, so a lot of what it has to offer won¡¯t be helpful to you. I brought you here today because I overheard you and dad talking the other night and thought that the foundation would be the perfect place for you to work. You¡¯d be helping people in a meaningful way, just like at your old community center, and you could work here right up until the baby is born. There are three nurse practitioners that live on site. Even after the baby is born, we could set up a nursery next to your office.¡±


    Mom took a few steps towards me and brought me in for a hug. ¡°Thank you, Abby. I¡¯m so proud of you and what you¡¯ve created here. It sounds like a wonderful place.¡±


    Mom¡¯s are very mushy people. Also, this is yet another reason to not wear make-up. When I finished crying, I only had to wipe my eyes and wait a minute for the redness to go away. Mom had to use the car mirror to reapply makeup.


    I took mom into the administration building to meet Shauna, Jenny and Gabriel. Normally they all wouldn¡¯t be here on a Saturday, but we still had about half of the survivors from last weekend¡¯s rescue operation staying with us. Combined with the nearly two dozen survivors that had been with us before that, we were really stretching the limits of our available resources when it came to personnel. Shauna was already holding interviews for new positions.


    ¡°Abby! I¡¯m so glad you¡¯re here. I know you¡¯ve had some sort of a family emergency but I need your signature on several orders and I¡¯d like to run a few of the candidates by you.¡± Shauna was talking to me and looking at some paperwork at the same time, so she hadn¡¯t seen mom and dad walk in behind me.


    ¡°I might have some time before my shift at the clinic. Otherwise, I can stop by tomorrow morning after I see Sifu Zhang. Right now, though, I¡¯d like to introduce you to my family emergency. Shauna, this is my mother, Hannah. Mom, this is Shauna Martinez. She¡¯s the administrative head of the Hannah Foundation.¡±


    Shauna kept her expression neutral, but I could see the dilation of her eyes as she took in my mother standing before her. She came over right away and greeted mom warmly.


    ¡°When did this happen? Did Roger have something to do with this?¡±


    ¡°A few hours after the big rescue, Roger found a connection to mom on Phil¡¯s computer. He followed it up and the next thing I knew, he¡¯d dropped mom off in my room. He used the same drug on her as he used on Samuel and she doesn¡¯t remember anything about the rescue.¡±


    ¡°And you couldn¡¯t tell me all this last week because¡­.?¡± Shauna let her sentence drag on a bit, willing me to fill in the rest.


    ¡°Because I wanted to surprise you. I only told her about this place five minutes ago when we pulled in.¡±


    ¡°Hannah, I would offer to take Abby out behind that woodshed and teach her some common courtesy, but she¡¯s my boss. She¡¯d also beat me to a pulp.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s ok, Shauna. I understand. She might be my boss too, if I take her up on the job offer that she just made me a few minutes ago. I could ask my brother to make her life difficult in his classes, if you¡¯d like.¡±


    ¡°Definitely not. Abby runs some of the classes for both Sifu Paul and Sifu Zhang. She¡¯d just return the favor one day when I¡¯m in class and I¡¯ve noticed that Abby never gives back less that she gets.¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s her overdeveloped sense of vengeance. I was a victim of that just yesterday.¡± Mom let out a long suffering sigh.


    ¡°Why do people keep talking about me as if I¡¯m not here? How about we start the tour mom? My shift starts in less than an hour and we have a lot to see.¡±


    I introduced mom to Jenny and Gabriel on the way out. They¡¯re reactions weren¡¯t so muted as Shauna¡¯s had been. I got a bear-crushing hug from Jenny and a high-five from Gabriel. Both were very respectful towards mom.


    Shauna joined us on our tour and after a few minutes of her interrupting my spiel with tons of extra details, I dragged her over next to mom and told Shauna to take over. Dad and I followed quietly behind the two of them and listened to Shauna answer all of mom¡¯s endless questions.


    ¡°She¡¯s going to fit in very well here, Abby. Thank you for offering her a place.¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s not exactly how I¡¯d envisioned it a few years ago, but she¡¯s the reason this place exists. She¡¯ll always have a place here. Although, between Shauna, mom and Diane, I may not have anything left to do.¡±


    ¡°I know you, Abby. If those three displace you here, then it¡¯s what you intended to happen. You already have the next move planned. Perhaps the next two or three moves. Would you like to share those plans with me?¡±


    ¡°Sure. First, I¡¯m going to graduate high school. Then, I have an independent study program that I¡¯d like to undertake this summer. After that, I have a few ideas that I want to explore for expanding the foundation. It¡¯s still not quite doing what I wanted it to do.¡±

 B3: Chapter 12 - Harry鈥檚 Surprise

    With Shauna¡¯s assurance that she¡¯d drive mom and me home later, dad drove to the university to continue working on his own project there, while I headed to the clinic. Mom and Shauna were going to continue the tour and get mom introduced to all the staff. They¡¯d come around to visit the clinic at the end of my shift.


    Sisters Clara, Olivia and Amelia were overjoyed to find out that mom had been rescued and were delighted to show her around. Shauna drove us home right afterwards and I headed off for Kung Fu, where Sifu Zhang and Uncle Magnum were so excited about my return that they gave me extra push-ups during plank.


    It felt good to be back. Bobby wasn¡¯t in class today, but Mark, Tyler and Maggie were. I would have liked to work a little with them, but Sifu Zhang had other plans for me and between him and Charlie, I paid for my week of indulgence. Thirty minutes of warm up, thirty minutes of non-stop stamina exercises and thirty minutes of sparring. I didn¡¯t usually go for a mid-day nap, but after that class, I seriously considered it.


    Home and showered, I helped mom with preparations for the dinner party with Harry, Jake and Mark. While she worked, she asked me about Mark and Jake and how I¡¯d met them. I kept the details to a minimum and explained about the fire and saving Mark and how I¡¯d gotten to know his family afterwards. That led to telling her about finding the rubies and about the auction and how that led to being able to open the foundation years ahead of schedule and in a much bigger way.


    Mentioning the foundation sent mom into another round of praise for what I¡¯d created there. I tried to pass it off with an ¡®aw shucks, ma¡¯am, twerent nothin to it¡¯, but mom wasn¡¯t having any of it. She told me what a wonderful place it was and how she¡¯d met a few survivors already and listened to them explain how the foundation was helping them take back control of their lives. She was really excited to start working there.


    Mark and Jake were the first to arrive. I¡¯d worked it out with mom that she should only come out once everyone was there. I was going for maximum effect. Jake handed me a bottle of wine as he walked in, but Mark held back a bit at the entryway, looking around warily.


    ¡°Mark? Are you ok?¡±


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    ¡°I¡¯m just wondering if there are any giant flying pudding bowls around.¡± I heard dad and Jake have a chuckle at that.


    I grabbed his arm and pulled him in. ¡°You¡¯re safe for now. I told them to come around later in case I need them. Hopefully, you¡¯ve learned your lesson and won¡¯t tease a lady about her weight this time.¡±


    ¡°Oh, I¡¯d never tease a lady. I was raised better than that.¡±


    ¡°Are you implying that I¡¯m not a lady?¡±


    Jake spoke up before I could lash out at Mark. ¡°Mark, come in here and have a seat before Abby decides to show us how many ways she knows to make your butt hit the ground.¡±


    Mark broke out a sheepish grin, bowed slightly at the waist and said, ¡°Hello Abby. Thank you inviting us to join you for dinner tonight. It¡¯s an absolute pleasure to be here.¡±


    Mollified, I played hostess and offered drinks to our guests. Soon Mark had us all laughing at his stories of the tortures he was enduring at the hands of Sifu¡¯s Paul and Zhang. ¡°When Abby is the gentlest person in the room, you know you¡¯re in trouble.¡± Having faced similar tortures, I really couldn¡¯t disagree with his views.


    Harry arrived and I brought him in to the Parlor to join the others. I let him get settled and have a bit of time to chit-chat before I excused myself for a moment and went to get mom. Mom looked amazing in her new outfit. The style was the same as the one that Danielle had set up for her, turtleneck sweater and slacks, but mom made a few subtle changes, such as a chunkier cable-nit and wider pant leg, that really added to the casual elegance of the look. As we passed my room, I suddenly stopped and brought her back. I¡¯d completely forgotten that I still had her jewelry box.


    Mom¡¯s eyes lit up with joy at seeing her old jewelry and I helped her pick out a pair of diamond studded earrings and a gold link bracelet to add to her ensemble. With these final touches, I led mom to the Parlor.


    Mark noticed us first and a crease furrowed his brow. He was curious to know who I was with, but he waited for me to make the introduction. When dad turned towards us, Jake and Harry followed his gaze. Jake¡¯s and Harry¡¯s expressions mirrored Mark¡¯s, but Harry eyes quickly changed to recognition.


    ¡°It can¡¯t be¡­¡± Harry struggled for a bit, trying to get his legs to work and get up. The hand holding his drink as shaking a bit and dad quickly relieved him of the glass. Harry continued staring at mom, like he was seeing a ghost and mom smiled at him, her own eyes going all shiny.


    Harry walked up to mom on leaden feet. I think he was afraid that she¡¯d simply vanish if he moved too quickly. Mom opened her arms out to him and he caught her up in hug and we could all hear the relieved laughter that bubbled out of him as he held her and said, ¡°You¡¯re alive! I can¡¯t believe it.¡±


    ¡°Jake, Mark. I¡¯d like you both to meet my mother, Hannah.¡±

 B3: Chapter 13 - Dr. Abby

    ¡°Thank you, Abby¡±


    ¡°What for Jake?¡±


    ¡°For inviting me tonight. I came because you said you had a plan in the works and I enjoy seeing you in action. This exceeded all my expectations. I¡¯ve been with Harry through a lot of tough times over the past few years and seen him lose a lot of the people that he loved. To be there with him when he gets one of them back is very special to me.¡±


    I looked over at Harry and mom, sitting next to each other at the end of the table with dad. Harry was telling mom a story from the old days, about some of their old coworkers, and mom was listening intently. I¡¯d never seen Harry so animated, so full of life.


    ¡°He does seem pretty happy.¡±, I answered, as I watched a trickle of sweat run down the side of Harry¡¯s face. Why was he sweating? I looked closer and realized that his face was redder than before and he looked sick. Unconsciously, Harry right arm massaged his chest. I scanned him and I straightened up involuntarily. My mind raced through my options for what seemed like minutes but was probably only a few seconds, before I decided what I needed to do.


    I left the table and returned a few moments later with a stethoscope in my hands. I didn¡¯t need it for anything, but it made for a great prop and it would help explain how I knew certain things. I walked over to Harry¡¯s side and interrupted his story.


    ¡°Harry, I need you to sit back for a few minutes and relax. You need to focus on your breathing.¡±


    ¡°Abby? What¡¯s going on?¡±


    ¡°Harry. You¡¯re sweating in a cool room, you¡¯re short of breath, your face is turning red, and you¡¯ve been having mild chest pains for a little while now. I need you to relax before you have a stroke.¡±


    I held his wrist and pretended to be checking his heart rate and asked him if he had high blood pressure.


    ¡°Yes, my doctor has had me on medication for several years now. Abby, I¡¯m fine. I get this sometimes. I goes away in a few minutes.¡±


    I put the stethoscope on and reached over to unbutton the top buttons of Harry¡¯s shirt. ¡°Hey! Don¡¯t you think that you should buy me dinner first?¡±, Harry joked.


    ¡°I just did. Now be quiet and let me have my way with you, old man.¡± I listened to his heart. It didn¡¯t tell me anything that I didn¡¯t know already or pretend to do with his wrist, but everyone had come to expect that of a doctor and it gives people a sense of comfort.


    ¡°Why do have a stethoscope anyways, Abby?¡±


    ¡°My boyfriend and I like to play doctor and it was on sale on eBay for ten dollars. I couldn¡¯t not buy it. Don¡¯t worry, I clean it with an alcohol swab after each use.¡± I heard a chortle from Jake and Mark turned pink. I did get a nice face-palm from dad. Mom on the other hand ignored my comments and asked if Harry was ok.


    ¡°No, he¡¯s not. His symptoms could be caused by over seventy-five different things. I¡¯m going to see if I can narrow them down.¡± I proceeded to take his medical history, going down a mental checklist that I¡¯d scanned in one of the medical textbooks.


    ¡°I¡¯m almost certain that it¡¯s coronary heart disease, probably caused by clogged arteries.¡±


    ¡°Well, you don¡¯t have to keep wondering. You¡¯re right. My doctor diagnosed it using ultrasound a few years back. He gave me some medication and told me to change my diet.¡±


    ¡°Have you been taking your medication?¡±


    ¡°Most days.¡±


    ¡°Did you change your diet?¡±


    ¡°I tried it for awhile. It was awful and I didn¡¯t want to live that way. I chose to live life on my own terms.¡±


    ¡°Let me see if I can translate that into English. You chose to continue clogging your arteries and cut your life expectancy down by twenty or thirty years.¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s not that bad, Abby. I¡¯ll be fine.¡±


    ¡°Have you been getting any exercise lately, Harry?¡±


    ¡°No.¡±


    ¡°Because you¡¯ve been too tired and I bet it¡¯s been getting worse. Much worse. Your heart is working too hard because it has to push blood through arteries that are getting smaller and smaller. With less blood circulating through your body, your organs are getting less oxygen. Oxygen is what keeps us alive. It¡¯s what our body uses to repair itself. The less you get, the less you live. Once your artery is completely blocked, and I think it¡¯s not too far from that right now, you¡¯ll have a heart attack. If it doesn¡¯t kill you, it¡¯ll probably leave you impaired in some way and then you and I can sit down and you can try to tell me about how you¡¯ve chosen to live life on your own damn terms. Only you won¡¯t be able to because you probably won¡¯t be able to talk and your hands won¡¯t work properly.¡±


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    ¡°Abby¡­¡±


    ¡°Don¡¯t ¡®Abby¡¯ me. You¡¯re not fine and you know it. There are several options available to treat this condition, all with excellent success rates. You have your own medical school at your disposal. You know how good the doctors there are. Why haven¡¯t you gone in for surgery?¡±


    After it became apparent that Harry wasn¡¯t going to answer me, Jake answered for him. ¡°His mother and his first wife both died due to surgical complications. His mother from an infection and his wife from a mistake. A few of our friends passed away under similar circumstances. He doesn¡¯t believe he¡¯ll survive any surgery.¡±


    ¡°Not your story to tell, Jake.¡± Harry was glaring at Jake.


    ¡°No, it isn¡¯t. Only you weren¡¯t going to say anything and Abby isn¡¯t the kind to let you get away with it, so I stepped in to save everyone the time. If you don¡¯t like it, I¡¯m sorry and I take it back. Everyone, please forget I said anything.¡±


    ¡°I think I¡¯ll head on home now. Hannah, thank you for dinner. I can¡¯t begin to tell you how glad I am that you¡¯ve been returned to us.¡± With those words, Harry got up and took a few steps towards the door before losing his balance and falling to the ground. Dad and Jake were by his side in moments and started getting him up.


    ¡°Bring him to my room, dad.¡±


    ¡°Shouldn¡¯t we call an ambulance?¡±, Mark asked.


    ¡°There¡¯s nothing they can do for him if he refuses any surgical intervention. He¡¯ll be more comfortable here and I have something that might help him.¡±


    Everyone turned to look at me. ¡°Staring at me won¡¯t get him better. Go on, get him to my room and lay him down.¡±


    Dad and Mark ended up half carrying, half dragging Harry to my room and laying him down on my bed.


    ¡°Harry. I have a non-surgical treatment for your clogged arteries, but I won¡¯t use it on you unless you give me the go-ahead. I won¡¯t waste it if your intention is to die.¡±


    Between half breaths, Harry said, ¡°There are no non-surgical treatments for this.¡±


    ¡°Actually, there are a few. They¡¯re not backed by clinical studies and they¡¯re mostly anecdotal, but they do exist. They also need months to take effect. My therapy is faster. Do I have your permission to go ahead?¡±


    ¡°If there¡¯s no surgery, then I give my permission.¡±


    ¡°Great. I need everyone except for dad to clear out.¡±


    When the room cleared, I shifted Harry to R1 and turned to dad. Before I could say anything, he asked, ¡°Can you really help him?¡±


    ¡°Sure. That part¡¯s easy. The hard part will be making it look like I did something that isn¡¯t completely impossible. I¡¯m going to need to do a lot of handwaving and fancy hocus pocus.¡±


    ¡°You¡¯re going to hide your abilities by doing ¡®magic¡¯?¡±


    ¡°No, I meant that figuratively. In medicine, if you want to do magic, you just have to label it as ¡®Eastern¡¯ medicine. Nobody here seems to understand it, but they all pay lip service to how they believe it¡¯s on par with Western medicine. I¡¯ll need to go to the kitchen and pull together some ingredients and chop them up and mash them into a paste. I¡¯m really glad that my mortar and pestle arrived already. That makes this sort of thing look official.¡±


    ¡°You¡¯re too young to be this jaded.¡±


    ¡°Well, it¡¯s true. Anyways, I do believe that many of the Eastern medicines work. It¡¯s only that none of them work for this.¡±


    ¡°What will you do with your paste once you have it?¡±


    ¡°I¡¯ll pretend to mix it with some orange juice and make him drink it. Then I¡¯ll send him back to L2 and remove the plaque from his arteries. It won¡¯t cure him right away, there¡¯s been damage and some shrinking to his arteries that I don¡¯t know how to fix, but they won¡¯t be blocked anymore and he¡¯ll have closer to normal blood flow. Compared to how he feels now, he¡¯ll feel incredible when I¡¯m done.¡± I had dad go back to the position he was in when I send Harry to R1 and I brought Harry back. I told Harry I was going to get everything ready and that I¡¯d be back soon.


    I left my room to rummage in the kitchen noisily for various ingredients. I grabbed a few of the spices from our new spice rack and some flour. I had to get mom to show me where the measuring bowls were and I put each of my ingredients into my mortar and pestle. Mark and Jake were in the Parlor with mom and I only had to make some noise. I poured a glass of orange juice and carried it and my concoction back to my room. As I passed the entry to the Parlor, I noticed Mark sitting next to mom and he was doing something with his phone.


    ¡°Don¡¯t you dare, Mark!¡±, I said as I realized what he was about to do.


    ¡°Don¡¯t you have a life to save?¡±


    I growled in frustration and stalked back to my room. Harry and dad were both giving me questioning looks.


    ¡°Mark¡¯s about to show mom the fire video. After I finish saving Harry¡¯s life, I¡¯m going to kill Mark. Karmically speaking, that should balance everything out, no?¡±


    ¡°There are cultures that believe that when you save someone¡¯s life, you¡¯re responsible for that life forever.¡± When did dad become sure an expert on cultures?


    ¡°Oh good. I saved him and now I¡¯ll be responsible for ending his life. Perfect.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m not sure if you¡¯re interpreting their vision correctly.¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s a risk I¡¯m willing to take.¡± I spooned a few tablespoons full of my mixture into the orange juice, making sure to send said mixture into L2 before the spoon make it into the juice.


    ¡°Here you go. Drink up!¡±


    Harry looked at the orange juice dubiously. Then he sighed and drank it all down.


    ¡°That didn¡¯t taste bad at all.¡±


    ¡°Of course not. Why should it? If I gave you something that tasted awful, then you¡¯d never want to take down anything else I gave you.¡±


    ¡°I don¡¯t make the rules, Abby. When someone gives you a home remedy to take, it always tastes bad. That¡¯s how you know it¡¯s working.¡±


    ¡°If you say so. Doesn¡¯t make sense to me. Seems like that would undermine your trust in your physician. I¡¯ll make it taste bad next time, if that¡¯s what you want.¡±


    ¡°No. No. This was good.¡±


    ¡°Excellent. Now I¡¯m going to count back from ten and when I get to one, you should be feeling all better.¡±


    ¡°Seriously?¡±


    ¡°No. That would just be silly. Ten, Nine, Eight, Seven, Six, Five, Four, Three.¡± At three, I sent him into L1 and followed him there. I started wrapping small packets of arterial plaque in a field and shifting them to L2, where thanks to stasis they fell to the floor in easy to sweep up bits. There were a few arteries that were almost completely blocked and several that were only partially blocked. My work with getting rid of tiny cancer cells made this seem simple in comparison.


    Twenty minutes later, I brought us both back to reality and Harry said, ¡°Two, one. Why¡¯d you stop. You were just getting to the good part.¡±


    ¡°You¡¯re done. All better. You can get up now.¡±


    ¡°But you didn¡¯t do anything. You just counted down from ten and stopped after three.¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s been about twenty minutes since I said three, Harry. Try sitting up.¡±

 B3: Chapter 14 - Dessert

    Harry sat up and looked around. ¡°No dizziness so far.¡± He moved on to standing and then walking around.


    ¡°I feel good. I didn¡¯t realize how tired I felt before. I thought it was just old age.¡±


    ¡°It was mostly lack of oxygen to your body. You should feel even better over the next few hours before the effect stabilizes.¡±


    We returned to the Parlor and Harry showed off his energy by picking me up and swinging me around. I might have squealed in surprise and yelled at him to put me down. It didn¡¯t matter much, since he ignored me completely. He only stopped when he got too dizzy and had to sit down.


    ¡°That¡¯s better. It¡¯s ok to get dizzy when there¡¯s a reason for it.¡± Harry was practically glowing with happiness.


    ¡°How are you doing, Harry?¡± Jake asked him.


    ¡°Jake, I haven¡¯t felt this good in years. Most days I¡¯ve been waking up feeling like I haven¡¯t slept. Since Abby¡¯s treatment a few minutes ago, I don¡¯t just feel like I can do things, I actually want to. Do you think she laced that pasty stuff she made with drugs? Cocaine or heroin? If she did, I can see why people get hooked on it.¡±


    Jake looked at me and asked, ¡°You didn¡¯t, did you?¡±


    ¡°Maybe just a little.¡± I brought my pointer finger close to my thumb to illustrate the point.


    ¡°How long will this treatment last? Will he have to come back again every week?¡±


    ¡°Jake, do I look like I do things in half measures? I¡¯m not some pharmaceutical company that needs to have my customers hooked for life on my drugs so that I can make huge profits. He¡¯s done. At least until his poor dietary choices and lack of exercise cause the plaque to build up again.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s not going to happen again. I¡¯m a changed man.¡±


    ¡°Yeah, right. You¡¯re like an alcoholic after his first AA meeting. Talk to me when you¡¯ve got your one-year bronze sobriety chip.¡±


    ¡°You¡¯ll see.¡±


    ¡°Uh huh. Will you be turning over this new leaf before or after dessert? Mom made chocolate peanut butter brownies. I think she mentioned that you used to love those.¡±


    ¡°Abby, you are quite possibly the most evil person that I¡¯ve ever met. Your mother has been missing for thirteen years and on the day of her return she bakes all day for us and you would have me spurn her and her wares just to make a silly point. I¡¯d thought better of you, but I can see that I was mistaken.¡± He shook his head in mock disappointment.


    ¡°So, you¡¯ll be having two slices, huh?¡±


    ¡°Consider it a test drive of the new arteries.¡±


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    ¡°Wow. Your resolve lasted all of three minutes. I¡¯m in awe.¡±


    Dessert tasted just as good as it sounded and I made sure that Mark saw me take my third piece, daring him to say something. He dared.


    ¡°I see you¡¯re not worried about clogged arteries.¡±


    ¡°No, I have a treatment for it. How about you?¡±


    ¡°I just happen to know someone who does. I can probably talk her into saving me, again.¡±


    ¡°You¡¯d like to think so, but you¡¯re forgetting the old saying.¡±


    ¡°Which one is that?¡±


    ¡°People who show videos, shouldn¡¯t eat brownies.¡±


    ¡°Oh, that one. Yes, that¡¯s a good one. Not as good as, ¡°A moment on the lips, a lifetime on the hips¡± though.¡±


    God help me, I almost gave in and laughed. ¡°I see your point, but my favorite has always been. ¡°Get lower in your horse-stance, Mark, we¡¯re not standing around waiting for the bus.¡±


    Mark winced. ¡°I remember that one. My favorite one is, ¡°Pain is just weakness leaving the body.¡±


    ¡°I kind of like, ¡°If it isn¡¯t hurting, you¡¯re not doing it right!¡±


    Jake interrupted our banter. ¡°Abby, do you have any plans for making your treatment for clogged arteries available to hospitals?¡±


    Everyone¡¯s ears perked up at this like of questioning, dad most of all. He knew I couldn¡¯t, but he was curious to see how I¡¯d get out of it. ¡°Not at all, Jake. It would be a waste of time to even try.¡±


    That wasn¡¯t the answer he was expecting and it took him a second to regroup. ¡°Why would that be? I looked it up while you were fixing Harry up. Arterial disease is the direct cause of millions of deaths worldwide every year. You could save so many lives.¡±


    ¡°There are several reasons. First, as a non-medical professional, anything I bring to the table would be ignored. Add in my age and I wouldn¡¯t even get a meeting to explain about the treatment. Second, my treatment is based on existing Eastern medicine techniques. This creates two problems. Problem one is that most people who practice Western medicine discount Eastern medicine and problem two is that as part of established art it can¡¯t be patented and so pharmaceutical companies can¡¯t make money from it. In fact, it would hurt their current sales of drugs directed at the same market. You might think that this is trivial, but it¡¯s not. If big pharma wants to kill a treatment, there will be dozens of papers out within three months questioning everything about the new treatment and positing that it probably causes cancer as it cures your heart problem. Another issue is that of time. Even if I could get someone to listen to me and even if pharma didn¡¯t come down on me like a ton of bricks, the treatment would still have to make it through the FDA and all of it¡¯s trials. That could take over ten years and cost upwards of a hundred million dollars. With all that there¡¯s still only slim chance of it passing all their trials. I have better things to do with my life than beat my head against a brick wall and thank them for the pleasure of using their wall.¡±


    ¡°Harry, how accurate is what she¡¯s telling me? It not really that bad, is it?¡±


    ¡°If anything, she¡¯s underselling the difficulties. She left out that my situation is rare. Most people would have gotten the surgical treatment and been fine. That means that she¡¯d have to put her treatment up against existing techniques that have been around in some fashion for over a hundred years. To make matters worse, she¡¯s not even allowed to do what she just did for me. Medical treatments can only be performed by licensed medical personnel. She might get away with selling it as a new-age ¡®healing¡¯ technique if she adds in some crystals. However, I do agree with you Jake. Saving millions of people every year would be worth the effort and I¡¯d be glad to help get Abby into meetings with key people that can make it happen.¡±


    ¡°I know you would, Harry, but there is one final problem. What you saw me do was only the finishing touches on the main ingredient. That ingredient is extremely rare and all efforts to synthesize it have failed. You¡¯re looking at saving maybe a few hundred people per year, if you used all of the available stock before it went bad. It has a short shelf-life.¡±


    ¡°Damn! That¡¯s frustrating and depressing.¡±


    ¡°You don¡¯t know the half of it, Jake. My cancer treatment is even harder to produce.¡±

 B3: Chapter 15 - At the Hospital

    I let mom sleep in late on Sunday. She¡¯d had a busy weekend so far. She¡¯d met my friends on Friday night, gotten a tour of Hannah¡¯s Home on Saturday morning, and been reunited with Harry on Saturday evening. I felt that she needed a few hours to relax before I continued with her reintroduction to society. However, I couldn¡¯t give her too much time. I still had a schedule to keep.


    Dad woke mom up in time for the brunch that we¡¯d prepared for her. Once all the bagels with lox and cream cheese, scrambled eggs, and pancakes had been polished off, I set about cleaning up the dishes while mom got ready to join me for my shift at the hospital.


    ¡°Who are these people that you¡¯re so excited for me to meet?¡±, mom asked as she pulled the car out of the driveway. Her phone, one of the spare phones that I¡¯d gotten from Howie, was opened to Waze and directions to the hospital were on display. Mom was in love with the app. It let her get around with confidence in a strange city.


    ¡°They¡¯re people that dad and I met when we were out searching for you. Pierce Forman works at the hospital as the head surgical nurse and he¡¯s kept your picture up on their bulletin board almost since your disappearance. Over the years, he¡¯s become a good friend and he¡¯s the one that got Eva and I to volunteer in the pediatric oncology center. The other person I want you to meet is Mary. She runs the local soup kitchen and she¡¯s been showing your picture to every one of her clients in the hopes that they¡¯d seen you. She was the one that taught me all about human trafficking and showed me how it continued to destroy the lives of its victims even after they escaped from it. Also, you met her once back in Raleigh, a few years before you disappeared.¡±


    ¡°I did?¡±


    ¡°Her son¡¯s name is Robbie. She says that you helped him when you worked at the community center. She credits you with keeping him off of drugs and out of the gangs.¡±


    ¡°Robbie O¡¯Reilly? Really big guy? Looks like a walking tank?¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s him. I met him a few times when I was helping out at the kitchen. He¡¯s married now and has two kids, a boy and a girl. Nine and seven years old. His daughter¡¯s name is Emily Hannah O¡¯Reilly. You made a big difference in his life.¡±


    Mom wiped away a tear as it slipped from the corner of her eye and we drove on in silence. A few minutes later, mom broke that silence and asked, ¡°Did you tell them I was coming or is this another surprise?¡±


    ¡°Of course it¡¯s a surprise! I¡¯m not going to waste an opportunity like this. How often does my mom come back after being gone for over a decade? I¡¯m going to milk this for all the entertainment value I can squeeze out of it.¡±


    Mom shook her head in resignation. ¡°I think you enjoy shocking people a little too much. You definitely don¡¯t get that from your father. I¡¯m guessing that it¡¯s Paul¡¯s influence on you. He¡¯s the same way.¡±


    ¡°I don¡¯t know what you¡¯re talking about.¡±, I replied diffidently. ¡°Uncle Paul has been an upstanding role model.¡±


    ¡°Uh huh. Try to remember that I¡¯m his little sister. I know all about how upstanding he is. He used to tease me mercilessly whenever I brought a boy home. The only person he never teased me about was your father. Speaking of which, what can you tell me about his girlfriend, Margaret? He really wants me to meet her.¡±


    ¡°We call her Maggie. She¡¯s very nice and you shouldn¡¯t get any revenge on Paul by teasing him about her. She¡¯s good for him. I¡¯ve never seen him this happy. While you were away, he went out with a lot of women, but he never had a relationship last longer than six months. Most never made it to two. When you were taken, he rearranged his entire life to help dad and me. He deserves a chance at happiness and Maggie makes him happy.¡±


    Mom nodded as she took in the information. I expected her to follow up on this and ask me how they met but I was caught off guard by her next question.


    ¡°Abby. Did Josh ever find anyone special like that while I was gone? I¡¯d understand if he did. Thirteen years is a long time and everyone thought that I was dead. I¡­I just need to know and I¡­I¡¯ve been too scared to ask him.¡±


    There was a lot of pain and fear in mom¡¯s voice. I answered her without any hesitation.


    ¡°No. There was never anyone else for him. He only went on a handful of dates in all those years and only when a colleague would set him up on a blind date. I can¡¯t remember any of them getting a second date. I¡¯m sure he only went along with it to stop our pestering him. He¡¯s never wanted anyone but you to share his life with.¡±


    Tears streaming down her face, mom whispers, ¡°Thank you.¡± Mom wipes the tears from her face again, the second time in the past ten minutes, and slowly gets control of her emotions. ¡°You know, I feel so confused. I¡¯m relieved, hell I¡¯m ecstatic, that your father loves me so much, but I¡¯m also a little sad. I never wanted him to be alone for so long. If I had really died, I wouldn¡¯t want him to spend the rest of his life holding on to only his memories of us. I¡¯d want him to move on, eventually, and find someone to share his life with again. In this case though, his moving on would have killed me inside. He was alone for thirteen years, but from my perspective, I never left. I went shopping with you, we got kidnapped for ten minutes and then I was back with you both. The idea that he would have found someone else in an afternoon¡­I¡¯m not sure that I could have handled it.¡±


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    ¡°I¡¯m sorry, mom.¡± Now I was tearing up. This wasn¡¯t good.


    Mom reached out and held my hand. ¡°It¡¯s not your fault, Abby. You saved us both. If you hadn¡¯t shifted us into one of those layers, we¡¯d probably both be dead by now or wishing that we were. We¡¯re alive and we¡¯re together again. Yes, we lost some years, but those years would have been horrible years.¡±


    ¡°John and the police would have saved us, if I¡¯d held on for a few more minutes.¡±


    ¡°Maybe, but I don¡¯t think so. Lenny and Karl would have used at least one of us as a hostage to get away. If they couldn¡¯t manage that, they¡¯d have killed us. What you did, even if you had no control over it, was the only thing that could have gotten us out of there alive and free.¡±


    I squeezed mom¡¯s hand one more time before she takes it back to make the final turn to the hospital. Mom has to circle the block a few times before she finds a free space to park in and I was once again appreciating my ability to leave my car anywhere in L2 when I drove myself. Finding a parking spot really sucked.


    Mom and I entered the hospital cafeteria and I looked around until I found Pierce and Mary sitting together at one of the tables by the window, talking animatedly. I¡¯d called them and asked them to meet me here, without having given them a reason. Each of them had tried to get out of the meeting, saying that they were too busy, and tried to reschedule for another time. I¡¯d simply told them that they¡¯d be very upset if they failed to be there on time. Pierce sighed with resignation and rearranged his lunch schedule to fit the meeting in. Mary grumbled a lot and finally conceded when she saw that I wouldn¡¯t budge. She was firm on the fact that she only had thirty minutes available, if she was going to make it back in time to get ready for her lunch crowd.


    As per my stage directions, mom and I approached the table with mom coming in a few steps behind me. I made it to the table before either Pierce or Mary noticed me and I just stood there, waiting. Pierce noticed me first, getting up and giving me a quick hug in greeting.


    ¡°Abby. Finally. What¡¯s so important that we had to upend our day to meet?¡±


    I stood there and smiled, saying nothing. Mary rose from her seat as well and greeted me. ¡°Out with it girl! I¡¯ve got a lunchtime rush in less than an hour.¡±


    I continued smiling at them.


    Mom moved out from behind me and stood next to me and I watched Pierce and Mary intently, with a big ol¡¯ goofy grin on my face.


    The two of them stared at mom with uncertainty, trying to puzzle out her presence at my side. The resemblance between us couldn¡¯t be denied and it only took Mary a few seconds to get it. Her eyes widened in astonishment and she put he hand to her mouth as she took in an involuntary gasp. She tiled her head and looked questioningly into my eyes. I gave her a slow, silent nod and Mary nearly knocked me over as she rushed in to give mom a bear hug.


    I¡¯d never seen Mary cry before, but she did now. ¡°Thank God! Thank God!¡± was all she could get out. While mom tentatively hugged Mary back, I glanced over at Pierce, who was still standing there looking utterly lost.


    I caught his attention and mouthed the word ¡®mom¡¯. It still took him a few more seconds for that to penetrate his brain. When it did, it was almost like watching a cartoon where a lightbulb suddenly appears over the characters head. Bing! Suddenly Pierce was trading place with Mary, as she turned to me and gave me a bear hug as well.


    Once all the hugs were put away, the four of us sat down. Pierce, with Mary¡¯s full support, demanded to know the who, what, where, when and how of mom¡¯s return. Mom and I kept the rescue details short and focused the story on how mom had been fitting back into her life, including her new job at Hannah¡¯s Home.


    After they were brought up to date, Mary pulled out her phone and showed mom pictures of Robbie and his family. The proud grandmother brought special attention to her granddaughter, who bore mom¡¯s name as her own. Emily Hannah looked nothing like mom, yet Mary managed to find a feature or two that she swore were the spitting image of mom, despite there being no DNA connection between the two, whatsoever.


    For his part, Pierce told mom all about meeting dad and me all those years ago and of the few times that dad brought me in when I was sick. Hearing about how panicked and insistent dad had been forced a laugh out of mom, followed by a feeling of regret that she hadn¡¯t been there for me. Seeming mom get quiet, he finished with the more recent and upbeat story of my fire rescue. Having already heard the story from Mark, along with a tense viewing of the video, Mom snapped out of her thoughts and enjoyed the fresh perspective that Pierce provided.


    Before she had to leave, Mary made mom promise to come over to her house for dinner with Robbie and his family and she left mom a standing invitation to visit her at the soup kitchen.


    ¡°I can¡¯t express how happy I am that you¡¯re back, Hannah. Not just for you and Abby, though. Josh needs you. I was so worried for him. He never got over losing you and I feared that he¡¯d never let anyone else into his heart. He¡¯s a good man and I¡¯m glad that he doesn¡¯t have to be alone anymore.¡±


    With Mary gone, Pierce let us back to his nursing station and over to the massive bulletin board that adorned the longest wall of the waiting area beside it. The board was covered with dozens of announcements of every sort. Hospital news, local businesses offering various services, tutoring sessions, blood drives, roommate ads, and lost pets.


    At the center of it all, one poster had been pinned to the board for years, always having pride of place. It was mom¡¯s poster. It read, ¡°Missing¡¯ along the top and below that was a picture of mom. ¡°Have you seen this woman?¡± was written along the bottom, along with mom¡¯s name and a number to call. The poster had been there for as long as I could remember. I passed by it before and after every shift. Hundreds of thousands of people, hospital patients, visitors and workers, had seen it over the years. Now, mom was seeing it for the first time and she reached out to touch the picture.


    ¡°I remember the day that your dad took that picture of me. It was in the spring and I was pregnant with you. We took a walk through the park near our house on the first nice day of the year.¡±


    As mom reminisced, Pierce returned to his desk and rummaged around for few seconds. When he re-joined us, I expected him to take down the poster. Instead, he pulled off the cap of one of those thick red markers and wrote, ¡°FOUND¡± over the word ¡°Missing¡± in neat, bold print.

 B3: Chapter 16 - A Lesson

    I knew those pop-quizzes would come back to bite me in the ass. Once again, no good deed goes unpunished.


    On Monday morning, I was called into the principal¡¯s office and was given the news that my biology and chemistry teachers had both decided that I¡¯d mastered not only their course material, but the material of the next two levels above mine in both biology and chemistry. Apparently, those extra packets were course materials for the higher levels. As a reward for my perfect test scores, I was being awarded some sort of science prize and I¡¯d be getting credit for those higher-level courses. I didn¡¯t need the prize or the extra credits, but I didn¡¯t see the need to tell the principal my views on the subject and I figured it couldn¡¯t hurt to have the extra credits. When the principal told me that I no longer needed to go to my biology and chemistry classes, that I¡¯d be having a free-study period in the library instead, I perked up and finally showed the excitement that he¡¯d been hoping for. So far, so good. The week was off to a great start.


    By Thursday, my good feelings towards those teachers and the principal were gone and I¡¯d had my first fight with my mom. The trouble started when the principal decided to call dad and let him know about the award and the extra credits. Dad brought it up at dinner on Wednesday night and congratulated me. Mom got all proud, as if I¡¯d really achieved something instead of just lucking out to have a scan-reading ability, and asked me which universities I¡¯d applied to. She wondered aloud if it was too late to send them this new information and increase my chances of being accepted.


    If I¡¯d only nodded my head and told her that I¡¯d look into it. I didn¡¯t do that, though. I told her the truth. That I hadn¡¯t applied to any universities, since I wasn¡¯t planning on going to one. That¡¯s when I got my first taste of the other aspects of having a mom.


    She was furious, irrationally so. I was so used to having calm, rational discussions with dad about such things that her anger caught me completely off guard. Usually, in a disagreement, I can assess the trend of the argument and twist it to my advantage. That wasn¡¯t going to work here. Mom ignored my reasons and kept harping on my future and how important it was to get a good education. I tried explaining that I was going to continue working on my education by myself and that I¡¯d already started my foundation. Going to university would serve no purpose. She wouldn¡¯t listen and after a few minutes I decided that if this ¡®discussion¡¯ continued much longer I¡¯d end up getting upset and saying something that I probably shouldn¡¯t. So I waited for her to pause and simply said, ¡°We¡¯ll have to agree to disagree on this. It doesn¡¯t matter anyways because the application deadlines are long past and there¡¯s nothing to be done about it until the Spring semester at best.¡± With that, I shifted to R1 and stayed only long enough to register the bewildered expression on mom¡¯s face before walking away.


    I didn¡¯t make it very far. Mom¡¯s crying stopped me short and I headed back in, intending to apologize. I didn¡¯t think that I¡¯d done anything wrong, but if mom was crying, I guessed that I had. Dad was sitting next to mom at the table and holding her. I was still in R1 and as dad started talking, I stayed there, listening in to their conversation, hoping to learn what I did wrong.


    ¡°Hannah, this isn¡¯t like you. I know that you have always wanted Abby to go to college, but you didn¡¯t listen to her reasoning at all. She has valid reasons for not wanting to go to university. What¡¯s really bothering you?¡±


    Mom got her breathing under control and said, ¡°I had a long talk with Diane today at the foundation.¡±


    ¡°Who is Diane?¡±


    ¡°She works at the foundation alongside Shauna. She¡¯s a survivor. One of the ones that was rescued from Wilmington a year ago. She¡¯s an amazing woman. She¡¯s been organizing the other survivors from that rescue and making sure that they get the help they need.¡±


    ¡°What did she tell you in your talk that has you so disturbed?¡±


    ¡°Diane was describing her rescue and how Roger showed up just in time to save her from being brutally raped by two of her guards and then leading her to a safe place to stay until the police showed up. She told me how Roger killed five of the guards and I remembered you saying something about Abby being Roger. Josh, Abby killed people. I can¡¯t get that thought out of my head.¡±


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    ¡°You object to Abby taking their lives?¡±


    ¡°No¡­.yes. Both. I don¡¯t have an issue with them being dead. They were slavers and if anything, she let them off too easily. I¡¯m upset that Abby was the one that killed them. I¡¯m worried about what that might do to her. To her soul. What kind of person will she turn into? I¡¯ve seen it with the gang members that I worked with back in Raleigh. I could almost always tell the ones that had killed. There was always a dead part of them that I couldn¡¯t reach. I¡¯ve seen it in a few police officers as well. Even though it¡¯s different for the police, since they¡¯re protecting people, it¡¯s still there. For most of them I could see that it was eating them up inside and I don¡¯t want that to happen to Abby. I want her to have a normal life. I want her to go to college and be like other kids her age. I want her to have other options than being Roger.¡±


    ¡°Have you noticed any signs of those issues in Abby, the deadness or the anguish?¡±


    ¡°No. Nothing. I think that¡¯s bothering me more than anything else. She acts like it never happened. I don¡¯t think she¡¯s bothered by what she had to do at all.¡±


    ¡°Let¡¯s ask her.¡± Without raising his voice, he continued, ¡°Abby, it¡¯s ok to show yourself.¡±


    Reappearing in reality, I asked him, ¡°How¡¯d you know I was here?¡±


    ¡°I know you, Abby. There were only three options available to you. Either you had stalked off to your room, outside somewhere, or you were still here. I didn¡¯t think that you were upset enough to stalk off. Your parting words were very polite and considered. I was also certain that you wouldn¡¯t leave if you¡¯d heard your mother crying.¡±


    This type of discussion was more of what I was used to. Instead of following up on it though, I addressed mom¡¯s last comment.


    ¡°I didn¡¯t set out to kill them. I just didn¡¯t care if I did or not. As long as they couldn¡¯t hurt those women and children anymore. You should also know that during this latest rescue, I came to the decision that I wouldn¡¯t kill anymore of the slavers, unless it was absolutely necessary. I think that my actions at Serpentine scared the slavers. It may have caused them to be willing to destroy themselves and their prisoners rather than being caught by me.¡±


    ¡°I think that you¡¯ve made a good decision, Abby. Not only for the reason that your mother brought up, nor for what you said. There¡¯s another aspect to his that you may not have considered. Abby, from what I¡¯ve seen of your abilities and from what you¡¯ve told me that you can do, I think that it¡¯s fair to say that you could be the most dangerous person in the world.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s a little over the top, dad. There are nine countries with nuclear weapons and there are dozens of dictators out there. Also, all the soldiers and covert agents.¡±


    ¡°They all have checks on their powers or skills. Someone that can either reign them in, redirect them, or order them to stop. You don¡¯t. You answer only to yourself. Not only that, but your power is greater than all of those others. In a single night you can drive up and down the city streets and send every single person to L2. The world would wake up and find that a city of people had disappeared and no one would be able to explain it or ever find those people. If you were to continue that, you would instill fear in the hearts of every person in the world and no one would ever feel safe again. All that and you wouldn¡¯t have even had to kill a single person. If you did decide to kill, the effects on society would be devastating.¡±


    ¡°Dad, I¡¯d never do any of that. Why would you even put those ideas into my head?¡±


    ¡°Because you need to understand why it is so important that you hold yourself to a high moral code. Much like those superheroes that you and your friends talk about so much. You can¡¯t let yourself get to a place where killing is your go-to option.¡±


    ¡°I won¡¯t become like them.¡±


    ¡°No. Not for awhile and maybe never, but change isn¡¯t something that you can stop. Everything in life is a slippery slope. You have to be constantly vigilant. Few people set out to be evil. It just happens over time. One small decision leads to another and over time those tiny changes lead to big consequences; you find yourself in a place that you never dreamed of being in. You¡¯ve already started out making a huge decision, perhaps not even realizing just how big it was, and your mother and I are worried about where such a decision will lead you to.¡±


    ¡°What would the slope look like? How would I go from killing slavers to becoming evil?¡±


    ¡°You killed those guards because they were about to rape Diane. Next time you might kill a guard because he was hitting one of the captives. Next it would be because he was watching someone else hit the captives and did nothing about it. Ultimately, you could justify that even working for a slaving outfit was enough to for someone to need killing. You might get a taste for the killing, because it solves the problem too neatly, no need for the police to even get involved. Instant justice. Maybe one day you don¡¯t have any leads on human traffickers so you go looking for a gang or some criminal organization and you start taking them out. Eventually, you¡¯ll come across someone who isn¡¯t a rapist or a murderer. Maybe it¡¯s a car jacker or a petty thief. With all the incremental decisions that you¡¯ve made up to that point, it will only be another small decision to defend your actions for killing him. After all, you won¡¯t have gone from killing slavers to killing petty thieves overnight. It¡¯s years of small decisions as you make your way down that slope to the bottom; from hero to murderer.¡±

 B3: Chapter 17 - Good Times

    The next two months until graduation were very busy ones. At the foundation, word had spread about us and we were fielding inquiries from all over the country. We built a dozen new cabins and had plans for eight more. I also bought a bus for Hannah¡¯s Home so that we could take the survivors on outings. The gun range was a favorite among the survivors and we helped those that wanted to purchase a gun with their paperwork and in choosing the best option for them. For those living in states with strict gun control laws, we offered training in using a taser or pepper spray. Combined with Sifu Zhang¡¯s instructions, these could be formidable weapons.


    Tyler had been a big help in choosing the bus. True to his word, he¡¯d volunteered for working at Hannah¡¯s Home and he was making himself useful in all sorts of areas. He played ¡®Attacker¡¯ for Sifu Zhang¡¯s self-defense classes and helped Fred with the landscaping. Most days that he volunteered though, he could be found working at least part of the day in the kitchen with Gabriel and Shelley. Shelley had become an integral part of Hannah¡¯s home and I¡¯d upgraded her to the status of a full time employee after the Christmas break. I was almost certain that Tyler and Shelley were either dating already or they would be soon.


    Eva was devastated that I¡¯d been right about Tyler not being interested in me. She was even more upset when I told her that Tyler would not be at my house everyday working with dad. With mom being back home, dad wanted to spend more time with her and didn¡¯t want the extra work and responsibility involved in taking on an apprentice. By the time Tyler finally asked him for the position, dad had already made arrangements with his old mentor, Ted Roberson, to take Tyler on. The only drawback for Tyler was that Ted lived a few hours away and so any relationship that Tyler developed with Shelley would have to involve quite a bit of traveling.


    On the rescue side of the foundation, Kevin came by a few weeks after mom¡¯s return and told us that they¡¯d caught the mole. The trap they¡¯d laid had worked out pretty much as they¡¯d planned and now Kevin¡¯s boss had a new boss. The old boss was up to his neck in trouble and was looking at a first-degree murder charge, as his crimes led to the killing of the fourteen year old captive, along with a bunch of other charges for leaking classified information. In exchange for avoiding the death penalty, the old boss was working with Kevin¡¯s team to uncover more people involved in the human trafficking trade.


    With the mole having been found, I authorized Shauna to resume working with the FBI and Kevin was back to arresting the bad guys. I did give Kevin a warning that it was likely they¡¯d run into the same problem again and to be extra careful. The people that we were up against had very powerful backers. Kevin agreed with my assessment and explained all the extra security measures he was putting in, which had already been approved by his boss. From now on, he would be given a much freer hand in choosing his resources and he wouldn¡¯t need to report up the chain of command until after the arrests had been made.


    On the home front, mom¡¯s reunion with her parents was epic. Given that my Bubby and Zaidi were in their seventies, we opted not to surprise them like we had Harry. We invited them over, along with Paul and Maggie, and told them that we had some news about mom. Bubby Brandy started tearing up right away, expecting the worst, but we reassured her immediately. Paul told them that mom had been found and that she was safe and sound and waiting in the kitchen for them to be told. Without a word, Zaidi Stevens took his wife¡¯s hand and they made their way to the kitchen, not wanting to wait for their Hannah to come to them. After thirteen years, they had given up their daughter for dead and they wouldn¡¯t wait to see her any longer than was necessary.


    Everyone cried, even dad. Tears of joy and celebration as our family reunited. I¡¯d never seen Bubby Brandy and Zaidi Stevens so happy and the day was filled with their stories about all the things that mom had missed while she¡¯d been gone. Zaidi brought mom up to date on all the backstage intrigue at their local synagogue, where he was filling out his fourth term as president, and Bubby told mom about the trips they¡¯d taken and about the one they had planned for next Spring. They were going to Poland to visit Zaidi¡¯s father¡¯s old village to try and find out about an old family mystery.


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    For her part, mom told them all about her new job, working for her daughter¡¯s foundation and reminded them about my upcoming graduation. I was fussed over and congratulated and asked about my future plans. Bubby even pinched my cheeks, lightly. She said that she didn¡¯t see why Bubbies were always pinching cheeks, only that it was in the Bubby handbook and she had no choice in the matter.


    There was no mention of the new baby yet. It was a Jewish tradition not to announce a new baby until three months had passed, as those were the months with the greatest chance of a miscarriage. However, mom would have disregarded the custom when it came to her own parents. In this case though, mom and dad decided to wait to make the announcement because it was too soon after mom¡¯s rescue and they didn¡¯t want there to be any questions of parentage. If mom was rescued three weeks ago, how could the baby be six or seven weeks old already.


    At one point in the afternoon, I took Paul aside and handed him a small red velvety bag. ¡°What¡¯s this?¡±


    ¡°Open it and see.¡± I watched him release the drawstring and upturn the bag into his hand. The yellow diamond that I¡¯d found, now all cut and polished, was sitting in a gorgeous white gold setting. The intertwined bands of white gold set off the yellow diamond perfectly and Paul caught his breath.


    ¡°It¡¯s beautiful, Abby. Why are you showing me this?¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m not showing it to you. I¡¯m giving it to you. It¡¯s an engagement ring for Maggie. You know, for you to give to her. When you finally ask her to marry you.¡±


    ¡°I can¡¯t accept this, Abby.¡±


    ¡°Why not? Don¡¯t you think she¡¯ll like it?¡±


    ¡°She¡¯d love it. Yellow is her favorite color and this ring is stunning. I can¡¯t accept it because this is too much. A ring like this probably goes for tens of thousands of dollars.¡±


    ¡°First of all, I found that diamond, so it didn¡¯t cost me anything. Second of all, I knew it! You are planning on asking her to marry you.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s none of your business, nosy.¡±


    ¡°Of course it¡¯s my business. I¡¯m going to be the best cousin ever to your kids. It¡¯s bad enough that you¡¯ve made me wait so long. Also, my little brother or sister will need some playmates. It¡¯s time for you to get to work!¡±


    ¡°Fine. You¡¯re right. I am considering it. As to the ring, it¡¯s not what you paid for it, it¡¯s what you can sell it for.¡±


    ¡°I don¡¯t need the money. I¡¯ve got plenty already. If I needed more, I¡¯d just go out and find more gemstones. Although, I have a drawerful already so there¡¯s not much point right now. Take the ring.¡±


    ¡°Nieces aren¡¯t supposed to give expensive gifts to their uncles. It¡¯s supposed to be the other way around.¡±


    ¡°I see. You can uproot your life and move to another city for my sake, but you¡¯ll have me believe that giving you a rock is an expensive gift. Got it. I¡¯ll be sure to pass on that bit of wisdom to your children one day. Sacrificing for your family is nothing. True value resides in shiny rocks.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m going to talk with Sifu Zhang tonight. We¡¯ll be moving up your red belt testing date as soon as possible. All of a sudden, I really want to kick you. Hard.¡±


    ¡°I love you too, Uncle Magnum.¡± I gave him a hug and left him there, literally holding the bag.


    Two weeks later, Paul and Maggie announced their engagement. My romantic uncle proposed to her on the second anniversary of their first date. He recreated their first ¡®pizza and a movie¡¯ date and asked her after the pizza part. Who says romance is dead? Despite his best efforts to ruin the moment, Maggie said yes and they set their wedding date for the labor day weekend. I offered them Hannah¡¯s Home as their venue and they gladly accepted. Hannah¡¯s Home had a large interior banquet hall if the weather turned bad and beautiful grounds if they caught a sunny day.


    Now I just a little less than three months to find a dress and a date for the wedding.

 B3: Chapter 18 - Summer Plans

    Bobby and I broke up on prom night.


    It was sad, but not unexpected. Bobby had been accepted to USC and would be starting there in the fall. His cousins from out west had invited him to stay with them for the summer, until his dorm room was available, and Bobby left the day after prom. He¡¯d joked that he needed the extra time to find a proper Kung Fu studio to train in. We¡¯d known about his leaving for months and avoided the topic, choosing instead to enjoy the time we had left with each other. It was ironic though that now that our schedules were almost completely clear we were saying goodbye.


    Mom and Eva fussed around me on the day that he left and I had to reassure them repeatedly that I was fine. Eventually, dad asked me if I would please have a small breakdown so that mom and Eva would have their closure moment and move on. The two of them looked scandalized at his comment, but I immediately broke down into faux-tears and started wailing in my best impression of a soap opera actress and beating my chest in sorrow. ¡°Bobby!! Bobby! How could you leave me?? You said that you¡¯d love me forever and always be with me. Oh, woe is me!¡± Mom and Eva were not amused, and they finally left me alone. Literally. They went shopping together. Without me. When had my mom and my best friend started going out shopping together?


    Unlike previous summers, I had no jobs and no trips planned. I¡¯d even put my scanning at Sister Clara¡¯s clinic on the backburner. I was coming to grips with the idea that I was finished with school. This summer wasn¡¯t simply a three month break before going back to school. This summer was the start of my career. The only problem being that I didn¡¯t know which career to choose. I¡¯d been thinking intently about this since Christmas break.


    Officially, I was the head of the Hannah Foundation, but in truth, Shauna, Diane and mom were doing most of the work and I only needed be there for a few mornings a week to approve expenditures and to give some direction. I still believed strongly in the work that the foundation was doing and I had plans to expand it further, but I¡¯d decided that even then the foundation would be a side interest and not my main career.


    The same idea applied to Kung Fu, blacksmithing and investing. They were fine hobbies, but not careers for me. Where did that leave me? What did I really want to do? I thought about the past few years and tried to focus on what gave me the strongest sense of fulfillment. After a while, I found three area of interest: scanning for mines, rescuing people as Roger, and medicine.


    Becoming a mining consultant and helping McKenzie Resources and other companies in finding and exploiting mine sites all over the world sounded wonderful. I could travel the world and make a very good living while doing something productive and worthwhile. Yet I could see myself growing bored of it after a few years. There really wasn¡¯t much of a challenge to it. I already knew everything that I needed to know to get the job done and I could do it faster that anyone else. Maybe I¡¯d refine my technique or increase my range over time. From that perspective, being a mining consultant seemed like a something that would be interesting to do a few times a year.


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    Using my abilities to rescue people sounded great and the only downsides to it were that I could never tell people what I did for a living and that the work was inconsistent. Although, if I offered Roger¡¯s services to the CIA or FBI, or even to the State Department, I¡¯d probably have more work than I could handle. Did I want to go to work for the government? Would being able to pull their agents out of anywhere simply embolden their planners and put their agents in greater risk? What if I disagreed with what their objectives were or if they wanted me to save a murderer because he had vital information for their other plans? The only way I could see it working was if I got to decide which rescue attempts I would participate in. Even then, could I trust that I wasn¡¯t being lied to? Again, this was something that seemed more part time than full time.


    Compared to the other two options, medicine seemed like a huge challenge. Not only was there so much to learn, but there was also so much that still wasn¡¯t even known. Developments in medicine were ongoing and I¡¯d never be bored. Learning new ways to use my abilities to heal people felt like it was something that would keep me on my toes. Although, this route presented it¡¯s own challenges. Becoming a doctor would take a decade or longer, depending on my chosen specialty, and it would mean going back to school, sitting in classrooms and writing essays and tests. I was so over that. Maybe if there was a way to go directly to the residency part, where you could actually treat people, then I¡¯d be willing to give it a go for a few years, but as it was, I couldn¡¯t do it.


    Where did that leave me? With an entire summer to experiment in. I didn¡¯t have to make my decision right away. I could try out all of my options and see where they led me. With that in mind, I set about finding out how I could become a doctor without going to medical school. The short answer is that you can¡¯t. If the goal is to become a licensed doctor, capable of legally performing medical procedures, you absolutely need to go to through medical school. There¡¯s no home school alternative and as far as my searches found out, there are almost no shortcuts. It seemed that going to a Caribbean medical school could shave a few years off of the process. However, not being willing to move to the Caribbean, I crossed that option out. Although, it did seem like a nice place to vacation.


    Nurse practitioners can treat patients on their own, with some exceptions, and it was a good alternative to becoming a doctor. However, becoming a nurse practitioner required between six and eight years of study. Paramedic training, on the other hand, seemed much more reasonable at six months to two years, but wouldn¡¯t give me the type of license that would be useful to my plans.


    I spent hours researching ways that I could get around the requirements with nothing to show for it except for my mounting frustration. I recalled Mark¡¯s problem-solving advice and decided to check my assumptions. Did I need to become a doctor? Yes¡­and no. I had a special set of abilities that I believed would allow me to do things that no doctor could do. If I was going to use those abilities, I needed to first develop the skills of a doctor. Those skills were only taught in medical schools and their associated teaching hospitals. So yes, I needed to learn to be doctor, but no, I didn¡¯t need to actually be certified as one.


    With that revelation, my plans fell into place. I would go to medical school, only I wouldn¡¯t bother registering. I could learn just as well in R1 as I could in reality. Right away, that decision saved me from having to spend four years earning an undergraduate degree. Now I only had to find a way to bypass the four years of medical school classes and I could start on my personal residency program.

 B3: Chapter 19 - Medical School

    The Thomas Hendrick School of Medicine was located on the northeast side of Galt University and was comprised of three nine-story buildings that students affectionately called, the Quill. Supposedly the name was derived from the term ¡®equilateral¡¯ that described the triangle configuration of the three buildings. Adjacent to the Quill was the Galt University Hospital, where some lucky Hendrick graduates continued their training as residents.


    Summer wasn¡¯t the best time to start medical school. I learned this very quickly when I looked at their class schedules and found few first-year courses. Most of the offered courses were geared towards those in their second and third years. Only those finishing their first year actually got a summer break. After that first summer, summer¡¯s got shorter and shorter, as the medical students either had internships or had to study towards their certification exams. My initial plan was to sit in on lectures while in R1 and take notes. With only a few handfuls of classes to choose from, and the fact that many of them overlapped each other, I realized that it would take me just as long to learn this way as it would to just go to medical school, minus the undergraduate degree. The solution that I came up with was a simple one. I¡¯d record the lectures, have them transcribed and then printed by Gerry. That way I could effectively download the lectures into my brain in minutes.


    I prepared a text to Howie, asking him about what recording devices he would recommend. Before I could send it however, I had a flash of insight. I wasn¡¯t the only student to have this problem. Lots of students had to miss class for a variety of reasons and most schools even provided the option to view the classes online. It was very likely that the classes were already being recorded and transcribed.


    The internet is an incredible thing. It only took me a few minutes to find the Hendrick School transcription service and to start seeing what was available. Joining the service only cost a small fee and it didn¡¯t even require you to be a student at the university. With membership, you get a certain number of lectures free per semester. If you wanted more, they had a per lecture fee or you could sign up for the Premium Service and have access to all the lectures you wanted, including the archives.


    The archives were a veritable treasure trove for me. I could download full courses, in either video format or transcription, and all four years of medical school courses were available. To make things even more amazing, the transcripts didn¡¯t just provide a written account of everything said during the lecture, they also had the teacher¡¯s presentation and notes integrated into the text at the appropriate places. If a diagram was referred to several times throughout the class, then that diagram had been pasted into the transcript at each significant reference.


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    I took the Premium Service right away and started downloading the transcriptions for every course. The courses were offered by multiple teachers and I even downloaded a few of these duplicates to see if the teachers emphasized different aspects of the material. Each course had it¡¯s reading material listed and I copied all of these into a separate file. I was surprised at how many I¡¯d already read. Those that were new to me were going to Gerry, along with the transcript files. I put an urgent request of all of the first-year materials.


    Downloading forty-five courses took a few hours and while I waited for them, I kept searching and found that Galt wasn¡¯t the only university with an on-line transcription service. Almost all of the top medical schools had their version of the service and I looked through the content of those that allowed it. For the most part, it was very similar, as all medical students had to learn the same basic courses required to pass the USMLE (United States Medical Licensing Examination). The main differences seemed to be in two areas. One was that some medical programs offered a research path that Hendricks didn¡¯t offer. The other difference was more philosophical. Most schools, Hendricks included, taught medicine by subject, such as anatomy, physiology, cell biology and within each subject the organs were discussed. Some schools, however, taught by organ systems, in which the students would learn about an organ and all the associated subjects that applied to it. Both seemed to be viable ways of learning and I read arguments for and against both systems. For my way of learning, I didn¡¯t think that it would make much of a difference, but I signed up for a transcription service for the one of the organ-based teaching programs and downloaded some of their courses, just to be sure.


    Having decided that the pathway from me to Howie to Gerry was one step too long, I¡¯d gotten Howie to get me a direct line to Gerry. He and I were partners after all. We¡¯d spoken briefly on the phone once and since then all of our communications had been through texts or emails. Due to the large size of the file that I was sending to Gerry, I loaded it into a Dropbox account and texted him the details. Moments later I was looking at his return message. A thumbs up emoji and the works, ¡°I¡¯ll get right on it.¡±


    With the theory portion of medical school taken care of, that left the application of that knowledge and the learning of skills to be handled. Medical students had labs to do and rounds at the hospital where they were taught how to interact with and treat patients. I didn¡¯t see much problem in shadowing the students while they worked with patients, but how was I going to practice my own skills? I pictured myself breaking into the cadaver labs and working on corpses in the middle of the night. Hopefully, as I learned more and followed the students and residents around, I¡¯d figure out a better way.

 B3: Chapter 20 - Investments

    Before I started working on my future, I needed to clean up my room in both reality and in L2. My room in reality was a mess and filled with books and papers related to school. That all had to go. I¡¯d keep my school yearbooks and a few of the better books that had been assigned over the years, but the rest was either going to the recycling bin or being gifted to the school. Of course, once I started the cleaning process, I had no choice but to do the job properly. Clothes, old gadgets, trinkets, pharmaceuticals. All of it got put in front of an internal review board and most of it was found wanting. When had I accumulated so much useless crap?


    Two full garbage bags, three recycling bags, and two donation bags later, my room was spotless. I shifted over to L2 and took a look around. It was a Scrooge McDuck mess, with bundles of cash left in various corners and bags of jewels tossed into a pile. Go-bags, my exo-suit, guns, baseball bats, duffel bags, bankers boxes, hard drives, a parachute, electronics, and a meteorite were strewn around the room with no order to them at all. It was a mess and I set about putting some order to it all. I bought four sturdy racking units from Lowe¡¯s and built them up in L2. Three of them I built as shelving units, while the fourth I turned into a double-hanging section. Most everything was easily stored away neatly in no time at all. It was organizing and counting the money from the various ¡®donors¡¯ that took the most time.


    I¡¯d spent about sixty percent of the cash that I¡¯d gotten from Lenny¡¯s hidey-hole and none from the hauls from Serpentine¡¯s and Basilisk¡¯s upper management. All together, I counted out roughly seven million dollars in cash and enough diamonds and jewels to open my own exchange. With the cleaning done, deciding what to do with the money became paramount. It wasn¡¯t doing anyone any good just sitting around. It needed to be invested.


    I separated out a million dollars and stuffed it in one of the bags that were lying around. This would be for mom and Shauna to give out to the survivors at Hannah¡¯s Home to help them get a fresh start or to pay for schooling. These small, tax-free, untraceable ¡®investments¡¯ would be made discretely and I wasn¡¯t expecting to see any of it back. That meant that I¡¯d eventually need to generate more of it.


    I still held out hope that Gabriel would be able to ¡®legitimize¡¯ the fifty-one million dollars that was no longer in Serpentine¡¯s accounts, so I didn¡¯t count that in my ¡®illicitly gained funds for distribution¡¯ pile. Yet. Also, I couldn¡¯t count on always finding ¡®free cash¡¯ at the offices of the human trafficking networks. Therefore, I decided that I should invest some of the rest and to that end, I put one million dollars into a second bag. This one was destined for Howie. He¡¯s had enough time to find a bunch of potential investment opportunities and I hoped to get that going right away.


    Before shifting back to reality, I examined the handful of things that didn¡¯t have a place on the shelves. All of it was from Edward¡¯s go-bag and home safe. Having found mom, I¡¯d simply thrown them into my L2 room and pretty much forgotten all about them. Now it was time to take a closer look.


    There were six items that were of interest. The first was a list of five addresses. Having visited the third one and found Phil there, I knew these to be safe houses for Edgar¡¯s co-traffickers. The second item was a burner phone, a cheap no-frills phone with prepaid minutes on it. I powered it up and looked through the contacts. Only three contacts and phone numbers were listed; work, Phil, and Lisa. Who was Lisa? I hadn¡¯t encountered any women yet among the human traffickers, but I knew they were out there. Maybe Lisa was one or maybe she was just Edward¡¯s girlfriend. I copied down her name and number and put the phone together with the list of addresses. These would go to Kevin at the FBI and he could sort it out.


    The third and fourth items were an external hard-drive and a thumb drive. I retrieved my laptop from reality and plugged the hard drive into it. My mind boggled at what was on it. It was an off-line copy of the Agora slave auction site. The site had been taken down before the FBI could access it and they¡¯d only had the video that Roger had taken of the screen while Edward had worked on it. This was a game-changer and I had a feeling that Kevin was going to be my best friend when I gave this to him. After I made copies for myself and for the team at Hannah¡¯s Home. Not only could hundreds of people now be classified as having been kidnapped instead of runaways or disappearances, but the Agora website had information on the distribution network and clients of the entire Basilisk Group trafficking network.


    The thumb drive had a financial records and banking information. Gabriel was going to have a field day with it. Hopefully, Edward had stored the banking passcodes somewhere in all those files. If so, the Hannah Foundation was hopefully going to receive some very large donations in the future.


    The final two items were the mysterious tube and the folder full of papers. I saved the tube for last and looked through the papers. At first, most of them appeared to be boring personal papers that Edward kept. On second glance however, I saw that they were invoices for work done on a house by contractors. There were also architect invoices, permits, door codes, alarm passwords and even the deed for the purchase of a piece of land. The most interesting bit was that the property had been purchased by Fred Collins, one of the aliases that Edward had set up a passport for. That meant that the FBI would not have known about it and could not have seized it as part of his assets. A bank statement showed that the phone, tv, internet, utilities and taxes were being paid automatically through his bank and that there wasn¡¯t going to be a shortage of funds anytime soon. I was going to have to take a trip back out to Raleigh to see what was in Edward¡¯s house.


    My imagination was running wild about the possible contents of the tube. I didn¡¯t scan the contents on purpose, because I wanted it to be a surprise. One and half feet long and four inches in diameter, it looked like a customized diploma tube. It was made of metal and whatever was in it, Edward felt that it needed extra protection because it was locked. I wrapped the locking mechanism in a field and sent it to L2. Now the tube was unlocked and I was placing mental bets with myself about what was in the tube. My best guess was that it contained a very expensive painting, probably stolen. Other ideas were that it a Basilisk Group organizational chart, or a portrait of the woman he loved.


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    I was almost right with my first guess. It was a piece of art. Just not in the way that I was imagining. It was an old, well drawn map of an island. The edges were frayed and it gave the map a sense of great age. At the top left hand corner was written, ¡°Ocracoke Island¡±. Turning it over to see the back, there was a name written in small lettering in the center, ¡°Edward Teach 1717¡±. Was Teach the person who drew the map or the owner of the map? Who was he?


    I took a minute to look him up and what I learned led to more questions than answers. What was Edward doing with a map that used to belong to Blackbeard the pirate? Did Edward think this was a map for Blackbeard¡¯s lost treasure? Did he really believe that Blackbeard buried his fortune on the island? Despite having grown up in North Carolina, I was surprised in my readings by the extent of Blackbeard¡¯s adventures here. His name had come up from time to time, but I¡¯d never really paid it any attention. Regardless of the treasure, the map itself was of historical significance and I wondered how he¡¯d gotten it.


    Carefully rolling up the map and placing it back in it¡¯s case, I closed the cover and left it on one of my recently built shelves, next to the meteorite. This shelf, newly christened ''The Self of Mysteries'', would have to wait for answers. I still had deliveries to make and I called Howie as I was loading the car. Luckily, Howie was at his warehouse and I told him I would be right over.


    ¡°What¡¯s in the bag, Abby?¡±, Howie asked as I plopped it down on the other visitor¡¯s chair in his office.


    ¡°A million dollars.¡±


    Howie''s eyebrows show up. ¡°Who do you want killed?¡±


    ¡°Does it really cost that much? It seems like most people do it for free.¡± That got a laugh out of him. ¡°This is investment money. I¡¯d like to deposit it in The Bank of Howie and watch it grow.¡±


    ¡°Is that really a million dollars?¡±


    ¡°You¡¯re welcome to count it. Actually, I kind of have to insist on it. I might have miscounted and then you¡¯ll think I¡¯m trying to cheat you.¡±


    ¡°You¡¯re not anxious about walking around with that amount of money?¡±


    ¡°No. I brought it from very secure location and I didn¡¯t leave the car with it until I was inside your gates. Did you manage to find any new off-grid businesses to invest in?¡±


    ¡°I did manage to find five decent opportunities. None of them are blockbusters, but they should give you strong returns. I¡¯d planned on having you pick one for now and get to the rest later, as more money became available, but if you add the million dollars to the proceeds from the gemstones that you¡¯ve given me to see, you could probably handle all five at once.¡±


    ¡°Great. Tell me all about them.¡±


    Howie spent the next hour walking me through the five companies. His top choice was an on-line prepper warehouse that needed money to expand their inventory and their premises. Preppers believed that civilization was going to break down for one reason or another and they were determined to be prepared when it did. Hence their name. Between those that believed in the Zombie Apocalypse, alien invasion, the upcoming second American civil war, an imminent comet strike, the inevitability of a nuclear war or the super-flu pandemic that would wipe us all out, the prepper business was booming. Howie¡¯s prepper warehouse people wanted to expand and were willing to give up twenty percent of their company in exchange for the money.


    Next on the list was a whiskey distillery. This would be a start up and the entrepreneur, Dale, needed funding. His story was very similar to Gerry¡¯s story. He¡¯d been in the business all his life and he was now retired and bored. He knew everything there was to know about making whiskey and Howie vouched that there was no one better at it. Howie also disclosed that if I chose to invest in the distillery, he would invest as well and provide Dale with premises and help with the distribution.


    ¡°How will Dale ensure that he¡¯s not selling to minors?¡±


    ¡°Two ways. One is the price. Most minors couldn¡¯t afford to buy his product. The other reason is that he has a select list of clients that will buy all the whiskey he can produce. When he¡¯s ready to expand, I¡¯ll add my contacts to the list. There are no minors on his list or mine.¡±


    Howie described the third potential investment as a ¡®boutique ordinance provider¡¯. As an ex-ammunition specialist in the army, Ray knew all about ammo and felt that there was an unmet need in the hand loaded bullet category. He proposed to provide hand loaded bullets of varying calibers to range shooters who were looking for increased accuracy from their bullets, but didn¡¯t have the time, patience or know-how to hand load their own bullets.


    ¡°Are you deliberately trying to get me in trouble with the ATF?¡± The bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives was a federal agency that enforced federal laws regarding the items in their bureau name.


    ¡°The only thing illegal about these businesses is that they won¡¯t pay taxes. There¡¯s also no connection to you. All your investments are undocumented. My fees go towards making sure that the various companies will pay you the appropriate share of your profits, despite there not being any paper trail of your investment.¡±


    ¡°How do you avoid selling ammunition to mass shooters?¡±


    ¡°There¡¯s currently no background checks required for the sale of ammunition so the crazies can get their bullets anywhere. Also, Ray makes specialty bullets. The crazies usually don¡¯t like to overpay for their bullets. Besides which, Ray will work with shooting range members. These members have all had background checks done on them.¡±


    The last two investments were a mechanic that wanted to open his own shop in an old barn and an on-line school program that would help parents of home-schooled children oversee the progress of their children and act as tutors for those children. Howie explained that a good-sized chunk of the ¡®off-the-grid¡¯ community was unhappy with the current state of the educational system in this country and were looking for alternatives that focused more on learning critical skills and less on social issues. The basic idea seemed to be a more structured home-schooling experience with teachers to guide the students and report to the parents.


    I ended up funding them all. I wasn¡¯t sure about the home-schooling business, but they were the smallest investment of the five and I trusted Howie¡¯s opinion about the need. I left Howie¡¯s to deliver the Basilisk hard drives and thumb drive to Hannah¡¯s Home and to drop off the other duffel into mom¡¯s care. The rest of the day was devoted to going through the internal company information that I had administrative access to and compiling a list of predictions for James to use in making his trades.

 B3: Chapter 21 - Surgery

    Gerry started delivering the lecture transcripts and course materials the following week, just in time for the Summer Session at Hendricks to begin. Given the books I¡¯d already absorbed over the past eight months, I breezed through the first-year course material in two days. The second-year courses were mostly new to me and I paced myself, making sure that I understood all the material by taking on-line tests for each course. That took me through the end of the week and I spent the weekend working on my clinical skills at Clara¡¯s clinic. For those that agreed to sign a waiver, Clara was letting me sit in on her consults and procedures. One of the courses that ran right through the first two years of medical school was called Clinical and Community medicine and working with Clara helped me fulfill this requirement and to put real world application to my theoretical knowledge.


    Years three and four of medical school focused on clinical rotations within different specialties, such as gynecology, family medicine, pediatrics and surgery. While there were still course lectures, the bulk of the time the students were apprenticing under doctors and residents at the Galt University Hospital. I learned a lot by shadowing the students at the hospital in R1 over the next week and got a feel for each of the specialties.


    One of the unexpected holes in my education that I quickly found was that the books and lectures didn¡¯t teach you how to operate all the different machines that the hospital used to diagnose and treat patients. I tried watching the nurses and the residents handle the machines, but they only used certain features and ignored others. If I wanted to know the true capabilities of the machines, I¡¯d need to read the manuals. A flurry of images were soon on their way to Gerry with a request for the printing of those manuals.


    Having taken the week to review the specialties, I chose surgery and family medicine as my first two rotations, with plans to devote half of every day to each. However, instead of following the students as they did their assigned tasks, I followed the residents and the doctors, watching them talk to patients, gather information, order tests and make their diagnoses. I especially enjoyed joining them on their morning rounds and comparing my diagnoses to those of the residents. Even though I had a ton of theoretical knowledge, it took weeks before I started getting some of my diagnoses to match theirs. Years of experience, seeing thousands of patients and learning firsthand the likelihood of certain diseases, trumped my few weeks of book learning. In a sense, I knew too much and had too many possible causes for any given set of symptoms. It took awhile before I understood which options were most likely and learned the slight differences that would signal one diagnosis over another. I suppose that¡¯s why rotations and residency programs were so vital to becoming an effective doctor.


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    Another reason that I had so many options to choose from in my diagnoses was that I wasn¡¯t using my scanning abilities on the patients until we were moving on to the next patient. If I was ever in a situation that required me to work with other doctors, I had to be able to back up my diagnoses without the benefit of my scanning ability. Using my scanning ability led me to the correct diagnoses in seconds, as my field highlighted the abnormal areas of the body where the trouble was occurring. For instance, if a patient like Harry were to come in complaining of fatigue, I could scan him and see immediately that clogged arteries were the cause. Saying so, however, would get me challenged by every other doctor as I had no rational way of knowing that. Working without scanning taught me what tests I needed to run to convince other doctors of my diagnosis.


    While my abilities gave me a nice advantage when it came to family medicine and rounds, it took me to a completely different level when it came to surgeries. Not only was I able to see everything up close from my R1 vantage point, but by wrapping the surgeons in a field, I was able to soak up their techniques by watching them perform a single surgery. I still needed to practice those techniques in order to master them, but just that put me light years ahead of the medical students that I followed.


    I made it a point to go to as many surgeries as I could and each night I would go and practice the techniques that I¡¯d learned on one of the bodies in the cadaver lab. At first, working on dead bodies in the middle of the night was very creepy and I got nauseous easily. Cutting into bodies wasn¡¯t like slicing an orange and stitching it up. It took a few weeks for me to adjust my mindset and my gag reflex.


    Eventually though, it all became second nature and I mastered the techniques that I¡¯d watched. At least on a dead body, with no blood flow and no consequences for a mistake. Being able to see the inside of the body before cutting in or intubating was very helpful and I was always able to get to the exact depth I was aiming for. Still, at some point in the future, I¡¯d need to start working with live patients. I didn¡¯t know how I¡¯d be able to do that, given that I was the only one that knew about my training. In the meantime, I would continue to learn new techniques and take on more specialties.

 B3: Chapter 22 - An Early Birthday Present

    Sometime towards the end of my first month of medical school, Mark caught up with me as I was leaving Kung Fu and offered to walk me home. My car was only steps away in L2 and I didn¡¯t have the energy to come back for it later. Especially since I needed it to go to practice on the cadavers in three hours.


    ¡°Thanks, but my mom¡¯s going to pick me up in a bit. Why don¡¯t you join me on that bench instead?¡±


    When we were seated, Mark asked, ¡°Abby, are you ok?¡±


    ¡°Sure. Why do you ask?¡±


    ¡°You¡¯ve been distant lately. It¡¯s been weeks since you¡¯ve made me do any extra push-ups during plank and you stopped making fun of me.¡±


    ¡°Maybe I¡¯m trying to be nice?¡± We both had a good laugh at that.


    ¡°I¡¯m just tired, Mark. Putting in lots of hours and getting only broken sleep.¡± Mark seemed relieved by this answer and I couldn¡¯t see why.


    ¡°I didn¡¯t realize that running the foundation would be so draining.¡±


    ¡°Oh, it¡¯s not. I barely spend any time there these days, except for working with Sister Clara on the weekends. I¡¯m working on a different project now.¡±


    ¡°Does it involve taking over the world or destroying the moon?¡±


    ¡°No. Not the entire world. Just the tri-state area.¡±


    ¡°Dr. Abby Doofenshmirtz. Has a nice ring to it. You¡¯ll have to watch out for Perry. He¡¯s very tricky.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯ll be sure to set up a few traps in case he comes by.¡± There was an awkward pause after this, neither of us having a good follow up. I took the opportunity to ask, ¡°When I told you that I was exhausted from working, you seemed relieved. Why?¡±


    ¡°I thought that you might be¡­¡± Mark paused to consider his words. ¡°Pining for Bobby.¡±


    ¡°Pining? As in longing for or yearning? Seriously? People don¡¯t use that word anymore unless they¡¯re quoting Monty Python¡¯s dead parrot sketch. Do you spend hours at the library looking up obscure words? It would probably be easier for you to just take up Latin or Sanskrit if you¡¯re trying to become a walking, talking anachronism.¡±


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    ¡°There¡¯s my Abby! I¡¯ve missed you. Caustic as ever.¡±


    ¡°You looked that one up, didn¡¯t you? Just so you wouldn¡¯t have to use acerbic again.¡± I shook my head in wonder.


    ¡°Well, I¡¯m just glad you¡¯ve stopped your pining.¡±


    ¡°I wasn¡¯t pining! Bobby¡¯s a great guy and I miss him sometimes, but if he hadn¡¯t been leaving this summer, I doubt we would have made it to prom as a couple.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s a bit counterintuitive. Please explain.¡±


    ¡°Bobby and I had a good time together, but whatever it is that makes for a great relationship wasn¡¯t there. We both saw it and decided to stay together a few more months until he left. Besides having fun, it also gave Eva and James a chance for some guilt free PDA. They didn¡¯t have to be on their best behavior because there was two ¡®singles¡¯ hanging out with them and I didn¡¯t have to feel like a third wheel.¡±


    ¡°I see. You were being noble. Sacrificing for the good of your friends.¡±


    ¡°Oh, it wasn¡¯t a sacrifice at all.¡± I gave Mark my best sleazy smirk, along with a few slow nods, and I made a gun gesture with my fingers. I was going for the Burt Reynolds look.


    I got a head shake from Mark, but failed to get the coveted face-palm. I knew I should have gone with the Monty Python ¡®Nudge, nudge, wink, wink, know what I mean¡¯ line instead.


    ¡°Anyways, I thought that you might be pining and decided to cheer you up with an early birthday present.¡± He handed me a thick envelope and continued, ¡°But there¡¯s a catch. You¡¯ll have to take me along with you, since I¡¯m your ride there.¡±


    I crinkled my face in confusion and he motioned for me to open the envelope.


    ¡°Oh my God. Four VIP access passes to Comic-Con in San Diego???!! Thank you!!¡± Despite being sweaty and gross from Kung Fu, I leaned over and hugged him. By now I was dry, mostly, and I don¡¯t think I got him wet. Thank God for deodorant, though.


    ¡°Eva and James are going to die when I show them. How did you get these?¡±


    ¡°I asked Jake. He knows a guy who knows a guy who knows the mayor of San Diego.¡±


    ¡°Wow! Thank you. I can¡¯t believe it. I¡¯ve always wanted to go but I couldn¡¯t afford the trip. Now that I can, I just didn¡¯t think of it. Old mindsets are hard to break sometimes. I¡¯m so excited. Am I babbling?¡±


    ¡°A little, but it¡¯s nice to see again.¡±


    ¡°I guess I have been working too hard. This is perfect though. I¡¯ll be forced to take some time off. Wait, the show is just nine days away. I¡¯m going to have to go see Eva right after I shower. I need to be there in person so see her reaction and she¡¯s going to need as much time as possible to prepare her costume.¡±


    ¡°Costume?¡±


    ¡°Of course! Eva wouldn¡¯t go to her first comic-con without dressing up. That¡¯s half the fun. She¡¯ll go as Wonder-Woman. James will definitely go as Batman. I¡¯ll be Super-Girl. Who are you going to go as?¡±


    ¡°Mark McKenzie?¡±


    ¡°That won¡¯t do. Eva would have a fit. Don¡¯t worry, I¡¯ve got an idea and it won¡¯t be too embarrassing for you wear in public.¡±


    ¡°I really don¡¯t need a costume. Really.¡±


    ¡°Trust me, Mark!¡±


    Now I got the face-palm.

 B3: Chapter 23 - San Diego Bound

    I pretended to call mom to tell her that Mark was driving me home and then I made him wait while I showered quickly before heading off to Eva¡¯s house. Cadaver practice tonight wasn¡¯t going to happen and I¡¯d have to pick up my car later. Some things couldn¡¯t wait and telling Eva was one of them.


    On the way home, I texted James to tell him to meet me at Eva¡¯s and the two of them were sitting on the swing chair on Eva¡¯s front porch when Mark pulled up at Eva¡¯s.


    ¡°Hey Abby. Hi Mark. What¡¯s the big news?¡± Eva didn¡¯t like to be kept in the dark and my message to her had only said that I have life-changing news.


    ¡°Big news? What big news? Can¡¯t a girl just come over and say hi to her friend?¡±


    ¡°Spill it, Abby!¡±


    ¡°Oh! That big news. Well, Mark gave me an early birthday present.¡±


    ¡°And? I swear, Abby, if you don¡¯t start talking, I¡¯m going to¡­I¡¯m going to tell on you to your mother!¡±


    ¡°Well, that¡¯s a threat you¡¯ve never made before. You should go easy on those threats. You¡¯re going to want to be extra nice to me. In fact, I think that you¡¯re going to owe me a lifetime supply of ¡®Get out of Eva¡¯s Punishment Exercise Classes¡¯ coupons.¡±


    ¡°There¡¯s nothing you can say that will get you those coupons.¡±


    ¡°Really? Care to bet on that? Those coupons against me going to two classes a week until you go away to school. James will determine the winner.¡±


    ¡°Deal.¡±


    I handed over the envelope with the four passes and waited a few seconds as she took in what they were. The piercing shriek of joy, followed by a lot of jumping up and down and high-pitched babbling aimed at James in explanation, brought Eva¡¯s parents and sister outside to see what was going on. Meanwhile, James was trying to keep his cool, but the silly grin on his face belied that.


    ¡°And here I thought that I¡¯d gotten you a birthday present.¡± Mark said as he played with his ears, trying to get them to start functioning properly again.


    ¡°You did. Making it possible for me to share the present and make Eva and James so happy is just another aspect of it and it makes it so much better. It¡¯s the gift that keeps on giving. Speaking of which, do you think I won the bet?¡±


    ¡°There doesn¡¯t seem to be any doubt of that. Well played!¡±


    ¡°Thank you!¡±


    After a round of high-fives and lots of hugging, of which Mark received a generous helping from Eva, and a manly handshake from James, things finally started to settle down. Eva didn¡¯t seem to mind at all when I had James confirm that I¡¯d won the bet and we spent the next half hour planning out our costumes. Mark let out a breath of relief when I explained that he¡¯d be going as Connor Kent, the latest incarnation of Superboy, and that Connor¡¯s costume was a black Superman t-shirt, blue jeans, and black boots.


    Although Comic-con was a four-day event, Mark asked us if we minded staying in San Diego longer as he was hoping to mix pleasure with business and visit the McKenzie Resources offices out west. I immediately agreed. It would give me that chance to get do some corporate espionage on the other side of the country and to check out a few of their world-class hospitals. Eva and James were also happy to stay a little longer and play tourists.


    While Eva took care of the costumes and James planned out every aspect of our convention time, I went back to working on my medical non-degree. I was getting a little tired of playing midnight grave robber and wanted an alternative way to learn or practice surgical techniques. Once again, I turned to the internet for a solution and it provided one for me. Surgery simulators. Who knew?


    There were two types, the mechanical kind and the virtual ones. You could even get a combination of the two. The mechanical ones consisted of a mannequin style body that had all the organs inside. The virtual ones had you wearing a headset over your eyes and they immersed you in a virtual reality operating room. You wore special gloves that allowed you to manipulate surgical tools to perform surgeries. The simulators looked very interesting, but there were so many to choose from and there seemed to be specific ones for each specialty.


    Falling back on my old standby, I called Howie to see what he knew about surgical simulators.


    Nothing. He knew absolutely nothing about them and he berated me for several minutes for yet again asking him about something that he knew nothing about and for making him feel inadequate and ignorant. He promised to look into it and let me know what his contacts could find. In the meantime, I went back to desecrating corpses.


    My one-month anniversary of starting medical school came up and I celebrated by changing my family medicine rotation to an emergency medicine rotation. This was a fourth-year rotation and so the students were allowed to handle slightly more relevant tasks. As with my last rotation, I spent two days learning what the students were doing, before switching my focus to the residents and doctors. I also started to spend some time watching the nurses and how they functioned within the hospital ecosystem. I learned a lot about triage, the art of deciding which patients were in the greatest need of a physician¡¯s immediate care, and in the associated skill of making patients wait quietly for their turn, even though other patients who had showed up later were taken ahead of them. Some nurses were better at it than others. The key difference was attitude. Nurses that gave it, got more of it. A few seconds of explanation and a sympathetic smile achieved far more than ignoring the patients.


    Unauthorized usage: this narrative is on Amazon without the author''s consent. Report any sightings.


    Between the complaining and pissed off patients and the demanding and brusque doctors, I decided that I never wanted to be a nurse. I didn¡¯t know if I had enough self control not to accidentally kick someone in the head when they were being so rude and dismissive.


    By the time Comic-Con came around, I was ready for a break. Mark picked us all up and drove us to Jake¡¯s plane. I felt great to be on a plane with soft seats. My last several trips had been in L1, where the seats were rock hard. Sitting in the plush chairs was so relaxing and I promised myself that I¡¯d bring some pillows on my next stolen flight.


    Halfway through the five-hour flight, Eva came over and sat down next to me.


    ¡°I need your help, Abby.¡± Eva spoke quietly, almost conspiratorially.


    ¡°Don¡¯t know which button to press to flush the toilet in the back?¡± I whispered back.


    ¡°No. Mark already showed me that. I want you to fire, James.¡±


    I turned around and saw that James was sleeping peacefully in his seat.


    Turning back to Eva, my face was scrunched up in confusion. ¡°Why? He¡¯s doing a great job. The foundation made a twenty-four percent return this year. I even have plans to double the amount of money he¡¯s working with by the end of the summer.¡±


    ¡°You¡¯ve put a seventeen-year-old, with almost no experience with investments, in charge of a twenty-five million dollar account. That¡¯s a lot of pressure. Add to that the pressure of potentially losing all that money and shutting down one of his best friends dreams and it¡¯s no wonder that he been sleeping so poorly lately. I¡¯m worried about him, Abby. I think all this might be too much for him to handle.¡±


    ¡°I know he worried about all that when I offered him the position, but when I explained that his fees could fund his Justice Foundation, he lit up and seemed to put all his doubts away. He hasn¡¯t said anything to me about his worries since. Are you sure that¡¯s what¡¯s bothering him?¡±


    ¡°No, but I know something is wrong and I¡¯m certain that it relates to his work for the foundation. I also know he worries about letting you down.¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s not just letting Abby down that I worry about. It¡¯s all the people that she¡¯s helping with her foundation.¡± I guess we weren¡¯t being quiet enough and we¡¯d woken up James.


    ¡°You really don¡¯t have to worry about that. Even if you lost all the money, the foundation still has plenty of funds available and by the end of the summer, it will have even more. I have another gemstone going up for auction, in Europe this time. It should bring in another fifteen to twenty million dollars. The foundation isn¡¯t mentioned as the seller so that we don¡¯t attract too much attention. The foundation also has other sources of revenue that will come in over time. A few might be as early as next year and some that will only bear fruit in the next ten years. Most of those are related to mining and are tied in with McKenzie Resources. Besides that, I¡¯m working on something now that could lead to a steady stream of very large donations on a regular basis. James, you really don¡¯t have to worry about messing up. At most, it would be a temporary setback of a few months to my plans. Most likely though, even if you lost it all, it wouldn¡¯t slow the foundation down at all.¡±


    ¡°That does ease my mind, Abby, but losing all the money hasn¡¯t been my big worry. It¡¯s actually the opposite of that. I¡¯m worried that we¡¯re making too much money.¡±


    Mark joined the conversation and asked, ¡°Why would that be a problem?¡±


    James looked at me for permission to speak about the account in front of Mark. I nodded my head. ¡°Mark is Jake¡¯s official liaison to the foundation. The investments are foundation business and it¡¯s ok to talk about them in front of him.¡±


    ¡°Good. I thought I might have said too much already. The problem with doing too well, Mark, is that someone is going to notice it at one point and start asking me questions about how I¡¯m doing it. It¡¯s not normal that virtually all of our trades result in positive returns. Right now I can pass it off as beginner¡¯s luck. In another six to twelve months, that¡¯s not going fly. Eventually someone official, maybe from the SEC, is going to investigate us.¡±


    ¡°I don¡¯t understand. I¡¯ve seen the investment reports and you¡¯re trading publicly traded companies on the open market. The portfolio is diversified and has some of the largest companies in the world in it. Thousands of other funds have those same companies in them. What is there to investigate?¡±


    ¡°Two things. One, as I¡¯ve already mentioned, is that we don¡¯t miss. All of our larger trades make money. Two relates to the timing of the trades. We do the bulk of our trades before the quarterly results come out. We buy in the week before and sell in the week after. If you put the two issues together, it starts to look like we have insider information.¡±


    Mark sat back in his chair and thought for a few moments. ¡°That seems like a stretch. Maybe if you were doing that for one or two companies, then I could understand how someone could make the accusation. But you¡¯re doing it with dozens of companies. You can¡¯t get insider information on so many different companies. You¡¯re not doing anything that others aren¡¯t doing, you¡¯re just more successful at it. You should be proud of what you¡¯ve managed to do. Grandpa Jake and I have been seriously impressed with your returns for the foundation. Your hard work and intuition are quite extraordinary. You have nothing to worry about.¡±


    When James didn¡¯t say anything to that, merely keeping his eyes downcast, Mark turned his gaze to Eva and then to me. Seeing Eva¡¯s sheepish look and my pursed lips, he asked, ¡°What is it that I don¡¯t know?¡±


    I sighed. ¡°It¡¯s ok, James. You can tell him.¡±


    ¡°What I was trying hard not to say is that I¡¯m not worried about myself. You¡¯re right about my hard work being important to the success of the investments, but the intuition part comes from Abby. She sends me a list of companies every quarter with her prediction of how the company did in the past quarter. I decide how best to trade the stock, based on her predictions.¡±


    ¡°Prediction? You make her sound like a psychic.¡±


    ¡°What else would you call it when someone makes an assertion without any facts to back it up and yet the results are always withing the range that she sets out?¡±


    ¡°Good research?¡±


    ¡°I have the same sources of information that she has access to, as well as a few others these days. Her predictions make sense, but they aren¡¯t supported by any research that¡¯s available on those sources. They¡¯re not even supported by any of the analysts following the stocks she¡¯s chosen. She used to pass off her information as ¡®internet rumors¡¯ and justify them to me. She doesn¡¯t bother to do that anymore. So either she has a large network of insiders feeding her information from over seventy companies, or she¡¯s psychic. Thanks to a great pep talk from Eva, I¡¯ve learned to accept it, but it doesn¡¯t stop me from wondering what¡¯s going to happen when, not if, we¡¯re investigated.¡±


    Mark eyed me suspiciously for a few moments but finally asked James, ¡°Have you considered not always making profitable trades? You¡¯ve had your first year of beginner¡¯s luck. Other investment firms have done as well or better when they started off, claiming that they have a new investment philosophy. However, they rarely keep achieving those high returns. Make a few bad trades and you¡¯ll join their ranks and become invisible. No one will file a complaint against you if you¡¯re merely human and make mistakes. Average annual returns of nine to fourteen percent shouldn¡¯t be looked at too closely.¡±


    James looked like he¡¯d been kicked in the head. ¡°Why didn¡¯t I think of that?¡±


    ¡°Because you¡¯re so focused on getting the most out of the trades. You always try to do your best. Taking a dive isn¡¯t in your nature.¡±, I explained.

 B3: Chapter 24 - Comic-Con and Beyond

    Comic-Con was a blast! Oh my God. So many people in costumes, geeking out over their favorite superheroes or villains. In school, there had always been a small group of us comic book fans, but here there were thousands of us and even though a surprising portion of ¡®us¡¯ forgot to put on deodorant, it was still one of the most welcoming places that I¡¯d ever been to.


    Eva and I only stood out a little bit in our costumes and then only because we had the toned muscles and flat stomachs to pull off our skimpy, comic-book outfits. Eva garnered quite a bit more attention than I did, since she also had all the curves and proportions to match her comic book heroine. It seemed like every few minutes we were asked to pose for a picture with someone. It dawned on me after the seventh time that, despite our badges, people were mistaking us for official Comic-Con employees!


    Eva used her new-found fame to gather in as many Wonder-Women as she could find and take a group picture. Not to be left out, I did the same with the Super-girls. We ended up with several new friends and soon created a group on Telegram so we could keep in touch during the show or after it. We tried to gather up the Batmen for a similar photo, but they were all too surly.


    Our VIP passes gave us priority access to the all the main events, presentation rooms, and discussion panels. We got to see previews of the newest Star Trek: The Next Generation spin off with Captain Riker commanding the Enterprise, a DC movie starring Superman Red and Superman Blue called ¡®Rise of the Supermen¡¯, Marvels latest Wolverine installment about his time in Japan, and the latest incarnation of Dr. Who.


    One of the panelists in a discussion about ¡®The Movies That Fans Want to See¡¯ brought up the idea of a remake of The Princess Bride, with a more racially diverse cast. The near unanimous jeers and death threats that came from the crowd caused him to excuse himself and not return to the panel. It took me a few seconds to realize that Mark was physically restraining me from going after the guy.


    We walked the exhibit halls several times, collecting all sorts of freebies from the booths and storing them in our tote bags. Mark was great at holding our bags as we rushed from one booth to the next, or as we got autographs from the Sci-fi and Comic celebrities. One booth had a virtual reality game where you got to experience training as the X-Man of your choice in the Danger Room. Beside the headset, they also had gloves and boots that tracked your hand and leg movements. It was amazingly realistic, as I shredded the bad guys as Wolverine. The video that Mark took of me from his vantage point outside of the virtual reality game didn¡¯t show me in quite the superhero-ish light that I was imagining. I loved it anyways and noted down the company name to see what other games they had. Maybe a set up like this would be fun for the survivors at Hannah¡¯s House to play with. I also wondered if we could create a Kung Fu teaching and sparring version.


    My favorite part of the show happened on the third day and it wasn¡¯t even part of Comic-Con. We¡¯d just finished having lunch at the overpriced cafeteria with most of the Wonder Women and Super Girls when Eva suggested doing an impromptu Zumba class in one of the side halls after the last presentation of the day. Everyone loved the idea and Eva left to see if she could arrange it. Five hours later the room was packed with willing participants and Eva and I were on stage. Eva led the class and I was one of her two back-up dancers. The other girl, a Wonder-Woman named Andrea, was a big Zumba enthusiast and was able to follow along nicely. Having helped Eva create and test her routine, I was easily able to hold my own.


    The video of us costumed superheroines doing Zumba was posted exclusively on the Comic-Con website and the site crashed from all the traffic. The organizers asked Eva to run another class on the final day and this time the room was jammed with people wanting to join in the fun. The organizers moved us to a much larger hall and Eva did her thing. Going from a thirty person class to over three hundred was an unbelievable experience. Afterwards, the organizers invited us back for next year¡¯s convention. Not only would we get free passes, but we¡¯d get paid to run two classes per day. Eva was in heaven! When I managed to sweet talk them into two extra passes for the boys, James joined her there.


    With the end of Comic-Con, our itinerary had us staying in San Diego for two more days before moving on to Los Angles for three days. Eva and I were sharing one room and James and Mark shared another. For the five days left to us, we met the boys for an early breakfast and then we all went our separate ways until dinner. Mark went to the McKenzie office, Eva and James roamed the city, and I took care of ¡®Foundation Business¡¯. Eva, never one to let me get away without details, pressed the issue and I explained that I was thinking about opening a west-coast Hannah¡¯s Home and was scoping out suitable locations.


    This narrative has been purloined without the author''s approval. Report any appearances on Amazon.


    As planned, I spent the first day infiltrating the ten publicly traded companies that I¡¯d researched and gained access to their servers. The following day, I headed out to Sharps Memorial Hospital to observe how they did things out west. Some of their surgeons were world-class and I wrapped them in fields, while scanning their actions inside the patient, to learn new variations on techniques that I¡¯d studied at Galt. The hard part was figuring out the advantages of their techniques over the ones that I knew. It wasn¡¯t as if I could ask them. Or could I? I took down the names of the surgeons with new techniques, along with the surgery they were performing, and made a note to see if they¡¯d written a paper on it. Such papers were common, as they gave the surgeon greater renown and let them name the new technique. Usually, they named it after themselves and you ended up with ¡°The Kripstein Variation¡± or ¡°The Jamison Procedure¡±. Boring! If I ever created a new technique, one that I was able to publish, it was going to call it ¡°Fluffy¡± or ¡°Spot¡±. I could imagine how the conversation would go. ¡®How¡¯d you manage to remove the patient¡¯s heart without making any incisions? Oh that. I used the Fluffy Maneuver.¡¯


    Early the next morning, Mark and I set off for Los Angeles. Eva and James had decided to accept the offer of one of the Wonder-Women and her boyfriend to go camping and hiking at the Mission Trails Regional Park with them and a bunch of other superheroes we¡¯d met over the past week. I¡¯d been invited as well and had promptly and politely declined. I¡¯d had enough of camping last summer to last me for quite a long time. I wasn¡¯t going to repeat the experience, unless I was consulting on a mining project and getting paid for it.


    With no need to rush, Mark chose to take the Pacific Coast Highway up to Los Angeles and I got to see so many of the beaches that I¡¯d only heard about in books and movies. The views were breathtaking, and we stopped twice to take in the view and to walk along a beach. All together, our two-hour drive took closer to four and we arrived in Los Angeles with enough time to check into our hotel and have some lunch before separating to do our own thing for the afternoon.


    Despite the shorter than expected timeline available to me that day, I managed to break into the computer systems of most of the twenty companies on my list. Tomorrow morning, I would get up extra early and take a flight from LAX to Silicon Valley and get the rest. My portfolio was missing the tech component. There was a distinctive spaceship shaped building that I couldn¡¯t wait to see in person. Howie had even procured some specialized software that would be of great help in dealing with their specialized operating system.


    Mark and I met up back at the hotel around five and Mark suggested that we go to Venice Beach. Not one to refuse a beach excursion, I changed outfits and met him back in the lobby ten minutes later wearing my bikini under a pair of cropped daisy-dukes and a super-girl t-shirt. A beach bag filled with a towel, flip-flops, sun-screen, water and a hat was slung over my shoulder and I was ready to go. Mark looked more relaxed than I¡¯d ever seen him, in his surfer-dude knee length bathing suit and an over-the-top Hawaiian shirt covered in palm trees. Mark took my hand and gently pulled me out to the waiting taxi, before opening the door for me and leading me inside. My heart skipped a beat at the physical contact, but I tamped down on my emotions and waived the moment away as a mere friendly gesture. Nothing to see here. Move along. Remember to breathe.


    On the ride over to the beach, Mark gave me a rundown of his day and asked about mine. I told him that there wasn¡¯t much chance of opening a Hannah¡¯s House in Los Angeles proper. Maybe I¡¯d consider something in the surrounding areas or elsewhere in California, if the prices were better and the traffic more manageable.


    ¡°If you won¡¯t be real estate hunting, what are your plans for the next two days while I¡¯m stuck in meetings?¡±


    ¡°I¡¯ve got a few projects that I¡¯m working on. Don¡¯t worry, I¡¯ll stay out of trouble.¡±


    ¡°So, I won¡¯t be seeing a video of your adventures popping up on the internet?¡±


    ¡°That was only the one time!¡±


    ¡°And yet, I have two videos of you on my phone.¡±


    ¡°Yes, but the second one isn¡¯t on the internet, so it doesn¡¯t count.¡±


    ¡°What about the Superheroine Zumba Class video? Does that one count?¡±


    ¡°No. I knew they were filming and that video is mostly of Eva and the crowd. I¡¯m only a side-kick in that one. A back-up dancer to the main event.¡±


    ¡°In that case, I look forward to seeing your fourth video, whether it¡¯s on the internet or not.¡±


    ¡°Fifth.¡±


    ¡°Excuse me?¡±


    ¡°You already missed seeing the fourth one. Better luck with the fifth.¡±


    ¡°Abby, when was there a fourth video? Abby?¡±


    As Siri says, we had arrived at our destination and I got out of the cab, ignoring Mark¡¯s questions and let him pay the driver. The beach was calling me and I walked slowly towards the ocean so that Mark could catch up.

 B3: Chapter 25 - A Proposal, of sorts

    Mark tried to get me to tell him about the fourth video as we walked barefoot along the beach. He kept guessing as to it¡¯s contents and I kept shooting down his attempts.


    ¡°Were you saving a child from being run over by a truck?¡±


    No.


    ¡°Single-handedly turning back the rising oceans of global warming?¡±


    Nope.


    ¡°Holding up falling building so that everyone could get out?¡±


    That¡¯s Superman you¡¯re thinking of.


    ¡°Getting a cat out of a tree?¡±


    I did that once. No video of that though.


    We continued our slow walk, and somewhere along the way, Mark took my hand again and held it. Somewhere along the way in the sense that I didn¡¯t know where we were exactly, not in the sense that I didn¡¯t realize it when it happened. I was hyper aware of it and it felt like my heart starting beating at twice its normal rate.


    I glanced over at him and he acted like taking my hand was a perfectly normal, everyday, thing. Like he¡¯d done it thousands of times before. At that point, I couldn¡¯t help myself and I slapped a field around him. His heart was beating almost as fast as mine was! This was a big deal for him too.


    I was so focused on what the field was telling me that his next words stunned me. Although, to be honest, even without the field distracting me, his words would have been just as shocking.


    ¡°I think we should have our honeymoon in Hawaii. I hear the beaches there are spectacular.¡±


    This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.


    Barely managing to get my heart out of my mouth to speak, I answered him as nonchalantly as I was able to. ¡°Don¡¯t you think you¡¯re getting a bit ahead of yourself, Mark? We haven¡¯t even gone on a first date.¡±


    ¡°Abby Smith! Are you asking me out on a date? If so, I accept. Where will you be taking me?¡±


    I gave him the face-palm that he so richly deserved and said, ¡°Smoothly done.¡±


    We walked a few more steps before I asked him. ¡°What¡¯s going on here Mark?¡± I brought up our interlocked hands for reference. ¡°I thought that we were just friends.¡±


    ¡°Your words, Abby. Not mine. I never said that.¡±


    ¡°At Jake¡¯s place, when he teased us. You said it then.¡±


    ¡°No. You did. I was going to tell him that it was too soon.¡±


    ¡°Oh. If you felt that way back then, what¡¯s changed?¡±


    ¡°A few things. You¡¯ll be turning eighteen next week and you¡¯ll officially be an adult in the eyes of the law. A twenty-year-old man going out with a sixteen-year-old girl would have been suspect. More importantly though, I needed the time to explore my feelings for you. You ran into a burning building to save my life. I wasn¡¯t sure if my feelings for you were genuine attraction or hero-worship.¡±


    ¡°What finally made you decide?¡±


    ¡°I didn¡¯t. I just realized that I could feel both simultaneously. You¡¯re a hero and I¡¯m attracted to you. You¡¯ve continued to amaze me since the day we met and I can¡¯t separate you from the your actions. Your actions reflect your decisions and your decisions reflect who you are. A caring and courageous force of nature, with a blindingly fast reverse side kick.¡±


    I laughed at that, while my eyes got all shiny, and a horrible thought occurred to me. ¡°Oh shit! Eva is going to be insufferable about this. She¡¯s been saying that you like me for over a year now and I told her she was crazy.¡±


    ¡°We can¡¯t have that. If you want to rescind your offer of taking me out on a date, I¡¯ll accept your decision.¡±


    ¡°How come there¡¯s never a pudding cup around to throw at you?¡±


    ¡°Because a pudding cup isn¡¯t enough with your appetite. You¡¯d need a pudding bowl.¡±


    Taking advantage of the fact that I was already holding his hand, I pushed him off-balance and stuck my leg behind his to trip him. He went down gently, as I hadn¡¯t let go of his hand as he fell and I was able to slow his fall. Despite his soft landing on sand, he groaned as if I¡¯d kicked him and broken his legs. Smiling at his antics, I dropped down and straddled his stomach, leaned over and kissed him to shut him up. It worked very well. He didn¡¯t say anything for quite some time.

 B3: Chapter 26 - New Techniques

    As predicted, Eva took one look at Mark and I, standing at the airplane hotel holding hands, and let out an ¡°I knew it!¡± before rushing over and pulling me away to ask me about our trip. I put her off until we got on the plane, explaining that we had five hours to go over it. She took the delay gracefully and proceeded to usher us all on the plane like we were a wayward museum tour group blocking access to the Mona Lisa. With all the pushing and shoving, she almost left her own bag behind.


    Under duress, I gave Eva and highly abridged version of our Venice Beach conversation, merely saying that Mark took my hand, and proceeded to tell her about the diner we found in an old firehouse and our ride through the Venice canals just off of the beach. I told her how the next night we rented bikes and rode along the twenty-two miles of pathways of the Strand and of our trip to the La Brea Tar Pits.


    For her part, Eva gave me a play-by-play of their camping trip and James interjected with a story of Eva tripping and falling ten feet into the river. Since she was busy organizing everyone into a scenic group picture at the time, the whole thing was on video and we all watched the fall in forward and reverse several times before Eva snatched the phone from James¡¯s hands and tried to delete it. My hands were faster though and I snatched it from her and returned it to James. If my videos had to be out there for posterity, so did hers!


    Back on the east coast, Mark dropped me off at home in the middle of the night and four hours later I was at the hospital for morning rounds. The break had given me time to sit back and think about how I wanted to continue my medical education. Overall, I felt that I was learning a lot and was on the right track. However, my musings led me to a glaring omission. I was learning and developing the skills to do things like a regular doctor. Only I wasn¡¯t ever going to be one of those. I had special abilities to draw from and besides using my field as an aid to enhanced learning and patient scanning, I really wasn¡¯t doing much with it.


    I was already very proficient at removing things from the body without having to cut into it. Why couldn¡¯t I do surgeries the same way? Could I use my fields to close wounds or to seal ruptured arteries? Was there a way to insert an IV or catheter without piercing the skin? Could I freeze nerve clusters inside an L2 stasis field and eliminate the pain signals it was sending? I figured that for every surgical technique that I was learning, there had to be an Abby way of doing it with fields. That became my new goal.


    At home that evening, after Kung Fu and a shower, I made a list of the different goals of a surgical procedure. For instance, some surgeries were to remove or excise things. You could remove cancers, plaque from arteries, organs, gall stones, and bullets. Other surgeries were to stop internal bleeding due to trauma of some sort like those from a knife or a bullet. Other goals included repairing (bones, birth defects), reattaching (fingers, tendons), attaching or adding (pace makers, implants), transplanting (organs), reconstructing (cosmetic or due to injury), ablating (lasering the cornea), restarting (heart), and giving birth.


    Beside each goal, I listed out the surgical techniques that were required such as cutting open the skin, cutting something out, clamping off veins to reduce the blood flow, inserting an IV and catheter, intubating the patient, and suturing the skin at the end of the procedure. Next, I planned to list if my field could bypass the step entirely and if not, how I could use my fields and the layers of reality to accomplish the same goal.


    Removal or excision was the first goal I listed. That one was easy, as I¡¯d already done it. Wrap a field around all parts of an object in the body and send it to L2. No cutting or suturing needed. No anesthesia, no intubation, no catheters or IV. No need for suction or replacement blood standing by.


    Things got more complicated after that. I could add things into the body, but how do I place them in just the right place? How do I use the fields to close off a bleeding vein? Nothing came to mind and I put my list away, hoping that I get some inspiration in my sleep.


    My big break came a week later as I was eating breakfast with dad. Mom, a late riser, was still asleep and dad and I were finishing up our food. He would be heading off to the university to teach and I was heading to the university to learn. I flashed back to the last two summers where dad and I shared this exact routine before heading off together to his class.


    ¡°Abby, I¡¯ve been thinking about that rescue that you made in Venezuela. When you saved Samuel.¡±


    ¡°Why are you thinking about it?¡±


    ¡°How can I help you figure out new ways to use your abilities, if I don¡¯t think about them?¡± This is why I should have opened up to him about my abilities earlier.


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    ¡°Did you come up with anything new?¡±


    ¡°No, nothing new. However, I might have come across a flaw in your reasoning. You mentioned that you only came back to reality twice in Venezuela. Once was on the bus with the locals that you¡¯d freed and the other time was to use Waze to find the prison. Is that correct?¡±


    ¡°Yes.¡± Where was this going?


    ¡°Why did you need to phase back to reality for Waze to work?¡±


    ¡°Because there¡¯s no cellular signal in the layers. R1 and L1 have copies of the satellites in space, but they don¡¯t function. You need to be in reality for that.¡±


    ¡°Yes. I can see that. However, couldn¡¯t you have shifted the phone to reality and updated it¡¯s information.¡±


    ¡°I wouldn¡¯t be able to hold...¡± oh my God. I face-palmed. Of course! ¡°How did I miss that? And how did you think of it?¡±


    ¡°From your description of training with your weapons in R1. You shifted the staff to reality for the hit, while you stayed in R1. You said that you connected the field around the staff to the field around you and that allowed you keep holding it without it falling down. Being able to combine the layers through your ability to connect fields can be very useful, so long as you remember that you can do it.¡±


    It was like a bomb going off in my brain. All of a sudden, I started seeing how to use my fields in conjunction with surgical instruments. Dad¡¯s words had broken through the blockage that I¡¯d been having. I jumped up and gave him a big hug.


    ¡°Thanks, dad. You just gave me the key to solving a lot of my problems.¡±


    ¡°If you told me more, or even what you¡¯re working on, I might be able to be of more help.¡±


    ¡°Soon dad. I need a few more months. It¡¯s like when you¡¯re working on one of your sculptures and you want to have it done or nearly so before you let anyone see it.¡±


    ¡°I can understand that. Only tell me, please, is what you¡¯re working on dangerous?¡±


    ¡°No. If it works out, it should be wonderful. You told me that my gift could make me the best assassin the world has ever known. This project will show you that my gift can be used for positive changes as well.¡±


    With that, I put my dishes away and ran off to my room to work out some new techniques.


    It took me two weeks of trial and error, and plenty of practice, to get the handle on doing surgery my way. It turned out that it wasn¡¯t as simple as I¡¯d first imagined and it required not just my ability to connect myself to objects in other layers, but also my ability to shift only part of an object, while having it still connected to the rest of it. Multiple fields connecting multiple layers connecting to multiple parts of an object.


    Not only that, but I often needed to find several different ways to get do the surgeries, depending on what the circumstances were. For instance, if I was able to bring the patient into L2, I wouldn¡¯t need to clamp off a bleeding vein. The patient would be in stasis and all blood flow would cease. However, if I was surrounded by people, then clamping off a bleeding vein involved putting a field around the vein and sending the last centimeter into L2, while leaving this bit connected to the vein in reality. By sending the end of the cut vein into L2, the blood inside would be frozen in stasis, creating a plug for the blood that was still in reality. I¡¯d done the same thing when I¡¯d shifted the Basilisk building into L2. I¡¯d left the power and water lines connected, only in another reality, and neither of them overflowed into the empty space.


    Alternatively, I could also use a clamp to shut off the vein by sending the clamp into R1, passing the clamp through the body that was still in reality, and then sending just the tip of the clamp back to reality to close off the vein. This technique would allow me to do surgery inside the body, without piercing the skin or needing to get around any intervening organs or bodily structures. Scalpels, electrocautery handpieces, syringes and sutures could all be used in a similar fashion. This technique would be very helpful in doing surgery in L2, but would create confusion if witnessed in reality.


    For private surgeries, those not witnessed by others, I could replicate suction by sending any blood or bodily fluids into L2. Returning that blood was a bit tricker, in that once I was finished surgery I had to bring it back and place it in the veins. This would require an autotransfusion devise and an IV, both of which could be hidden, yet still connected to the patient, in R1 when the patient was returned to reality.


    In an emergency, I could close wounds, such as a gunshot or stabbing wound, by sending the upper layer of blood seeping out of the wound into L2 and connecting that plug of stasis blood to the surrounding skin.


    I had so many options and as I did more rotations, I found more and more uses for my abilities. While most were variations on the techniques I¡¯d discovered, a few were new. I kept at it though and was continually amazed at the things that my field allowed me to do. While the end result of my surgeries would probably be similar to regular surgery, my way used far less resources, had no risk of infection, and had much faster recovery times due to not having to cut into the body. This last one was especially important as I could operate on a patient that was too weak or compromised to survive regular surgery.


    One more advantage my techniques provided was the lack of pain involved. Either the patient was in L2 and completely unable to feel any pain or the instruments would pass through his or her body without any nerves sending pain signals to the brain. Even injections or fluid extractions could be done directly into the vein, without piercing the veins at all. My scanning would let me position the tip of the syringe directly inside the appropriate vein and I¡¯d shift only the tip into reality to inject or extract, as required. I bet that kids would love getting shots from me. I could do painless spinal taps and bone marrow extractions, as well as painless biopsies.


    As usual, the hardest part would be hiding my technique from the patients themselves and from anyone else.

 B3: Chapter 27 - Simulators

    ¡°Ok, Howie, you¡¯ve had almost two months to figure this stuff out. It can¡¯t be much harder to find than the mining software or the exosuit.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯ve had the information for weeks, Abby. I just don¡¯t like the options available and there¡¯s nothing I¡¯d feel comfortable recommending for you to buy. I¡¯ve assessed each of the simulated surgery companies and what you¡¯re looking for doesn¡¯t exist. Parts of it are there, but not in a way that would be useful to you. For example, there are some decent mannequins on the market, but they¡¯re all very limited in the number of procedures you can practice on them, and those procedures are fairly basic. Some of them are geared towards specific specialties and others are only partial body mannequins. You¡¯d be much better off renting some time at the local simulation center in Charlotte. They have week long courses that you can take. You¡¯d get a feel for some of the better mannequins on the market and understand why I won¡¯t recommend that you buy any of them. Honestly though, if you¡¯ve worked with cadavers, I¡¯m not sure what working with these systems can help you with.¡±


    ¡°On the virtual reality side of things, you encounter the same problem. Most systems have only a few of the things that you¡¯re looking for. There are dozens of systems, each specialized to one body part or one type of surgery. The interfaces are often confusing and unnatural. The visual effects are either unrealistic or they¡¯re too realistic with no functionality to them. I think that if you want a real simulator, then you¡¯ll have to build it yourself.¡±


    ¡°I don¡¯t know anything about programming or creating something so sophisticated.¡± Although I think I succeeded in hiding it, I felt depressed. This was the first time that Howie couldn¡¯t come up with an amazing solution for me.


    ¡°I didn¡¯t mean for you to do the work yourself. You just need to buy a few existing smaller companies and have them work on making what you want for you. That¡¯s what I¡¯ve been working on for the past few weeks. I¡¯ve found one company in Florida that¡¯s not in the simulated surgery market at all, but their program core could easily be modified to handle a surgical environment. My computer guys were very impressed with their system. Got into quite a frenzy about their compression algorithm and AI integration. It¡¯s a bunch of kids who struck out on their own after college, trying and failing to make it big. Two guys and a girl. They have three programs that they license: Darts, fishing, and hunting.¡±


    ¡°People don¡¯t want those games?¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m sure that there¡¯s a market for all three. Only most of the year, a person can just go out and do those things in real life. Also, the market for VR is still in its infancy and the installed user base isn¡¯t as big as they¡¯d probably expected it to be. Using it for medical education though is a whole other ball game. It¡¯s something that every hospital could use, every medical student, every doctor. It¡¯s also much cheaper to buy a VR machine and pay some yearly user fees than it is to buy a mannequin and to pay for all the associated costs every year.¡±


    ¡°There¡¯s still a major problem. It will take them years to replicate a human body and all of it¡¯s functionality. Waiting that long isn¡¯t an option.¡±


    ¡°Has the amazing Howie ever let you down? Nope. I¡¯ve got you covered there too. I found another company that has an already built VR human body. They went bust three months ago. Spent all their money trying to create a fully functional human body that would look and act exactly like a human body would in real life. My computer guys say that the graphics are incredibly realistic and the functionality is superb. When you cut into the body, which looks like a real person and not a CGI creation, it bleeds like a person would and that the internal organs aren¡¯t simple representations or outlines. The heart is created from actual video files of a heart and pumps blood through the VR body. Even the skin has all the proper dermal layers.¡±


    ¡°Who would I be buying the VR body from?¡±


    ¡°Gary Wilders, the founder. He¡¯s agreed to sell you the program for a surprisingly reasonable amount. Basically, he¡¯s looking to pay back his parents and a few other key investors who bet on him. He can¡¯t sleep at night knowing that he lost all their money. You¡¯d be spending about twice on him as you did on the prepper warehouse. If you¡¯re interested, his only other request is that you consider hiring him and some of his ex-employees.¡±


    ¡°Ok. You seem to have this deal well in hand. When can you set up a time for me to meet with the Gary and the Florida company?¡±


    __________________


    A week later, I was sitting in the conference room of ProSport VR Systems in West Palm Beach Florida. That was the official title used by Mia Gearson, Game Designer and Coordinator, when I was invited to come in and sit. In reality, I was sitting in the living room of modest suburban house that ProSport VR Systems was renting as both their working and living quarters. Mia had dressed up for the meeting in tan slacks and a light pink blouse. One of her co-founders, Chase Marner, Programmer, was sitting across from me at the table. He hadn¡¯t bothered dressing up, but at least the jeans and t-shirt were clean. I had the distinct feeling that this ¡®conference¡¯ room had presided over many more pizza parties than business meetings and I was glad that I hadn¡¯t gone to the trouble of dressing up too much myself. Beige capri pants, a light blue polo shirt and tan sandals.


    ¡°Will Mr. Gearson be joining us as well? I¡¯d been hoping to speak with all of you together.¡±


    ¡°Matt hasn¡¯t been feeling well this past week. I didn¡¯t want to wake him. His cold is really taking a lot out of him.¡±


    ¡°Oh. I hope he gets better soon.¡± Mia and Chase just nodded and I wasn¡¯t sure where to go from there, so I just plowed ahead with the reason for my being there.


    ¡°I¡¯d like to make an offer on buying your company and all of it¡¯s IP (Intellectual Property). The offer would be conditional on all of you continuing to work for the company and using your knowledge of the system to design a new virtual reality program. The payment for the company would be spread out over three years, with one third being paid for every year of your service to the company. Should you leave before that, the payment would be forfeit. However, the payment would be independent of your individual salaries, which would include having the company pay for your rental of apartments in a suburb of Charlotte, North Carolina.¡±


    ¡°You¡¯d want us to move?¡± Mia inquired. I noticed that she didn¡¯t object or say that the company wasn¡¯t for sale. Nor did she seem to have issues with continuing to work for the company.


    ¡°Yes. My base of operations is just outside of Charlotte. I have access to a lot of resources there that could help us in building the new program.¡±


    ¡°What program would that be?¡± Chase was interested. As the company programmer, this was probably more important to him than the salary or company payout.


    ¡°I want the new company to build a fully interactive medical and surgical VR simulation program.¡±


    Chase started asking a long question in technobabble that I didn¡¯t understand at all.


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    ¡°I can¡¯t answer or even understand any of that. If you could rephrase it for someone who isn¡¯t technical, I¡¯d appreciate it.¡±


    Mia interjected, ¡°Never mind, Chase. I¡¯ll ask her. Abby, could you please explain what you¡¯d like this program to do?¡±


    ¡°Sure. I¡¯m currently undergoing medical training and I was trying to find a way to practice my surgical skills. I¡¯ve done tons of practice on cadavers, but they¡¯re not always available or fresh. There¡¯s also no blood and or movement. I tried using some of the medical simulation mannequins but they¡¯re way too basic. Most of the medical VR systems use 3D figures or CGI style people and they don¡¯t react properly. They¡¯re great for keeping simpler skills honed, but there¡¯s not much to them if you¡¯ve passed that point. I¡¯m looking for a system that can challenge me with problems that might crop up during surgery or where I can try out different techniques and see which ones work best. Being able to practice at home would also be a time saver in terms of travel.¡±


    Chase leaned forward as I was talking and his eyes were alive with excitement. ¡°Finally! A challenge. I¡¯m in.¡±


    A voice came from upstairs, ¡°Hold on, Chase. We need to discuss this.¡± The voice belonged to Matt and he did look sick. Aside from the messy hair and unshaven face, Matt wore a bathrobe that covered his shorts and t-shirt. He looked tired and worn out. He coughed as he made his way down the stairs and I could see that he was having difficulty swallowing. I scanned him quickly and found his problem immediately. He didn¡¯t have a cold.


    ¡°We don¡¯t need to sell the company. We¡¯re doing ok.¡± Matt made it to the end of the table and sat down heavily in the chair farthest from everyone.


    Chase¡¯s expression was a mixture of sadness and determination. ¡°No, we¡¯re not. The revenue from the games aren¡¯t enough to keep us going. The market just isn¡¯t there yet.¡±


    ¡°We just need a few more months and the new game will be ready. We can ride it out until then.¡±


    ¡°No, Matt. Mia¡¯s been trying to tell you that we¡¯re not going to make it for awhile now. You just don¡¯t want to hear it. We¡¯re more than six months from getting the game to market and we¡¯re out of money now. We¡¯re behind three months in our rent and we haven¡¯t paid ourselves in just as long. We¡¯re living on fumes, Matt. Time to face the music. Ms. Smith is offering us a lifeline. We need to take it. She¡¯s our only chance.¡±


    Matt¡¯s face took on a pained expression as Chase spoke. ¡°You¡¯re not supposed to say those things in front of her. You¡¯ve just killed any chance of negotiating a better deal. Also, how do you know that she can deliver?¡±


    ¡°Because I did my homework and looked her up online. She started her own charitable foundation at sixteen and funded it herself, with money that she make by selling one of the largest set of rubies ever found in North Carolina. Two of the board members for her foundation are Harry Kronin, a dean at a university near Charlotte and Jake McKenzie, Chairman of McKenzie Resources, one of the largest mining companies in the world. If they¡¯re ok being associated with her, I am too. Somehow, she also managed to be awarded the Order of Merit from the government of Germany. That¡¯s one of their highest civilian awards. I¡¯m don¡¯t know what she did to earn it, but they don¡¯t give those away like candy, especially to non-German citizens. Finally, there¡¯s an unbelievable video online of her saving someone life by carrying him out of a burning building.¡±


    Matt quietly took this all in and seemed to deflate further, all the fight having gone out of him. He shook his head in resignation.


    ¡°If it makes you feel any better, Matt, my offer isn¡¯t changing because of your circumstances. I believe that it¡¯s a fair deal. I want to work with you and your team and starting off that relationship by taking advantage of you guys is wrong way to do it.¡±


    ¡°Can you tell us more about what you want to game to do?¡± Matt straightened up his posture and shifted his position to show his interest.


    ¡°Better still, I¡¯ll show you. Come on over to the couch.¡±


    Matt slowly got up and walked over. ¡°Great. Now take off your robe and lie down.¡±


    When Matt hesitated, Mia said, ¡°Since when do you have a problem taking off your clothes and lying down when a girl tells you to?¡± Matt turned all sorts of red and Chase laughed at him. ¡°She¡¯s not going to bite you. Go on.¡±


    Matt lay down and I pulled out my stethoscope from my bag. I¡¯d brought it to illustrate a point about the need to get the dimensions of all the equipment perfectly in line with reality, but it had a better purpose now and it gave me the idea that I should probably start keeping a doctor backpack with me at all times. I started giving Matt a doctor¡¯s exam, skipping over a few of the more personal parts, as his sister and friend were watching, and asking him about his medical history. I kept it brief and was done in around five minutes.


    ¡°I¡¯m guessing that you didn¡¯t go see a doctor because you don¡¯t have any medical insurance?¡±


    ¡°Yeah, but this is just a cold. I wouldn¡¯t have gone anyways.¡±


    ¡°Well, it¡¯s not a cold. I think that you have a condition called hyperthyroidism. Your thyroid gland, which regulates a lot of your body¡¯s functions, is overactive and causing your symptoms of excessive sweating, fatigue, irritability, irregular heartbeat and sleep loss. The real clincher, though, is your enlarged thyroid gland at the base of your neck. A regular check-up would have brought that up in an instant. You need to go see a doctor today and have some blood tests done to confirm what I¡¯m saying. There are other thyroid issues that could cause all those symptoms. If I¡¯m right, the doctor will prescribe some medication and as long as you take it every day, you¡¯ll be fine.¡±


    I took out a thousand dollars from my wallet and handed it to Mia. ¡°Please make sure that he goes to see a doctor today. If this doesn¡¯t cover the costs, call me and I¡¯ll send you some more.¡± Mia accepted the money with tears in her eyes.


    Turning back to Matt, I explained, ¡°That¡¯s part of what I want the program to do. Although initially I want the program to focus on the surgical side of medicine, eventually I want it to be programmed with hundreds of interactions like the one we just had. Those are called clinical interactions and they¡¯re comprised of regular doctor visits that happen millions of times, every day across the planet. The patient comes in to see the doctor with a problem and the doctor tries to figure out what¡¯s causing it. Knowledge is the key, but experience plays a big role as well. Practicing with a VR system can sharpen a doctor¡¯s ability to recognize the clues needed to make a proper diagnosis. Think of it like bringing your car in to a mechanic when it makes a funny noise. You know there¡¯s a problem, but you need the mechanic to find out what¡¯s causing it and fix it. Medicine is the same, yet even more complex because you¡¯re dealing with people and people don¡¯t always tell you all of their symptoms. It forces the doctor to hunt for clues and it¡¯s very easy to miss important ones. A program like this will help train doctors to look for those clues as a matter of habit.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s for later though. For now, I¡¯m looking to start with one fully equipped surgical suite and one patient that I¡¯ll be able to program in with certain medical problems and then correct those problems surgically. Over time, we¡¯ll add in more techniques, patients of varying ages and health, a full surgical team including an anesthesiologist and nurses, differing levels for students and doctors, and a ranking system.¡±


    Chase was suddenly looking worried. ¡°I can¡¯t program a fully functional body in VR. I don¡¯t have the medical knowledge to do that.¡±


    ¡°I took care of that yesterday. I bought the assets of a company that recently closed down. They had a very advanced VR human body already completed. The owner of that company, Gary, is coming on board, along with several members of his team. If you guys say yes, we can start the hiring process and I can get you in touch with Gary to start integrating their VR files into your system. I¡¯ll warn you now that one of your biggest challenges in working with their VR body is the size of the files required. I¡¯m told that they¡¯re huge. You¡¯ll probably need much more powerful computers to handle working with them.¡±


    Chase rubbed his hands gleefully and Matt looked thoughtful. ¡°Just how realistic are you wanting these scenarios to be?¡±, Matt asked.


    ¡°If you¡¯re doing VR surgery and you make a mistake and kill the patient, I want the guy¡¯s pregnant wife and seven-year-old daughter to come in and I want the little girl asking, ¡°Where¡¯s my daddy? Is he going to be ok?¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s going to ruffle a few feathers.¡± Mia was smiling at the thought of it.


    ¡°The students are practicing for real life situations. They need to see that there are consequences to their mistakes. Nothing about our scenarios should be easy or routine for them. When they reach a certain level of proficiency, which can be inferred by how quickly they finish the surgery or from their score, then the system should increase the difficulty on their next try. By the time the medical student performs surgery on his or her first live patient, I want them coming out of that surgery thinking about how much easier it was than our program.¡±

 B3: Chapter 28 - A Change of Plans

    I set up Gary and Mia¡¯s teams in the industrial building at Hannah¡¯s Home, next to Sifu Zhang¡¯s Kung Fu, and I put Shauna in charge of making sure that they that they all got settled in ok. The two teams of three quickly grew to ten employees, as key team members were lured back to their old jobs, and within a few short weeks, the two teams merged into one. For my part, I cut back on my studies a little, ending my days at three, so that I could help the new company, VR Health Systems, get off the ground.


    If it weren¡¯t for Jenny taking a keen interest in the new venture, I¡¯d have been forced to put my medical training on hold completely. I had no idea how much work it would be to integrate two companies and to ride herd over them. Jenny took on the task of operations manager without being asked and organized things so that I got a daily update report when I came in and had a list of all the decisions that the team required in order to move the project towards my vision for it.


    This side project was putting a serious dent in my legitimate personal funds, but I had enough to last me out the year. That would be enough time for some of my other projects to bear fruit and refill my cash reserves. While my farm and my mining land wouldn¡¯t give me much of a return for many years, my mining consultation business, as well as my planned ¡°Natural Healing¡± consultation business, should more than handle the costs of running VR Health Systems.


    Throughout the remaining weeks of summer, my schedule was packed from morning until¡­morning. I started off my days following rounds at the hospital and then joining my ¡®peers¡¯ in whatever rotation I was currently learning about. Afternoons, until three, were spent observing surgeries in the ORs and listening in on the pre- and post-surgical analyses. Mostly, I was following the general surgeons around, but I sometimes ventured into the orthopaedic, thoracic, or colorectal department surgeries. My repertoire of surgeries was growing fast and my field allowed me to recall every bit of those procedures. In addition, as I came to realize that my new VR project was going to need to recreate these surgeries from the standpoint of each member of the surgical team, I started scanning all of the participants. This put a serious strain on my abilities and pushed my concentration to the limit. Although, like any other muscle, continued use improved those abilities and it became easier as the weeks went by.


    Leaving the hospital at three, I would head out to Hannah¡¯s Home for about two hours to work with the people at VR Health Systems and then another hour with Shauna going over foundation business. Home, dinner and a late Kung Fu class were my next activities, followed by home, shower, and school for some cadaver practice. Most nights I was sleeping by one or one-thirty and I¡¯d start the whole process again at six in the morning.


    With a schedule like that, it was no wonder that I looked forward to the weekend. Weekends were my only chance to sleep-in a little and to spend a bit of time with my parents and friends. Even Mark was relegated to the weekends and he made sure that his trips for McKenzie resources left his weekends free.


    On the last weekend before Eva and James left for university in Chapel Hill, I had plans to spend almost the entire two days with them. The festivities were to begin with lunch at Big Julie¡¯s Pizzeria.


    A few sentences from mom at breakfast put an end to those plans.


    ¡°Josh, there¡¯s a call out for volunteers to help search for a mother and daughter that went missing at South Mountain State Park. They¡¯ve been gone since yesterday afternoon. It¡¯s only an hour away. Do you think we could go help them search the area?¡±


    Mom had been reading the news on my iPad. She would have preferred to get a ¡®real¡¯ newspaper, only they¡¯d all either gone out of business or online in the decade plus that she¡¯d been away. At her words, dad turned to me and raised his left eyebrow in question.


    ¡°Why are you looking at me?¡±


    ¡°I was just thinking that your field might be perfectly suited for searching that state park.¡±


    ¡°How could Abby¡¯s field do that?¡± Mom hadn¡¯t ever seen my detailed maps of Jake¡¯s mines and didn¡¯t know how far out I could scan. Dad filled her in and she told us to be ready to leave in fifteen minutes.


    ¡°Dad, there could be hundreds of families out there on those mountains.¡±


    ¡°You¡¯ll just have to look for groups of two, with one of the two being very small. Given that they¡¯ve been missing since yesterday, I¡¯d guess that one of them, or both, are injured or they¡¯re in an area that they can¡¯t get out of.¡±


    ¡°Hmmm. In that case, I¡¯ll need a bit more time to get ready. I¡¯ll meet you and mom at the car.¡±


    Since my impromptu examination of Matt, I¡¯d been building up my own doctor¡¯s kit. Initially, it was an emergency medical kit, resembling what many people kept in their cars, and it quickly evolved into several backpacks, as I considered all of the things that I might need. I had one backpack organized with all the drugs and medications that I might need, including some EpiPen¡¯s and a glucose meter. Howie was able to find me a good deal on the drugs as they were all within six months of their expiry date. As this bag spent almost all of it¡¯s time in L2, the expiry dates were meaningless for my purposes. Having the bag in L2 also let me store several useful medications that would normally need to be kept refrigerated.


    A second backpack was set up as a trauma bag. It contained sterile dressing, splints, and oxygen tank, a few tourniquets, chest decompression kit, trauma scissors, open chest seals, heavy duty all-purpose tape, airway stabilization equipment and a manual suction device. Whereas a first aid kit was used for small scrapes and cuts, this bag was used to keep a person alive until you could get them to the hospital. This bag, I¡¯d purchased full stocked and merely tweaked it a bit for my personal preferences. For instance, from my experience at the embassy party, I make sure to include several needle decompression syringes.


    My final backpack more closely resembled the traditional doctor¡¯s bag and included a stethoscope, percussion hammer, otoscope, ophthalmoscope, cotton, alcohol, throat swabs, sterile gloves, sutures, scalpels, sutures, needles, scissors, syringes, a thermometer, a flashlight and equipment to measure blood pressure. To be on the safe side, I added several surgical instruments that I thought might be useful to have.


    I dressed quickly, grabbed the three medical bags and overlapped them on my back. The drug bag stayed in L2, the trauma bag went to L1, and the doctor¡¯s bag was shifted to R1. It still amazed me how I could be carrying all those bags simultaneously and not feel their weight at all. I was pretty sure that some physical laws were being broken in the process.


    On the way, dad asked me if I had ever used my field to search for anything.


    ¡°Sure. I searched for ores in Jake¡¯s mines.¡±


    ¡°Not quite, Abby. In the mines, you scanned everything. That¡¯s not the same as searching for something specific.¡±


    ¡°It kind of is. How can you search for something specific without seeing everything else while you¡¯re looking?¡±


    ¡°If you know the shape of something, then your eyes can pick it out of a pile of other things, without your brain actually paying attention to every item in the pile. Your scans seems to read the entire pile and list of what¡¯s in it and where. I would assume that scanning that way give you a complete picture, while also filling up your brain with incredible amounts of information that you don¡¯t need. I would think that if you were able to use the field to only look for what you need to find, then you¡¯d be able to scan much further as well, since you wouldn¡¯t be overwhelmed by all the extra detail. Instead of thousands of data points, you¡¯d only get a few.¡±


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    Dad had a good point. I remembered trying to go past my three-mile limit and how my brain couldn¡¯t seem to hold everything clearly after that. If he was right, then I needed to find a way to only scan for what I was searching for. In this case, it was a mother and daughter. I didn¡¯t know their shapes, but maybe I could search for all humans and narrow it down from there, as dad had suggested earlier. Now I just had to figure out how to scan for humans.


    ¡°Got any suggestions on how to scan for something specific?¡±


    ¡°Picture an object that you¡¯re very familiar with and keep it in mind while you scan. Try it while we drive. Perhaps the wheel on the car?¡±


    I gave it a try. I pictures the circular shape of the tire, the color of the tire, and the metal rim interior of the tire and I kept the image firmly in my head while I shaped a small ten foot by ten-foot field and passed it through the moving car.


    ¡°You¡¯re low on oil and windshield washer fluid. Also, next time you bring the car in, have them top up the brake fluid and check why the rear passenger-side tire is getting slightly more wear on the inside part of the tire. Mom, the lip balm that you were looking for is under your seat, closer to the door, six inches back from your right foot. There¡¯s also a combined seventy-cents in various positions under your seat dad.¡±


    Mom was giving me a strange look, a little amazed and a little bit worried about my mental health. Dad just chuckled and said, ¡°Good to know. Now tell me what you did. How did you scan the car?¡±


    I explained about the field and how I passed it over the car. He asked a few more questions and got quiet for awhile, deep in thought. I¡¯d seen him like this sometimes, as he tried to figure out how to create difficult pieces for one of his artworks.


    ¡°Are you able to pass the scan through the car faster? Perhaps then the field won¡¯t have enough time to register everything.¡±


    ¡°At the mines, I sent the field through miles of rock in a few seconds. That¡¯s faster than the speed of sound. Scanning the car took less than a second. I don¡¯t see how I can get it to go faster, unless I had it going at light speed and that¡¯s several orders of magnitude faster still. I¡¯m pretty sure that my brain wasn¡¯t designed to handle that.¡±


    ¡°Don¡¯t electrical impulses in the brain travel at the speed of light?¡± Mom asked.


    ¡°No. Sound travels at around one mile per five seconds. Light travels at 186,000 miles per second. The fastest neurons in the brain go about a hundred and twenty miles per second.¡± Those neurology books sure were coming in handy.


    ¡°That means your brain is able to handle faster speeds. If it¡¯s not a speed issue, perhaps you need to look at how you¡¯re sending out your field.¡±


    Now it was my turn to get quiet and thoughtful. What other ways could I send out a field? Shape the field and send it out. I¡¯d always done that. Except¡­except I hadn¡¯t started out that way. The first time I¡¯d send out the field had been unintentional, when I¡¯d been sparring with Uncle Magnum. No, Paul. I needed to get out of the habit of calling him that. The joke was old and it was time to retire it. I was eighteen, not twelve anymore. Anyways, that first time, I hadn¡¯t shaped the field beforehand. I¡¯d just instinctively sent it out. My lack of power had limited it to staying just a few feet from my body. If I did the same thing today, the field would probably burst out much, much farther.


    Thoughts started clicking together in my head. Burst. Impulse. Pulse. Where had I heard about pulse bursts? Eva! She¡¯d been telling me about laser hair removal and how the handpiece they used sent out laser pulses to damage the hair follicles. Could I send out the field in a pulse burst away from my body? I wouldn¡¯t shape it or keep it going, just send it out away from my body in all directions.


    It took a few tries before I got the idea to work, somewhat. My mind kept trying to form a shape. That¡¯s what I was used to. Finally, overcoming the habit, I managed to send out the field without any control or boundary limits. I just threw the field outwards, projecting it away from my body in all directions. It was a weak burst and I could sort of make out the ragged edges of it twenty feet away. It provided significantly less information than my regular scans. I wasn¡¯t sure if that was a good thing on not, but it was something new. It had the potential to be what I was looking for, so I kept experimenting. First by adding more power, to see how far I could pulse. I let out a series of pulses in quick succession, each one with more power than the last. There was no strain at all in reaching the one-mile mark and I put that on hold for now. Next, I tried to see if I could send out a pulse in one direction, rather than out in all directions at once. Having already gotten a handle on pulsing, this came easily and I was soon sending out pulses in any direction that I chose. It made sense that sending out a pulse in only one direction took far less power than sending it out in all directions. With the same amount of power as I¡¯d used in sending my pulse one mile in all direction, I could send out a pulse in one direction for six miles. Wow! I hadn¡¯t been close to my power limit when I¡¯d sent out that pulse and I wondered how far I could send one out. However, before I could start experimenting with that, I had to see what I could use the pulse for. Right now, it didn¡¯t seem to do anything.


    Despite my earlier attempt to hold the image of a tire in my head, I already knew that simply imagining what I wanted to find wouldn¡¯t work. The field didn¡¯t work that way. It couldn¡¯t read my mind. I had to direct it to do things. Although, when I stopped to think for a minute, I realized that even giving directives to the field required some understanding from the field. It was reading my intent every time I shaped a field or sent it out or changed frequency to reach a layer or sublayer or reality. There had to be a way to communicate my intention for the field to search for an object when I sent out a pulse.


    Just for the sake of completeness, I sent out a pulse while imagining the tire in my head. Yup, I was right. Nothing. What else could I try? How do I connect the idea of the tire with the pulse? If the field couldn¡¯t read my imagination, could I pair the pulse with an image or with an object? What if I held one of the tires in a field while I sent out the pulse? Like giving a dog a scent to track.


    It worked!! I let out a gleeful ¡°Yes!¡± and punched the air in triumph. I startled mom and she jerked in her seat. Dad merely said, ¡°Glad to have you back. You¡¯ve been in your own world for half an hour. We should be at the park in fifteen minutes. Please bring us up to date on your efforts.¡±


    I took dad through my thought processes and my trials and errors. I got the biggest reaction out of him when I told him how far I¡¯d pulsed. ¡°Six miles? And you weren¡¯t anywhere near your limit. That¡¯s remarkable.¡± When I finished my tale, dad got all thoughtful again.


    ¡°You¡¯ve gotten closer to what we need, but you¡¯re not quite there yet. If you have a duplicate of what you¡¯re looking for, then you can find other examples of it, as you just did with the tires. All four of the tires were lit up in your pulse. You need to take it a step further and see if you can find things that you don¡¯t have a duplicate of. In the tire experiment, you used one of the tires as an example and it found the others. Since the four tires aren¡¯t exactly the same, with one having more wear than the others, that suggests that the field is able to find things that are very similar to what you¡¯ve presented as an example. However, you didn¡¯t pick up on the spare tire in the trunk. Spare tires are typically thinner than normal tires so that they take up less space in the truck. I¡¯d like you to try creating a field in a shape similar to a tire and seeing if that works as well. If it does, try getting progressively further from that shape until it is just the suggestion of a tire. Maybe even try shaping a simple two-dimensional circle. You need to get a feel for how far from the actual you can get and still find what you¡¯re looking for.¡±


    Damn! I¡¯d completely forgotten about the spare tire. Dad had some very good observations and I set about trying out his suggestions. The field accepted to search for a tire based on the tire shaped field I created and ended up catching the spare tire this time. As I shifted the field to look less and less like a tire and more like a circle, more and more items started being detected in the search. The first one was the steering wheel, but soon the air filters in the engine showed up and then cup holders, air vents, break lights and even engine cylinders.


    Thinking ahead to the upcoming search, I changed the fields shape from a flat circle to that of a 3D person and sent out a half mile forward pulse in the direction we were traveling. Thirty-two adults showed up in my search. Shrinking the field in size to that of child, I tried again and found nine-children. Given that the size of the adults varied a good bit, as did the sizes of the children, I got the impression that there was a good amount of leeway in the field¡¯s interpretation of what counted as ¡®similar¡¯ to my shaped field. Was I missing the people between those two sizes? Was there a way that I could get everyone in a single pulse? Trying again, I created two person-shaped fields, one adult and one child sized, and send out a pulse. This time, the field only found six people, three sets of two, each set with one adult and one child. That¡¯s exactly what I needed for my search!

 B3: Chapter 29 - Lost in the Woods

    I told my parents about my new discovery and we high-fived all around. Dad¡¯s high-five was reversed and tentative since he was still driving and watching the road. A few minutes later, dad pulled into the main parking area of the South Mountain State Park where the search for the mother and daughter was being coordinated and where the volunteers were being assigned their groups and area to cover. Mom and I stayed in the car while dad headed over to find out in what area they had gone missing and in what areas the search was being conducted.


    Dad returned a few minutes later with a map of the park, a starting location and more on the story of how the mother and daughter got lost. The family of four had gone camping together, two parents and two children, aged seven and five. The seven-year-old¡¯s inhaler had been almost empty and the father and son had gone back home to get a fresh one, leaving the mother and daughter to hang out at the campsite by themselves for two hours. When the father and son returned, the campsite was deserted. They searched the whole area before heading to the ranger¡¯s station to get help. Speculation was running deep as to what happened with everything from abduction to getting lost in the woods being thrown out as a possibility. The silver lining in all this is that the night had been relatively warm and dry so there wasn¡¯t any danger of them succumbing to the elements.


    Mom and dad started debating the best area from me to start my search. Mom was in favor of driving out to the backwoods camping area where the family had stayed, clear across to the other side of the park, and searching from there. Dad liked her idea, but felt that given the massive range of my abilities, it didn¡¯t really matter where I started and that I should just start looking now and if I didn¡¯t find them, we¡¯d drive however many miles we needed until we reached the limits of where I¡¯d already searched and start again.


    With nothing to lose, I gave dad¡¯s idea a try. I shaped the adult and child fields again and sent out a powerful pulse. ¡°I¡¯ve got five sets of parent and child in a two-mile radius of here. I¡¯m sending out a field to check each one. Four of the adults are male and the one female adult is with a boy. All are healthy and near a campsite or a trail. Let¡¯s drive out a few miles towards where they went missing and I¡¯ll try again.¡±


    Three more stops with no luck brought us to the other entrance to the park. Dad parked the car and we all got out. Mom began heading for the trail that led to the campsite and I called her back. ¡°I need a few minutes to get into my gear.¡± I got my duffel bag from the trunk and took out my exosuit. As I strapped on each of the sections, I explained to them what was. ¡°If either of them is hurt, I¡¯ll be better able to carry them out.¡±


    ¡°If you find them and they¡¯re injured, we should call in the paramedics. You shouldn¡¯t risk injuring them further.¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s ok, dad. I¡¯ll scan them before I move them. Also, if I shift them to L2, then I can carry them without worrying about hurting them. Our biggest problem will be explaining to any paramedics or police how we found them and how we brought them out.¡±


    I strapped on the final piece and made sure no one was looking my way before sending the exosuit into R2. I¡¯d bring it back later, if it was needed. In the meantime, it would just limit my movement through the forest. Dad shook his head in wonder at the way the suit seemed to disappear.


    Mom had the map in hand and she set a brisk pace. With so many other search parties around, we didn¡¯t need the map, but I think that it was helping mom with her anxiety over the missing mother and daughter. I could have scanned for them from the car just as easily, but I got the feeling that mom needed to do something, to feel useful, so I kept quiet. From dad¡¯s expression when I caught his eye, he agreed.


    We came up to the campsite fifteen minutes later. I¡¯d expected to see more park rangers and policemen around, but then I remembered that they¡¯d all be out searching. There was a temporary command post off to the side and I could see the father and son inside of it, listening intently to the constant reports from the search parties. Dad led us to an empty picnic table and had us sit down. Mom said she was ready to head out, but dad insisted. ¡°You¡¯re six months pregnant, Hannah. That doesn¡¯t make you an invalid, but it does mean that you should rest more. Besides, Abby needs to scan again. It¡¯s probably easier for her if she¡¯s not walking through the woods while she does it.¡±


    We sat and I sent out my pulse, searching for the mother and daughter. I put a lot more power into this pulse because mom was so impatient. It was weird, the closer we came, the more anxious she was getting. ¡°They¡¯re almost three miles away. Much farther south and to the west than the search parties are looking. Hold on, I¡¯m sending a field to scan them and the area. Ok. The little girl is fine. A few scraps and cuts. The mother has a concussion. There¡¯s a small gash on the back side of her head. She also has a small fracture in the lower part of her tibia. It probably hurts to put weight on it. She¡¯s going to need help to get out of there. She has two nasty lacerations. One on her right arm and one on her broken leg. She¡¯d lost a lot of blood and the wounds will need stitches. She¡¯s probably very weak right now, but there¡¯s no permanent damage. They¡¯re huddled up at the base of a small cliff. There aren¡¯t any dangerous animals around.¡±


    Mom was about to get up and dad stopped her with a light touch to her shoulder. ¡°They¡¯re safe, Hannah. We can take a few minutes to figures things out. Abby will keep scanning the area to make sure that nothing changes. Abby brought up a good point back at the car. We have to find a way to explain how we found them. It¡¯s also a six-mile round-trip hike and I don¡¯t think that you should be doing that in your condition.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯ll be fine for the hike. Abby can keep scanning me to make sure that I don¡¯t overdo it and I promise to stop if she says that I need to. Josh, I need to see that they¡¯re ok. I don¡¯t know why. I just do.¡±


    ¡°I suspect that you¡¯re identifying with the mother and daughter and comparing their situation to your own. The little girl is almost the same age Abby was when you were both abducted.¡±


    Oh wow. How had I missed that connection? Looking back on the morning, I can see it so clearly now. Mom¡¯s weird anxiety, near panic, to get out here and help out, was a form of post-traumatic stress. Her mind was reliving the terrors of our abduction. I got up and went sit next to her and give her a hug. Dad¡¯s massive arms joined us in the hug and I felt mom¡¯s rigid frame relax, probably for the first time since she¡¯d read about the missing mother and daughter.


    Mom wiped a few tears from her eyes and gave me a determined look. ¡°I still want to see this through and help them get back. What¡¯s the plan?¡±


    ¡°I have one idea. I¡¯ll need to try something new with my new searching skill. If it works, it could be what we need. I just need a minute.¡±


    Finding the mother again, I put a tiny field around the some of the dried blood at the back of her head and then I paired that blood with a pulse going from us towards her direction. The pulse lit up a trail of blood for me to follow. The first traces of the mother¡¯s blood were on a few rocks at the edge of a stream. Either she¡¯d been walking along and fallen or she¡¯s slipped when she¡¯d tried to cross it. I think she fell, smacked her head and tore her arm open against a rock. Following her trail after that was easy, if confusing. The concussion was probably affecting her judgement considerably. Between the occasional bloody hand-prints trees and the drops of blood from her arm wound, I had enough to explain how we found them. The fresher blood from the tear in her leg wasn¡¯t much help, since she hadn¡¯t moved too far from the place where she¡¯d fallen and damaged her leg.


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    We brainstormed for another few minutes, making sure that our stories would match up, if anyone questioned us, and then we set out. Once we were out of sight, mom and dad continued down the trail while I went back to the command tent and snagged one of the walkies-talkies they were giving out to search parties. Keeping the pen in R1 and sending just the tip into reality, I wrote in dad¡¯s name on the check list, along with how many we were in our search party and marked us off as searching the area where I¡¯d found the blood. The handwriting wouldn¡¯t match, but I saw that several people had filled in the form so I didn¡¯t worry about it.


    A few minutes later, I caught up with mom and dad and it wasn¡¯t long before we found the blood. I led us from one trace to the next, going slowly both for mom¡¯s sake and so that anyone who followed our track would see signs of hesitation. In truth, we were carrying it a bit far. No one was going to question us or follow our track with suspicion. They would be impressed that we¡¯d found the trail of blood and been able to follow it. Hopefully, they would chalk it up to good observation or something. After all, it¡¯s not like a crime was being committed and there was no monetary reward for finding the family. However, dad insisted on the extra precautions. I¡¯d been involved in too many unusual happenings and this was only going to add to them.


    Taking our time, it took us over an hour and a half to walk the three miles and it was almost noon before we were a few hundred feet away from the Carolyn and Melissa. I¡¯d caught their names while in the command tent. Melissa was the little girl. As per our plan, mom and dad started calling out their names as we approached their position. If we hadn¡¯t been listening so keenly for it, we wouldn¡¯t have heard the little girl¡¯s cry for help.


    We rushed over and found them sitting up at the base of the short cliff, just as I¡¯d described. They¡¯d barely moved positions from when I¡¯d first scanned them. When she saw us, Melissa got up and ran to us. ¡°My mommy needs help. She¡¯s hurt.¡± I nearly started crying at the desperation in her voice. Putting my emotions aside, I shifted my trauma backpack to reality and started working on cleaning and binding the Carolyn¡¯s wounds. Carolyn was in a confused state and I kept up a running commentary of what I was doing so that she¡¯d have something to focus on. Meanwhile, Mom reassured Melissa that her mom was going to be ok. For his part, dad used the walkies-talkies to report to the command tent. When he relayed our find, I could hear cheering in the background and the Head Ranger pressing him for information about our location.


    I paused my ministrations long enough to pull out my phone and get our GPS coordinates. Dad passed on the information and gave them a rundown of Carolyn¡¯s injuries and explained that I was caring for her wounds. When the Head Ranger, Ian Thompson, wanted more details, dad handed me the walkies-talkie and I gave him the full rundown, using all the appropriate medical jargon that I¡¯d learned over the past few months. At his request, I handed the speaker to Carolyn so that her husband could speak with her. Her confused state didn¡¯t lend itself very well to a conversation and soon we handed him over to Melissa, who started telling her daddy all about being lost in the woods and how hungry she was.


    That jogged my memory and I shifted my regular backpack to reality from L3 and took out some rations bars and water. Melissa continued talking to her dad while she ate. I managed to get Carolyne to eat a few bites and drink a few sips of water while I finished wrapping up her wounds and applied a splint to provide support for her fractured leg. She¡¯d either need to get a cast or a boot for it at the hospital. I left the head wound untouched for the moment. I could see that the blood had crusted over and starting to clean it up would only bring her more pain. The doctors at the hospital would decide what sedatives to administer to her, given her concussion, while they sewed up her wounds. It was definitely not something that a non-medical school trainee like myself would know anything about.


    Five minutes later, Ranger Thompson was back on the line explaining how the fastest way to get Carolyne to the hospital was by helicopter. He¡¯d located a potential landing site half a mile from our location and asked if we¡¯d be able to get her there. Dad assured him that we could. He gave dad the GPS coordinates and I entered them into my phone. I scanned the area and, now that we didn¡¯t have to follow a trail of blood, I was free to choose the easiest path. In this case, the best path was using a well established game-trail for most of the way.


    We set out with me leading the way, dad following and holding Carolyne, and mom bringing up the rear with Melissa in hand. I¡¯d offered to carry Carolyne, but dad refused my help, explaining that the exosuit would just confuse everyone. He was right, but I hadn¡¯t planned on anyone seeing me. Regardless, dad managed easily enough without my help.


    The helicopter arrived in the small clearing not long after we did and we all got a ride to the hospital. This alone was worth the price of admission. I¡¯d never been in a helicopter before and the best way I could describe it was to say that it felt like being carried around in a basket. It was a great way to travel and probably the closest thing I¡¯d found to the joys of driving in L2. No traffic, no stop signs, no pedestrians to watch out for. Just going from point A to point B. I¡¯d have to look into getting one of these.


    Ranger Thompson and Mike Brenner, Carolyne¡¯s husband, met us on the roof of the hospital along with a team of medical professionals. Carolyne and Melissa were fussed over and taken to be x-rayed and examined, while Ranger Thompson thanked us for our assistance and asked us to take him through our rescue for his reports. Dad did most of the talking and we were done in twenty minutes. We graciously accepted Ranger Thompson¡¯s offer of a ride back to our car and when we pulled into the park we were surprised by a small crowd of park rangers, paramedics, search and rescue personnel, and several policemen who wanted to congratulate and thank us. Ranger Thompson had radioed of our upcoming arrival and an impromptu lunch had been set up. Mom, dad and I were given Guest of Honor status and couldn¡¯t say no to joining in.


    ¡°Abby! We didn¡¯t know that you were moonlighting as a Search and Rescue Specialist.¡± I turned around to find Jose and Carter coming my way, along with Dean and Janie.


    ¡°Hey guys. What brings you out here? This isn¡¯t your patrol area.¡±


    ¡°Missing people. It was all hands on-deck, especially for those of us who were off-duty. Besides, when we end up finding lost hikers, Ian always sets up a lunch for us. We wouldn¡¯t miss that.¡±


    ¡°How do you guys know Ms. Smith?¡± Ranger Thompson was eyeing me with confusion while mom and dad both seemed very interested in the answer to that question.


    ¡°Abby¡¯s the one that did the imaging for the entire police department with that new ultrasound machine. After the insurance company verified some of her results, they practically forced us all to have the scans done. Did the scanning for the paramedics and fire-fighters too. It was great.¡±


    ¡°What new scanning machine? You guys been holding out on us?¡± Ranger Thompson interest was piqued. Jose, one of the paramedics I¡¯d scanned, gave Ranger Thompson the basics. ¡°It was the easiest scan I¡¯d ever had. I just walked in, talked to Abby for a few minutes, and it was done. It saved Nathan¡¯s life. He had no idea he had lung cancer. Wasn¡¯t even a smoker. Anyways, Abby¡¯s machine caught it so early that he was able to have it removed before it could spread and he was out of the hospital in less than a week. Lots of other were saved the same way.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯ll call your rep after lunch and get the details. I can¡¯t have my rangers playing second-hand citizens to you guys.¡± Looks like I¡¯d have to open up my schedule a bit to accommodate more scans.


    I introduced mom and dad to the everyone, along with their job title and their health assessment. Jose, paramedic, early onset clogged arteries due to too much fast food and too little exercise. Carter, paramedic, in excellent cardiovascular shape. Dean, rookie police officer, too much acid in his stomach due to overindulgence in apple juice, and Janie, Dean¡¯s senior partner, in need of a psychiatrist for putting up with Dean¡¯s constant chatter. ¡°Guys, these are my parents, Hannah and Josh.¡±


    Janie looked confused. ¡°Hannah? As in Hannah¡¯s Home that you named after your missing mother?¡±


    ¡°Yes. She was rescued a month or two after you guys came in for your scans.¡± This statement was followed by a new round of congratulations and cheers.


    ¡°You were abducted?¡±


    ¡°My mom and I were when I was four. Mom got me away, but she disappeared from our lives for thirteen years. She¡¯s only been back for around five months.¡±


    ¡°I guess that explains why a woman in your obvious condition was out here today, helping out.¡±


    ¡°Yes. I had to make sure that this family got the rescue that our family missed out on for so long.¡±

 B3: Chapter 30 - I Do

    Between all of Maggie¡¯s teaching friends and Uncle Paul¡¯s students and friends, along with each of their families, Hannah¡¯s Home was packed with people for their wedding. It was a gorgeous Labor Day weekend and the ceremony was held by the lake, with the bride and groom taking their vows on the dock, under a traditional Jewish canopy called a Chupah.


    Hannah¡¯s Home had twenty-two survivors in residence at the time and Maggie invited them all to the join in their celebration. Shauna, Jenny, Gabriel, Shelley, Tyler, and the Sisters were also in attendance. The dancing started outside, in a sectioned off area of the parking lot and later moved inside to the auditorium as night came on and dinner was served. After the traditional first dance of the bride and groom the floor opened up to a series of Horas, Jewish dances consisting of long chains of people dancing in concentric circles, with the bride and groom and their parents and siblings holding the center space.


    When normal dancing resumed, Jenny dominated the dance floor, this time with Sifu Zhang. I didn¡¯t know that he had it in him and apparently Uncle Paul didn¡¯t either, as he was starring, opened mouthed, at his mentor¡¯s grace and style on the dance floor.


    Mom spent much of the night being fussed over by family members who hadn¡¯t seen her since before the kidnapping. The news of her pregnancy only intensified these interactions and several times I saw mom and dad head over to the tables set aside for the survivors in order to escape from all the attention. The dance floor could have been another island of seclusion for them, only dad wasn¡¯t big on dancing. Although, if the music was slow enough, he¡¯d be happy to hold mom in his arms and sway back and forth, box-step or move around in circles. Dad wasn¡¯t light on his feet.


    For my part, I mostly spent the night dancing with Mark. Sure, I spent some time making nice with the family and listened to inane chatter like, ¡°Look how grown up you are! I haven¡¯t seen you since you were...¡± and ¡°He¡¯s a very good looking boy. Is there another wedding coming up?¡±, but mostly I danced. It was a rare night off and I had no responsibilities and no cares. I was celebrating my Uncle¡¯s good fortune in meeting such a wonderful person and that was all. I didn¡¯t scan a single person and I didn¡¯t think about anything medical related.


    ¡°I haven¡¯t seen you this relaxed and happy since Comic-Con. Whatever you¡¯re working on, I think you should take breaks from it more often.¡± Mark was whispering into my ear during a slow song, ¡°Careless Whisper¡± by Wham.


    ¡°Maybe I should. What did you have in mind?¡±


    ¡°How about an all-expense paid tour of all McKenzie Resources US operations?¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s just more work. I thought you wanted me to relax.¡±


    ¡°I need to work. You don¡¯t. You can spend your days however you want and your evenings in my arms.¡±


    ¡°That last part sounds tempting. How long is the trip?¡±


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    ¡°A month, but if you don¡¯t come with me, I¡¯ll come back every other weekend to see you.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯ll split the difference with you. Send me the itinerary and maybe I¡¯ll join you for a few legs of the trip, depending on which cities you¡¯ll be near. That way I can work on a few of my projects and rack up some consulting fees from Jake. My virtual reality company will need another infusion of cash in the future and I shouldn¡¯t wait until the last minute to start earning it.¡±


    ¡°Funny you should mention that. Jake was hoping you¡¯d look into a few properties for him. Also, he asked me to let you know that the next part of the dinosaur payment will be coming in next month. That might ease some of your immediate cash issues.¡±


    ¡°Oh God. I forgot all about my payments for the dinosaur. This is great news. Does that mean that it¡¯s almost ready for display?¡±


    ¡°From my understanding, that¡¯s still awhile away. It just means that the university had reached another milestone in the excavation and have to make another payment according to the contract. The skeleton is fully intact and they¡¯re taking their time. It really is a rare find and they¡¯re making sure that they don¡¯t mess it up. Zach was in heaven though. Jake arranged for him to spend two weeks this past summer at the dig site.¡±


    ¡°He must have been a terror, running around and getting his nose into everything.¡±


    ¡°Not at all. Jake made sure of that. Told him that the first time he misbehaved would he his last time at the site. They had him working with some of the grad students to keep him busy and interested.¡±


    During the next slow song, this time Runaway Train by Soul Asylum, I brought up something that had been bothering me for awhile.


    ¡°Mark, there are some things about me that I don¡¯t talk about. Secrets that I keep to myself. We¡¯re getting closer to each other and I don¡¯t want it to become a barrier between us. I¡¯m also not ready to discuss those secrets with you. I might never be.¡±


    ¡°I know, Abby. I¡¯m ok with it, mostly. It¡¯s hard not knowing, because I can¡¯t help you. You keep starting to say certain things and stop yourself. Sometimes I want to tell you to just say what you were going to say. I don¡¯t because I figure that you¡¯ll tell me when you¡¯re ready to. It all just adds to the mystery of Abby. That said, I really would like to know what you¡¯re working on.¡±


    ¡°I can tell you that, if you agree to Swami rules.¡±


    ¡°You tell me, but you won¡¯t tell me how you¡¯re doing it? I can live with that.¡±


    ¡°You¡¯re pretty smart for a new college graduate.¡±


    ¡°Hey, we can¡¯t all find million-dollar gemstones and live the dream. Some of us need to learn our chosen profession and work for a living.¡±


    ¡°Shows what you know. I¡¯m studying to become a doctor.¡±


    Mark stops dancing and looks at me with a level of seriousness and intensity that I usually only see in him when he¡¯s talking about geology or mining. ¡°Are you being serious or are you setting me up for a punchline?¡±


    ¡°100% serious. I am doing it my own way though.¡±


    Mark grabs me in a big hug and twirls me around. I notice that he has gotten stronger over the past year.


    ¡°That¡¯s wonderful Abby! It¡¯s been eating me alive that you weren¡¯t pushing yourself to achieve your full potential. Don¡¯t get me wrong. The foundation is amazing. It¡¯s just that I know that you can do so much more.¡±


    ¡°Don¡¯t knock the foundation. There¡¯s a lot more to the foundation than what you see now. I just need a little more time. And why didn¡¯t you say anything, if you were so worried?¡±


    ¡°Abby, you can¡¯t talk someone into wanting more for themselves. You can try to guide them to it, but they need to find their own way to it, if they ever can.¡±


    What struck me as amazing about Mark was that he didn¡¯t challenge me about becoming a doctor. He was content to know that I had a purpose, a goal, and that I was pursuing it, no matter how. He only cared about me and that I was fulfilled. Damn. One more reason to be thankful that I dragged his cute butt out of that burning house.

 B3: Chapter 31 - A Commercial Break

    ¡°Do you have any plans for that empty space beside the Kung Fu studio?¡±


    At their request, Shauna and I were giving the foundation¡¯s board of directors a tour of Hannah¡¯s Home and showing off the latest improvements that we¡¯d made. Jake and Harry were getting a peek into every nook of the property.


    ¡°Abby decided that we¡¯re going to be turning that space into a gym. We¡¯ve mapped out the weight training area, as well a room for Zumba and other types of fitness classes. The equipment has already been sourced and we should have the last flooring and ventilation quotes by the end of the week, Mr. McKenzie.¡±


    ¡°Abby, can you please order Shauna to call me Jake.¡±


    ¡°Sure thing, Mr. McKenzie. Shauna, please refer to Mr. McKenzie as Jake from now on, when he¡¯s not around.¡±


    ¡°Damn smartass teenagers. They have no respect for their elders.¡±


    ¡°Actually, Jake, your problem seems to be that they¡¯re showing you too much respect.¡± Harry was having fun watching us rile up Jake. Harry was looking much fitter these days. He¡¯d kept his promise to change his diet and he was exercising regularly. He¡¯d lost over fifteen pounds since I¡¯d cleaned out his arteries and he had no trouble keeping up with the tour.


    ¡°Et tu, Harry? Why is everyone against me?¡±


    ¡°And over here, we have our newest addition, VR Health Systems. It¡¯s a company that I¡¯ve invested in. They¡¯re paying rent, just like Sister Clara¡¯s clinic, so they¡¯re helping to pay a few of the foundation¡¯s bills. Normally, I¡¯d just walk you past it, as it¡¯s not a part of the foundation, but since Harry¡¯s here, I figured I¡¯d use the opportunity to put in a shameless plug for the company. I¡¯m hoping to convince Harry to use his vast powers as the dean of Galt University to help us out by providing us with free consultants and an endorsement. You can consider this part of the tour as the commercial break.¡±


    ¡°What does VR Health Systems do?¡± Harry asked skeptically.


    ¡°We train doctors using virtual reality to simulate real world medical issues. Jenny¡¯s going to take over the presentation and I¡¯ll answer any questions that you have afterwards.¡±


    Jenny introduced herself and the team and proceeded to explain the reason behind the company¡¯s formation. She took them through our perceived gap in the market and how we were taking VR to the next level. While she did that, I suited up and prepared for the demonstration. We¡¯d hooked up three extra units to the system so that Jake, Mark and Harry could be in the operating room with me while I performed the surgery.


    I waited for them to join me just outside the OR and once they¡¯d gotten used to the virtual reality environment, I walked them through all the steps that a surgeon had to go through. ¡°An instructor can choose to abbreviate this simulation and only focus on the actual surgery, or they can leave it as is and the medical student will be scored on every aspect of his or her preparation for surgery, from reviewing the patient¡¯s chart to washing up before the surgery to ensuring that everything they need for the surgery is present. In honor of Harry joining us today, I¡¯ve set up today¡¯s surgery to be an Atherosclerosis endarterectomy. That¡¯s the procedure he would have needed to clear out the plaque from his arteries.¡±


    A half hour later, I took a slightly queasy pair of directors outside into the sunshine to get some fresh air. Mark was already there, having left the simulation when I¡¯d first cut into the VR body.


    ¡°That was too real, Abby. I never wanted to be a doctor and this just reinforced that decision. When I saw the blood and organs, I honestly forgot that I was in a simulation.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s exactly what I was going for. That VR body is as real as we can make it right now. All the different bodily systems are programmed to function exactly like a human would, down to bleeding at the right pressure and amount for any given injury. Over the next several years, our plan it to program it further, into the cellular level so that we could even model the effects of various drugs on the body and show how the immune system reacts to viruses, bacteria and cancers.¡±


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    ¡°Our short-term goal is to program the system with more surgeries. Once we have the top five most common surgeries in every major surgical department programed, we¡¯ll put more emphasis on the clinical interactions between doctors and patients. That part requires a more comprehensive AI in order to simulate the various responses that a human would give when questioned by a doctor. The medical student will have to work with the clues given in order to come up with the correct diagnosis. The student will be able to order tests and then use the results of those tests to prepare and administer a treatment. Our objective is to train the students for the real world, without having them make as many mistakes on real people.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s where you come in, Harry. I¡¯d like to start having some of the doctors, residents, and medical students try out the system and evaluate it. I¡¯d like to get suggestions and feedback for how to improve the system from your people. Hopefully, they¡¯ll like it enough to put in a VR Health Systems Simulation Lab at the Quill. If you agree to be a beta site for VR Health Systems, I can offer you a substantial discount for being our first customer.¡±


    Jack quickly interjected, ¡°Hold on, Abby. Don¡¯t give him too big a discount up front. Make him earn it by through usage milestones. The last thing you want is to have your system sitting unused in a basement closet because one of the medical school administrators doesn¡¯t want the system taking up their resources and makes sure that the system is sidelined. This is academia you¡¯re dealing with and the politics are insane. Everyone fights tooth and nail for their share of the budget. At the very least make him put your system as part of his marketing budget so that the none of the doctors see this an encroachment onto their turf.¡±


    Harry laughed, nodding his head in agreement. ¡°I know you¡¯re just trying to complicate my life, Jake, but that¡¯s actually a very good idea. Being the first school to use Abby¡¯s system will put us ahead of many of the larger schools that have had simulation labs for almost three decades. That¡¯s something my marketing department can make use of. Abby¡¯s system can also improve our training, while making us less reliant on cadavers. One of the reasons we don¡¯t have a simulation lab is because of the high upfront costs and the ongoing expense of the consumables. Unlike so many other simulation labs out there, the VR system has no consumables. Depending on the price of the system, we could end up with a cost-effective simulation lab, while providing a higher quality education.¡±


    We spend a few minutes discussing the pricing of the hardware and the yearly software fees. Jake kept annoying Harry by pushing me to increase the price. ¡°What¡¯s the point in marketing this great new system, if the company folds because you were too cheap to pay for using it?¡± The two of them fought it out, while Mark and I stood to the side.


    ¡°Got any popcorn?¡±, he asked.


    ¡°Sorry, no. When does your flight leave?¡±


    ¡°Right after this tour. I¡¯ll be dropping off Jake in Ashville and continuing on from there. You¡¯re still set to join me in two weeks?¡±


    ¡°Yup. I can spend a day at the mine with you in New York and then I¡¯ll spend another day visiting hospitals out there, before we head on to Cleveland and Minnesota.¡±


    ¡°Looks like they¡¯re winding down. You know they¡¯re going to ask you about that surgery, right?¡±


    ¡°Yeah. I¡¯m a little surprised they didn¡¯t already.¡±


    ¡°Jenny told me that they modeled the whole surgery based on you and your directions. Your knowledge and skill, combined with your lack of any official medical training is going to raise a few eyebrows.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s my biggest reason for needing the vetting of Galt University. I¡¯d give them the system for free if I had to, just to get my foot in the door. Galt may not be very prestigious, but it¡¯s known to have a solid medical program. A reference from them will open up a lot of options.¡±


    ¡°Do you have an explanation ready for them? For how you became a surgeon in less than four months? One so proficient that she can teach techniques to residents and medical students?¡±


    ¡°Not really. I was going to go with evasion, deflection and misdirection.¡±


    ¡°Ah. The usual then. Always lead with your strengths.¡±


    Mark got a shot to the arm for that dig, but he was right. Harry and Jake finished their bickering and Harry¡¯s next very next question was to ask about the doctor that consulted with us to advise on that surgery and to model our technique on.


    I pretended to misunderstand his question and answered an entirely different one. ¡°It¡¯s not just that one surgery that we were advised on. We have fifteen surgeries programmed in already. For over half of those we have at least two techniques that can be used and scored. The hardest part is programming in all the different ways that we can think for a student to mess up the surgery and finding the proper response for correcting it. We have the process down now and we¡¯re able to add in two, sometimes, three surgeries to our list every week. At that rate, we¡¯ll be switching over our main focus to the clinical interactions in half a year.¡±


    Harry was about to ask another question when I was saved by the bell. The bell in question was the ringing of Jake¡¯s cell phone. As he answered it, Mark gave me a thumbs up for my evasion. However, Jake''s side of the conversation caught our attention and we all listened intently.


    ¡°Did everyone get out?¡± Pause. ¡°How many are still inside?¡± Pause. ¡°What magnitude was it?¡± Pause.


    ¡°How soon until the engineers clear your guys to start excavation?¡± Pause. ¡°Any word on aftershocks?¡± Pause. ¡°My crew will be there in an hour with extra equipment. Good luck, Tom!¡±


    Jake didn¡¯t stop to explain anything to us. He dialed a number and started talking as soon as it was answered. ¡°Ricky, I just got off the phone with Thomas Carver. He¡¯s got a cave in and trapped miners. I¡¯m assuming that the earthquake didn¡¯t damage us, or you¡¯d have called me already. Get a team and equipment over to his place and be ready to help him in any way you can. Call me right away with any news or questions, no matter what time it is.¡± Jake stayed on the line for another few exchanges and then turned back to us.


    ¡°Earthquake in Montana. Epicenter wasn¡¯t far from our silver mine. Our neighbor and good friend Tom has a cave in. Over twenty miners are trapped a mile down. The engineers won¡¯t let anyone in yet so no one knows the extent of the damage.¡±


    ¡°Are we going to go and help out?¡± Mark asked.


    ¡°I¡¯ve already sent in our crews to help. Tom knows his business. You and I would just be in the way.¡±


    Mark looked over at me. ¡°Abby wouldn¡¯t be.¡±

 B3: Chapter 32: Trouble in Montana

    Jakes eyes lit up in understanding. ¡°Feel up to a trip, Abby?¡±


    ¡°Sure. How can I help?¡±


    ¡°Tom¡¯s people are going to need to know if the mine¡¯s safe to enter, where the structure¡¯s been compromised. Anything you can tell them would be a big help.¡±


    ¡°I can do that. Let me just grab my bag and my computer. If you get me the mine coordinates, I can download a map of the area and set up for the mine on the way. Jake, I¡¯ll get you as much information as you need, but is anyone going to follow my advice?¡±


    ¡°You let me handle that part of it. Tom and I go way back. He owes me. If he won¡¯t listen, I¡¯ll call in a few of my markers with him. Then, once this is over, he¡¯ll owe me one more.¡± Jake pulled out his phone again and called his pilots. They were already getting the plane ready to take off soon, but they needed to file a new flight plan, arrange for hanger space in Montana, and calculate their required fuel. Jake also had them hire a helicopter to take us from the plane hotel to the mine site.


    For my part, I called dad to let him know where I¡¯d be and that I¡¯d be gone at least until tomorrow afternoon. Before we left for the airports, I ran back inside to see Jenny and get one of our portable VR rigs. I could hook up to the VR server using my satellite phone or through wifi and I didn¡¯t want to miss the programming session that we¡¯d planned for tomorrow.


    The flight took a little less than four hours and Montana was two hours behind the east coast, so it was a little after six in the evening when we got in the helicopter. This was my second helicopter ride in the past month and I loved it just as much as the first time. This time, however, the trip took an hour and I had enough time to look in the cockpit and ask the pilot and co-pilot some questions about how everything worked. They walked me through almost all the instruments and showed me how the controls worked. With a field around the pilot, I was able to get a feel for handling the aircraft and I decided that I should ask Gerry to print some helicopter pilot instruction manuals for me. I hoped that Howie would be able to find a decent VR helicopter training simulator for me to practice on as well.


    We landed on a helicopter pad a few hundred feet from the mining offices. Thomas Carver met us once we¡¯d finished our duck walk and cleared the rotor blades. Thomas was a tall, broad shouldered man with dark skin and a well-groomed beard that had more grey than not. Dressed in jeans, and a lumber jacket, he looked more like a miner than the CEO of a mining company. Jake made quick introductions all around and Tom led us to the command center for the rescue operations. I had a quick flashback to the ranger rescue command center from three weeks earlier. The ranger command center didn¡¯t have the feeling of desperation that this one did. It also didn¡¯t have any family members in it. Thomas explained that the families of the trapped miners were waiting in another building, where there was more seating and food and coffee could be provided.


    I soon learned that there was a problem with the air in the mine and the command team was trying to feed in more air though one of the exploratory holes that had been drilled when they were searching for the ore. It wasn¡¯t a very wide hole, five inches in diameter, and it went deep into the earth. The twenty miners were trapped in one of the new side tunnels and their air was fouling faster than fresh air was coming in. They wouldn¡¯t survive the night.


    In all the chaos of the command site, I slipped outside and shifted to R1. I made my way to the mine entrance and positioned myself off to the side, where I wouldn¡¯t be noticed if I had to return to reality. Having gotten a look at the map of the mine in the command center, I had an idea of what the mine had looked like before the cave-in. Now, I sent out my field to see how things had been changed by the earthquake.


    It wasn¡¯t pretty. The mine had twelve levels, all of them running out from a central shaft and the levels connected to three large veins of silver. The first two veins were mostly played out while the third seemed like a more recent addition. The new vein was farther out from the others and deeper, with the tunnels running out to the ore being much longer than the others. The cave-ins had occurred on the bottom two levels, with the earthquake shifting the tunnels in those areas and collapsing them for twenty feet near the center. The workers on those levels were trapped behind all that loose rock and they were running out of good air.


    I scanned the entire mine and beyond, carefully inspecting every part of it, noting any structural weaknesses. It wouldn¡¯t do to have the rescuers get trapped in another mine cave-in while they were trying to get their friends out. I spent the next half-hour inputting as much of the information as I could into my mining program, slowly re-creating the mine and it¡¯s new configuration. I marked off the areas of instability and made notes on where to place the shoring. Finally, I placed markers for where the twenty miners were situated. There were twelve on the second to last level and eight on the bottom-most one.


    Those two tunnels were offset from the rest of the tunnels and from each other by about five feet, due to the ore vein having shifted down and to the right at some point in its history. That meant that there wasn¡¯t a good way to drop down into those tunnels by digging a hole through the floor of the tunnel above. I didn¡¯t have enough knowledge or experience to know how they¡¯d get the miner out and I worried that my map wouldn¡¯t be of any use at all, except to show them how impossible it was to get the miners out.


    The most frustrating part for me was that my field wasn¡¯t useful for this situation, except for the mapping aspect of it. I hadn¡¯t encountered this problem before. Usually, it was case of having to figure out how to use my field to get the job done or of finding a way to use my field without anyone else noticing. This situation was entirely different. My ability didn¡¯t work in a mine. My power wasn¡¯t the ability to phase through things, rather it was the ability to shift to a different layer of reality where those things didn¡¯t exist. In this case, and in the case of every mine, the rock existed in all the layers that I had access to, so I couldn¡¯t go through it. Most of my usefulness was being sidelined for this rescue and I¡¯d have to hope that other people could do what I couldn¡¯t.


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    Putting my self-pity aside, I came back to reality and headed back inside. I heard Mark call out to me and I made my way to him.


    ¡°Were you able to get anything?¡±


    ¡°I have the entire mine mapped out, but I can¡¯t figure out how they¡¯ll be able to get to them.¡±


    ¡°Can I see?¡± I opened the computer and walked him through the newly created weak spots and the cave-ins. Instead of being downcast at the fate of the miners, Mark got more excited as I explained.


    At the end of my briefing, Mark kissed the top of my head and ran to get Jake.


    Mark showed the map to Jake, only needing to explain my notation marks. ¡°Abby, you¡¯re incredible. That¡¯s exactly what we needed.¡± Within seconds, Jake was gone again, taking the computer with him into the other room to bring everyone there up to speed.


    ¡°Where did you get that map, Jake?¡± Thomas asked.


    ¡°It¡¯s new experimental ground penetrating technology. It¡¯s still in the development stages. They¡¯re planning to start commercialization in a year or two.¡±


    ¡°Is it accurate?¡±


    ¡°Tom, did you think I flew down here at the drop of a hat because I thought I could mount a better rescue than you could? This is why I came. If it wasn¡¯t accurate, I wouldn¡¯t be here staking my reputation and the lives of your miners on it.¡±


    ¡°Jake. The technology you¡¯re talking about isn¡¯t possible. You know that. I know every company on the planet that¡¯s working on that type of technology and not one of them could get anywhere near that level of depth, detail, and precision.¡±


    ¡°Tom, your guys are running out of air. It¡¯s your call. Do you really care about the impossible map or do you want to save their lives?¡±


    Tom turned to his foremen. ¡°Get the guys together. We have work to do.¡±


    A cheer went through the workers and they started organizing the work. In what seemed like no time at all, a few of the engineers were sent off to shore up the weaknesses in the mine and the rest started working on the best way to dig the miners out, given the new information. Ideas were put up and shot down and in the end Jake came to me with a plan.


    ¡°I¡¯d like your opinion on this Abby. I know that you¡¯re not a mine engineer, but no one knows this mine better than you do right now. If we dig here, and here, do you think the rock will hold?¡±


    I studied the plan and reviewed my mental image of the rock in that area. Pointing to the first area he¡¯d pointed out, I said, ¡°This site is very stable. The other one is good, but not great. The quake put some pressure there and caused slight micro fissures. Normally, they wouldn¡¯t be a structural problem, but with all the digging you might weaken it and cause it to collapse. If the idea would still work, then this area right here would be a better choice.¡±


    I pointed to an area twenty feet away and Jake thanked me and went back to the group. Ten minutes later, the room was almost empty. Only Jake, Mark and I were still inside. Every available worker was busy making the rescue happen.


    ¡°Now what do we do?¡±, I asked.


    ¡°We wait and we pray. We¡¯ve done all that we could do.¡± Jake let out a breath and took a seat at one of the now empty desks.


    I had a hard time accepting that. I had all this power and I couldn¡¯t do more. Maybe if I could get to L4 or L5, assuming they existed, then I¡¯d be able to get the miners out myself. What would L4 even look like? Would mountains disappear? Would L5 mean that the Earth¡¯s outer crust faded away? Would successive layers of earth¡¯s seven layer disappear until the earth was no longer there? What would happen to me then? If a layer disappeared and I fell down it, how would I get back to surface? When the earth was gone, would I drift into space? Would there be any air at all?


    Air! The miners. There was something I could still do. I sent out my field to see how the miners were holding up. No so good. Some were coughing and having trouble breathing. A few had passed out and the rest of them were lethargic, at best. I didn¡¯t know how long the rescuers needed, but it didn¡¯t seem that the miners had a lot of time left so I shifted them all to L2. I hadn¡¯t been able to hold twenty fields six months ago when I¡¯d needed to shift the bombs away. However, all my practice with scanning the actions of entire surgical teams simultaneously had paid off and I was able to do it now with the miners. It helped that I only needed to concentrate on the twenty individuals for a few seconds. Once they were safely in L2, I set a field around the area to warn me if the rescuers were getting close. Once they tripped my field, I get alerted and bring the miners back before the rescuers could get close enough to see that the miners weren¡¯t there. The workers themselves would never realize they¡¯d been away.


    Waiting is boring and nerve-wracking. I hated it. Not being able to do anything sucked. I was able to follow the work crews and see that they were doing, but compared to the speeds that I usually worked with, it seemed glacial. When my pacing grew too annoying for him, Jake suggested that I map out the rest of the property. That didn¡¯t take me very long to do and when I finished that, Mark borrowed a car and we drove to Jake¡¯s neighboring property. Can you call a mine that¡¯s ten miles away a neighbor?


    I was a little nervous at the distance involved, now that I¡¯d sent the miners to L2. What if they rescuers made it to the trapped miners and I was too far away to feel the alert that I¡¯s set? Instead of relying on my field, I sent out a powerful pulse, pairing it with a field shaped like a hardhat, and was able to see where the workers were. I thought that I would have time enough to get this job done and more.


    After mapping Jake¡¯s property in detail, Mark drive me around so I could continue to scan all around his and Thomas¡¯s properties. I set my alarm for five-minute reminders and I sent out a pulse every time it buzzed. We were almost back to the mine when I felt the rescuers pass through the field I¡¯d set. I immediately brought the miners back from L2 and let out a sigh of relief that I hadn¡¯t messed that up. How would I have explained the miners not being where they were supposed to be and having to ¡®find¡¯ them later? As it was, the rescued minors would have a time gap that I hoped would be explained away by the bad air messing with their minds and causing them to be confused. It was also possible that those miners with watches would notice that their watches were off by several hours.


    Everything seemed to go into fast-forward once the rescuers reached the trapped miners. In short order, the rescued miners were brought up and reunited with their families. It was a touching scene and it played out very well for Thomas on the local news channels. A cave-in of this size rarely had such a happy ending. Not one miner was injured enough to require hospitalization. The mine itself would be shut down for the next week, as engineers pored over it, making sure that it was safe to mine again. Thomas and his crew were ecstatic that everyone was ok and announced a celebratory picnic for the following day, for all those that wanted to come with or without their families.


    Thomas extended that invitation to us and we accepted, especially as we had already accepted his invitation to stay the night at his house.

 B3: Chapter 33 - A Conversation with Thomas

    The next morning came way too soon. Even though I hadn¡¯t exerted myself much the day before, it had been a full day even before all traveling and the rescue. I¡¯d been exhausted and when my head hit the pillow, I was out like a light.


    I woke to whispering voices outside my door and soon my door was opened quietly and someone left something on the desk before leaving just as quietly. I sat up to see that my clothes had been washed and folded neatly for me. Before bed last night, Thomas¡¯s wife, Denise, had shown me to one of her daughter¡¯s rooms and given me a robe to change into. Now, with the clothes freshly laundered, I got up and got dressed. It was just after ten in the morning and I padded my way downstairs to see who else was up.


    I found Jake, Thomas and Denise sitting on one end of a long breakfast table laden with way too much food for just the three of them. Thomas spied me first as I came through the kitchen entryway.


    ¡°Ms. Smith. Good morning to you. Please sit and join us for breakfast.¡±


    ¡°Thank you, Mr. Carver. Everything here looks delicious.¡±


    ¡°Please call me Thomas or Tom.¡±


    ¡°Then I¡¯m Abby or Abigail. I prefer Abby, though.¡±


    ¡°Fair enough, Abby. Jake was just telling me that you¡¯re the one I need to be thanking for last night turning out so well.¡±


    ¡°I don¡¯t know about that, Thomas. It seems to me that you and your people figured out how to get the job done and then you did it.¡±


    ¡°Jake, is she being straight with me?¡± Thomas had a confused expression on his face.


    ¡°She is. Knowing Abby, she doesn¡¯t see what she did as being that significant because she wasn¡¯t down in the mines helping you dig. Her contribution wasn¡¯t real work.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s a load of shit, Jake. Without her map and guidance, there¡¯s no way we could have gotten to those miners in time. Never mind the fact that without her pointing out all the structural weaknesses after the quake, the mine would probably be shut down for a month or more instead of week.¡±


    ¡°Hey, don¡¯t yell at me. I know exactly how important she was to the rescue. She¡¯s the one that has no clue.¡± Jake smiled in a self-satisfied way as I scowled at him.


    I finished my bite of pancake and explained, ¡°Once the scan was complete, I looked at the map and had no idea how to rescue them. You were the ones that figured it out and did it. If the rescue had depended on my abilities, those miners would still be down there.¡±


    ¡°And without your map of the changes in the mine, we couldn¡¯t have come up with a plan in the first place. Regardless of your feelings about it, Carver Mining owes you a debt of gratitude. I am in your debt and if there¡¯s anything you need, please let me know.¡±


    ¡°Don¡¯t forget that you also owe me, again. I got her here and in time. As to owing Abby, good luck with that. I¡¯ve been trying to pay her back for years and there doesn¡¯t seem to be anything that she can¡¯t already get for herself. More importantly, before this conversation is over, you¡¯re going to owe her a lot more than you realize right now.¡±


    ¡°That sounds ominous, Jake. Even for you. How did you get in Abby¡¯s debt? That¡¯s not something that happens to you very often. It¡¯s usually the other way around.¡±


    Of course, because my life sucks sometimes, that¡¯s when Mark showed up, like a damned rotten unwanted, bad penny. ¡°I can help you understand that one. I even brought a visual aid.¡±


    Before I¡¯d even had a chance to finish my pancake and run for the door, Mark had queued up the video and had the Carvers enthralled. In between bites, I muttered to myself about how I was never going to save his sorry ass from a fire every again, if this was going to be the thanks that I got. Jake must have overheard my musings because I heard him quietly laughing to himself. That laughter got a lot louder when the video ended and Denise asked me the usual question. This time, I had an answer.


    ¡°I was thinking that I was helping a nice, caring, person. Turns out I was wrong. Next time, instead of running in to save Mark, I¡¯m going to pull out some marshmallows and slowly roast them while the house burns!¡±


    While Mark and Jake got themselves under control, Thomas turned to his wife and said, ¡°I think we should introduce Abby to Isaiah. Do you think he could get here in time for the picnic?¡±


    Jake was on him in a flash. ¡°No way, Thomas. I got dibs. Her and Mark are dating. Keep Abby out of your evil machinations.¡±


    ¡°Dibs?! Dibs! Tell me you didn¡¯t just say that when referring to me. Like I¡¯m a trading card or the passenger seat in the car. You might be old, but I will take you down.¡± Jake had the decency to look sheepish at my chastisement, but he was still going to pay for that remark. ¡°You can be certain that I¡¯ll remember this the next time we negotiate, if there even is a next time.¡± Jake winced at that last bit. Good.


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    ¡°Easy Abby. He didn¡¯t mean anything mean by it.¡± Mark was quick to intercede. ¡°It¡¯s just something that the families have been doing for years. They play matchmaker with their grandkids and try to pair us off together. It¡¯s not just these two, either. There are around twelve families involved. Even though it hasn¡¯t ever worked out, they keep trying, totally oblivious to how ridiculous their pairings are because everyone of them thinks that their grandchildren are perfect. They aren¡¯t though and the clash of spoiled personalities can be epic. I never been paired up with the Carvers, because their daughters are younger than I am. Conner¡¯s about the right age though and I¡¯m sure there¡¯s going to be some back room wheeling and dealing going on soon. I¡¯ve already prepped him in how to handle it. Rose, on the other hand, I haven¡¯t said a word to. I can¡¯t wait to see how she¡¯s going to take the idea that she¡¯s being traded around like a thoroughbred.¡±


    ¡°Somehow, I don¡¯t think she¡¯s ever going to have to go through any of that. Connor either. Jake and I will work it out when we get home.¡± I smiled sweetly at Jake and then at Thomas. Denise, meanwhile, came over and hugged me.


    ¡°Well done! It¡¯s about time someone came along and put these two old fools in their place.¡± I really like Denise.


    ¡°So, Jake. What¡¯s all this about negotiating with Abby? And why am I going to owe more than I already do?¡± Thomas was doing a wonderful job of changing the subject and I decided that since I was in his home, eating the excellent breakfast prepared by his lovely wife, that I would let it go. For now.


    ¡°Last year, Abby used her scanning equipment on some of my mines. The results were impressive. Within a few days, she had better maps of my mines that I did and she even found sources of ore nearby that we didn¡¯t know about. Those areas had previously been explored and nothing had been detected. The worst outcome that I had was a five percent increase in mine revenues. She did the same thing with your mine last night, once the rescue plan had been chosen. Abby has asked me to negotiate with you on her behalf, for those maps.¡±


    ¡°Yesterday¡¯s map was impressive, but I don¡¯t remember seeing anything on it that would increase mine revenues.¡±


    ¡°Hypothetically, what if there were another vein that you didn¡¯t know about? Remember, your first two veins are completely played out and the third isn¡¯t as big as the first two. You probably only have two years left before you have to close up shop here.¡±


    ¡°Three and a half years.¡±


    ¡°Fine. What would it be worth to you for that mine, your very first mine, the one that you¡¯ve built your empire on, to last another ten or fifteen years?¡±


    ¡°Nice try, Jake, trying to toy with my emotional attachment to that mine, but it won¡¯t work. I¡¯ve done my homework and had the area explored. There isn¡¯t anything more there to be found.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s exactly what I would have said about my mines. I would have been wrong. Just as wrong as you are. But that¡¯s not important right now. How about we set a price for the information. If Abby¡¯s wrong, then we¡¯ve just wasted some time. If she¡¯s right, then all the hard work of negotiating will have been done already. Besides, Abby¡¯s not ready yet with her presentation. She¡¯ll need a few hours. We should let her work while we¡¯ll talk.¡±


    Mark and I bussed our dishes and helped Denise with the post-breakfast cleanup, while Jake and Thomas started trading numbers. We finished up just in time for the yelling to start and we all left them to their fun. Mark headed back to his room to start rescheduling his trip, while I started putting together all the files I¡¯d created last night. Jake may have been bluffing about there being a new vein, but he wasn¡¯t wrong. The reason Thomas had never found it was that they¡¯d built some of their processing building right over the vein. I suppose that when he¡¯d started the mine, he¡¯d explored that area with the techniques available at the time and hadn¡¯t ever broken out of the mindset that there could be anything there. Although large, the ore body was pretty far down and I thought that there was a good chance that Thomas wouldn¡¯t have to move the building when they mined the ore. That would be for him to decide.


    I finished up the existing mine report and moved on to the properties surrounding both Thomas¡¯s and Jake¡¯s mines. There were four of them that would be ideal extensions to their existing mines. One for Jake and the rest for Thomas. I farmed out the task of looking up their owners and seeing which ones were for sale to Shauna, with instructions to lock up as many of them as possible with options to purchase. My final report was for Jake¡¯s existing mine and I finished it just before my VR session with my team at VR Health Services.


    I hooked up my VR rig and connected it through my phone to the internet. My plan was unlimited, so there was no extra costs involved. It was a typical meeting where we ran through all aspects of the surgery we were adding. I did a run through of the surgery, making sure that all the instruments were there and that the body was showing all the correct indications. Then I did the surgery four times, each with an increasing level of difficulty. The first time, the surgery was textbook perfect. The second time, the program added two complications. In this case, an artery that started bleeding and a weak heart that needed to be restarted. The third time even more things went wrong, including the nurse handing me the wrong instruments and the patient being morbidly obese. The fourth time, the program put in many of those same elements and then proceeded to simulate a power failure in the hospital and only the emergency lights and the heart monitor worked.


    I was wrung out by the time I took off the VR helmet and gloves. Doing surgery this way severely limited me from using my abilities as I couldn¡¯t scan the patient while I was working, since there wasn¡¯t a patient there, only a program of one. With the exception of my perfect knowledge of those surgeries, I was in the same boat as any other doctor performing those surgeries.


    With the call over, I repacked the VR rig and took another shower, wishing I had another set of fresh clothes to change into. VR surgery, is sweaty work, even if it is blood and germ free. I found Denise after I¡¯d finished freshening up and she showed me how to connect to their printer. With my presentation ready, I checked in on Shauna¡¯s progress and found that she¡¯d already been able to secure options on two of the properties. The other two hadn¡¯t returned her calls. I moved the presentations on those two to the back. I wouldn¡¯t present them, unless Thomas agreed that he wouldn¡¯t try to buy them out from under me.


    With my ammunition in hand, I went in search of Thomas and Jake. Hopefully, Jake had managed to negotiate well with Thomas. There was a lot of untapped potential on and surrounding his mine.

 B3: Chapter 34 - A New Development

    Although they were good friends, Thomas and Jake were very different people and had very different reactions to my presentations. When dad and I had presented my maps to Jake a year ago, he¡¯d compared the maps to his own and started making calculations. He was all business.


    Thomas wasn¡¯t nearly as calm. He took the map that I gave him and started swearing almost as soon as he took in what it was showing him. He spent five full minutes railing against all the experts that had assured him that there was no more ore on his land. He cursed that he¡¯d been making do with older equipment for this mine because he¡¯d been assured that it was near it¡¯s end of life. All the headaches or broken-down machinery and all the planning for closing the mine had been a colossal waste of time.


    Denise, sitting beside me, quietly assured me that he wasn¡¯t mad at me. She said that Thomas would calm down in a few minutes and he¡¯d see the upside. He just needed to get this out of his system. Regardless, it made me very nervous to tell him about the surrounding properties with significant deposits and how I was buying them up.


    It turns out that I was right to be nervous. Luckily though, Thomas took out his rage on Jake. ¡°You knew she was going to do this. You set me up!¡±


    ¡°I did and I¡¯ve been enjoying every minute of it. She got me the same way. Although, I wasn¡¯t such a big baby about it. She just made you a fortune, you should be celebrating and instead you¡¯re stomping around and yelling like she just shot your dog. Come on Tom, your favorite mine has a new lease on life and Isaiah will have a chance to run it for the next ten years or more. Sure, you¡¯ll have to share some of that with Abby or her foundation, but most is better than none.¡±


    ¡°What do you mean by ¡®Abby or her foundation¡¯?¡±


    ¡°Some of the properties she buys herself and some she buys on behalf of her foundation. She started one up a year and a half ago.¡±


    ¡°What¡¯s the foundation for?¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s called the Hannah Foundation. It¡¯s named after her mother. They were both abducted fourteen years ago. Hannah managed to get Abby away, but she was taken. Abby¡¯s mother was missing for thirteen years and was finally rescued six months ago. Abby set up the foundation to help the victims of human trafficking.¡±


    ¡°Slavery. Her foundation helps rescued slaves?¡± Thomas was genuinely shocked. All this anger and frustration disappeared in an instant.


    You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.


    ¡°Yes. Abby funded the foundation herself and she puts the properties that she finds in the foundation¡¯s name so that it will become self-sufficient, with it¡¯s own long-term source of income. That way she never has to compromise on how she wants to run the foundation. Abby¡¯s in charge of the show. I¡¯m only on the board of directors as a figure-head.¡±


    ¡°Damn. How¡¯s the foundation doing? Is it successful? Is it helping people?¡± The eagerness in his voice came out.


    ¡°Next month, Abby and I are heading off to an official ceremony in Washington to receive a Presidential Award for Extraordinary Efforts to Combat Trafficking in Persons on behalf of the foundation.¡±


    Thomas came over to me and took my hand in his. ¡°You go on and buy up those properties. I¡¯ll sign the documents Jake¡¯s lawyers set up and we¡¯ll get those properties revenue positive as soon as possible.¡±


    Denise was by his side in moments as his emotions got the better of him and he turned away. She explained that five years ago, his sister Edna¡¯s granddaughter disappeared. She was twelve at the time and the family is certain that she was kidnapped. The police treated the matter as a runaway. The family has been devastated by it all, especially Edna. They were very close.


    ¡°The Hannah Foundation works closely with the FBI and we¡¯ve assisted them on several occasions. If you get me the granddaughter¡¯s name and the specifics of the case, I¡¯ll ask them to look into it right away. They¡¯ve recently come into possession of a huge database of victims of human trafficking victims. I can run her picture through that to see if there are any new information.¡±


    Now Denise was tearing up and saying that she¡¯d get Edna to meet us at the picnic with everything she had.


    We left for the picnic shortly after stayed there for half an hour before leaving for home. We were taking an extra passenger with us in the form of Edna Carver, who wanted to see Hannah¡¯s Home for herself and gladly took me up on my offer for her to stay there for a few days and talk to Kevin, our FBI contact. On the flight back, I took pictures of the case file that Edna had concerning her granddaughter, Ann, and send it all to Shauna to relay to Kevin. The timing was excellent, as Kevin was already on his way to see us tomorrow and to give us an update on where the FBI stood with the Agora database and the FBI¡¯s attempts to find all those people.


    I spent the rest of the plane ride home renegotiating my rates with Jake for the files that I¡¯d created on his mine in Montana and on the property next door. He thought I¡¯d been kidding about his ¡®dibs¡¯ remark costing him and he¡¯d been right about that. However, that didn¡¯t mean that I couldn¡¯t make him sweat it out for a few hours. Mark was enjoying Jake¡¯s discomfort immensely and he occasionally chimed in with a few words in my favor. As he and I had planned, he kept his input to a minimum so that Jake wouldn¡¯t get suspicious. Eventually though, Mark and I couldn¡¯t keep our smiles down and Jake cottoned on to our game. Jake was not amused and I had to remind him that I wasn¡¯t amused by his antics either. That set him back a bit and we called a truce.

 B3: Chapter 35 - Updates

    Shauna was waiting for us when the plane landed. Jake and Mark continued on with the plane and Edna and I were driven to Hannah¡¯s Home. I stayed long enough to make sure that Edna was well taken care of and I headed home. It was good to be back and mom, dad, and I shared a late dinner, while I told them all about the mine cave-in and the rescue. Dad was most interested in my thoughts about L4 and beyond. Mom was more interested in Edna and her granddaughter Ana and she was looking forward to meeting her tomorrow.


    The next morning, Mom and I drove out to Hannah¡¯s Home together. I left mom to get acquainted with Edna while I went to work out with Uncle Paul and Sifu Zhang. My daily hospital rounds usually caused me to miss their morning training sessions, and it felt good to be back training just the three of us. Sifu Zhang was happy with my progress overall and scheduled my red-belt test for right after Christmas. Since my only plans for the holidays were to work with Sister Clara, that suited me fine. Uncle Paul had plans to go away, but he wouldn¡¯t leave until three days after Christmas, so he was good with the date too.


    As was usually the case these days, we ran through the forms and then the two of them took turns beating up on me. I¡¯d continued my usual practice of not using my field at all, until I couldn¡¯t continue fighting without it. Only then would I wrap them in a field to get an advantage. I was very proud of the fact that it took both Uncle Paul and Sifu Zhang a lot longer to get me to the point of needing to use my field that it did on that day, over a year ago, when Sifu Zhang had staggered into Uncle Paul¡¯s studio and watched Paul spar with me. Since I was now scheduled for my red-belt test, I guess that fact hadn¡¯t been lost on them either.


    After a shower and change I ducked into VR Health Services for a meeting with Gary, Mia and Jenny. We talked about the progress that was being made and I told them about Harry agreeing to let us beta test at the Thomas Hendrick School of Medicine and the Galt University Hospital. They were thrilled at the news and immediately started making a list of features that had to be finalized before we could have medical students and residents trying out our program.


    The chance to beta test at Galt reminded me of the time that I¡¯d tested out my fake scanner at Sister Clara¡¯s and how that doctor at the hospital had been so rude to her. I told the team about the story and suggested that we add a score for ¡®behavior¡¯ to the program. Students that were rude to the VR nurses would lose points. Likewise, a doctor with a poor beside manner could be penalized as well. The team all agreed that if there was a chance that the system could lessen the arrogant behavior of some doctors, then it was worth incorporating into the program.


    At the end of the meeting, I made one final suggestion. Even though we still had a long way to go with the surgery part of our program, I wanted some time set aside to begin on the clinical interactions side of the program. To that end, I proposed that our researchers and designers spend time with Sister Clara going over the most common ailments that patients come in with at her clinic and to see if she¡¯d let them observe some of the interactions and treatments.


    I left VR headquarters and went to my office in the administration building. I spent over an hour researching and listing out which books I wanted Gerry to print for me next. For the last three months, I¡¯d focused mainly on medical books, textbooks, and transcriptions of lectures. Gerry had also taken the initiative of finding transcripts and videos describing new surgical techniques from medical conferences around the world. This time though, I wanted to branch out a bit. First, I asked for helicopter flight school textbooks and testing material. To this, I added books on helicopter maintenance and types of helicopters.


    Next, I added languages. Russian, Portuguese, Chinese and Yiddish would be languages five, six, seven and eight. I¡¯d have no time to watch movies and work on my pronunciation and accent, but at least I¡¯d be able to somewhat understand them and read articles in those languages. I would have the chance to practice Chinese with Sifu Zhang and Yiddish with my grandparents.


    For awhile now, I had the idea that I should use my last half hour of my time volunteering at the hospital to read to the kids. I kept picturing reading Harry Potter to them from memory while I scanned their cancers and shifted away tiny portions of the cancer, thereby weakening it sufficiently for their chemotherapy and drugs to take effect. I¡¯d been using this incremental cancer reducing technique for the past several months exclusively on those children whose cancer wasn¡¯t responding to treatment and it was working very well. The kids were slowly getting better and no one was getting suspicious. The best part was that this would barely show up on scans, unlike a full cancer removal would, and what did show up would be attributed to the drugs working as intended. I figured that it was time to step up the program a little and use it on all the kids during reading sessions. Of course, the Harry Potter series made the list, as did Holes by Louis Sachar, a few Gordon Corman books, Matilda, The Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, James and the Giant Peach, The Lighting Thief, and Ender¡¯s Game. Sadly, The Princess Bride did not make the list, because unlike most books, the movie was much better.


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    I finished up the list for Gerry with books on horticulture, herbal medicines from around the world, everyday pharmacology, virtual reality programming and design, virtual reality limitations, university level geology courses and the associated lectures and mining techniques. I wrapped up the list and sent it off to Gerry along with a request for a recommendation of which metallic ink printer would be best for the office and which portable one would be best, adding that both needed to be able to accept his ink cartridges. So as not to possibly offend him, I explained that I wanted my staff to print out summaries of their updates for me to read. This was entirely true. I realized that I was spending way too much time reading progress reports every week and that it was only getting worse. By printing those reports on metallic ink printers, I could slash the amount of time I was spending getting updates and I would remember what I¡¯d read for more that five minutes. It would also be handy to be able to print out my own notes, thoughts and observations, key web pages and emails.


    Shauna was busy on the phone when I finished up my messages to Gerry, so I took the opportunity to give Howie a call and get some news about my off-grid investments. In a nutshell, Gerry¡¯s printing company was still growing, the mechanic had built out his shop and was slowly building his business, the homeschooling school opened in time for the school year with eighteen students and five teachers, the whiskey distillery was still setting up, and the hand-filled ammunition business was already taking orders from over a dozen gun clubs and was planning on hiring on an additional person. Besides that, Howie had been able to sell off more of the gemstones that I¡¯d given him and my ¡®undeclared¡¯ account was now brimming with more funds that were ready to be invested.


    ¡°Howie, I can see that this is only going to get more complicated. I can¡¯t see you having the time to keep up with all my business interests and take care of your own businesses. Do you know anyone that I can hire to manage all this for me? Someone that you trust to do a good job and not steal from me?¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m glad you asked that, Abby. I happen to have someone in mind. Two someones actually. My kids, Scott and Jordan. If you¡¯re ok with keeping it all in the family, that is.¡±


    ¡°I have no issues with that. I¡¯ve worked with my father many times. I didn¡¯t figure you for an engineer though, Howie.¡±


    ¡°Oh, I¡¯m not. My wife is. Big Star Trek fan. She chose the names. Names sounded ok to me so I didn¡¯t argue. At least she didn¡¯t name them Spock or Guinan. Scott¡¯s seventeen and Jordan is fifteen. I figured that Scott could be in charge of finding new investment opportunities, while Jordan took care of the books and followed up with your existing business, making sure they¡¯re treating you right and didn¡¯t forget to give you your due. She has a head for numbers like you wouldn¡¯t believe.¡±


    ¡°Don¡¯t you want them to work with you and learn the family business, take over for you one day?¡±


    ¡°You may not have noticed, but I¡¯m not the easiest person to get along with. It¡¯s probably better for them if they don¡¯t spend all day with me. I¡¯ll supervise them and make sure they don¡¯t make stupid rookie mistakes, but they¡¯ll only get me in small doses. Hopefully, this way, they get experience and they won¡¯t grow to hate their old man.¡±


    ¡°You¡¯re a wise man, Howie.¡±


    ¡°You don¡¯t have issues with them being so young?¡±


    ¡°How old was I when I first met you? It would be hypocritical of me to object to them based on their ages. As long as they can do the work well, I¡¯m good. Speaking of work, in all your research on simulators, did you run across any other interesting VR companies that needed saving? The more I see of VR, the more uses I can think of for it. I¡¯d like to hire on at least ten more people to the team and branch out into a few new projects.¡±


    ¡°I found a lot of them. Very few were in the medical field.¡±


    ¡°That ok. Matt and Mia weren¡¯t in the medical field either. I¡¯m hoping to add in expertise in weapons, explosives and ballistics, education, flight training, AI and VR equipment. Matt¡¯s very good with designing equipment for VR rigs, but he¡¯s going to need help for what I have in mind.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯ll see what I can do. Anything else, before I go break the good news to the kids?¡±


    ¡°Yes. Can you get me a helicopter?¡±

 B3: Chapter 36 - Good News First

    Shauna wound down her report on Hannah¡¯s Home activities, staffing and finances. We were at about half capacity, with thirty of our fifty-six cabin spots being filled on a rotating basis as survivors returned home and others took their place. We discussed plans for another eleven four-person cabins, bringing out available capacity to one hundred survivors and agreed that we should start work on them within the next month. Using the standard cabin design from out last expansion, Shauna would only need to consult with our architect for the placing of the new cabins. Shauna would verify the availability of the contractors that had built the last set of cabins and see if she could get some a discount before finalizing with them.


    From a staffing perspective, a new cook had been hired, as well as two more councillors and two more teachers. Diane had been able to make the most of our relationship with Galt University by integrating Hannah¡¯s Home into the curriculum. Galt¡¯s schools of psychology, education, and law all had professors that were giving out extra-credit assignments that involved working with the survivors and helping them overcome their challenges.


    Financially, the foundation was doing great. My efforts with James were paying off and we were able to meet all of the foundations¡¯ expenses using only our gains in the market. In addition, the auction of the largest diamond that I¡¯d found with Mark on our day off at the diamond mine last year had been completed in Europe a few weeks ago and the money had been transferred to the foundation accounts. James would have a total of over forty million dollars to play with now. Finally, Gabriel had been successful in transferring all of the money from the Serpentine and Basilisk accounts into our own, secret, off-shore accounts and he was confident that over the next few years, he¡¯d be able to bring that money in through anonymous donations to the foundation.


    ¡°What are your plans for all that money, Abby? This place doesn¡¯t need it and the money keeps growing.¡±


    ¡°I have two projects that I¡¯d like to see the foundation take on. The first one is the expansion of Hannah¡¯s Home to other parts of the country and eventually to Europe as well. We should start thinking of how many we¡¯d like to open up here in the United States and where. Then we¡¯ll see if there are other compounds like this one available for sale at a decent price. Maybe Sister Clara can help us out there by letting us know who to reach out to at the Church. Ideally, our future expansion properties will have clinics like Sister Clara¡¯s on site.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s great, but the way things are going now, that won¡¯t actually eat into much of the foundation¡¯s coffers since you¡¯ll be expanding piecemeal. By the time you open the third Hannah¡¯s Home, the second will have been paid off by the returns in your trading account. What¡¯s your other plan?¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s going to stay a secret for now. I want to lock it in before I tell anyone about it. I need six more months before I can share it with you and everyone else.¡±


    ¡°You and your secrets. Where does this obsessive need to keep things to yourself come from? Or is it just that you love the ¡®big reveal¡¯ moment and shocking people?¡±


    ¡°Have you been talking to Mark lately? This sounds more like him that it does you.¡±


    Shauna gave me a wicked grin. ¡°I might have spoken to Mark the other day while you were taking Jake and Harry through that VR simulation. Your name might have come up and it¡¯s possible that some of your penchants were discussed.¡±


    I started laughing. ¡°Penchants? Yeah, now I know for sure you were talking with Mark. Who even uses that word anymore? I think Shakespeare was the last one before Mark. Anyways, enough with Analyze Abby time. Did you get a chance to look into our copy of Agora database for Ana, or do we need to wait for Kevin¡¯s report in an hour?¡±


    ¡°She¡¯s in it. It took me a bit to find her, since she¡¯s not listed under her real name. I had to use the approximate date of her abduction. She was assigned a number and I had to enter that number in another database to track down where she was sold to. It¡¯s listed as a farm in Wyoming. Google Earth shows almost nothing around for miles. It¡¯s literally in the middle of nowhere.¡±


    ¡°Is she still there?¡±


    ¡°There¡¯s no way to tell. Agora only keeps track of the initial sale. Kevin will have found out all this and might have more information. I guess you¡¯ll be calling in Roger on this one.¡±


    The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation.


    ¡°Depending on what Kevin says. Maybe they¡¯re already mounting an operation to rescue her.¡±


    ¡°We¡¯ll find out in just a little bit.¡±


    We did. Kevin was early and we had him join us in the conference room with Jenny and Gabriel. He started off by thanking us again for the offline copy of the Agora database.


    ¡°You have no idea what kind of storm you stirred up with that database. My boss has been put in charge of a massive taskforce, comprised of agents working for over ten different law enforcement agencies, whose task is to track down every one of these victims and bring their kidnappers to justice. For my part, I¡¯m reporting my progress directly to the head of the FBI every week and have over fifty agents under my command. We¡¯ve also uncovered some European leads and we¡¯ve passed those on to the CIA. They¡¯ve been working in conjunction with Interpol to shut down that end of things.¡±


    ¡°Have you guys made any rescues yet? Should we be getting ready for a large influx in survivors here at Hannah¡¯s Home?¡± Shauna was leaning forward eagerly in anticipation.


    ¡°Yes and definitely. We¡¯ve moved on the more prominent traffickers and customers first, as they have the most resources to hide once they find out we we¡¯re after them. Thirteen politicians and five actors have already been arrested and charged. There are dozens more high-profile arrests to be made. We¡¯ve been keeping the whole operation very quiet. We¡¯re trying to avoid spooking any of them and having them kill their captives. Coordinating all the moving parts in the task force has been a bear, but we¡¯ve finally got the bear moving forward. We¡¯ve freed over fifty captives so far. By the end of next week that number should be at two hundred. The week after that will see that number double.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s great news, Kevin. Hopefully, some of them will come here for help and we¡¯ll be able to do our part in helping them restart their lives. From what you just said though, you should be too busy to be here giving us a report. Why are you here?¡±


    I was being a little rough with Kevin because I was disappointed by the number of rescues so far. His explanation made a lot of sense, with all the care they had to take not to get the captives killed and with the interdepartmental coordination that was required, but they¡¯d had the Agora database for over two months! As Roger, I could have rescued more that fifty captives in two months by myself. I took a deep breath and calmed myself, realizing that as Roger, I didn¡¯t need to bother with all the legal niceties like evidence and probable cause and convincing judges and juries and so on. They did have to worry about all that, in addition to the fact that they were going after powerful people with deep pockets, so I guessed that it made sense that they¡¯d want to make sure that they did things by the book.


    ¡°I was originally coming here today to ask you for Roger¡¯s help. When Shauna sent me the information on Ana, I looked into it and found that we had another reason to talk. With Ana, I have some good news and some less than good news. Which do you want to hear first?¡±


    ¡°Good news first. Always.¡±


    ¡°Ok. We found Ana in the database. She was sold to a farm in Wyoming and she worked there until two weeks ago. She was used as slave labor and assembled parts for resale in an underground bunker. She was not sexually abused during her time there. The farm owners were ok with keeping working their captives to exhaustion every day while giving them little in the way of food, but they drew the line at sexual abuse of minors. Once the minors came of age though, they had no issues selling them to the highest bidder. I know all this because we raided that farm last week and rescued the nine girls working there. The farm was owned by one of those politicians that I mentioned. We have enough on him to put him away for life.¡±


    ¡°So where¡¯s Ana now?¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s the bad news. We don¡¯t know exactly. A different group of slave runners were shipping her to Florida. They go slow and pick up slaves from all over when they¡¯re making these cross country trips. However, we do know where they¡¯re going to end up since we know who the buyer is. Ideally we would be waiting there when their runners make their delivery. In this case, we can¡¯t be there. We¡¯re spread out too thin as it is and we don¡¯t have the manpower to have a team standing around waiting for days for Ana and the rest of the girls to show up. The plan is to circle back in a week and catch them then.¡±


    Kevin must have seen the anger on my face because he leaned back in his chair and put up his hands in a warding gesture. ¡°It¡¯s not my call, Abby. I made the case for having the police go in and help the girls. The higher ups weren¡¯t interested. It¡¯s not a glory thing, they¡¯re just doing the math differently. They want to take down the whole network, not just one part of it. They know the girls will be harmed by it, but they¡¯re thinking of all the girls down the line that won¡¯t be.¡±


    ¡°Do you have any idea how many times those girls can be violated in a week? It¡¯s a miracle that they haven¡¯t been sexually abused so far and you propose to wait until they¡¯ve been raped a few times before you go in there and save them? Are you guys out of your minds? I¡¯m not going to let them be sacrificed for some potential benefit so some other girls down the line. Tell me where to find them and Roger will take care of it.¡± I stood up and put my hand out for his file. Reluctantly, he handed it over and I started going through it until I found the address and headed out the door.


    ¡°Wait, I need to talk to you about Roger.¡± Kevin called from his seat.


    I continued my exit and said, ¡°We¡¯ll talk about it once Ana is back in Edna¡¯s arms!¡± and slammed the door behind me.

 B3: Chapter 37 - Ana

    Four hours later, I was sitting in a ¡®borrowed¡¯ rental car outside a modest house in a suburb of Orlando. I¡¯d already scanned the house and seen the basement cells, each a mini-hotel suite with no windows and no bathroom door. The chains at the edges of the bed and the lack of any place to store clothing told me all I needed to know about the place. Only three of the eight cells were occupied. Each with girl barely into adulthood and all of them huddled under their bedsheets. None of the girls were Ana and all of them were showing signs of drug addiction.


    I was sitting in the car because I was seething with rage and I knew that if I went inside, none of the four men inside would survive. I kept weighing mom and dad¡¯s words about how much damage I¡¯d be doing to my soul versus the satisfaction of knowing that these people would never be able to do this to anyone ever again. I had other options besides killing. I could just as easily tie them up and call the police, only I was sure they¡¯d make bail and start up their business in a new location before the end of the week. I sat in the car for ten minutes, going over my options before getting out and heading inside, leaving my baseball bat in the car where it couldn¡¯t tempt me.


    Wearing my Roger outfit in L2, with my exosuit ready in L3 should I need it, I entered the house and shifted to R1. A few minutes later, twenty-four mini-cube cameras were spread out at key places around the house, ready to record everything and send those recording to the Dropbox account that I set up in Roger¡¯s name. I wondered if Captain Stevens was still monitoring this account and if he was, how long it would take him to call me once new recordings were uploaded to it.


    Putting thoughts of Serpentine out of my mind, I set about copying the phones of each of the men running this forced prostitution house. Each of them was alone in their rooms and that made things especially simple. Three of them were already using their phones and so I just sent them to L2 while I copied their phones contents, before putting the phone back in their hands and returning them to reality. None of them even realized they¡¯d been gone. The last guy was watching TV and I had to send him to L2 twice before I was able to freeze him there when he wasn¡¯t blinking. Then I only needed to hold his phone to his face for it to unlock.


    I copied the one computer in the house. It was a recent model laptop with zero security on it. There wasn¡¯t even a password on the home screen. That may have been because it was locked up in the safe in the closet and the owner figured that was enough security for him. He was probably right, but it wasn¡¯t enough security to keep me out. The safe in question was in the attic, which had been remodeled at some point and turned into a penthouse suite. Obviously, the penthouse was where the leader of this gang of pimps lived and I was surprised that the place wasn¡¯t a mess. Either he was a neat-freak or he had excellent maid service. I suspected that he had the girls downstairs help out around the house when they weren¡¯t being raped in the basement.


    The gang leader wasn¡¯t currently in the house and I hoped that meant that he was busy bringing in his supply of girls. Kevin hadn¡¯t known exactly when they¡¯d be arriving and I didn¡¯t relish the thought of waiting here for a few days until they showed up. There was absolutely no chance that I¡¯d let even one more person abuse the girls downstairs.


    While I waited, I cleaned out the contents of the walk-in safe. Mr. Gang Leader didn¡¯t seem to believe in banks and I made sure that, if he survived my encounter with him, he might have a new appreciation for them. I left behind enough money for the police to find and use for evidence. More important than the cash were the files that he kept in the safe. Records of his slave purchases and sales were in one folder and blackmail photos of his customers amusing themselves with those slaves in several other, and much larger, folders. He had a lot of photos, each set properly organized with the customer¡¯s name, address, and amount they were paying him to keep their hobby from becoming known to their wives, bosses or the police. Beside the folders, lined up neatly and labelled in a clear script, were eight external hard drives. Each label listed the year and the city.


    As I suspected, the drives contained videos. A lot of videos. Gang Leader had been doing this for eight years and every year he moved to a new city. I vowed that this would be his last one.


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    Over the next hour, I gathered enough evidence from the videos to put each of the gang members, including their leader, in prison and posted it to the Dropbox account. I took pictures of the customer files and added those as well. I gave the police everything they¡¯d need, and more.


    While I waited for the inevitable call from Captain Stevens, who would probably get an alert that something had been added to the Dropbox account, I sent Kevin the records of purchases and sales of slaves, as well as other interesting files that Gang Leader had on his computer. The FBI would be able to dismantle this slave network as well.


    ¡°Mr. Willoughby?¡±


    ¡°Captain Stevens. Thank you for calling so promptly.¡± I was using the voice changer on my phone and talking quietly, so as not to be heard by the men in the house.


    ¡°I thought you were working for the FBI these days.¡±


    ¡°The FBI is too busy right now to handle this one, so I¡¯ve sent you the information on this slave network. I need the police to come pick up the vermin, once I¡¯m finished with them.¡±


    ¡°Will there be anything left of them?¡±


    ¡°Yes. They¡¯ll only be incapacitated, although medical attention will be required.¡±


    ¡°Just remember that it comes at tax-payer expense.¡±


    Damn it! He was right. Worse yet, patching up these men would take hospital resources from those who really needed it.


    ¡°Good point. Light medical attention may be required. Nothing so extreme as last time.¡±


    ¡°Can you give me the address yet?¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s not in your jurisdiction. I¡¯m hoping that you¡¯ll pass on the information to the police in Orlando.¡± I gave him the name of the suburb and told him that I¡¯d call him back with the address once I had secured the girls.


    Gang Leader called one of his men at the house a few nerve-wracking hours later and told them that he was fifteen minutes out and to unlock the back door. The girls were drugged and he would need help carrying them in. I though about the logistics of getting the girls to Hannah¡¯s Home and decided that it would be better to take them to the airport in whatever car they were currently in. That meant that there was no reason to wait any longer in taking out the gang.


    Taking out the gang, and their leader a short while later, was anti-climactic. I shifted them to R1 and tied them up tightly before returning them to reality. The confusion and panic on their faces was small comfort to me. They deserved so much more. I desperately wanted to give them back some of the pain that they¡¯d given to countless others. It wouldn¡¯t undo the pain they¡¯d caused. It would just make me feel better. I held myself back though, forcing myself to hold on to dad¡¯s slippery slope argument.


    I made sure that Ana and the four girls in the van were unhurt before sending them and the van to L2, while I retrieved my unused cameras and doubled checked the house to make sure that I hadn¡¯t missed anything. I¡¯d worn thin gloves, so I didn¡¯t have to worry about leaving fingerprints behind on the laptop or on the hard drives. I loaded the duffel bag filled with the money from the safe into the van and got my bat from the rental car and stored it away as well. Before leaving to return the rental car, I shifted the girls in the basement, as well as the bad guys, to L2.


    A half hour later, I was back at the house, by way of public transport, and ready to head back home. I called Captain Stevens with the address and twenty minutes later, police cars were blocking off the road and getting ready to raid the house. I shifted everyone inside back to reality and stayed long enough to watch the girls being led out to waiting ambulances. As I¡¯d requested of Captain Stevens, the police had come prepared with clothes for the girls.


    With five minutes to take-off, I managed to load the five girls onto the last flight going out to Charlotte. It had only been nine hours since I¡¯d stormed out of the meeting with Kevin and I expected to have the girls safely tucked away in one of the Hannah¡¯s Home cabins before midnight.


    It had been another long day, most of it spent traveling and waiting around. It was highly gratifying though and it made me second guess myself and my choice to study medicine. I could be doing this kind of work every day, taking down the Agora or this new slave prostitution network myself. Was I going against my decision from a few years ago to focus on doing things that no one else could do? Shouldn¡¯t I be leaving the medicine to the doctors and only work on rescues? Somewhere along the way, I¡¯d lost sight of that idea. Or had I? The rescues were still happening. They weren¡¯t being done in the same way I would have chosen, but they were being done. Also, those rescues were being done based on information that I¡¯d provided to the FBI and police. On the flip side, once I was sufficiently knowledgeable in medicine, I would be better able to save lives that regular doctors couldn¡¯t.


    The longer I thought about it, the more I realized that it didn¡¯t really matter. Doctors and the police were never going to run out of people to save and those people didn¡¯t care who saved them or how. As long as I kept doing what I could, that would have to be good enough.

 B3: Chapter 38 - Politics

    I timed it so that Shauna got the text from Roger while I was training with Paul and Sifu Zhang. It was a simple text message. ¡®Cabin 15. Drugs will wear off in a few hours.¡¯ I¡¯d left the girls there in L2 and only brought them back just before my workout. The girls had been in L2 stasis since last night and so the effects of the drugs hadn¡¯t diminished in that time. It would be a few hours until they woke up. That gave me enough time to finish my workout and get in some VR surgery time before all the excitement.


    Edna was an emotional wreck, alternating between crying and laughing. The joy she radiated was infectious and all of us that were there to watch her reunion with Ana did so with goofy grins on our faces and tears in our eyes. Mom hugged me and whispered how proud she was of me.


    Mom and Diane went to work and got the girls settled in, while Shauna notified Kevin of the rescue, leaving the red tape of updating the various authorities up to him. He thanked her and said that he¡¯d be over shortly to finish our discussion from yesterday. With the official business out the way, Shauna helped each of the girls notify their families that they were safe and of their location. More crying and laughing followed with facetime reunions. After the joy came practical matters and the foundation arranged and paid for the families of the girls to come see them as quickly as possible. The girls were then brought to the Sister Clara¡¯s clinic and given a complete physical and Sister Clara started treatment for malnutrition.


    Despite living the farthest, Ana¡¯s parents and siblings, along with Thomas and Denise Carver arrived first. He¡¯d charted a plane the moment he found out and filled the plane with family members who couldn¡¯t wait to see their lost Ana. I was briefly introduced to the now infamous Isaiah and I could see why Jake felt he had to call dibs on me. Isaiah was very easy on the eyes. It was chaos in cabin 15 and we had to move the reunion outside so as not to overwhelm the other girls. Ana was showered with love and attention and Thomas ordered up a feast from several local restaurants. We offered to have our chef prepare some food but he refused, stating that he didn¡¯t want to use up our resources. As the other families arrived, the reunion morphed into a large outdoor barbecue and the other survivors that were staying with us joined in the celebration.


    I missed an hour of the celebration when Kevin showed up and Shauna and I led him back to the conference room to finish our discussion.


    ¡°Thank you, Abby, for getting Roger involved. I keep forgetting just how effective he is. I still can¡¯t believe how fast it all happened.¡±


    ¡°Try to remember that the next time someone decides that letting girls get raped is an acceptable price to pay in achieving your higher-ups'' long-term goals. It¡¯s easy for them to do that because they¡¯re not paying the price. It¡¯s not their daughters being forced in sexual slavery. If it happens again, I¡¯ll do everything I can to make sure that Roger never works with the FBI again. You¡¯ll never get another lead from him.¡± Apparently, I had not worked through all my anger just yet.


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    ¡°I will pass that message on to the director. Also, I promise you that if we¡¯re ever short of manpower like this again, I¡¯ll ask you for Roger¡¯s help. He has shown a lot of restraint since the Serpentine rescue.¡±


    At a nod from me, he continued, ¡°As I was starting to explain yesterday, one of the interesting points to arresting high profile people, is that some of them will do or say anything to save their reputation. The mere threat of making the arrest public and turning the world against them is like torture to them. One of the actors actually agreed to tell us everything we wanted to know, just for agreeing to hold off our arrest announcement until after the awards season was over. He believes one of his movies is a strong contender this year and he sees it as his last chance at immortality.¡±


    ¡°My point is, the ones we¡¯ve arrested are talking and they aren¡¯t holding anything back. The disturbing thing is that a few of them have made mention of being told not to worry about being caught, because politicians will force the authorities to have them released. They don¡¯t know which politicians or how they¡¯ll force their release, only that it¡¯s real because they were given proof. Each of them explained how they got a tip that a politician would change his vote on a key bill at the last minute or retire to ¡®spend more time with his or her family¡¯, weeks or months before those things were announced. We tracked down a few of those stories and we think there might be something to it.¡±


    ¡°Do I need to worry about these guys being released?¡±


    ¡°No. The director has enough clout to ignore any pressure put on him, except by the President himself and if the President is controllable, then we are completely screwed.¡± Kevin was right on that one. If the President could be controlled by human traffickers, the country was in deep trouble. I really hoped that wasn¡¯t the case.


    ¡°What kind of help are you looking to get from Roger?¡±


    ¡°We need to find out if and how the politicians are being controlled. Given Roger¡¯s ability to get into anywhere and copy any computer system, we¡¯d like him to see if he can find anything of use in proving that certain politicians are compromised.¡±


    ¡°This seems more like a job for the NSA.¡± Shauna said.


    ¡°Yes, it is, but all we have is a few whispers. It¡¯s not enough to get them to spy on sitting or ex-members of Congress.¡±


    ¡°You many not believe this, but Roger has higher standards than the NSA. Why would he spy for you? It¡¯s not like you¡¯ve covered yourselves in glory recently.¡±


    ¡°Look, we don¡¯t want him to download the information on their computers and send it to us. All we want is some sort of confirmation. Something we can start an investigation with. If there¡¯s nothing, then that¡¯s it. We¡¯ll leave it at that. No harm done.¡±


    ¡°If he were to agree, where would he even start? There¡¯s are hundreds of politicians in congress alone. Add in governors, state legislatures and municipal councils and there are thousands of potential politicians that could be blackmailed.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s true, but the people we¡¯ve arrested were able to give us three names to verify. Also, since the arrests, the aides of two politicians have called us requesting more information on the arrest of a few of the high-profile individuals. What¡¯s interesting is that we¡¯ve made no formal or informal announcements yet of their arrest. How would they even know about them?¡±


    ¡°Get me the names and I¡¯ll talk with Roger. No guarantees though. He may not want to do this.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s all I can ask. Thank you, Abby.¡±


    The barbecue was still going on when I got back, but Kevin¡¯s news had put a damper on my partying mood. The Serpentine and Basilisk groups had both been taken down. Now there was evidence, slight as it was, that a third group was also involved. Maybe it was part of the MTC from Len¡¯s notes. If it wasn¡¯t, then that meant that there were now two trafficking groups out there for me to deal with.

 B3: Chapter 39 - On Tour with Mark

    Thomas and most of his family returned to Montana the next day. Ana and Edna stayed on in cabin 15 for three weeks, while Ana recovered and tried to figure out how to pick up the pieces of her life. She was eighteen, with the education of a twelve-year-old and almost six years of servitude that she would need to put behind her. I didn¡¯t envy her for the road she had ahead of her, but at least she would have strong support from her family. The other girls that I¡¯d rescued weren¡¯t all so lucky.


    One of them, Elizabeth, had been taken when she was seven and her parents had divorced shortly after. They fought over which one of them should take her in and mom had hung up on them. Over the next weeks, mom took a special interest in Elizabeth and helped her get re-started on her education.


    Having taken almost a week off from my studies, I resumed my medical schooling the day after the barbeque and kept it up until it was time to meet up with Mark in New York on his tour of McKenzie Resources US mines. Between all the rescues and studying of the last few months, I was looking forward to this much-needed break. I felt bad for medical students who had to keep up this kind of schedule for over a decade.


    It turned out that I¡¯d over-planned for my break. There were just too many things that I was trying to cram into each day. Add new companies to my investment list, study new surgical techniques at the best hospitals in every city, scan the mines that we visited and the surrounding areas for opportunities, scan-read a book every day, and keep up with my Kung Fu training. All this was supposed to be accomplished before six in the evening so that Mark and I could go out for the evening.


    There was just no way to get it all done and I had to cut, drop or change my plans. The first thing to go were the additions to my investment portfolio. I¡¯d created a list of twenty companies for each of the three cities. I cut that down to three companies and I made sure that they were in close proximity to the one hospital that I would be visiting in each city, in order to reduce travel time. Next, I decided to use my new pulse scans on the surrounding properties at the mines. Instead of the full scans that showed me everything in the ground, I only searched for the one ore that the mine was already producing. This meant that I could scan those properties in minutes, instead of hours. If I found any good prospects, I¡¯d do the full scan of that property. I cut the scan-reading to one book every two days, unless I happened to get up early, and I kept my Kung Fu training to one hour per day.


    The one part of my plan that I wasn¡¯t going to compromise on was my time with Mark. Every night, after work, Mark drove back from the mine into whichever city were staying in and we¡¯d go out for dinner. In New York, we watched a play on Broadway and walked around Times Square. In Cleveland, we went to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and visited some food markets. In Minneapolis, we spent an evening at the Mall of the Americas. Some nights, we headed back to the hotel and watched movies on TV. I didn¡¯t much care what we did, as long as we were together.


    One night, we were lying down on the couch in his room, watching ¡°Meet the Parents¡±. When we got to the part where Ben Stiller¡¯s character is strapped to a lie detector machine by Robert De Niro¡¯s character, my mind lit up with an idea. Could I use my field as a lie detector? I could read the body¡¯s reaction better than any machine could. I sat up and grabbed my phone. What did a lie detection machine measure? Blood pressure, pulse, respiration, and skin conductivity. I¡¯d never measured skin conductivity, so I looked it up. ¡®Electrodermal Response¡¯. Apparently, the skin conducts electricity differently depending on your psychological state. From a cursory glance, the theory seemed to be that there was a way to tell if someone was lying by measuring the changes in the conductivity of the skin and combining these finding with the heart rate and respiration changes.


    ¡°What¡¯s got you so fired up, Abby?¡±


    ¡°I was just wondering if I could detect if someone is lying based on changes in their heart rate and respiration. Hold one a minute, I¡¯ll be right back.¡± I walked through the connecting door to my room and grabbed my stethoscope from my medical backpack.


    When I returned to his room, Mark asked, ¡°Don¡¯t you need some sort of contraption like they had in the movie?¡±


    ¡°Nah, this should be fine.¡±


    Mark shook his head in resignation. ¡°Of course, you would come up with an Abby way of doing things.¡±


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    ¡°Hey! What¡¯s that supposed to mean?¡± I asked curiously.


    ¡°Well, there¡¯s the regular way of doing things and then there¡¯s the Abby way. Normal people need equipment and preparation and years of study to master new techniques. You, not so much. Mine exploration, magic, investing, and medicine. It makes no sense at all, but it seems to work for you. Now you¡¯re about to find a way to steal away the last bastion of self-preservation in a good relationship.¡±


    ¡°What?¡±


    ¡°Lying Abby. You¡¯re trying to find a way to determine if I¡¯m lying to you or not. What am I supposed to say when you¡¯ve eaten five bowls of stew and then ask me if your outfit makes you look fat?¡±


    I sent a pillow flying at his face. He managed to block it with his forearm. He though he was safe, but that was just my distraction. Before he could bring his arm down, I was already reaching in to tickle him. He tried to get up as I ticked his sides but I held him tightly and repositioned my legs around him. Soon our wrestling devolved into kissing and sometime later I managed to get back to figuring out if I could detect lies with my field.


    Placing the stethoscope back on his chest and wrapping him in a field, I curled up next to him on the couch and placed my head on his chest. I started asking Mark questions. My three minutes of research had told me that I needed to ask him some basic questions first, in order to get a baseline. Once I knew what his normal physiological state was, I could watch to see how much it changed when he answered certain questions. The theory went that the degree of change could indicate that the person was anxious about his answer and was probably lying. However, the process seemed to be more art than science, in that there could be many factors causing the physiological changes and lying was only one of them. It¡¯s possible that a past traumatic memory may have been triggered by the question and the physiological reactions could be due to that.


    ¡°For the record, please state your full name.¡±


    ¡°Abby. There is no record. We¡¯re not in court.¡±


    ¡°Just answer the question. What¡¯s your full name?¡±


    ¡°Mark McKenzie¡±


    ¡°How old are you?¡±


    ¡°Twenty-two¡±


    I kept asking him questions that I knew the answers to and watched his reactions through the field.


    ¡°Now I need you to lie to me, so I can see if there¡¯s a difference.¡±


    ¡°The sky is plaid.¡±


    ¡°What kind of a lie is that? And who chooses plaid? It¡¯s not even a color. It¡¯s a pattern.¡±


    ¡°Well, the sky is definitely not plaid. If you don¡¯t like my choice of lies, ask me a question that I can lie about.¡±


    ¡°How many siblings do you have?¡±


    ¡°Three¡±


    ¡°Where did you go to university?¡±


    ¡°Yale for my undergraduate degree and Harvard to get my master¡¯s degree.¡±


    ¡°What¡¯s seven times eight?¡±


    ¡°Sixty-four¡±


    I wasn¡¯t registering any significant differences with these lies. Mark was relaxed throughout. Maybe he needed something more significant to lie about.


    ¡°Tell me why you¡¯d rather have a zinc mine than a diamond mine.¡±


    ¡°Well, I wouldn¡¯t. Zinc is a commodity and¡­oh, I forgot I was supposed to lie. Sorry.¡±


    I sighed audibly and tried again. ¡°What chemical compound is most commonly used in the gold leeching process?¡±


    ¡°Uhm¡­baking soda.¡± Big spike in readings. Pulse rate up.


    ¡°You¡¯re a terrible liar. I didn¡¯t need to read your physiological changes to catch that one. Also, let¡¯s move on, because I can see you¡¯re just dying to correct your answer and tell me that it¡¯s cyanide.¡±


    ¡°There are newer processes, but cyanide is still the most widely used. It¡¯s very effective in terms of removing the gold from the rock and in terms of cost. However, it¡¯s lousy for the environment.¡±


    I face-palmed. ¡°Ugh! I was trying to find something significant for you to lie about so I¡¯d get a clearer reaction. I may have gone too far. Let¡¯s try something else. How many girlfriends have you had?¡±


    ¡°A hundred and fifty-seven, including you.¡±


    We¡¯d never discussed past boyfriends or girlfriends, but I was pretty sure he was lying because of the outrageous number. There was a spike in some of readings, but that may just be due to the subject matter.


    ¡°You¡¯re my favorite out of all of them.¡± Some spikes, some no change. Was he lying now?


    ¡°You have to wait for a question, Mark¡±


    ¡°I think you¡¯re wonderful, Abby.¡± No spikes at all.


    ¡°Still haven¡¯t asked a question¡±.


    ¡°I love you.¡±


    Huge spikes! His pulse was way up. Was he lying or just nervous about saying if for the first time? I lifted my head up off of his chest and looked him in the eyes. He wasn¡¯t lying. No way.


    ¡°I love you too.¡± I¡¯d never said that to a boyfriend before and I felt myself starting to tear up. Mark put a stop to that with his next choice of words.


    ¡°Just remember who said it first.¡± My indignant expression set him off laughing again and he wrapped me in his arms before I could recover and beat him to a pulp.


    ¡°I can¡¯t believe that you quoted a line from a hockey movie to me at a time like this!¡±


    ¡°It wasn¡¯t just any hockey movie. It was a romantic hockey movie!¡± And then he kissed me and I forgot what I was going to say next.

 B3: Chapter 40 - Award Ceremony

    ¡°Abby, this is Rebeccah Meyers. Her family and mine have been friends for years.¡±


    Mark introduced me to a pretty redhead in a slinky little black dress. I¡¯d read about those dresses, but I¡¯d never felt I could pull off the look like it was meant to. Rebeccah pulled it off very well. She was older than Mark and I guessed her to be in her early thirties.


    ¡°It¡¯s nice to meet you.¡± I said as we politely shook hands.


    Mark and I had been walking around the Benjamin Franklin Room in the Harry S. Truman building where the State Department was having its annual award ceremony, when we stumbled across Rebeccah. The Hannah Foundation was getting the Presidential Award for Extraordinary Efforts to Combat Trafficking in Persons. Jake and I had been invited to accept the award on behalf of the foundation. My invitation had an ¡®and guest¡¯ next to my name. I had wanted to bring Mom, but she was only a few weeks away from her due date and wasn¡¯t allowed to fly anymore. Instead, I had to go with my second choice, Mark. He made good filler and looked very dashing in his tuxedo.


    ¡°Is she a part of the Peyton Place families?¡±, I asked Mark.


    Trying hard not to laugh, Mark answered, ¡°Yes and how do you even know that show? I thought I was the one who used anachronistic words and references.¡±


    Rebeccah was looking at us like we were slightly off. ¡°I¡¯m lost. Care to explain Mark?¡±


    Mark obliged. ¡°Abby met Thomas last month. He wanted to introduce her to Isaiah. Jake put down the ban-hammer and I had to explain the whole grandparents interfering in our lives thing to her. Peyton Place is an old tv show with all sorts of drama and family intrigue. It¡¯s from the sixties.¡±


    ¡°Well, the comparison fits our families perfectly then. Being one of the oldest grandchildren in the families, there wasn¡¯t anyone for them to force on me, so I lucked out. I do remember Mark having to go out with my sister Lilly a few times before they gave up on them. That was a big mistake on their part. Lilly is not the easiest person to get along with.¡±


    I raised my eyebrows at Mark.


    ¡°In a way, I owe Lilly a debt of gratitude for being so...challenging. That matchmaking attempt was so bad, Jake left me alone for six whole months after that.¡±


    Rebeccah laughed apologetically at that. I got the feeling that her sister was a source of embarrassment for her.


    ¡°So, are you here with anyone tonight, or are you on hospital business?¡± Mark asked.


    ¡°Mom¡¯s here for the hospital politics. I¡¯m here because my boyfriend works for the state department and he dragged me here tonight. I¡¯m don¡¯t even know what this is about. People getting trinkets for sucking up to people in power. It¡¯s all a bunch of political bullshit.¡±


    I squeezed Marks hand. I felt sorry for whoever her boyfriend was. That¡¯s then Ethan came over and handed Rebeccah a glass of wine.


    ¡°Oh, thank you, Ethan. Let me introduce you to Mark and Abby. This is Ethan, my boyfriend.¡±


    The shock must have shown on my face because Rebeccah asked, ¡°Abby, are you ok?¡±


    While I gathered myself, Mark answered for me. ¡°I¡¯m sure Abby is just surprised that Ethan¡¯s your boyfriend. We met him the summer before last.¡±


    ¡°Oh. It seemed more than that.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m sorry. My mind had to readjust. I thought Ethan was...sorry Ethan, but I thought you were gay.¡±


    Ethan¡¯s eyebrows rose a few inches. ¡°What? Why would you think that?¡±


    Mark tried to hide his grin, while Rebeccah openly laughed out loud.


    ¡°It¡¯s just that every time I¡¯ve seen you since our first meeting, you¡¯ve walked in and out with Alexander. You two seemed...close. Not that there¡¯s anything wrong with that. Not at all. Two men can..¡±


    Now Mark was doubled over and Rebeccah was turned away, desperately trying to get control of her features.


    ¡°Abby, stop! We get it. Alexander is married and has three children back home. Rebeccah and I have been together for almost two years now. Alexander and I have a working relationship. That¡¯s all.¡±


    Rebeccah finally calmed down enough to say, ¡°It¡¯s ok, Ethan. No need to explain. I won¡¯t stand in the way of your bromance!¡±


    And she was off again, taking Mark back with her into their fit of laughter.


    ¡°I¡¯m sorry, Ethan.¡±


    Ethan shrugged in resignation. ¡°It¡¯s ok, Abby. My fragile male ego can handle it. At least you didn¡¯t accuse me of being a Steeler¡¯s fan. That, I would have taken offense to.¡±


    Mark returned to the conversation. ¡°I¡¯m sorry too, Ethan. I really wasn¡¯t laughing at you. I was more entertained by Abby¡¯s distress and subsequent explanation.¡±


    Rebeccah piped it, ¡°I was laughing at you.¡± and proceeded to give Ethan a peck on the lips by way of apology. ¡°Ethan is definitely not gay. He¡¯s very manly!¡± Rebeccah continued.


    ¡°Thanks for the very belated show of support, dear.¡± The term of endearment was said in a manner that suggested it was anything but.


    ¡°Anytime. So what did you meet about? And how come you¡¯ve never mentioned them to me before?¡± Rebeccah queried.


    ¡°Because you would have asked me questions the answers to which that I am not allowed to discuss, honey.¡±


    ¡°You don¡¯t have that excuse, Abby. You never mentioned meeting up with Ethan and Alexander again.¡± Mark mentioned casually.


    ¡°It must have slipped my mind.¡±


    ¡°Why are you turning red? The only time I¡¯ve seen you turn red is when...oh! Ethan, is there a video that I might want to see?¡± Glee had returned to Marks face.


    I shook my head at Ethan. Seriously??! Am I that easy to read? This wasn¡¯t happening.


    Seeing my head shake, Ethan tried to help, only to fail miserably. ¡°I cannot confirm or deny the existence of any video.¡±


    I face-palmed and said, ¡°That was the worst denial ever. Didn¡¯t they teach you any spy craft at all when you were studying to be a diplomat? Bill Clinton, Bill Cosby and OJ were more credible that that. You totally suck!¡±


    ¡°Ethan. I need it for my collection!¡± Mark wasn¡¯t giving up.


    ¡°I really can¡¯t help you. All this goes well beyond my pay grade.¡±


    ¡°Ethan, what¡¯s this all about?¡± Rebeccah insisted.


    ¡°Sorry, work rules.¡±


    ¡°Hmmph! Fine, keep your little secrets.¡± Rebeccah answered frostily.


    Feeling that he might have caused a rift in their relationship, Mark rushed on to change the subject, but I knew that he wouldn¡¯t give up on seeing the video.


    ¡°Anyways, Abby, Rebeccah¡¯s family owns and operates the top-rated hospital in Raleigh, Mercy Hospital. It¡¯s one of the few privately owned hospitals in the state. Rebeccah¡¯s mother, Felicia, runs the place and Rebeccah works as a doctor there.¡±


    ¡°She¡¯s actually the best general surgeon at the hospital. Probably in the state.¡± Ethan¡¯s pride at his girlfriends¡¯ accomplishments shone through. He also wanted a change in subject.


    ¡°Thank you, Ethan. Although, when your parents are both doctors and you come from a long line of doctors, it¡¯s hard not to pick up enough to be a good at it.¡±


    ¡°What about Lilly?¡± Ethan asked casually.


    ¡°Good point. She never was one to listen to anyone else. I guess we¡¯ll find out. She just started medical school this fall. Mother says she¡¯ll be a great doctor because she won¡¯t form any emotional attachments to her patients. Pure dispassion.¡±


    Wow. I completely disagreed with that sentiment and felt the need to add in two cents. ¡°I don¡¯t know about that. I¡¯d never want to be treated by a doctor that didn¡¯t care about me; who treated me like an appliance that needed repair. I¡¯m a person, not a toaster. Nobody cares if they can¡¯t fix a toaster. I want my doctor to be passionate about my health.¡±


    This story has been unlawfully obtained without the author''s consent. Report any appearances on Amazon.


    ¡°Well said, Abby! I couldn¡¯t agree more. Some doctors don¡¯t see it that way though. My father for example. He¡¯s at the top of his field, but he¡¯s a heartless bastard. He cares about the patient only insofar as the patient outcome affects his surgical statistics. Lilly takes after him.¡±


    ¡°Abby¡¯s taken an interest in medicine lately.¡±, Mark chimed in.


    ¡°That¡¯s nice.¡± Rebeccah seemed disinterested at this. She probably heard that a lot.


    ¡°Yeah, I¡¯ve been reading a lot of books, watched hours of videos and tried out some techniques.¡±


    Ethan choked a bit, like he¡¯d been startled.


    ¡°Well, that¡¯s a good start.¡± I could tell that Rebeccah was trying really hard to be polite about my ¡®efforts¡¯ and didn¡¯t want to hurt my feelings.


    Still sputtering slightly, Ethan said, ¡°Uhm, you may not want to dismiss Abby¡¯s efforts. She has a tendency to downplay her abilities. If she says that she¡¯s read a lot of books on medicine, I¡¯d put her up against any med student you¡¯ve got. Probably even second or third year residents.¡±


    ¡°Don¡¯t be ridiculous, Ethan. This isn¡¯t like your job where someone can fake their way through a meeting. You either know your stuff or patients die. It takes years of constant study to get where my residents are. If Abby¡¯s interest blossoms and she gets into medical school, she will get there eventually.¡±


    ¡°Knowing and working with people is my job, Rebeccah. I stand by my observation. Why don¡¯t you ask her some questions and see?¡±


    ¡°Fine, but when I prove you wrong, I expect an apology from you.¡±


    Until she said that last bit, I wasn¡¯t going to be participating in any testing. Now though, there was no way that I was going to let Ethan apologize for being an excellent observer and for trusting in me.


    Mark led us to our table, where Jake was sitting and nursing a whiskey with a stern looking woman around his age, with shoulder length grey hair pulled back in a ponytail.


    Before we could be introduced, Rebeccah started in with her questions. She didn¡¯t expect much and started with basic anatomy questions. Things that were covered in high school biology courses. When she saw that she couldn¡¯t stump me with those, the questions got more advanced. I made sure to keep any expression from my face, as I answered question after question. At Jake¡¯s inquiry, I heard Mark give him a quick rundown of the conversation that led us to this impromptu inquisition. Both Jake and the woman leaned forward and listened attentively.


    I have to admit, as her questions got more complicated, I found myself enjoying the challenge. Soon she was throwing out symptoms and we were discussing possible diagnoses, which tests should be ordered to rule out or prove the diagnoses and potential treatment options. At one point, she corrected one of my treatment plans, but I referred her to a recent paper published in The New England Journal of Medicine that touted the effectiveness of my suggested course of treatment.


    After fifteen minutes of the oral exam, Rebeccah wound down.


    ¡°Satisfied?¡± Ethan asked. Maybe with just a tad of smugness.


    Rebeccah wasn¡¯t ready to throw in the towel just yet. ¡°There¡¯s no doubt that Abby knows her theory. She¡¯s very impressive. However, it¡¯s quite another thing to work with patients.¡±


    Ethan sighed. ¡°Rebeccah, Abby mentioned that she practiced too. Given that, if I needed a surgeon, Abby would be my second choice, behind you.¡±


    Rebeccah¡¯s eyes bugged out. ¡°You can¡¯t be that stupid. She¡¯s just out of high school. It would take her a decade to learn enough to even be a descent surgeon. Don¡¯t talk about things you know nothing about.¡±


    ¡°You just finished admitting that I was right about her and now you¡¯re questioning me again. Would you care to wager on it?¡±


    ¡°It wouldn¡¯t be fair taking your money when you make so little of it.¡±


    What the hell?! How was Ethan putting up with this from her? I kept expecting him to call her on her behavior. Instead, he just kept looking down at his hands when she twisted the knife in.


    This time, he at least glanced up at her and continued his challenge. ¡°One year of salary. Mine against yours. That¡¯s significant to both of us.¡±


    Holy cow! Things were escalating too quickly and I wanted out.


    ¡°You¡¯re on. I normally wouldn¡¯t take your money, but in this case, I think you need the lesson. Anyone can read books, but you can¡¯t homeschool your way to becoming a surgeon. It¡¯s not possible. You can¡¯t bullshit your way through it. It¡¯s not like being a liaison; sipping your wine and stroking everyone¡¯s egos while all the big shots play ¡®King of the Castle¡¯.¡±


    I barely stopped myself from slapping her. Turning abruptly to Mark, I said, ¡°Mark, would you please ask me to dance?¡±


    ¡°As you wish, Abby. Would you like to dance?¡± Mark stood up and held out his hand to me.


    ¡°I would love to.¡± I got up and took his proffered hand.


    ¡°Wait? What just happened? Where are you going?¡± Rebeccah was confused at the sudden change.


    ¡°Nothing happened. Mark wanted to dance. That¡¯s all.¡±


    ¡°Abby, I may not know you very well, but it¡¯s not hard to see that something I said upset you. You¡¯re not great at hiding your emotions yet. Your upset with me. Why?¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s a party, Rebeccah. We¡¯re here to have fun, right?¡± Deflection. I just need to calm her down enough for me to get away.


    ¡°I¡¯d rather know why you¡¯re about to blow me off. I have a feeling that you¡¯ll make sure that I won¡¯t see again once you go dancing.¡±


    ¡°Rebeccah, even if I thought it was a good idea to talk with you about it, I would talk with you privately.¡±


    ¡°I know everyone here and they know me. I¡¯m a big girl. I can take it.¡±


    So I took a deep breathe and told her exactly what I was thinking.


    ¡°Ok. I¡¯ll tell you why I¡¯m pissed off at you. I¡¯ve listened to you put down Ethan on three separate occasions tonight. Not in a teasing way, but in a way that denigrates him and makes him feel small and inferior. Every time you¡¯ve done it, I¡¯ve seen him look down at his hands in embarrassment. Meanwhile, he¡¯s complimented you several times and said how amazing you are with your patients and how you¡¯re the youngest surgeon at your hospital. The pride he says it with breaks my heart, because I can see how he feels about you and I see how you treat him. Do you think that being a strong, independent woman means that you have to be superior to your boyfriend and not take an interest in him or his accomplishments, while he has to glory in yours? You¡¯re supposed to be a team. Working together and helping each other. Every single great relationship that I¡¯ve seen is between two strong individual who build each other up. They have their own interests, but they also take an interest in what the other is doing.


    I bet Ethan could name every member of your surgical team and every nurse on your floor. Besides Ethan¡¯s immediate boss and Alexander, can you name anyone in his office? Can you even say what tonight¡¯s party is for and why Ethan is here? Did you go meet with his boss and talk him up? Did you show any interest in furthering his goals? I¡¯m willing to bet that he¡¯s done that plenty of times at your hospital functions.¡± Rebeccah seemed uncomfortable at my words, but I could tell that I¡¯d hit the mark. I didn¡¯t let up though.


    ¡°My parents each had their own careers when they started dating, but my dad took time to teach at her center and my mom took time to help my dad get his art into new galleries. Helping each other didn¡¯t mean they were weak. It¡¯s the opposite. They grew stronger together. When my friend Bobby and I were dating, I went to cheer him on at his football games and in the off-season he came to my Kung Fu classes. We supported each other and even though our relationship didn¡¯t work out, we¡¯re still good friends. The same is true with Mark. He¡¯s interested in mining and geology and soil remediation so I read a few books and articles on those subjects so that when he tells me about his problems, I might have something useful to offer or at least I¡¯ll understand what the issues are. I want to support him and his career. That doesn¡¯t make me weak. For his part, when I told him about my studies, he was ecstatic for me and encouraging. He told me that he¡¯d been worried that I hadn¡¯t been trying reaching my full potential. He didn¡¯t knock me down and tell me that I couldn¡¯t do it. I had his unquestioned support and it means the world to me.


    Now don¡¯t get me wrong, we¡¯re not perfect and we tease each other plenty. He picks on my eating habits and I make fun of his archaic word choices. I¡¯ve may have even send a flying pudding his way once for his comments, but we do it in fun. We laugh with each other. We¡¯re building stories that we could tell our kids about one day. We¡¯re building our story. We never step on each other on purpose and if we go too far, we back off and apologize.


    Since you know everyone here, then I¡¯m sure you know Jake and his wife Nancy. I never had the privileged of meeting her, but from the way Jake speaks of her, I can tell they had a once in a lifetime love affair. He still talks about what she would have loved or how she would have felt about certain things or people. At a time when women were encouraged to be nothing more than be hood ornaments for their husbands, a mere trinket, she was his true partner. When he went mining, she¡¯d go with him and cook for him and the crew. They raised their kids together, as a team. When she took an interest in charity work, he was there for her with all the resources at his disposal. Does Jake seem weak to you? Was Nancy weak? Love isn¡¯t about your triumphs over each other. Its about your shared triumphs over the world. It¡¯s not mind games or domination games or some contest. It¡¯s about sharing your life with each other.


    I don¡¯t know how you really feel about Ethan. Maybe you like him. Maybe you even love him. Whatever your feelings, I can see that you¡¯re getting what you need out of your relationship with him. He supports you. I don¡¯t see what¡¯s in it for him. I don¡¯t know him very well, but it seems to me that he deserves more than you¡¯re giving him. And that¡¯s why I¡¯m so pissed off with you. You¡¯re treating someone I consider a friend like shit.¡±


    I finally ran down. Until I¡¯d started speaking, I hadn¡¯t realized how much her casual dismissal of Ethan had bothered me. I looked around the table and saw big, surprised eyes looking at me. The woman sitting with Jake had a worried expression on her face.


    I¡¯d expected Rebeccah to be furious with me and attack me for the things I¡¯d said. Instead, Rebeccah¡¯s face was a mixture of agony and wonderment and she turned away from me and towards Ethan, who had a stunned expression on his face.


    ¡°I didn¡¯t see it, Ethan! I swear I didn¡¯t. I¡¯ve been treating you like...like...¡±


    ¡°Like your father treated me?¡± The woman sitting with Jake suggested.


    Rebeccah turned around and faced her mother. I thought that I detected shame on Rebeccah¡¯s features and it made me feel mean for the things I¡¯d said.


    ¡°Yes! Exactly like that. I¡¯ve hated him for it all my life for what he did to you and I¡¯ve been doing it to Ethan.¡±


    She turned back to Ethan. ¡°I¡¯m sorry. I don¡¯t know how I didn¡¯t see it. Abby spent half an hour with us and she saw it. Give me a chance to do better. Please! I love you, even if I¡¯ve been doing a terrible job of showing it.¡±


    ¡°I know you do, Becky! I love you too. I have since we were kids. I know all about your father. Abby was wrong about one thing though. I wasn¡¯t embarrassed when I was looking down. I was angry. Not at you, but at your piece of shit father for setting such a bad example for you to learn from. Your mom and I were planned to talk to you about it when I got back from my trip Germany next week. We didn¡¯t know how you¡¯d take it. We know that you¡¯ve been doing it unconsciously, barely aware that you¡¯re even doing it, and that it¡¯s been getting worse. For what it¡¯s worth, you were rarely doing it six months ago.¡±


    ¡°I should never have been doing it at all. And Abby¡¯s right about never supporting you or learning anything about what you do.¡± Ethan took Rebeccah into his arms and let her away for a much needed private conversation, leaving the rest of us with the awkward residue of their open psychological wounds.


    I was about to say, ¡°Awkward silence¡±, when Mark squeezed my hand and shook his head. I kept quiet and Jake filled in the void instead.


    ¡°Abby, I¡¯d like to introduce you to Rebeccah¡¯s mother, Felicia.¡±

 B3: Chapter 41 - Award Ceremony 2

    ¡°Hi. It¡¯s nice to meet you.¡± I stammered awkwardly. What do you say to a woman who¡¯d daughter you just gave a public beat down to?


    ¡°Likewise.¡±


    To save us from further awkwardness, Jake told Mark to get me on the dance floor, as I¡¯d requested.


    ¡°So...how many geology books did you read?¡±, Mark asked once he got me on the dancefloor.


    ¡°I¡¯ve been really busy lately. I¡¯ve only managed to get through the first two years of a Galt degree, along with all the lectures.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯d have been impressed if you read a single geology textbook. You have half a degree already. How are you doing all this Abby?¡±


    ¡°I figured out how to get a photographic memory and how to read at incredible speeds. So it¡¯s doesn¡¯t take much time at all. Taking in information isn¡¯t a problem anymore. Acquiring skills is. Most of what I¡¯m doing these days is learning new procedures and practicing them.¡±


    ¡°I see. Did you happen to peruse any chemistry books as well?¡±


    ¡°I had that from my medical courses already. I did try to consider the mine remediation aspects of that field, but I haven¡¯t really put any effort into it yet.¡±


    Mark brought me in closer and held onto me as we danced.


    ¡°Mark? This is really nice, but the song is up-tempo, not a slow dance.¡±


    ¡°I know.¡±


    We spend a few songs like that before a tap on Mark shoulder broke us up.


    ¡°May I cut in?¡±


    Mark deferred to his grandfather and Jake took his place in the dance, albeit not nearly as close and with a more formal posture. I¡¯d never danced like this and Jake had to guide me around. I scanned his feet and those of the other people and soon picked up the form of it. Soon we were dancing effortlessly, and Jake said, ¡°I got a call from Thomas this morning.¡±


    ¡°How¡¯s he doing?¡±


    ¡°Oh, he¡¯s fine. Had a lot of nice things to say about you and how you got Ana back. He laughed himself silly when I told him that you hadn¡¯t mentioned it to me at all.¡±


    ¡°Oops. Sorry. I forgot. It¡¯s been kind of hectic lately.¡±


    ¡°Abby, he told me you saved her a month ago. I¡¯ve seen you twice in that time and spoken to you at least half a dozen times on the phone.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s where the ¡®I forgot¡¯ part comes in.¡±


    ¡°Uh huh. Well, thank you. That¡¯s three of my friends you¡¯ve helped out now. I keep falling farther and farther behind in what I owe you.¡±


    ¡°Three?¡± Who was the third?


    ¡°First Harry, then Thomas, and Felicia tonight. You spoke some harsh words to Rebeccah tonight and she needed them. I¡¯ve known Rebeccah all her life. She wouldn¡¯t have listened to those words from her mother or anyone else in the family. She¡¯s as stubborn as her mother. Only someone from the outside could have opened her eyes to how she was treating Ethan. I know you didn¡¯t do it for me but thank you anyways. I will find a way to repay you. It¡¯s my new goal in life.¡±


    ¡°If you¡¯re that serious about it, I did think of two things you could help me out with.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m all ears.¡±


    ¡°Can you keep those ears, and maybe your eyes as well, open and see whom among your wealthy friends and acquaintances or their families has medical issues that can¡¯t be helped by modern medicine?¡±


    ¡°Sure. What¡¯s your plan? Are you going to use that healing potion you used on Harry for his heart disease or maybe your cancer concoction that you mentioned?¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s exactly the plan. I¡¯m going to open up a holistic healing center. If I don¡¯t claim to be a doctor, I won¡¯t run afoul of the medical authorities. I figure that I¡¯ll get wealthy people to pay me a large consult fee and donate obscene amounts of money to the foundation in exchange for healing.¡± It felt good to finally reveal one of my plans to someone.


    ¡°How much were you thinking of charging for your services?¡±


    ¡°I haven¡¯t worked out the entire price list yet. For non-operable, late-stage cancer though, I was thinking twenty million dollars.¡±


    Jake¡¯s steps faltered for a second.


    The story has been taken without consent; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.


    ¡°Seriously?¡±


    ¡°Yup. One million dollars per cure and they have to buy them in packs of twenty. They¡¯ll be donating the other nineteen cures to cancer patients who can¡¯t afford it.¡±


    ¡°I guess that makes sense. You¡¯ll tell them the price, they¡¯ll have a heart-attack from the sticker-shock and then you¡¯ll cure them.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m a last resort Jake. Also, they only have to pay if it works. They¡¯ll have nothing to lose. You would have paid that for Nancy.¡±


    ¡°If it worked? Yes. That and more.¡± Jake grew quiet for a few moments, perhaps thinking about how I could have helped Nancy if she¡¯s managed to hold on a few more years. ¡°Assuming we can find the patients and they¡¯re willing to give your therapy a try, what will you do with all that money, Abby.¡±


    ¡°The large consulting fees I¡¯ll use for my VR companies. I¡¯ve added a few more teams into the mix and started some new projects and the expenses are starting to pile up. I¡¯ve already started dipping into my dinosaur money. As to the donations to the foundation, you¡¯re going to have to wait a little longer to find out. I don¡¯t want to say anything about it until I¡¯ve managed to lock in the main elements.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯ll see what I can come up with. Felicia would be a big help there. She already has access to wealthy patients at to her hospital. I¡¯ll start sounding her out about using an alternative treatment for those that have no other options.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯d be willing to share the donation with her hospital. Maybe a twenty percent referral fee?¡±


    ¡°I¡¯d start with ten percent and see how she reacts. She¡¯ll scream bloody murder and try to drive that percentage up. Fifteen should be our upper limit. She¡¯ll need you more than you¡¯ll need her. After all, they¡¯re her donors that you¡¯ll be saving.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯ll need another few months to get set up, so sometime in the new year is my target date. If there are customer that can¡¯t wait, I¡¯ll find a way to fit them in beforehand. Oh. I almost forgot. I¡¯ll need them all to sign non-disclosure agreements. There¡¯s only so much cure that I can produce. If word spreads too quickly, I¡¯ll have to turn people away and that would really suck.¡±


    ¡°I can see that. What¡¯s the other thing I can help you out with?¡±


    ¡°Next time we spin, get a good look at the man standing at the end of room, carefully inspecting the portrait of Benny F.¡±


    ¡°Benny F? Your generation has no respect for history. Ok. I see him. Yellow hanky?¡±


    ¡°I think they refer to them as pocket squares these days, but yes, that¡¯s him.¡±


    ¡°What about him?¡±


    ¡°I¡¯d like you to find Ethan and ask him to take you to speak with the head of security. Yellow hanky guy has a knife strapped to his leg. Six-inch blade. It¡¯s made entirely of plastic or he wouldn¡¯t have gotten through the metal detectors at the front door.¡± Ever since my last award ceremony, I¡¯d made it my habit to scan the area for guns and weapons. This was the first time I¡¯d found anything troubling. I wondered what the guy intended to do with the knife. Did he plan to stab someone in the bathroom? How did he think that he could get away afterwards? We were on the seventh floor of a secured government building that had cameras and guards everywhere.


    ¡°When they ask me, how do I tell them that I know this?¡±


    ¡°Mention that you saw the outline of it when he bent down to tie his shoe. Tell them you used to have a buddy that wore one just like it. Maybe it¡¯s innocent, but you felt it was your civic duty to let them know.¡±


    ¡°Why aren¡¯t you telling them all this?¡±


    ¡°Who¡¯d believe an eighteen-year-old girl? Also, I don¡¯t want any more attention than I already get.¡±


    ¡°Yeah, good luck with that. Not getting attention is the one thing I¡¯ve noticed that you really suck at.¡±


    He had a little chuckle at my discomfort over his accurate assessment.


    The dance ended and I returned to the table while Jake went in search of Ethan and the head of security. By the time he got back to the table, dinner was being served and it was speech time. He gave me a quick nod, indicating that he¡¯d delivered the message about Yellow Pocket Square Guy to the right people. Ethan and Rebeccah still hadn¡¯t returned and they ended up missing the dinner entirely. Lucky them. The food was too fancy for my tastes and I could have done without all the speeches.


    When the speeches finally died down, the Secretary of State stood up to start the award ceremony. As this was a state department ceremony, almost all the awards were for state department staff members, with only a few going to civilians or organizations. The foundation¡¯s award wasn¡¯t a state department award and wasn¡¯t normally given by the Secretary of State. For some reason, it had been fit into this ceremony. I wasn¡¯t going to complain. It was an honor to get the award and the recognition would help the foundation work with other governmental agencies, both here in the United States and abroad.


    Exactly halfway through the awards ceremony, the Secretary of State paused the event and asked for everyone¡¯s full attention. ¡°We have one more Superior Honor Award recipient to call up. However, before I get to that, I have an unusual award to present. This award is normally presented by the President of the United States and it is the Presidential Award for Extraordinary Efforts to Combat Trafficking in Persons. Tonight¡¯s award is being presented to the Hannah Foundation for its incredible contributions to the fight against human trafficking. Not only has the foundation provided substantial aid to hundreds of survivors of human trafficking, but they¡¯ve also assisted this government on numerous occasions to help combat the slave trade. Now the reason that I¡¯m giving out this award tonight, and at this point in the ceremony, is because the person who founded the Hannah Foundation is also being awarded the Superior Honor Award for her personal contributions to achieving this agency¡¯s mission. Her exception performance has allowed our agency to maintain and strengthen out relationship with one of our strongest allies. In fact, representative of those allies have made a special request to hand out the award tonight. Ladies and gentlemen, please welcome, Ambassador Wagner of Germany and her son, Stefan, who will be handing out these awards tonight.¡±


    What. The. Hell? I was getting another award? I turned to Jake, wondering if he was as stunned as I was, only to see him smirking face. He knew about this?!!


    ¡°You knew about this ambush? Why didn¡¯t you tell me?¡±


    ¡°Oops! Sorry. I forgot. It¡¯s been kind of hectic lately.¡± Jake¡¯s recitation of my own words from earlier back at me was infuriating. Worse yet, he gave his voice a falsetto to match mine. I was about to let him have it, when I heard Ambassador Wagner calling out my name and Jake¡¯s. I looked away to see her and Stefan¡¯s beaming faces and knew that my wrath would have to wait.


    I glared daggers at Jake as I got up and he walked over to me to escort me up to the podium.


    ¡°So Abby, how¡¯s that ¡®not drawing attention to yourself¡¯ thing working out for you?¡±

 B3: Chapter 42 - Getting Ready

    In the month leading up to mom¡¯s due date, dad became very nervous and had me scan mom and the baby several times a day. He kept worrying that the thirteen-year break in the gestation period of the baby had caused something to go wrong. I assured him, repeatedly, that everything was ok. The baby was in the correct position, the umbilical cord wasn¡¯t wrapped around its neck, and all the baby¡¯s organs had developed properly. There were no major alarms when I scanned either of them. Minor alarms were normal in everyone, as something was always happening in the human body.


    Dad still worried. Since there was nothing physically wrong, he decided that there might be psychological trauma associated with being trapped in L2 for so long. I tried explaining that there were not side effects to being in L2 and he asked me how I could know that.


    ¡°Because my field would tell me if there were.¡± Dad wasn¡¯t convinced and I offered to send him to L2 until after the baby was born and he could see for himself. He was less than amused. However, this was normal behavior for dad when it came to the health of anyone he loved, so I bore up under his worry and kept scanning for him, over and over again.


    One of my biggest problems with scanning for mom and dad was their request not to be told the sex of the baby. They wanted to be surprised. That meant that I had to be very careful in how I made reference to the baby, because I didn¡¯t want to ruin the surprise for them. Even in my own head I thought of the baby as ¡®the baby¡¯ and not as him or her.


    While dad worried about the health of the baby, I had another worry altogether. Would the baby be born with the same abilities that I had? I had no clue how I¡¯d gotten my abilities or where they¡¯d come from. No one else that I¡¯d ever met had a field around them and my mind kept switching between thinking that I was a mutant to thinking that there must be other people with my ability out there. If the trait was genetic, then maybe the baby would get it too. However, mom and dad, and their parents and siblings, didn¡¯t have it. Did that mean that I was a mutant or was the origin of the field environmental? I couldn¡¯t remember ever walking through a cloud of radioactive particles. Similarly, anything in my environment would surely have affected others around me. I simply had no clue as to the origin of my field and could only play the different options on a loop in my brain. One thing I could say for certain was that the baby did not have a field around it like I did, so far. I took that as a good sign that we¡¯d be safe from having the baby suddenly vanish when it was stressed out and hungry. If that were to happen during the delivery room, the baby could fall to the floor in R1 or R2 and hurt itself. Although, I doubted that would be the case, as my field seemed to have a few features that protected me from misusing it accidentally.


    The baby not having a field attached to its skin was a comfort, but I still couldn¡¯t rule out the idea that it might only develop the field once it was born. If the baby developed a field, how would I deal with it? Could I suppress the field until the baby was old enough to learn to use it properly? What if the baby turned out to be mean, how would I deal with a sibling that used its powers to steal or kill for fun? How would I find the baby if it disappeared into L2 and I had to locate it quickly? What if the baby ran away at one point or was kidnapped? There were so many possibilities for something to go wrong and I set about giving the baby the full Batman treatment.


    Although Batman had no super-powers, he was smart and knew how to plan for the worst. He had a plan for how to stop every member of the Justice League, should they ever go bad or fall under the control of an evil entity. He even kept some kryptonite around to stop Superman. For the baby, I needed to have my own set of plans to cover the different contingencies. These contingencies fell into three areas that I needed to research. One, field detection. Two, field suppression or negation. Three, field elimination.


    Even though I had an idea concerning field elimination, I put that aside for the moment, as there was nothing that I could do to test my theory. The only thing that I¡¯d ever successfully done to my base field was to change its frequency. Anything else I tried had failed. If the baby had a field, and I had no choice but to attempt something, then and only then would I give my theory a try. Getting rid of the baby¡¯s field would be a last resort measure and I tried not to think about how evil the baby would have to be for me to do something like that.


    Field suppression or negation was a different matter. This was something that I knew I could do as it was basically the same thing that I did now to shift between into the layers. I¡¯d started off by overlapping fields to shift the frequencies, but by now I knew the different frequencies at an instinctual level and it was second nature to apply the correct amount of power to shift the frequencies as needed. That meant that if the baby shifted to R1, I could just shift it back to reality. I was also confident that because I¡¯d been building my shifting ¡®muscles¡¯ constantly for the past several years, that I could essentially lock the baby in reality with a field. If I set my field up with sufficient strength, the baby wouldn¡¯t be able to change its frequency and shift away.


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    Of course, this would only work so long as I was close enough to feed my field power. All bets were off when I was traveling. That line of thought led me to wonder if there was a way to leave a field in place that would power itself for a limited duration and I started experimenting with different combinations of fields. I¡¯d done this when I¡¯d been trying to figure out how to get into the layers, but for some reason, I hadn¡¯t pursued it since. I felt guilty about this lack of initiative and curiosity. Wasn¡¯t I behaving just like that character in the book I¡¯d read, the one who had the ability to read minds? He¡¯d had a wonderful power and he never bothered to learn it¡¯s limits or how to control it. I looked down on him and here I was, guilty of the same lack. Yes, I¡¯d mastered many aspects of my abilities and even discovered some new skills lately, such as pulse scanning, but it seemed that I¡¯d put off discovering the extent of my abilities. That needed to be corrected right away.


    The first thing I did was to pull out a notebook and start making a list of all the possible combinations of fields that I could make with R, R1, R2, and R3. To this list of sixteen combinations, I added the layers L1, L2 and L3, which generated a further twenty-one combinations. Sections of the list looked like this:


    R1 + R =


    R1 + R1 =


    R1 + R2 =


    R1 + R3 =


    L1 + R =


    L1 + R1 =


    L1 + R2 =


    L1 + R3 =


    L1 + L1 =


    L1 + L2 =


    L1 + L3 =


    Once I had my thirty-seven combinations, I set out to fill in the blanks. Some I knew already and filled them in right away. R1 + R1 = L1. L1 + L1 = L2. Others, like R1 + R2 and L1 + R, were more difficult to figure out because they didn¡¯t seem to do anything or anything different than what I was already doing. For instance, combining R1 and R2 fields sent me to L1, just like combining R1 with another R1 field. Yet, I had the feeling that there was something different about it. I kept at it, trying to figure it out, when I was suddenly shifted back to R1. What the hell! One moment I¡¯m in L1 and the next I¡¯m in R1, without forcing a shift.


    I thought about what had happened and how it felt and realized that I¡¯d felt that feeling before. That feeling of being ripped from one layer to another. At the end of the bus incident, when I¡¯d automatically shifted from L3 back to reality, I¡¯d had the same feeling. Somehow, I¡¯d recreated some of the conditions of that day. That meant that it wasn¡¯t just a lack of power or strength that could kick me out. It was also the frequency that I¡¯d used.


    This led to hours and hours of experimentation and discovery, the upshot of which was that I learned that combining different R¡¯s or L¡¯s led to unstable shifts. These shifts deteriorated over time and sent you, or the object in the field, back to the whichever layer or sublayer you were in before you added the second field. I was able keep an object in the unstable shift for different amounts of time, depending on how much energy I put into the second field. Once that energy was used up in maintaining the field, it dissipated the second field and the object was left back in the first field, which would then shift the object back to whichever layer I had anchored it to as it too ran out of power.


    That discovery, of time-delayed temporary fields, filled in a lot of the blanks in my list, as well as solving my issue of being able to suppress the baby¡¯s field even while I was traveling. As long as I could set up the suppression field for longer than my trip, everything would be fine. To that end, I added some practice time each morning to build my field muscles further and extend the amount of power I could pour into a temporary field. In time I had left before the baby was born, I was able to increase that time from three days to five days. My goal was at least three weeks. That being the maximum amount of time that I¡¯d ever been away.


    Another combination that didn¡¯t seem to do anything was that of L1 + R. Merging an L1 field with an R field, like the one that my base field always had when I was in reality, didn¡¯t seem to do anything more that the L1 field did by itself. Yet, the combined frequency was different and I felt that something wasn¡¯t the same. I just couldn¡¯t figure out was it was, until I went hunting for a snack and left that field combination on by mistake. On my way to the kitchen, I passed by a greyed-out mom and it all made sense. By adding the R, a dose of reality was injected into L1 and I was able to see shadows of reality. This was the inverse of R1, where I was in reality and creating a bubble to L1. Further trials showed that L2 plus R and L3 plus R gave opposite versions of R2 and R3. Combinations of any L with R1, R2, and R3 all ended up being unstable.


    With this discovery, my list was now mostly complete. The remaining combinations were those that involved combing R with itself or R with one of R1, R2, or R3. None of them seemed to do anything more when combined than they did by themselves and after hours of fruitless thought, I left them up to future me to figure out someday.

 B3: Chapter 43 - Hide and Seek

    Time delayed fields were great for when I was traveling and I could also see them as being incredibly useful for scaring the crap out of people without me having to be anywhere near the scene of the crime, but what I really needed to work on was field detection.


    Field detection had two aspects to it. Could I use my field to detect the baby¡¯s field, if he had one? If not, could I place a tracker on the baby and use that to detect the baby? Oh, I also had to see if I could detect the baby in multiple layers or sublayers of reality. Crap! If the baby disappeared, would I have to search each of the three layers and each of the three sublayers? That could take too long. I needed to find a way to do it instantaneously.


    The idea of a tracker was very appealing to me, primarily because I was having trouble figuring out how to detect a field. For a tracking device, I needed something that wouldn¡¯t set off metal detectors and that wouldn¡¯t require a battery source. Recharging trackers would be too much of a hassle. Besides, I didn¡¯t need to use electronics to send out a signal for me to triangulate. My pulse scan could find anything I wanted it to, if I was in range. The problem was finding something unique enough that I wouldn¡¯t get hundreds of hits when I sent out a pulse.


    The other challenge was in how the tracker would be worn on the body. It¡¯s great to have a tracking device, but if it¡¯s not always on the person, then it¡¯s useless. I needed it to be out of the way, unobtrusive. It couldn¡¯t interfere with daily life. Something that wouldn¡¯t normally be taken off or discarded if you were being kidnapped. Clothing can be changed too easily. Phones can be taken away. Maybe an anklet? I liked that idea. A piece of jewelry might be taken off of a kidnap victim, but it wouldn¡¯t be thrown away. It would be pocketed and that would be just as good for my purposes.


    Deciding on an anklet to hold the tracker solved the problem of finding a unique tracker. The anklet I was envisioning consisted of a chain that would hold a small jewel on it. I was already practiced at finding jewels and all I needed was to find a rare one so that the pulse would find only one match to in its search. Did I have anything that was that unique? I shifted to L2 in my room and searched the stacks of jewels that I had on hand. Searching for anything with gold, silver, or diamonds would be a waste of time. I¡¯d get thousand of hits. What about other gemstones? I pulled out a few and tied them to a pulse scan. Every gemstone I tried got dozens of hits within a ten-mile radius. I had to find something else, something with a unique signature, a gemstone that no one else had or even could have.


    Looking through my bags of jewels, I soon realized that my only solution was to create something completely new. The same way that I combined fields to create new frequencies, I could merge gemstones to create unique tracking devices. I took out the bags of small diamonds that I liberated from the safe at Serpentine and spread out the diamonds. The cut diamonds weren¡¯t uniform in shape or size, but they were similar enough and perfect for my purposes. Next to the diamonds, I placed a ruby that I¡¯d found during one of my trips with Mark¡¯s family. The ruby was considerably larger, yet still less than half the size of one of the ones that I¡¯d sold at auction to get the foundation set up. Using my field I sent a small piece of the ruby to L1. Using tweezers, I picked up that piece and brought it to occupy the same space as one of the diamonds, before releasing the field around it. The result was diamond with a section inside that was a combination of diamond and ruby molecules. A Rumond? No. A Diamuby!


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    I tied that section of the diamond to a pulse scan and couldn¡¯t find a single thing that matched it. So far my idea was working. The next part involved making a second one and repeating the scan. If the scan picked up the other diamuby, I was in business. A few moments later, I was the proud owner of a unique tracking device! I experimented for a little while longer, until I not only had a functional tracker, but an incredibly beautiful one. Merging in tiny amounts of ruby into various points all over the inside of the diamond created an eye-catching sparkle effect that was unreal. I had no doubt that besides a tracking device, I now had a new revenue stream to exploit in exclusive gemstones.


    Setting aside the diamuby pair, one to integrate into an anklet and the other as the tracker, I returned all the gemstones to their places and shifted back to reality. The process of making the diamuby gave me another idea. While it was unlikely that a kidnapper would throw away a rare gemstone, it was possible that it wouldn¡¯t be recognized as one. It that case, it was unlikely that he¡¯d want to hold onto ¡®costume¡¯ jewelry. Why take the chance? The same way that I¡¯d merged the two gems, I could insert the diamuby inside a person. Perhaps inside one of their bones. Simply remove a bit from the bone and use my surgical techniques to insert the diamuby into the space I created. The pulse would detect the tracker inside the body just as well as it would outside the body. The person being tracked would never even know they had it in them, unless they took x-rays of that bone. That didn¡¯t seem to be very likely.


    With the baby¡¯s bones still growing, the anklet idea was the better choice for now. I was planning on giving it to the baby once it was born and explaining to mom and dad how it worked. Maybe I¡¯d ask them if they wanted trackers as well, in either anklet or bone form.


    I felt like I¡¯d accomplished a lot towards my goal, but I wasn¡¯t quite done yet. I still had to figure out a way to quickly scan in all seven layers and sublayers of reality. I could scan them each, one at a time. It would be effective, but inefficient. Thinking of my R1 backpack, I tired to come up with a way to have the diamuby exist in all the layers and sublayers. That way, I¡¯d find it no matter what layer I scanned.


    I pictured a set of nested diamubies, like those Russian nesting dolls, each in a different layer and connected to an outer diamuby shell using my connecting fields. While I believed that I had the skill to pull of such an intricate design, I rejected the idea when I realized that the fields wouldn¡¯t hold once I was too far away from the tracker, thereby defeating the entire point of it.


    Instead of concentrating on the tracker, I tried to think of a way to have the pulse scan in all the layers at once. No, not at once, but in sequence. What if I could send out a longer pulse; one that shifted from layer to layer, or sublayer? It would be similar to singing a note and then varying the pitch up and down. My current pulse-scan was a fast powerful burst. This multi-scan would take more time and more finesse to accomplish.


    I got to working on the multi-scan right away, taking my pulse burst and adding another layer to it. This was the hardest part and once I finally managed it, adding the rest was easier. Like every aspect of learning how to use my field abilities, this new technique tired me out quickly. I¡¯d found a new ¡®field-control¡¯ muscle that I¡¯d never used before and it needed to be built up.


    In the following weeks after this new discovery, I managed to build up that muscle considerably and send out the multi-pulse out further and faster. It would never have the mind-boggling range of the pulse-scan, but it still went pretty damned far when compared to the mine-scanning that I did. I also learned how to differentiate between the layers and sublayers of the scan so that I¡¯d instantly recognize in which layer the diamuby was in. I did this by making a bunch more of the diamubies and scattering them throughout the layers.

 B3: Chapter 44 - The Baby Arrives! Yay!

    One of the consequences of dad¡¯s worry about mom pregnancy is that I switched out of my planned rotation in plastic surgery and moved right into obstetrics. I spent the weeks before mom¡¯s due date learning just how many things can go wrong with a pregnancy and being impressed by the array of solutions that had been created by the medical community over the years.


    Despite mom¡¯s pregnancy proceeding beautifully, I treated the matter as if that weren¡¯t the case. I spent almost my entire time at the hospital going from delivery room to delivery room and learning how to deal with the myriad of complications that presented before, during and after the birth of a baby. I studied the doctors as they handled cesarean deliveries, twin and triplet deliveries, breach births, and post-partum hemorrhaging. Luckily the majority of the births I watched had few, in any, complications.


    At the end of each delivery day, I made it a point to check on the babies that had been delivered that day, learning how to treat the various issues that sometimes came up, such as jaundice, dehydration and infection.


    Because of mom¡¯s interrupted pregnancy, her official due date was off by a month, so when she went into labor three weeks ¡®early¡¯, the hospital prepared for complications related to delivering a pre-mature baby. Those measures weren¡¯t necessary, and my baby brother was born on November 7<sup>th</sup>, weighing eight pounds, four ounces.


    Although I wasn¡¯t allowed in the delivery room, I kept a close eye on things using my fields and checked for anything that could go wrong. Thankfully, nothing did, and dad came out of the delivery room to show my brother off to us a little while later. The little guy was swaddled snugly in a blanket, except for a foot that managed to escape. He had a mess of dark hair on his head and was super pudgy. It was instinctual to want to squeeze him. Most importantly though, I didn¡¯t detect a field around him at all. I was so glad that all of my worrying had been for nothing.


    There was quite a crowd waiting to see my brother and dad let me hold him while Paul, Maggie, Bubby Brandy and Zaidi Stevens all huddled in to see the new addition to our family. Dad¡¯s parents were traveling, and they¡¯d be here in a few days. Their plan had been to show up a few weeks before mom¡¯s due date and stay in town. They hadn¡¯t counted on an early birth and we couldn¡¯t tell them that we knew it would early without having to tell them more that we wanted to.


    I passed my brother over to Bubby Brandy before she exploded with excitement and went to check on mom. She was just being wheeled back to her room and I congratulated her on having made another beautiful child. She smiled tiredly and I told her about all the fuss being made over my brother. It was so strange to say those words, ¡®my brother¡¯. I¡¯d been an only child all my life and now I wasn¡¯t anymore.


    ¡°Did you and dad finally choose a name for him?¡±


    ¡°Yes, we did. His name is Benjamin.¡±


    ¡°I like it. It¡¯s not as good as the name I chose though. Logan would have been way cooler.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m not naming your brother after Wolverine.¡±


    I sighed, resigned to her decision. ¡°I guess I can tell Eva and James that you named him after the Thing in the fantastic four. His name was Ben Grimm.¡±


    Mom facepalmed. ¡°No Abby, we named him after my grandfather on my father¡¯s side.¡±


    ¡°Oh. I never knew his name. I thought you were naming him after my uncle.¡±


    ¡°Your uncle?¡±


    ¡°You know. The one who makes all that rice.¡±


    ¡°You try my patience girl. Have some pity for your poor mother that just went through eighteen hours of labor.¡±


    ¡°Uhm, you gave birth less than two hours after your water broke. I watched the birth. Ben practically slid out on your first push. I¡¯ve literally watched over a hundred births in the past month and yours was in the top five for easiest ones.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s not how this works, Abby. As a mother, it is my job to tell my children about all the hardships that I had to endure during pregnancy and delivery and then use those stories to guilt you into behaving properly and respectfully for the rest of your lives. Sometimes, the story needs to grow a bit in the telling. Eighteen hours of pain and suffering seems about right.¡±


    ¡°Ahh. I see. Lying to get what you want. It¡¯s a time-honored tradition.¡±


    ¡°I didn¡¯t expect you to understand. You¡¯re only five years old. Regardless, I expect you to be a good big sister to Ben and not present him with your flawed version of the events surrounding his birth.¡±


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    Mom was saved from my blistering retort to her claim that I¡¯m only five by dad¡¯s entrance into the room with Ben in tow. Dad rolled the mobile stainless-steel bassinet next to mom and gently scooped Ben up and into mom¡¯s arms. Mom looked down at him and gave a contented smile.


    While mom and dad stared at their newest child, I shifted my R1 backpack to reality and fished a small rectangular box out. Since mom¡¯s hands were full of baby, I handed it to dad.


    ¡°I made Ben a gift.¡±


    Dad raised his eyebrows quizzically.


    ¡°Fine, it also for you guys. Go on. Open it.¡±


    Dad did as instructed and took out the anklet that I¡¯d had made. I could have done the work myself, given enough time, but it wouldn¡¯t have been as nice and I¡¯d have had to give up days of studying to do it. Dad held it up to the light and showed mom. When the gemstone caught the light, her breath caught.


    ¡°It¡¯s beautiful, Abby. What kind of stone is that?¡± She asked.


    ¡°It¡¯s a combination of diamond and ruby. I call it a diamuby. I fused the ruby into the diamond at the cellular level. This doesn¡¯t normally exist in nature. I had a friend attach it to an a gold chain to make an anklet for Ben.¡±


    ¡°You¡¯re mother¡¯s right. It is beautiful. How is it a gift for us as well?¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s a gemstone and a tracking device. As long as he¡¯s wearing it, I should be able to find him. Because I¡¯m the only other person with diamubies, I can pulse-scan for it and his anklet will be the only thing that turns up. If he¡¯s out of my range, it¡¯ll take me longer, but eventually I¡¯ll be able to find him.¡±


    Mom eyes got all shiny as she took the anklet and fastened it to Ben. Dad brought me in for a hug and thanked me for the thoughtful gift.


    ¡°When he¡¯s older and his bones are better formed, I can put the diamuby inside one of his bones if you want. That way it can¡¯t be taken from him. It doesn¡¯t need a power source, so it can stay safely inside the bone forever. I can also do the same thing for you guys, if you want. I promise to only pulse-scan for you guys if I think you¡¯re in trouble.¡±


    Dad was the first to answer, ¡°I like the peace of mind that you¡¯re offering Abby and your mom and I will discuss it.¡±


    ¡°You¡¯re just worried about the whole loss of liberty thing? Big Abby is watching?¡±


    ¡°Not at all. If you were the government, yes, that would be my worry. I¡¯m just not sure that it¡¯s necessary.¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s your choice, dad. I would never force it on anyone. I do want you to consider something though. The foundation and it¡¯s work with the FBI and the police to combat human trafficking might end up angering some people. Right now they¡¯re reeling from how the FBI is taking them down. Once the heat is off them though, they¡¯ll start asking questions about how they were found out. If they ever get wind of Roger¡¯s involvement, then they¡¯ll try to get to him. When they can¡¯t find him, I¡¯m the next one they¡¯ll come looking for. I haven¡¯t managed to keep a low profile. They¡¯ll try to use me as leverage to get to Roger and they may try to use you guys as leverage against me. This scenario is probably just me being paranoid, but it is a possibility and I¡¯d rather be over-prepared than under.¡±


    ¡°Perhaps there is a need for these diamubies of yours. Let me think on it, Abby.¡±


    I stayed with mom and dad for a few hours, as a constant stream of friends and relatives came by to visit with mom and Ben. Pierce and Mary stopped by, as did Shauna and a bunch of mom¡¯s co-workers from Hannah¡¯s Home. Dad took a few pictures of me holding Ben and I sent them off to Eva and James. Eva couldn¡¯t wait for the Christmas break so she could come and squish his pudgy cheeks. When mom grew tired, I asked dad to text me when she woke up and I took the opportunity to continue my studies. I was already on the right floor and had only to shift to R1 to get ready. This was my best commute ever!


    That evening Harry came by to see the new baby, along with Mark and Jake. Mark looked good holding a baby and I mentioned it.


    ¡°I had a lot of practice holding Rose. She was a very fussy baby, but she always calmed down when I held her. I was mom¡¯s favorite person for a few years.¡±


    ¡°I might have to take up crying.¡± I mused.


    Everyone except dad laughed. He did his best to be the stereotypical ¡®Get your hands off my daughter¡¯ dad, but we all knew that it was just an act. He enjoyed playing the part and Mark enjoyed playing the part of the terrified boyfriend, even managing an audible gulp when dad gave him a stern look.


    When they were ready to leave, Mark invited me to join them for dinner and I kissed mom, dad and little Ben goodnight. In honor of my having a brother, Harry and Jake conceded to going to the Olive Garden for dinner. I¡¯d heard that baby brothers could be a pain, but so far he was turning out to be a good thing.


    Harry spent much of the meal admiring my never-ending bowls of ravioli as he picked at his salad with the dressing on the side. He didn¡¯t like his new diet, but he was sticking to it admirably. Meanwhile, Mark had made sure to put Jake as a buffer between us, in case his mouth ran away from him again and I had to throw a bread stick at him or pour some chicken and gnocchi soup down the back of his shirt.


    ¡°Don¡¯t think that I¡¯ve forgotten or forgiven what you did to me at the award ceremony, Jake.¡± I reminded him.


    ¡°I only gave as good as I got, Abby. You kept things from me and I returned the favor.¡±


    ¡°It doesn¡¯t work that way for Abby, Grandpa. She has that over-developed sense of vengeance. Why do you think I¡¯m sitting so far away from her? You¡¯d better watch out or you¡¯ll be covered in chocolate pudding before the meal is done.¡±


    Jake shook his head. ¡°Won¡¯t happen. I checked and they don¡¯t serve that here.¡± He grinned at me and his eyes twinkled mischievously.


    ¡°Plenty of other things here that can be made to fly, tough guy. Also, for the record, I didn¡¯t tell you about something good. You didn¡¯t tell me about something bad. There¡¯s a big difference.¡±


    ¡°Seems to me that getting a Superior Honor Award, is a pretty good thing. Especially since it¡¯s rarely given to someone who doesn¡¯t work for the state department.¡±


    ¡°You know damned well that I wouldn¡¯t have gone to that award ceremony if I¡¯d known about that award.¡±


    ¡°Well, it¡¯s all in the past now. Besides, a lot of good came out of that night. Ethan and Rebeccah have patched things up and they both send their thanks again. Also, I¡¯ve was able to make some inquiries about what we talked about and I think I have your first customer. You said that you wouldn¡¯t be ready until the new year, unless it was an urgent matter. This is urgent and he didn¡¯t even blink at the price.¡±

 B3: Chapter 45 - First Customer

    ¡°Who is he and what¡¯s he got?¡± I had just finished dessert and was deciding if I wanted more. No. I was good.


    ¡°Jim Barnes and it¡¯s not for him. His daughter, Jennifer, is the one that needs your help. She¡¯s thirty-two. A few years ago she got breast cancer and managed to catch it early enough that she was able to fight it off with surgery and chemotherapy. She was all set to get married in six months when it came back. This time, she wasn¡¯t so lucky. It spread around her body so fast that surgery wasn¡¯t a viable option anymore. She¡¯s not responding well to the chemotherapy this time and the other drugs that she¡¯s tried don¡¯t seem to be slowing the cancer growth sufficiently. Last week she put a stop to more treatments. As much as she can, she wants to enjoy the remaining time she has left.¡±


    ¡°How long did the doctors give her?¡±


    ¡°A month, maybe two. That was last week.¡±


    ¡°How did you find out about all this?¡±


    ¡°Jim and I have crossed paths a few times over the years at conventions and we have some mutual friends. He¡¯s mostly in oil out in Texas. He¡¯s getting on in years and was planning to hand off the company to Jennifer over the next several years. Same as I¡¯m doing with Mark. Jennifer is his only heir apparent and with her time coming up, Jim was looking to see if anyone was interested in making an offer on his company. He knows that oil isn¡¯t my expertise, but he called anyways in the hope that I¡¯d know someone who is. We got to talking and I told him that I might have a better option for Jennifer.¡±


    ¡°What did you tell him exactly?¡± I really hoped that Jake didn¡¯t oversell me. I preferred to under promise and over deliver.


    ¡°Just that I knew someone with an experimental drug and that based on what I knew of it there was a chance it could help. I explained that there was no charge if it didn¡¯t work, but if it did, then you were charging twenty million dollars. All he asked me is when could he bring her over. I told him Monday morning at nine would be fine. I took the liberty of giving him the address to Hannah¡¯s Home.¡±


    Mark and Harry¡¯s eyes had bugged out when they¡¯d heard the price that Jake had quoted. Harry said, ¡°Are you really charging that much, Abby?¡±


    ¡°For those that can afford it, yes. Most of that will go as a donation to the Hannah Foundation. The rest is a consultation fee to me, personally. My VR company is growing quickly and I need more funding. Also, I¡¯m committing to cure nineteen other people for free for that price. I¡¯m hoping to get at least five paying clients a year.¡±


    ¡°What are you going to do with a hundred million dollars?¡± This time Mark was asking.


    ¡°You¡¯ll see soon enough. Jake, can I borrow those high-priced lawyers of yours again to come up with a contract? I¡¯ll need a trustworthy third party to hold the funds and release them according to predetermined verifiable lab results. I also need a non-disclosure agreement that has to be signed by all members of the patient¡¯s family.¡±


    ¡°Of course, Abby. I¡¯ll set it all up. Why do you need the non-disclosure?¡±


    ¡°When someone as sick as Jennifer gets cured with an experimental treatment, you¡¯re bound to get several types of reactions, none of which I want to deal with. Their doctors will want to know all the details and try to replicate the results. Some will call me a charlatan and others will demand that I treat more of their dying patients. Meanwhile, when Jennifer gets better, her support group will want to know all about her experience and they¡¯ll want the same cure. Either way, I get way more attention than I want.¡±


    Harry had a pained expression on his face. ¡°Don¡¯t you want to save their lives, if you can? You sound like those desperate people are a burden that you don¡¯t want be bothered with.¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s a question of resources, Harry. In terms of the treatment, it¡¯s not easy to make and it¡¯s based on some extremely rare and hard to grow plants and fungi. Each cure uses a good amount of product, so only between a hundred and two hundred treatments can be produced a year. I¡¯m working on expanding the production, but there¡¯s only so much I can do. The more people that know about this treatment, the more time I¡¯ll need to spend turning them down. I¡¯m not hardhearted, Harry. Telling parents of dying children that I can¡¯t help them is not my favorite thing to do. This would be a problem even if I could make more. If I spent all day, every day, giving these treatments, I¡¯d still need a full-time secretary to turn people down.


    There¡¯s another aspect to this as well. My time is a constrained resource. I¡¯m growing the foundation, committing to treating over a hundred people every year, and studying to be a doctor. Am I required to live my life entirely for others or am I allowed to live my life as well?


    Your university makes the same resource calculation every year. You decide how many scholarships you can give out and still maintain your budgets, student to teacher ratios, and dorm room spacing. Jake does it too. He doesn¡¯t give away all his profits for the year to charity. He contributes to great organizations, but he has to set aside money for expansion, exploration, research, and for personal use.¡±


    Harry put his hands up. ¡°I surrender. I surrender. You¡¯re right. I withdraw the question. As someone who is here because of your treatments, I can assure you that I didn¡¯t mean to give offense.¡±


    Harry put out his hand and as I shook it, he pulled me in for a hug. I felt bad for his students. They never got to see this playful side of their dean. All they got to see was his stern, unyielding facade.


    I turned back to Jake and asked, ¡°Will you stay on as a middleman for this or would you like me to call them and go through the arrangements?¡±


    ¡°I¡¯d like to stay involved on this one. That way I can provide better information to the next patients I find. I also left out the part where their ¡®healer¡¯ is an eighteen-year-old, so it¡¯ll be better if I¡¯m around.¡±


    ¡°Good points. In that case, please let them know that I¡¯ll have one of the cabins readied for them. The treatment course is seven days. I¡¯ll spend a half hour with Jennifer every morning, alone, and then she¡¯s free the rest of the day. The cabin sleep four people, so she can bring a few people to keep her company. She¡¯ll have to stay on the property for the week and no food from anywhere else. That way I won¡¯t have to worry about her eating anything that¡¯s contraindicated for the treatment. I¡¯ll also need to know if she has any allergies. Regarding my age and lack of credentials, I¡¯m assuming that you¡¯ll be there to greet them with me?¡±


    ¡°Yes, I¡¯ll be there to add some grey hair to this endeavor. I¡¯ll pass all that information and get the lawyers to make sure everything is ready, including making sure that the money is deposited in their account before treatment begins.¡±


    ¡°Thank you, Jake. Oh! I almost forgot. They need to sign a paper acknowledging that they¡¯ve been informed that I am not a doctor and that I¡¯m an unlicensed practitioner of alternative medicine and healing. I don¡¯t want to be accused of misrepresenting myself as a doctor.¡±


    Mark dropped me back at the hospital after dinner and I peeked in on mom, dad and Ben before I went back home for the night. Mom and Ben were already asleep and dad was keeping vigil over them. I gave him a hug and a kiss and told him I¡¯d stop by tomorrow morning.


    On the way home, I called Shauna with a list of things we¡¯d need to get ready for Jennifer¡¯s arrival.


    The next four days were busy ones, with my studies, playing with Ben, training for my red belt, running VR simulation programming and setting up an ¡®healing room¡¯ in one of the conference room adjacent to the banquet hall. Thankfully, Monday soon arrived and the hard part was over. Now I just had the simple task of curing a woman of cancer that had metastasized all over her body. Ha!


    Jake met me at the administration building of Hannah¡¯s Home fifteen minutes before the Barnes family arrived. He told me that all the documents had been signed, the money transferred, and that everything was set.


    ¡°The only hiccup is the fianc¨¦. Jim tells me that he¡¯s been dead set against this whole thing and thinks it¡¯s all a scam. You can count on him to be a pain in the ass.¡±


    ¡°So noted. I¡¯ll try to be patient with him, but I won¡¯t let him interfere with the treatment. If I have to, I¡¯ll kick him out.¡±


    ¡°I figured as much and warned Jim about it. He understands. He¡¯s also aware that backing out once the first treatment is given forfeits the entire sum. Jim says the fianc¨¦, Michael, had been a rock throughout all this for Jennifer. He¡¯s been by her side and has kept her smiling no matter how bad things got. Michael and Jennifer had just gotten to the point of accepting her fate when this new hope presented itself. Michael feels that the devastation of this further failure will break her and they¡¯ll lose their last month together.¡±


    I was saved from having to reassure Jake again that I¡¯d be extra patient with Michael by the arrival of Jim and his family. They parked in one of the visitors parking spots and Jake, Shauna and I went over to greet them. To say that Shauna had been surprised that I was claiming that I could successfully treat terminally ill cancer patients would be a slight understatement. Despite her military conditioning to follow orders from her superior officers, she wasn¡¯t shy about letting me know how skeptical she was of my claims and she took a few minutes to make sure that I was aware of how irresponsible it was of me to get people¡¯s hopes up the way I was doing. Even using my trump card and reminding her that I¡¯d kept my promise of freeing her brother didn¡¯t help. She simply replied that while Roger was immensely skilled, he couldn¡¯t cure cancer. I admitted that Roger wouldn¡¯t be involved in this and I asked her to simply trust me and what she knew about my integrity. That finally managed to get through to her, but I could tell that I was skating on very thin ice with her. If I didn¡¯t manage to help Jennifer, there was a good chance that Shauna wouldn¡¯t continue working for me.


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    Upon exiting their car, Jim and his wife Amanda formed a grouping, while Jennifer and Michael formed another. Jennifer had the air of fragility that I¡¯d encountered so often with the children in the hospital¡¯s cancer ward. She was wearing a winter jacket, yet her recent loss of weight was obvious from her drawn face.


    When Jake introduced me as Jennifer¡¯s healer, I could tell that I was going to have a problem with Michael. His eyes flashed from mild resignation at having to be here to anger. My plan had been to be pleasant and win him over with results. That wasn¡¯t going to work anymore.


    ¡°Before we go to your cabin and get your belonging secured, I need you to be aware that the treatment hasn¡¯t started yet. You can still back out. Any contracts signed can be cancelled and all the monies deposited returned. I¡¯m not making this offer because I doubt the treatment. I believe that it is Jennifer¡¯s best chance for survival. However, once we start, you¡¯ll be here for a week and I don¡¯t want to have anyone trying to undermine the process and criticizing or questioning every aspect of the treatment.¡±


    Michael took the bait. ¡°Are you setting things up so that you can blame our lack of belief as an excuse for your treatment¡¯s failure?¡±


    ¡°Not at all, Michael. The treatment doesn¡¯t require your belief. It will either work or it won¡¯t. I¡¯m just not interested in dealing with you and your attitude towards the treatment. I can understand that you¡¯re skeptical about it. Shauna here feels the same way. I don¡¯t have a problem with that. What I can¡¯t understand is what you think I have to gain if this is a scam? The signed documents are very clear that if Jennifer isn¡¯t cancer free at the end of this treatment, I don¡¯t get any of the payment. The determination of the status of her cancer will be done by a third-party that Jim has chosen. There is no way for me to fake the results. So, what is Jennifer¡¯s downside to being here, much less yours? I¡¯ll be housing you in a nice cabin and providing your meals for the next week. There¡¯s an onsite medical clinic that can help with Jennifer¡¯s care and Jennifer will be surrounded by you and her parents all day. None of you are losing any time with her besides the half hour I¡¯ll spend with her every morning. Except for the weather being much colder than you¡¯re used to, please tell me why you have a problem with Jennifer giving this treatment a try.¡±


    Michael seemed at a loss. He¡¯d grudgingly agreed to come and he hadn¡¯t expected to be called out on his attitude, especially not within minutes of arriving. A fast attack is better than slow grinding battle. I waited for Michael to reply and before he could, Jennifer took his hand in hers and said, ¡°She¡¯s right, Mike. Try to think of this as a family vacation. Dad¡¯s put all his business on hold for the week and you¡¯re on-leave from teaching. Regardless of what happens, we¡¯ll have quality time together. The only thing that¡¯s changed is our surroundings. Aren¡¯t you the one that always reminds your students that the only difference between a good day and a bad day is your attitude towards it?¡±


    Michael closed his eyes and let out a breath. Then another. I could see his shoulder muscles relax and his entire demeanor changed. ¡°You¡¯re right, Jennifer, but what if this crazy treatment makes you worse. What if I lose you even faster?¡±


    ¡°Mike, as much as I¡¯d like to stay around, a faster end to the pain would be welcome at this point.¡±


    ¡°Jennifer isn¡¯t the first person that I¡¯ve treated and I¡¯ve seen no negative side effects so far. There is nothing toxic to the body in my formulation. It only attacks cancerous cells. If you don¡¯t have cancer, it won¡¯t do anything to you. I¡¯d taken it myself, just to be sure.¡±


    This last bit was news to Shauna and her expression said that we¡¯d be having words about it later on. In the meantime, Michael agreed to have a better attitude about the whole thing and we got their bags stowed away in their cabin before going off to Clara¡¯s clinic for a scan. Technically, I didn¡¯t need a scan as I¡¯d already scanned her and found all the cancer in her body. However, I felt that a detailed scan that could be matched to the previous imaging done on Jennifer would help reassure the family that we were capable of doing some science here.


    When we reached the clinic, I had the family wait in the waiting room until I could start the machine and get it warmed up. This was just a delaying tactic so that I could enter in all her cancers into the system. I¡¯d never had so many cancer spots to locate for just a single person and it took me a few minutes. Once I finished, I got Jennifer, completed her fake scan in a few minutes and printed out the results. They were impressed at how fast the whole process was and were a little shocked that I¡¯d found four cancer clusters that the hospital had missed entirely. Not that it really made any difference, since the other nine areas were more than enough to kill Jennifer.


    As I¡¯d been hoping, the scan did help ease their minds about me a little. Not only had the scan been quick and painless, I¡¯d also found all the cancers without having had access beforehand to Jennifer¡¯s medical file. I was no longer a ¡®quack¡¯ in their minds.


    That¡¯s when I decided to blow all that credibility out the window and give Jennifer a McDonald¡¯s vanilla milk shake to drink.


    ¡°I prefer the chocolate ones.¡± Jennifer said as I handed her the beverage.


    ¡°Yeah, but the chocolate is contra-indicated with the formulation. Besides, it¡¯s too late. The medicine is already mixed in. Go on, drink up.¡±


    Jennifer drank up as we exited the clinic and made our way to the other side of the building where I¡¯d set up the meditation room. At the front door to that wing, I asked Shauna to escort everyone other than Jennifer back to the cabin and told them we¡¯d join them afterwards for a tour of the property.


    The meditation room had, until very recently, been a small conference room. I¡¯d had Shauna remove the table and chairs and put quarter inch foam matting on the floor, going from wall to wall. All the windows had been covered over with a special type of film that allowed us to see out, yet blocking anyone from seeing in. The room was equipped with a very comfortable couch along one wall, two very large beanbag chairs along the window and dozens of pillows scattered all over the floor. The point was for the patient to get comfortable and I didn¡¯t care how they chose to do that. Jennifer walked over to the couch and sat down slowly. I offered her a blanket and pulled over one of the beanbag chairs for myself.


    ¡°What happens now?¡± She asked.


    ¡°Once you finish that milkshake, we close our eyes and meditate. I¡¯ll be honest with you and tell you that I suck at meditation. I usually go over all the things I have to get done. The mediation isn¡¯t really the point. The medicine can mess with your balance and your sense of time for the first half hour and I thought it would be better to have a nice place to relax where you won¡¯t fall down or get disoriented.¡±


    ¡°How can your sense of time get¡­¡± The sound of Jennifer¡¯s voice stopped as I shifted her, and the couch she was on, to L2 and got to work. I had a lot of cancer to take care of. In the half hour that I had allotted for today, I was able to shift seven of the thirteen cancer clusters out of her body and get rid of all the loose cancer cells in the nearby tissue. The other six clusters I left in place for tomorrow, merely clipping off their access to sustenance from the body. The seven clusters that I¡¯d removed were all sufficiently internal to the body so that there was no ¡®lump¡¯ that Jennifer could notice. Having a lump disappear within a half hour of taking the first dose of medication would be too suspicious. Twenty-four to forty-eight hours would be better. Ideally, a week would be best, only I didn¡¯t have that much time. Hopefully their joy and wonder at Jennifer¡¯s recovery would cloud any suspicions that what had been achieved was highly unlikely.


    ¡°¡­missed up?¡± Jennifer finished her question as I brought her back to reality. She looked confused as from her perspective, I¡¯d moved across the room in an eyeblink. I was no longer sitting comfortably in the beanbag chair, but was instead leaning against the wall, near the door.


    ¡°Are you ready to head back to the cabin and get that tour of Hannah¡¯s Home?¡± I asked guilelessly.


    A very confused Jennifer answered, ¡°We just sat down. How did you get over there?¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s what I meant by the medication messing with your sense of time. We¡¯ve been here for half an hour. It¡¯s time to head back.¡±


    I helped Jennifer up and we returned to the cabin.


    ¡°How do you feel?¡± Michael asked when we got back.


    ¡°Weird. Really weird. How long were we gone for?¡±


    ¡°Half an hour or so. Why?¡±


    ¡°It only seemed like a minute or two to me. I¡¯m ok now though, just a bit disoriented.¡±


    ¡°Do you want to take a nap and we can do the tour later?¡± Shauna asked.


    ¡°No. I¡¯m good. I have a bit of energy now. I won¡¯t later.¡±


    On Wednesday morning, our third day of treatment, I removed the last cluster of cancer cells from her body. She still had some cancer cells in her body though and over the next four sessions I¡¯d be hunting them down and getting rid of them. When I was done, the cancer would have a tougher time coming back. I¡¯d also instruct her to come see me for a scan every year, just to be safe.


    When I came back from the hospital later on that day, Shauna caught up with me on the way to VR Health Services.


    ¡°I¡¯m sorry for doubting you, Abby.¡±


    ¡°Huh?¡±


    ¡°About Jennifer and the cancer treatment. I¡¯m sorry I gave you such a rough time. I should have trusted you and what I know of you.¡±


    ¡°No, you shouldn¡¯t have. You were right to be skeptical and I¡¯m glad that you feel that you can challenge me when you think I¡¯m doing something wrong. I¡¯m much rather have that than blind obedience. Please don¡¯t hesitate to let me know when you think I¡¯m making a mistake. Uhm¡­what brought about this change of heart all of a sudden?¡±


    ¡°Jennifer did. She says that her breast cancer is gone. She can¡¯t feel the lumps there anymore. She also says that she¡¯s feeling a lot better, has more energy and that her pain is gone. Michael was in tears when they came to tell me about it. Jim and Amanda hugged me as if I had something to do with any of it. Is her cancer really gone?¡±


    ¡°Most of it is. She probably has some cancer cells still roaming around, but the next four days of treatment should take care of them.¡±


    ¡°Wow! Abby, if you can do that, why are you bothering with the VR stuff? It¡¯s cool, but hardly on the same level as curing cancer.¡±


    ¡°I can only produce enough treatments for around a hundred patients a year. That¡¯s only one hour a day of my time. Also, the VR stuff has more benefit than you realize. Do you know how many people die each year from medical errors? If the VR system can reduce that by only a few percent, I can help save more lives that I can treat with my cancer treatment. The cancer treatment is flashier because it produces so much benefit to a few people. The VR system can provide a little help to hundreds of thousands of people. The VR system isn¡¯t as sexy because it¡¯s impossible to measure its results. You can¡¯t measure negative outcomes that never occurred.¡±


    On Sunday afternoon, Jennifer underwent testing and imaging at one of the top hospitals in Charlotte and by Tuesday afternoon, Jake called to notify me that the money had been successfully transferred over to me and to the foundation. Since Jim had delivered on the payment, I was now committed to taking on nineteen more patients and I entrusted Shauna and Sister Clara to find those candidates for me from all over the country. I was already causing a minor stir at the hospital, since none of their pediatric cancer patients had died in the past six months. I didn¡¯t want to compound that by having nine-teen ¡®miracle¡¯ cures happen in the Charlotte area alone.

 B3: Chapter 46 - Medical Clinic

    ¡°Howie, what does the off-grid community do for medical care?¡± I caught Howie in his office as I was on my way to get an update from Jordan and Scott.


    ¡°Well, it depends, I guess. Most of the minor stuff they take care of themselves. Home remedies and vitamins. Stuff like that. They¡¯re very self-sufficient. The bigger stuff, like broken bones, they end up going free clinics or to the hospital.¡±


    ¡°There¡¯s no retired doctor that makes house calls or sees patients out of a small office?¡±


    ¡°Some communities have a doctor like that. He¡¯ll barter for things instead of charging for his time. Why are you asking?¡±


    ¡°I¡¯ve been studying to become a doctor and I¡¯ve practiced on corpses and VR. I need to work on real people. I figured that for those that didn¡¯t have access to health insurance, I might be an additional option.¡±


    ¡°Are you thinking of just offering your services as a country doctor or are we talking about surgery as well?¡±


    ¡°Both, though I¡¯d need to outfit a room with some equipment and stock some supplies.¡±


    ¡°Are you willing to be one of those ¡®no questions asked¡¯ doctors? Someone who will take in a stab wound or a gunshot wound and not report it to the police?¡±


    ¡°No, Howie. I¡¯m not going to become some mob or gang doctor, putting men back together so they can go kill other men or terrorize businesses and threaten families.¡±


    ¡°I understand. It¡¯s too bad, though. It pays well.¡±


    ¡°I don¡¯t need the money. I just want to help some people and practice my skills.¡±


    ¡°Ok. I¡¯ll see what I can do, but I¡¯m not letting you run a free clinic. You do that and you¡¯ll be up to your eyeballs in patients. Jordan will run the clinic for you and she¡¯ll set up a barter system. I¡¯ll set you up in the back of one of my warehouses. Do I have your ok to have Jordan buy some equipment from the funds that she¡¯s collected for you?¡±


    ¡°Sure, but I want to approve the list of purchases first. Actually, I¡¯ll get a list and send it her. If you¡¯re setting up the clinic, I¡¯ll need a reception and waiting room, a scanning room, an exam room and a surgical suite. I suppose I¡¯ll need another scanning machine like the one I have at Clara¡¯s.¡±


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    ¡°How long do I have to get this all set up?¡±


    ¡°Three months. I still need to finish my gynecology rotation, followed by family medicine and pediatrics. That should give me a strong enough base to start working from.


    ¡°How much time will you be devoting to this, Abby?¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m free Sunday nights from six to midnight. If there are enough customers, I¡¯ll add in a morning and an afternoon sometime during the week.¡±


    ¡°You¡¯ll have enough customers once word gets out. You should consider changing up the Sunday night for Friday night. From my experience, most people tend to get sick on Friday afternoons, just as the doctors take off for the weekend.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s a very good point. Ok, Friday night it is. Before I go see your kids for my update, any luck on finding that helicopter that I¡¯d asked you about.¡±


    ¡°I have a line on a few different models. Did you get your pilot¡¯s license yet?¡±


    ¡°No. I¡¯m thinking of starting courses in the new year. Gerry printed off all the course material for me. I haven¡¯t had time to get to it yet. Any chance that one of the models you¡¯re looking at is a Hughes 500D?¡±


    ¡°Hold on, let me check. Uhmm¡­no. What¡¯s so special about that one?¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s the one TC flew in Magnum P.I.¡±


    Howie facepalmed and kicked me out of his office. Laughing, I headed to the back of the warehouse to speak with Jordan and Scott. She handed me a breakdown of my off-the-books empire and I gave her the specs for a metallic ink printer that she should use for all future printed reports. Once we¡¯d gone through the figures, it was Scott¡¯s turn and he presented ten new companies that were looking for funding. I agreed with him on his three recommendations and chose one more besides. It was a woman who wanted to build a large greenhouse on her property to grow all sorts of medicinal plants used in home remedies. Her grandmother had trained her and passed down all the old family recipes to her and now that her kids were grown, she finally had the time to put that knowledge to use. I agreed to fund her for a percentage of the company and private lessons. I also suggested to Scott that once she gets up and running, he should put her in touch with the prepper warehouse people that I¡¯d invested in. I was sure that they¡¯d be interested in working with her.


    Before I left, I talked to Jordan about the clinic that Howie was going to set up for me and she was very excited about it.


    ¡°I¡¯m pretty sure that your first few days are going to be packed. You¡¯re going to have a lot of teenage girls coming to see you.¡±


    ¡°Why would that be?¡±


    ¡°First, you¡¯re a woman. Most doctors who make themselves available for the community are men. They¡¯ll feel much more comfortable talking to you about their issues. Second, you¡¯re not part of their community. You don¡¯t know their parents and you didn¡¯t watch them grow up. You won¡¯t judge them or tell them how their behavior will bring shame to their parents. Third, when it comes to women¡¯s issues, the home remedy mentality sucks. Finally, since you¡¯re not a licensed doctor, you won¡¯t be required to tell their parents anything.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m ok with the first three reasons you listed. The last isn¡¯t correct. Any abuse that I find out about will get reported to the police. Any behaviors that endanger someone¡¯s life, will get reported. Also, I will not be running an abortion clinic here.¡±


    ¡°Well, that¡¯ll put a bit of a damper on the excitement, but you¡¯ll still be well received.¡±


    ¡°I forgot to ask your father if he has a source for medication and prescriptions. Off-grid ways are still new to me.¡±


    ¡°He probably does. I¡¯ll ask him and let you know. Before you leave, don¡¯t forget to grab those boxes over there. Gerry sent you more books and there are two boxes of whiskey from your distillery as well. Dale says to save one as a collector¡¯s item and have fun with the other one.


    ¡°I¡¯m not old enough to legally drink alcohol yet. I do know a few old timers that are, though. I¡¯ll get them to try it out and see how they like it.¡± I was picturing Jake, Harry and Thomas sitting around a fireplace, talking about old times and how rough they had it growing up poor.

 B3: Chapter 47 - A Visit with Friends

    I missed Eva and James. I facetimed them every few days, but that wasn¡¯t the same as spending time with them. They¡¯d both been back to town for a few days during their fall semester break in October and they weren¡¯t coming back until the Christmas break. I couldn¡¯t wait that long, so when I judged that I was finished my gynecology rotation, I decided to take a break and go visit them at UNC Chapel Hill before I started my next rotation. Besides, visiting them would give me an excuse to take care of a few loose ends in nearby Raleigh that I¡¯d been putting off for too long.


    The last time I¡¯d done this drive, I¡¯d been heading out to investigate the Pearl Dragon Corporation. I¡¯d packed the truck with all sorts of gear that I thought I¡¯d need. This time, I packed it full again, albeit with mostly different gear. My four medical backpacks went in first, followed by my VR rig and a spare rig, a duffel with my clothes, a bag of cash, all the boxes of books that Gerry had sent me and that I hadn¡¯t gotten to yet, and a few bags of Howie¡¯s computer gear. At the last second, I threw in my Roger outfit and exosuit, even though I had no plans on needing them. There didn¡¯t seem to be any harm in stuffing them in and I figured that it was better to be safe than sorry.


    In some ways, it was easier than it used to be to just take off for a week. I didn¡¯t have to lie to dad about where I was going and I didn¡¯t have to pretend to be sick so that school wouldn¡¯t call looking for me. I also didn¡¯t have to convince Eva to cover for me. To counterbalance this new freedom, I had to arrange my absence with Shauna and Jenny. Jenny didn¡¯t mind because I was bringing my rig with me and could work on the simulated surgeries remotely. Shauna was ok with it too, as long as I stopped by and signed some purchase orders and a stack of checks that needed to go out.


    Between letting mom and dad know where I was going, squishing Ben goodbye, and stopping by at Hannah¡¯s Home to finish my paperwork for Shauna, I only managed to leave town at ten in the morning. By noon, I pulled up in front of Eva¡¯s UNC dorm building and left the car in L2. Eva had facetimed me many times while she¡¯s wandered around the dorms, so I knew my way around enough to manage to find her room. She wasn¡¯t there and I decided to wait for in her room. Yes, the door was locked, but in R2 it didn¡¯t exist.


    I didn¡¯t think it would be a long wait, as I clearly remembered her gloating about how she had no classes on Friday afternoon. Sure enough, she came in with James fifteen minutes later. They were too preoccupied with trying to swallow each other¡¯s tongues to notice me on the couch and my perfectly normal reaction of, ¡°Ewww. Get a room!¡±, sent Eva six inches into the air with a piercing screech.


    Eva sat down on the floor, one hand to her racing heart. ¡°Holy shit, Abby. You scared me half to death. I think I need to go change my panties.¡±


    For his part, James hadn¡¯t jumped nearly as high and he had barely screeched at all. He tried to sound like I hadn¡¯t surprised him too much, but my field showed me that his heart was racing faster than Eva¡¯s. ¡°Hey Abby.¡± He tried really hard to be circumspect as he fixed his shirt and refastened the top button of his jeans. ¡°It¡¯s good to see you. How come you didn¡¯t call to let us know you were coming by?¡±


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    ¡°Because I wanted to surprise you. Also, I have a new Instagram channel and I needed some juicy video to post. That entrance was perfect.¡± I motioned to my phone which was propped up on the desk with a view towards the door. I¡¯d placed the phone there mere seconds before I¡¯d announced myself. I hadn¡¯t set it to record, but they didn¡¯t know that. I was hoping to use to the non-existent recording to blackmail them into going to the nearest Olive Garden for dinner tonight.


    James face paled and Eva got up to snatch my phone. I was way faster.


    ¡°Don¡¯t worry! I wasn¡¯t live streaming to my adoring fans. I suppose if you let me take you guys out to the Olive Garden for dinner tonight, you could persuade me to erase my directorial debut video.¡±


    ¡°Or you could erase in now and I forget to ask you how you got into my locked room.¡± Eva was standing with her hands on her hips, superhero style, and glaring down at me.


    ¡°Sure. That works too.¡± I tossed her my phone.


    ¡°Hey! You didn¡¯t record anything.¡± Eva said as she flipped through my pictures.


    ¡°Of course not. You know I don¡¯t have Instagram or any other social media. Also, you should know me better by now. I wouldn¡¯t do that to you.¡±


    Eva sat down on the couch next to me and gave me a hug hello. Then she started tickling me and I had to wrestle her into submission. A throat clearing sound got our attention and we both turned to see James standing on the side with his phone out and filming us, a huge smile on his face.


    ¡°I do have social media and this video is going to get me thousands of new subscribers to my channel.¡±


    I turned to look at Eva and our eyes locked. Three seconds later we¡¯d tackled James and he was getting the tickle torture treatment from the both of us. Unlike me, James is very ticklish and he offered his surrender within seconds. Eva and I ignored him for a bit before we gave in.


    Eva and James took me out to lunch at the local equivalent to Big Julie¡¯s Pizza and showed me around the campus. It almost felt like we were still in high school and going home after doing our research for the stock market competition at the Galt University library. So much had changed over the past two and half years and I wondered what changes the next few years would bring.


    ¡°Where are you staying while you¡¯re here, Abby? It¡¯s not much, but you know you¡¯re welcome to my couch.¡±


    ¡°Thanks, Eva. I don¡¯t want to be a bother to you. You¡¯ve got to study and uhm¡­entertain¡­James. I found a great deal on an Air B&B fifteen minutes north of Raleigh. I¡¯ll be fine there. Besides, you snore.¡±


    Eva was indignant. ¡°I do not! James, tell Abby I don¡¯t snore.¡±


    ¡°I don¡¯t snore.¡± James¡¯ monotone recitation of her exact command did nothing to contradict my statement.


    Eva crossed her arms and pouted. ¡°With an attitude like that, you can bet that I won¡¯t be ¡®entertaining¡¯ you anytime soon.¡±


    A horror-stricken James quickly confirmed that Eva does not in fact snore, nor has she ever snored and that even if you were to hear what you might misinterpret as a snore, you were wrong and in need of a vigorous ear cleaning. He continued along this vein for some time before Eva finally shut him up with a kiss and forgave him.


    ¡°On that note, I¡¯m going to head out to my rental to check it out and drop off my things. I¡¯ll swing by and pick you guys up for dinner around seven tonight. You kids have fun.¡±

 B3: Chapter 48 - Edgars House

    Edgar¡¯s house sat on three acres of forested land and his closest neighbor was on the other side of the street, two hundred yards away. He¡¯d carved out a large semi-circle driveway in front of the house and as I drove along it, I got a good look at the house that Edgar had secretly invested his time and money into. The house was stunning. It was a modern style house with huge floor to ceiling windows, three levels high, with an expansive covered front porch, multiple balconies and what looked like a rooftop terrace.


    I left the car in L2 and walked up to the front porch. From there I sent my field out and scanned the house. There were sixteen cameras, hidden and otherwise, monitoring the house and they all connected to a concealed room on the third floor, just off the master bedroom. This room had been labelled as a ¡®panic-room¡¯ on the architects¡¯ drawings of the house and I decided to check it out first. I didn¡¯t want to have to stay in hiding for the entire week.


    Upstairs, I managed to shut down the camera system. Luckily, it didn¡¯t seem to be connected to an alarm company. The alarm system was another matter, but I had the alarm code, as well as the door code, from Edgar''s¡¯ files and they shut down the system on the first try. Within fifteen minutes of arriving at the house, I was back in reality and had unloaded my things into one of the guest rooms in the back of the house on the main level. Although, the view from the master bedroom was much nicer, the constant trek up all those stairs didn¡¯t appeal to me. The room was very nice, with its own bathroom and shower and had a door directly onto the back balcony, where the afternoon sun chased away the chill in the air.


    With plenty of time before having to pick up Eva and James, I took a tour of the house. My scan¡¯s gave me a perfect image of the layout and a good sense of the things in each room, but some things needed to be seen to be appreciated. For instance, the field could show me that there was a painting on the wall or a book on the table, yet it couldn¡¯t show me what the painting was of or what was in the book. It showed me the object, not the meaning.


    Unlike Edgar¡¯s rented house in Raleigh, this one was well decorated and had several personal touches to it. This wasn¡¯t where Edgar worked. It was where he lived, where he relaxed, when he wasn¡¯t working. Despite that, there were no family photos anywhere, nor anything that would tie this place back to Edgar. I walked from room to room, looking in drawers and cabinets, getting a sense of the place and its owner. However, only three rooms in the house gave a peek inside his head.


    The first was the panic room. The very name of it suggested that Edgar was very worried about his security. It was a very well-hidden room and I didn¡¯t bother figuring out how to open the door. I just shifted through it. The room was larger than ones I¡¯d seen on tv shows and clearly make with Edgar¡¯s comfort in mind. Besides the work desk with the security system camera monitor, there was a couch, a single sized bed, a bathroom, and a tiny kitchenette with a freezer stocked with long-term frozen goods. He¡¯d have been able to hide out here for weeks.


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    In one of the desk drawers, I found some pistols, cash, and his banking and credit card information, along with all the passcodes. I guess he never figured that anyone would find this room. I spent a half hour navigating online and changing all of those passwords, ensuring that Edgar could no longer access anything from his Fred Collins persona. The last I¡¯d heard, Edgar had been sentenced in federal court to so many consecutive life sentences and he wouldn¡¯t even be eligible for parole until well into his senior years. However, that wouldn¡¯t stop him from possibly passing on information about this place to someone else. With that in mind, I was happy to find the manual to the panic room door and I rest the password and biometrics for that as well. From the outside, resetting the passwords would have been almost impossible. Yet from the inside, it was simple. Before leaving the room, I shifted the money, guns and files to L1. You can never be too careful.


    The second room that showed Edgar¡¯s personality was the garage, where I found a Corvette and a Porshe 911, both in red. Edgar had been driving a sleek red Dodge Viper when I¡¯d med him and it now seemed that fast, red cars were his thing. The cars had up to date registration, for a few more months more at least, in Fred Collins name and I shifted them both to L2 until I could decide what to do with them. There was no way I was going to let those cars rot unused and I regretted not finding some way to remove the Viper from Serpentine.


    The last room that gave me some insight into Edgar was his basement. The entire floor was one large room, filled with boxes and file cabinets and artifacts. All of it relating to lost treasures from around the world. The metal tube with the map to Blackbeard¡¯s treasure hadn¡¯t been purchased on a whim. It was part of what I could only describe as an obsession. Ancient maps were tacked up to the walls, alongside modern ones, each decorated liberally with sticky notes and photos. Historical books lined the bookshelf two deep, with the overflow being stacked up beside it. Whereas the rest of house was a fortress of order, this place had the chaos of passion.


    The lost library of Alexandria, the library of Moscow Tsars, Lost Inca Gold, the treasures of the Copper Scrolls, the Thomas Beale Ciphers, the sunk treasure of the San Miguel de Archangel, the Amber Room, the Forrest Fenn Treasure, Mosby¡¯s Treasure, Romanov¡¯s Easter Eggs, Henry Gordier¡¯s Gold, The Shawnee Silver mines of Ohio and Kentucky, and many more. Edgar had notes and guesses on the whereabouts of each one. He drew together clues from wide ranging data points and rumors and there was no way to tell which ones were meaningful and which were meaningless.


    Looking around the basement, I got caught up in all the stories and history of the lost treasures. I never even heard of most of these lost items and their stories. Reading about some of the treasures, I couldn¡¯t help but notice how my field-scanning could be amazingly useful in finding these treasures. Whereas someone else would have to get permits to dig in certain areas or invest in massive amount of equipment for dredging in lakes or oceans, I would just have to run my field over massive areas and know if the treasure was there or not. For instance, the nazis were said to have sunk a lot of gold in Lake Toplitz, Austria. No one had ever been able to find it, but to this day, divers still kill themselves in searching the bottom of the lake. Given that the lake was only two kilometers long, I could do a full field scan of it in less than a minute or do a pulse scan for gold and find out if it¡¯s there in five seconds.


    Moving from area to area in the basement, I lost track of time and almost left too late to pick up Eva and James in time for our reservation. Before I left though, I made sure to shift everything in the basement to L1, thereby erasing the last significant traces of Edgar from the house and from reality.

 B3: Chapter 49 - Espionage

    ¡°I was talking with one of the third-year students and he told me about this Anki flashcard app that¡¯s used by med students. It¡¯s really great for learning human anatomy and physiology. Here¡¯s my phone. You can use it to test me.¡± Eva handed me her phone and I looked over the app. It really was a good tool, but I had a better one for her to use in studying for her test on Thursday.


    Being with Eva and James this weekend had been fantastic. We slipped right back into our old ways without regard to the missing months apart. Eva even managed to drag me to a few fitness classes. We were back in her dorm room on this chilly Monday morning and waiting for James to rejoin us after his morning class. Eva had classes all afternoon and was taking the morning to continue her studying.


    ¡°How about I show you something better?¡± I got up and started for the door to her dorm room.


    ¡°Where are you going?¡±


    ¡°I¡¯ll be right back. Just getting something from the car.¡± Five minutes later I was back in her room and setting up a VR rig for each of us. I logged on and set up an account for Eva.


    ¡°Put on the gloves and headgear and I¡¯ll show you some of what my company is doing to help medical students learn and become better doctors.¡± Eva put on the gear. I logged her on to the system and brought her into a group with me. Now we were in a classroom with posters of the human body and all of its structures on the walls. In front of us was a human body and as I manipulated the settings, I was able to shed the layers of the body until only the skeleton remained.


    ¡°You can use these controls on the side or you can just say what you want to see. Just say ¡®Show me¡¯ before your request. For instance, show me the muscular system of the right leg.¡± The right leg of the virtual body suddenly filled in with muscles. ¡°You can ask it to highlight the muscle groups and name them or you can go into test mode and tap on anything and name it yourself. You¡¯ll get a score at the end of the test and get a review on anything you missed. Also, what you¡¯re seeing now is what I call textbook mode. You can toggle it to real-life mode and see exactly what you¡¯d see if you opened up a person, only without the spraying blood.¡±


    ¡°Holy shit! This is awesome, Abby. You¡¯ve got way more detail than anything I¡¯ve seen. This beats the hell out of my textbooks. I can follow the muscles all the way around the body.¡± Eva started playing around with the system, adding muscles all over the body by naming them. She tried test mode and got an eighty-two percent. I showed her how to get the information on what she missed and a tutorial that was geared towards those areas that she needed the most help in.


    ¡°I have a few guys working on the next upgrade with you in mind. We¡¯re going to have the body simulate all sorts of exercises and show which muscles are worked and how improper form can cause injuries.¡±


    I told Eva that she could keep the rig that she was using now and that she¡¯d have access to all the latest downloads, as they came out. Eva hugged me, in real and VR, and thanked me for making learning fun.


    In the afternoon, James came over to help Eva with her studying and I let him use my VR rig. He was blown away and I left the two of them to study while I took off for some overdue espionage work.


    My target today wasn¡¯t corporate America, it was the US government. It was odd that I¡¯d been asked by a one government agency to infiltrate and spy on another governmental body. Helping Kevin with his fishing expedition into the computer systems of the seven politicians on his list that he suspected of being blackmailed made sense from one perspective, but I wondered if I was starting down that slippery slope that dad was talking about. I¡¯d convinced myself that breaking into politician¡¯s personal computers and phones would help the FBI take down more human traffickers. What would I convince myself to do next? How far would I go?


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    Thoughts like that, and a very busy schedule, had kept me from pursuing Kevin¡¯s request for the past two months and I finally made my decision. I would spy for the FBI. If I found no evidence of blackmail, I would tell the FBI that. I wouldn¡¯t hand over any copies of the politician¡¯s private information. Likewise, if there was evidence, I would only let them have the exact items relating to that evidence and nothing else.


    With that decision, I set out to Raleigh to plunder the offices of the senior US Senator from North Carolina, Sean Daniels. He had a Raleigh office, along with offices in four other cities in North Carolina and one in Washington. He was one of the politicians that called in to the FBI to find out more about the arrest of one of the Hollywood slavers, an arrest that he should not have been able to know about.


    My usual sweep of the office computers and servers yielded nothing and I headed off to his home to see if he had anything on his computer there. Having just left his offices, I knew from Sean¡¯s schedule that he wouldn¡¯t be home for another two hours. That would give me sufficient time to search his office and go through all his papers. Once he got home, I¡¯d need to get his computer password and copy over his phone.


    Mr. Senior Senator¡¯s house made Edgar¡¯s look like a shack. I wondered if he had this kind of money before he went into politics or if he was using his position to gain insider trading advantages. I¡¯d have to see about adding a little extra program to his computer so I could have the same information that he was using to make his trades. Scanning the mansion, I noted where the desk and computer were and headed directly for that room. It was good that I¡¯d scanned the place, because it would have taken me at least twenty minutes to find his home office otherwise.


    Reviewing the scan of Sean¡¯s office, I noticed that he had several hiding places. The obvious one was the safe behind an astonishingly realistic painting of a camera. The painting took my breath away and I snapped a picture of it to find out more about the artist. Besides the wall safe, there were two hidden areas inside the antique wooden desk and there was a thin concealed drawer on the underside of his chair. Donning my gloves, I set to work.


    The contents of the safe and the hidden caches in the desk were fairly mundane; securities, deeds, a will, legal documents, and some money. I left it all as it was and turned towards the chair. The latch to open the secret compartment was located under the lip of the front of the seat and the drawer opened towards the back. There was a single yellow business envelope inside.


    I slid out the contents out and looked at the three pictures I found. Each was of a child. Two of them I immediately recognized from the family photos on the Sean¡¯s desk. They pictures were of his son and daughter. The third was vaguely familiar and I took a closer look at the framed photographs covering the far wall of the office. I found the boy in the fourth picture I examined. Sean was on a boat with another man and a boy. It was a fishing trip and the boy was holding up his rod in one hand and a fish in the other. It took me a few moments to connect the dots in my brain and realize that the man standing next to Sean was the governor of North Carolina, Jacob Marlow. I searched on my phone and saw that the senator had married the governor¡¯s sister. That meant the boy with the fish was the Sean¡¯s nephew and the reason he looked familiar to me was that I¡¯d seen his picture on the Marlow¡¯s desk when I¡¯d stolen into the governor¡¯s office a year and a half ago to piggy-back on his insider information.


    Attached to the photos with a paperclip was a small piece of paper that read, ¡°Keep them safe¡±, in bold, typewritten, script. This certainly seemed to fit with Kevin¡¯s theory that some politicians were being blackmailed. I took pictures of the pictures and of the brief note. It looked like I¡¯d be making some trips soon in order to follow up on the other politicians.


    I waited for the Sean to arrive, so I could access his computer and phone, and once I was finished, I headed back for Edgar¡¯s house. Having read some of the messages on the Sean¡¯s phone, I had a lot of thinking to do.


    My thinking led to a decision. I¡¯d planned to stay in Raleigh for the rest of the week and hang out with my friends. Instead, I was going to pay a visit to the other six politicians on my list and see what I could find out. Three of the politicians were close by on the east coast, while the others were all the way across the country. I was going to find out who was doing the blackmailing and shut them down.

 B3: Chapter 50 - Chanukah!

    ¡°Dad, have you ever heard of Jeff Bartels? He¡¯s a Canadian artist. I saw one of his paintings and I looked him up. He has some interesting paintings. I think you¡¯ll like his alternate artifacts series.¡±


    Dad pulled out his iPad and did a search. His eyebrows rose when he saw the artworks and I left him to his perusal as I prepared my breakfast. Halfway through finishing off my breakfast, dad finally returned his focus to me and to the remains of his now cold breakfast.


    ¡°Thank you, Abby. His work is very detailed and imaginative. I¡¯m curious to see if I can recreate some of those painting in sculpture.¡±


    ¡°I thought you might. The motorcycle looks like a good candidate.¡±


    ¡°I agree. Have you given any thought to what we can make your mother for Christmas this year?¡±


    ¡°Yup. Although, I think we should switch it to Chanukah now that she¡¯s back. This year it¡¯s only three days earlier than Christmas.¡±


    ¡°I think she¡¯ll appreciate that. What¡¯s your idea?¡±


    ¡°A rocking chair. I was picturing her sitting outside by the fire-pit and rocking Ben to sleep.¡±


    Dad considered it for a bit and gave his approval. He got out a sketchpad and we worked on our design for a half hour before we heard Ben stirring from sleep. I got him from his room and dad and I played with him until he started fussing for some food. Mom hated using the breast pump and she didn¡¯t want to start Ben on formula yet, so I took Ben over to her and woke her up.


    A groggy mom said, ¡°Give me a few minutes in the bathroom and I¡¯ll take him from you.¡±


    ¡°No problem. If he starts crying, I¡¯ll shift him to L1 until you¡¯re ready.¡±


    Mom gave me the stink-eye and said, ¡°No matter how much he cries, Abby, he. stays. in. reality.¡±


    Morning mom was scary. Morning mom who gave up coffee while she was breast-feeding, was extra scary.


    I returned to dad and we finished up our draft design for the rocking chair. Although we still had a few weeks to get the work done, it was a rare Saturday morning that we were both free and we started working on the chair right away in the forge out back. When I felt mom pass through the field I¡¯d left surrounding the house, I told dad and we hid our project before she could ruin her surprise. We met her outside and went for a walk with her and Ben, before returning to the forge.


    ¡°Have you been practicing with your pulse-search technique, Abby?¡±


    ¡°A few times a day. I buried some diamubies out at different distances, and different realities, and I try to push myself to see how far out I can sense them. If I search in only one direction in reality, I can reach over fifteen miles. If I look in multiple layers, I can only go as far as eleven miles. Pulse searching in an expanding sphere around me only gets five miles. I¡¯m getting better, but it¡¯s very slow. I made most of my gains in the first few weeks. Since then, I¡¯ve only increased by small increments.¡±


    ¡°How far out do you need to go?¡±


    ¡°That depends. If Ben is kidnapped and I find out within ten minutes, then I can track him with what I have now. If I only find out an hour later, then I¡¯d need to be able to scan as far as a car can go in one hour. So, sixty or seventy miles. They could drive faster, but they wouldn¡¯t want to risk getting stopped by the police. At the very least, I¡¯ll need to double my distance now, and a bit more, just to cover the Charlotte airports from here.¡±


    ¡°You¡¯ve set yourself quite a task, Abby. You mentioned that when you were practicing with your shield, you tried keeping it active around you all the time. Perhaps if you tried to pulse-scan constantly throughout the day, you would improve your strength. Even if you don¡¯t scan as far, but simply do it more often, you¡¯ll see improvement. You don¡¯t need to beat the metal with your strongest blows to get results.¡±


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    We lapsed into silence as I considered how to apply his advice. The first thing I¡¯d have to change is what I was searching for. Diamubies were pretty scarce. I supposed that I could switch over to my standard award ceremony scan for guns and knives, except that with a pulse scan I¡¯d either need to have those items nearby for a model or I¡¯d have to create a similar shape to look for. For the guns, I could do that using the trigger shape. Triggers were reasonably generic across most models of guns. For knives, the shape of the top inch of blade should be sufficient.


    Searching for two different objects would require two different pulses. I gave it a try as I helped dad at the forge. Wow! There were a lot of guns and knives within a five-mile sphere of us. I drew in the sphere to a one block radius by decreasing the power. The pulses were even faster and the number of weapons became more manageable. Once thing was certain. I wouldn¡¯t want to try and rob any of my neighbors.


    Now that I knew what to pulse for and how much strength to put in the pulse, I just needed to find a way to do it all the time. It would have been great to set my field to pulse every five minutes on its own, but my ability didn¡¯t work that way. I had to fiddle around with my phone for awhile and download an app so that I could get it to vibrate twice every five minutes. As soon as I felt the vibration, I sent out my two pulses. The alarm was set to start going off at eight in the morning and stop at ten at night. I quickly saw that I would either get used to it or be driven completely bonkers by it. For the first few hours, it really seemed the like the second option would win out.


    Between the two of us, dad and I got a lot done that first day and over the next week, we each managed to work enough on the chair to get it to the point where it was almost ready. All it needed were the cushions and those I had ordered custom made from a local supplier. Of course, that only took care of mom. Dad¡¯s gift was going to be very different this year and I¡¯d been working on it for over a month. I still wasn¡¯t sure if it was going to be ready in time and I stressed out over it. Luckily, as the first night of Chanukah drew near, many of the elements finally came together and my tension eased. It wasn¡¯t exactly at the level that I¡¯d hoped it would be, but it was close enough.


    On the first night of Chanukah, mom gathered us around three candelabras that she¡¯d set up and she recited three blessings before we each lit one candle and placed the main candle in the center. Apparently, I done this before when I was little, but I didn¡¯t remember it. In a way, Ben and I were both having our first Chanukah together. Mom sang some songs in Hebrew and I made a mental note to get that language downloaded via metallic ink after the holidays. When mom turned out the kitchen lights, we stayed for a few moments and admired the dancing lights of the menorahs.


    Mom loved the rocking chair and had dad set it up next to the firepit right away. We moved the rest of the gifts outside and opened them by the light of the fire. I laughed at the plate of chocolate chip cookies dad had made for me and Ben seemed mesmerized by the tinkling metal rattle he¡¯d made for Ben. My gift for Ben was a small plastic ball with spikes all around it that he could chew on once he started teething.


    When only my gift to dad remained, I took out a VR rig from the bag beside me and helped him put it on. Like I¡¯d done with Eva, I put on my own set and connected the two of us to the new program I¡¯d had VR Health Services set up for me.


    ¡°Oh. This is my workshop at the university.¡± Dad looked all around with interest, looking to see if everything was as it should be.


    ¡°Hold on, let me just orient the room a bit, so you don¡¯t walk in to the fire-pit. Ok, turn to your left, where your forge is and walk up to it. Do you see these setting here? You can use them to control the heat of the flame. You could also just say what you want. Let me show you. Turn forge to nineteen hundred degrees. Bring in an iron ingot.¡± When the ingot appeared, I placed it on the anvil to let it soften. ¡°You can speed up the time or wait for it soften normally. Grab your hammer off the wall and you can start working with the metal.¡± I went on to explain all the features of the VR forge to dad and how this was the test version. I¡¯d be adding more features over the next six months.


    ¡°Eventually, instead of using only a virtual hammer, you¡¯ll be able to hold a physical hammer with sensors on it and use that to pound out a VR sword. The only thing I can¡¯t seem to replicate is the heat. I¡¯m hoping that you¡¯ll be able to use this system to teach your students different techniques or even to test them.¡±


    Dad removed his headset and squeezed me tightly. ¡°You have outdone yourself, Abby. I can already see several possibilities for this system. Would it be ok for me to work with your programmers to get it ready?¡±


    ¡°Of course. I¡¯ll introduce you to the two programmers for this application and they¡¯ll make any changes or additions that you want. You don¡¯t even have to go to the offices. You can set up a time with them, log on and show them what you want. Once I¡¯ve set you up as a manager, you¡¯ll be able to access other settings that will even let you record your ideas for the programmers to see at a later time and you¡¯ll be able to voice over lectures as well.¡±

 B3: Chapter 51 - Christmas!

    Mom really did like Christmas. She was constantly humming or singing Christmas songs as she fed Ben or worked in the kitchen. It was weird. She¡¯d had an orthodox Jewish upbringing and felt a strong connection to her religion, yet here she was belting out Christmas tunes. I asked her about it and she smiled and said that she liked the happy songs.


    Happy songs or not, this Christmas started off with torture, followed closely with pain and misery, and ultimately ended in joy and triumph. In the days preceding my red belt test, Uncle Paul was relentless with my training. I put my studies on hold for the week and we worked non-stop on my stamina, strength and power. Sifu Zhang and Charlie took over all of Paul¡¯s classes so he could give me his full attention, but there were still plenty of opportunities for all three of them to work me over. It was grueling and I couldn¡¯t wait for the test. It couldn¡¯t possibly be worse than the training.


    On the day of the testing, all four of us packed into Paul¡¯s car and we drove to Sifu Zhang¡¯s old school in Raleigh. He hadn¡¯t been back to visit since he¡¯d transferred over his school to his protege and his greeting as he entered the school was like that of a monarch returning after a victorious battle. It was a good thing that we¡¯d arrived early because the whole school had turned out and everyone wanted to welcome Sifu Zhang back.


    Sifu William eventually got everyone settled down and the testing day began. The previous day had been the testing day for beginners and all the levels up to and including third dan. Today, we would watch the testing for the fourth and fifth dans and then everyone would leave so that the testing for the red belts could begin. Only masters and the candidates were allowed to witness the testing. That was why mom and dad hadn¡¯t come to watch my testing and offer support.


    The school was easily four times the size of Uncle Paul¡¯s and whereas our school had a handful of fourth and fifth dans, this one had almost twenty students testing today. With so many higher level students taking their test, I was recruited to assist in their testing. Mostly it involved sparring with them for a few minutes. I was happy to help and it was a good way to take my mind off of my own testing. The only tricky part was keeping my fighting skills down to a level that was just slightly above theirs. The idea was to challenge them, not crush them. However, if they lacked the skill to advance to the next level, my job was to point it out to them and to those evaluating them.


    One of the fifth dan candidates, a tall, muscular man with tattoos all over his arms was very cocky. We faced off and he didn¡¯t bother putting up his hands to protect himself. I gave him a low power kick to the side of his head to remind him. He put his hands up after that and did much better. I didn¡¯t know how the judges would feel about his performance, but I thought he deserved to move ahead.


    The testing for these levels lasted for a few hours, followed by a belt ceremony for those that passed their testing. At the end of the ceremony, with included group pictures and much celebration, everyone was politely ushered out the door so that the final red belt testing could begin. The room cleared out, leaving twelve masters and four candidates. I was the youngest of our group and the only woman.


    Those of us who have been through the testing are admonished not to reveal what happens in the testing. When mom asked me about it later, all I could tell her was that I had to fight several of the masters and earn my place among them. Also, they didn¡¯t pull their punches.


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    The most challenging part of training for this test was that Uncle Paul asked me not to use my field during the testing. ¡°You need to pass this test on your own, without using the extra advantages that you have. Your special abilities have allowed you to grow at a much faster rate and have led you to this point years ahead of schedule. However, everyone who has achieved mastery has done so without using abilities like yours. If you truly want to be a master of Kung Fu, you need to do it on the same terms as everyone else.¡±


    I couldn¡¯t fault his logic and I put aside my field for the testing. Despite this handicap, Uncle Paul and Sifu Zhang had trained me well and I earned my red belt the old-fashioned way. Sure, I was bruised and battered, but I gave as good as I got and I was now a master of Kung Fu!


    Uncle Paul presented me with my red belt and tied it on for me during the ceremony. Sifu Zhang and Charlie cheered me on from the side. Watching Sifu Zhang cheer on a new master sent his old students into shock. They had never seen him so emotional.


    Only three of us got our red belt that day. The fourth candidate was injured during one of his fights and wasn¡¯t able to finish his testing. We stayed on to talk to Sifu Williams and one of the other masters and we helped them get the room ready for classes the next day.


    ¡°Sifu, when you left me the school, it was plain to those of us who knew you, that you were very sick. I kept expecting a call from Paul with sorry news. When he called to say that you were fine, I was surprised and a little skeptical, figuring that he was exaggerating to lift up my spirits. Seeing you here, healthy and stronger than I¡¯ve seen you in decades, is unbelievable and makes me sorry that I doubted him. If you wish to return, I would gladly step aside for you, Sifu. This school will always be yours.¡± Sifu Williams¡¯s offer was genuine and from the heart. He deeply respected his mentor and wanted nothing more than to have him back.


    A tear rolled down Sifu Zhang¡¯s face and he embraced his student. ¡°Thank you, William, but I have found a new challenge now and I would never seek to displace you from yours. Through your hard work, dedication, and perseverance, you have earned this school. You are Sifu here, until you are ready to hand it off to the next Sifu.¡±


    Wiping his own tear away, Sifu William asked, ¡°What are you doing now?¡±


    ¡°I am working for this newly-minted Kung Fu master. As payment for saving my life, I agreed to work for her charitable foundation. She built a studio for me to teach self-defence and Kung Fu to the victims of human trafficking that her foundation assists. Her foundation assists these survivors in regaining control of their lives.¡±


    ¡°Much like your Kung Fu, you pack a lot into a few sentences. Your answer only opens the door to more questions. If I¡¯d have known that she saved your life, I wouldn¡¯t have been able to evaluate her dispassionately.¡±


    ¡°That is why I didn¡¯t do the testing myself and why I didn¡¯t tell you until her testing was over. She deserved the chance to earn her mastery by the merits of her skill. Now that she has, I think you¡¯ll be interested in watching her fight again. This time without her holding back.¡±


    ¡°I don¡¯t understand.¡±


    ¡°Abby had the ability to access a higher level of Kung Fu. I asked her not to use it during the testing. Abby, please spar with Sifu Williams and show him what you can really do.¡±


    An hour later, even more wrung out than before but freshly showered and changed, I rejoined Charlie in the backseat of Uncle Paul¡¯s car. As he drove away and made his way to the highway, I was on the verge of falling asleep when I heard Sifu Zhang say, ¡°You did well today, Abby. Congratulations. You should take the next week off to rest and relax. After that, we¡¯ll begin your training for your first master level dan.¡±


    I groaned audibly and they all had a good laugh at my expense. It was yet more proof that no good deed goes unpunished.

 B3: Chapter 52 - Tracking

    With the start of the new year, I made a few changes to my schedule. First, I cut down on my Kung Fu training to two nights a week and one Saturday afternoon class. Uncle Paul wasn¡¯t happy about it, but I explained that I needed a short break for a few months. While that was certainly true, the main reason was that I needed more time so that I could get my helicopter pilot license.


    I¡¯d made arrangements with a local helicopter training school for private lessons every morning comprising of two hours of ground school classroom lessons and one hour of flying time every day. Before my first lesson, I had already scan-read all their training books and trained for hundreds of hours on the computer flight simulator that Howie had found for me. I¡¯d even snuck aboard many training and non-training flights and scanned the trainers as they flew for enjoyment or taught their students.


    My typical day started at seven o¡¯clock, where I¡¯d meet my first of two cancer patients in the meditation room at Hannah¡¯s home. Shauna and Sister Clara had managed to find over one hundred willing candidates for my cancer treatments. Given that the only risk to the patients was the cost of their flight, they had more candidates than I could handle.


    After working with the two patients, I¡¯d head out to the helicopter training school for the rest of the morning. I was home in time to have lunch with mom and Ben and then I was off to the hospital. I¡¯d leave the hospital at five and head back to Hannah¡¯s Home to work with the programmers at VR Health Services for a few hours before heading home to eat. Dinner was followed by either Kung Fu or scan-reading. If I were scan-reading a new language, I¡¯d also watch videos or movies in that language to work on my pronunciation.


    Throughout the day, I¡¯d also practice with my field. I was pulse-searching in a one block area around me every five minutes while maintaining my shields all day. I practiced holding and controlling multiple fields and I was constantly scanning people to see if I could find a way to perfect my ¡®lie detector¡¯ ability.


    Knowing that this schedule was only temporary helped me get through it. Mark¡¯s visits on the weekend didn¡¯t hurt either. Our long-distance relationship was working out very well for both of us because we were both always on the run. Mark was constantly traveling and learning about each of the McKenzie holdings, getting personally acquainted with the capabilities of each of the key people running their mines. Even if Mark had lived next door, we couldn¡¯t have seen each other much more than we were now. Because those moments were so few, we appreciated them more and tried our best to do fun things. Honestly though, sometimes we¡¯d set out to watch a movie only for both of us to fall asleep a few minutes into it.


    The routine lasted throughout January, varying only slightly as my instructor decreased my ground school drastically and increased my flight time. Apparently, he was impressed with my level of proficiency with the course material. My skill at controlling the helicopter, really a copy of his skill, also allowed him to teach more advanced piloting than was normal for my notice level. He proclaimed me to be a natural pilot and started training me in how to fly different helicopters as well. They had four different models at the school and I got a chance to learn on each of them.


    February seemed determined to throw me off my game. The first major interruption came in the form of Kevin. Back in December, I¡¯d given him all the proof he needed to show that someone was threatening the lives of the families of the seven politicians and he and his superiors were finally getting back to me with plan to put a stop to it.


    ¡°I know it¡¯s taken a long time, Abby, but we had to go slow in choosing which politicians to approach and how to approach them without tipping our hands. We ended up choosing your senator, Sean Daniels, and a senator from New York, Rhonda Evers. We chose Daniels because he was from North Carolina and we think that Roger is based out of here so it should be easier for him to help us. Daniels is also family to the Governor and his ability to have his ear gives him an outsized political impact compared to the other politicians on our list. Finally, Daniel¡¯s security chief is related to one of our agents. That meant we had a very reliable conduit to set up some secret discussion with Mr. Daniels. Likewise, we chose Mrs. Evers because her niece is an agent and calls from her wouldn¡¯t raise any eyebrows.¡±


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    ¡°Were you able to convince them to work with you?¡±


    ¡°Oh yes. Both were shocked to learn that we knew about the threats and they really want us to put a end to it. They¡¯ve agreed to cooperate, but they¡¯re really scared for their kids. They have no idea how the envelopes with the threats are even getting to them. Whoever left them is able to bypass all their security measures. Someone with Roger level skills is working for the bad guys.¡±


    That comment brought me up cold. My recent worries about Ben made me think of someone else like me, someone with a field. However, Kevin meant regular James Bond type skills and as he talked about their plans, I relaxed and put that thought from my head and concentrated on what he was saying.


    The plan was straightforward. Next time the senators received instructions from the blackmailers, they would inform the FBI immediately using a pre-set coded email. If the instruction ran counter to what the senators wanted to do, they would ignore them and the FBI would put round the clock, hidden surveillance on the children. If anyone came after the kids, the FBI would swoop in a catch them.


    Kevin¡¯s main worry was that the blackmailers would take too long to go after the kids and the FBI would decide to remove some of the round the clock security. He wanted Abby to see if there was any way that Roger could help, if that were to happen. I assured him that Roger would help as much as he could. However, if both senators refused their orders, then there would be three potential attack sites. Roger could only be in one place at a time. Kevin understood and simply asked for any help that he could get.


    The meeting with Kevin wasn¡¯t the source of the interruption to my schedule, but it was the cause. The only way that I could think of that Roger could be of use would be in tracking the children, if they were taken. I¡¯d have preferred a more pro-active option where I would stop the kidnapping from happening in the first place, but given the multiple locations and targets, that wasn¡¯t an option. I couldn¡¯t be everywhere at once. Instead, I took two days off and went to Raleigh and New York. In each of those cities, I waited until the kids were asleep and inserted a small daimuby into their femur bone. It wasn¡¯t a very complicated process. Creating a field of equivalent size to the gemstone, I removed a section from the inside of the bone and sent it to L2. I then placed the diamuby inside the hollowed out cavity using filter forceps. The forceps, glorified tweezers really, passed through the leg and bone in R1 and when the gem was positioned perfectly within the hole I¡¯d made, I shifted it to reality. The whole process took under two minutes per child, but having to get to the children at night meant that I still had to wait for hours until a flight was heading back to Charlotte.


    In all, I placed trackers in two kids in New York and three in Raleigh. As an afterthought, I also placed a few internet-connected cameras in R1, recording to a cloud server, in each of the children¡¯s rooms. If any of them were taken, I¡¯d be able to see who took them and I¡¯d have to return to those cities and start tracking them. However, that in itself presented a problem. By the time Kevin was able to inform me about the kidnapping and I was able to get out there, hours would have passed and the range for finding the children would have grown to almost unmanageable levels. There was no way that I¡¯d be able to find them, if I was using a car. Also, I¡¯d lose time waiting for a flight and getting to and from the airport.


    The solution was obvious once I finally thought of it on my flight back from New York. I was going to need access to a helicopter. When the time came, I would either have to ¡®borrow¡¯ one, already have my own, or ask Kevin to have one on standby for me. Each option had it¡¯s good and bad points and I would need to consider each very carefully. Regardless of which option I chose, refueling was also going to be a difficult issue to resolve.

 B3: Chapter 53 - Interlude

    ¡°There are lots of helicopters to choose from, Abby. I¡¯m just saying that you¡¯ll still need to consider hanger fees, fuel, insurance, and maintenance. It¡¯s a big hassle and I don¡¯t see you having the time to do it. You seem to be stretched thin as it is. I have two other solutions for you to consider.¡±


    Howie was finally getting to the part I was interested in. He was like that sometimes, when he¡¯s worked hard on something and wanted me to appreciate all the careful thought and planning he¡¯d done.


    ¡°I¡¯m all ears, oh great and powerful Howie. Lay them on me.¡±


    ¡°I like that. It¡¯s about time someone started to appreciate my brilliance. First solution, you lease the helicopter. Costs much less than buying, you can decide to change the model if it doesn¡¯t suit your needs, and someone else takes care of it. You just need to bring it in.¡±


    ¡°You can lease helicopters? Seriously? That¡¯s awesome. Wait, you never lead with your best option. What¡¯s the downside?¡±


    ¡°You. You¡¯re eighteen and a not even a fully certified pilot yet. Insurance is going to be a problem for a lease.¡±


    ¡°What¡¯s option two?¡±


    ¡°You make another investment and become a part owner in helicopter charter service and flight school. As a part owner, you¡¯ll fall under their company¡¯s liability insurance plan. You¡¯ll have access to all of their aircraft and you might make some money while doing it.¡±


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    ¡°If they need another investor, then it¡¯s either a failing business or they need to expand. Which is it?¡±


    ¡°Neither. The owner, a military veteran and his wife, opened the place after getting back from Iraq. They were both helicopter pilots. She was shot down and survived. A bullet hit her at an awkward angle and ended up near her heart. They managed to save her, but left the bullet inside because it was too risky to remove it. She¡¯s been having medical issues for the past few years related to the lead toxicity of the bullet. Those are in addition to the other issues with having a bullet so close to her heart. The VA and her health insurance can only do so much and they won¡¯t cover all of the experimental treatments that they¡¯ve tried. Even a lot of their regular claims get rejected. In a nutshell, the medical bills have been slowly bleeding them dry. He¡¯s taking money out of the company to make ends meet. Soon he¡¯ll have to close down because he won¡¯t be able to pay his bills.¡±


    ¡°Where are they located?¡±


    ¡°They¡¯re based out of Concord-Padgett Regional. It¡¯s called A&M Heliservices. That¡¯s just on the other side of Charlotte from you. You can get there in no time.¡±


    Damn right I could. That was where I was taking my private lessons! I¡¯d never met the owner. He was away on business when I signed up and after that I¡¯d always just flashed my student ID to get in and gone straight to see my instructor. The place was perfectly suited to my needs. Howie¡¯s story also gave me some insight into the two helicopters that I¡¯d seen in the maintenance hanger. They hadn¡¯t moved the entire time I¡¯d been there. I was guessing that he couldn¡¯t afford to get the parts. Helicopter maintenance could be very expensive.


    Howie and I discussed the investment for awhile and he set up a meeting for me to meet with the owner, Terrance Hillier and his wife, Julie, the following Saturday. I had enough in the bank to cover the investment, but it would mean having to cure another wealthy donor if I wanted to be able to continue funding VR Health Services into next year.

 B3: Chapter 54 - Head-to-Head Competition

    VR Health Services accounted for the second of the two February interruptions to my finely tuned schedule. This one occurred a few days after I got back from placing the trackers on the children. Harry had invited VR Health Services to come and give a presentation of our system to his doctors, residents, and students. To accommodate everyone, he¡¯d arranged for us to use one of the larger lecture halls with stadium style seating.


    Jenny and the teams had worked tirelessly for the past several weeks on their presentation and I was glad that I only had to demonstrate the surgical techniques. Jenny would be giving the briefing and we would both take questions afterwards.


    Harry and his staff had done a phenomenal job in coordinating schedules because all of the seats were filled and we even had people standing in at the back and a few students sitting in the aisles. Jenny walked on the stage, her height and powerful build gaining everyone¡¯s attention, and began talking about some of the issues that medical students, residents and even doctors faced in developing their skills using modern simulation devices and software. She showed pictures of the various machines currently in use and went over their features and limitations. Versatility and realism were the two major drawbacks and she quickly moved on to how VR Health Systems was the solution.


    Jenny took the audience through her PowerPoint slides and a short video before we got to the demonstration portion of the presentation. However, when she got to the part where she was supposed to ask for volunteers, she instead said, ¡°I was going to ask for volunteers for the next portion, but your dean had other plans and has graciously provided us with ready victims¡­I mean willing participants.¡± Jenny¡¯s fake slip of the tongue was met with the appropriate laughter from the audience before she continues. ¡°With us today are doctors from the prestigious Mercy Hospital in Washington, DC. Dr. Felicia Meyers, head administrator of the hospital, Dr. Rebeccah Meyers, General Surgeon, and Lilly Meyers, first-year medical student.¡±


    I looked out at the crowd and saw the three women getting up and making their way to the front. Next to their now empty seats, I saw Ethan and Mark applauding with everyone else. What the hell was going on? Why hadn¡¯t anyone told me about all this? It¡¯s not like I was the owner of the company or anything like that.


    As the ladies came onto the stage, I looked at Jenny and she gave me a sheepish smile. She mouthed the word ¡®sorry¡¯ only she didn¡¯t seem it at all. It was one of those ¡®sorry, not sorry¡¯ kind of things. Jenny continued with the planned presentation and we had Lilly start off. We outfitted her in a VR rig and I started taking her through the features that would serve her well in her first years of medical school. It was very similar to what I¡¯d shown Eva and James only a few months ago, except with a lot more systems and features. Over the next fifteen minutes, I showed the audience how useful the system could be for medical students and I even walked Lilly through a simple appendectomy and let her try it out by herself. When she didn¡¯t end up killing the patient, she let out a triumphant ¡®Yes!!!¡¯ and the audience, watching it all on the big screen, laughed and cheered her success.


    ¡°Oh my God. I want one of these! That felt so real. I¡¯m all sweaty and I feel like I ran a mile. I was so worried that I was going to kill that kid.¡± Lilly was glowing with excitement and the audience murmured appreciatively.


    I took the opportunity to show off another feature and explained, ¡°That was level one and it¡¯s designed to take a medical student through a textbook version of the surgery. Levels two, three and four each feature the same surgery, but things are programmed to get progressively harder as more and more complications arise. The appendix can rupture before you get it out or the patient can start having a heart attack during the operations. Level five, what the programmers have taken to calling the Kobayashi Maru, because it¡¯s almost impossible to save the patient, is the most challenging and can have things like a hospital wide power-failure with a malfunctioning back-up, or the patient is changed from this child to a ninety-five-year-old woman with a weak heart.¡±


    ¡°The higher levels are locked out, until the student or doctor has achieved a consistently high enough score to move on. Another great feature of the software is that it can help medical students learn to work with real views of the internal structure of the body, and not simple illustrations. Even cadavers don¡¯t prepare you sufficiently, as there¡¯s are no fluids running through them. Our VR body is an exact recreation of the human body, along with all it¡¯s fluids. While it doesn¡¯t go down to the cellular level yet, we are working on that. We¡¯re hoping that in the next few years, we¡¯ll be able to show students and doctors exactly what happens to the body when they prescribe different medications and what happens when the wrong medication is taken.¡±


    Lilly went back to her mother and Rebeccah soon took her place. Jenny continued with the presentation and described how a surgeon could preplan a difficult or time-sensitive surgery with his or her team and do full run-through to make sure that everyone knew their part. I helped Rebeccah into her VR rig and walked her through all the controls. Once she was comfortable with the few differences from reality that we couldn¡¯t yet overcome, I set her up with a few minor surgeries to perform, varying the difficulty between level one and level three.


    ¡°Now¡¯s where we put Dr. Meyer on the spot. How well can she do against our benchmark? Remember, once the system is set up, each time you log on and perform a surgery, you¡¯ll be measured against the best in the world. The rankings will be available for all to see. We want everyone to take these seriously and hope that hospitals will use our system scores to evaluate their residency candidates or surgical hires. With this in mind, Dr. Meyer, are you willing to give it a shot and solo your first VR surgery?¡±


    Rebeccah was built for competition and yelled out, ¡°Bring it on!¡± The crown cheered and a few of them even stomped their feet. Who knew doctors could be so rowdy? Jenny called for quiet and over the next ten minutes, Rebeccah stabilized and repaired a gun-shot wound to the upper chest. Her technique was excellent.


    As Rebeccah returned the sensored surgical instruments to the tray, her score flashed on the screen. Ninety-one percent. The crowd applauded enthusiastically. Rebeccah however, was not pleased.


    ¡°What is the scoring based on?¡±, she challenged.


    ¡°In this case, the duration of the surgery, amount of blood loss, consumable usage, and the number of movements performed to complete the surgery. Obviously, the outcome of the patient is a priority as well. There are other performance measures that are incorporated, but those are the main ones.¡±


    ¡°Who has the top score?¡±


    Jenny looked at her for a few heartbeats and said, ¡°Abby does. Until now, she¡¯s the only person who¡¯s run these simulations. She modeled all the surgeries for our programmers.¡±


    Rebeccah turned to me and paled a bit. ¡°You know all the surgeries? The list must have over fifty surgeries on it.¡±


    ¡°Eighty-four, so far. Our goal is to have the ten most common surgeries in each of fourteen main specialties before we move on to full commercialization. We expect to have it ready by the end of the summer.¡±


    Moving the system controls, Rebeccah scanned through the list of surgeries and stopped at hernia repair. ¡°I¡¯ve done this surgery hundreds of times in real life. You¡¯re obviously more experienced with this VR system. Let¡¯s see how we do against each other.¡±


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    I muted our mikes and said, ¡°What? Now? Rebeccah, there¡¯s no need to do this.¡±


    ¡°There is. Mother arranged for us to come here today. This is her way of finalizing my bet with Ethan.¡±


    Oh shit. I really didn¡¯t want to have to do this, much less in front of an audience. Jenny had outed me as the one who¡¯d programmed all of our techniques into the system. If I lost, then our system would come into question. I need to beat Rebeccah, but I didn¡¯t want to hurt her reputation.


    ¡°We can do it right after the presentation. In private.¡±


    ¡°Do your best, Abby. I sure will.¡± With that she turned on her mike and said, ¡°I challenge Abby to a duel!¡± and she mimed slapping me with an invisible glove.


    I had no choice but to respond with a big grin on my face, ¡°To the death!¡±, and it was on.


    This time, we each had our own patient. They were the exact same patient with the exact same hernia and we would both use the Lichtenstein open mesh technique. We both verified our trays and signaled when we were ready. Jenny did a countdown and the system started. For the next twenty-four minutes, I was in the zone. I had decided before the start that I would focus on my own work and not try to spy on her hand movements. I didn¡¯t want to have any unfair advantage over her. It must have been surreal for the spectators to see the two of us hunched over nothing and moving our hands in short, quick movements, while on the screen, they could see the bodies that we were working on.


    I put down my instruments and signaled the completion of the surgery. Rebeccah was still working on her patient and I looked up to the screen to see her suturing up her patient and put down her instruments. A few moments later, the score screen came on. Ninety-seven to One hundred and four.


    Jenny explained to the crowd, ¡°The scores are based on the previous best metrics. In this case, Abby beat her previous best and next time this surgery will be the one to beat.¡±


    Rebeccah and I shook hands and the crown gave us a standing ovation. I wanted to talk to Rebeccah some more, but Jenny continued with the presentation, this time bringing in Felicia to work with our clinical care model. This time, the VR showed the crowd a typical doctor¡¯s office and it had Felicia meet with patients and diagnose them based on their systems. I worked with Felicia and showed her how she could draw blood from the patient and order tests to be taken. Within moments, Felicia was able to see the results of the blood tests and x-rays and make her final diagnosis. For her first patient, it was a straightforward cold. Her second had cancer and she had to figure it out. To her credit, she followed the clues that we¡¯d left and successfully diagnosed the patient.


    Jenny finished up the presentation and we took questions for the next half hour before Harry came on stage and thanked us for the excellent presentation. He announced to the crowd that Galt University Hospital and the Thomas Hendricks School of Medicine would be the first in the world to have access to this new technology and he hoped that our doctors and students would set the high scores that all other schools would fail to beat. The crowd cheered again and I felt like I was at a high-school football rally.


    Shortly after, the crowd dispersed, leaving only a few handfuls of doctors who wanted to try the system for themselves and couldn¡¯t wait the few months. Harry gave us the ok and we gave them each a short surgery to try. Each of them was amazed at the realism and shook my hand and told me what an excellent job I¡¯d done.


    ¡°You and Jenny knocked that out of the park, Abby. I think this is the first time that I¡¯ll be introducing something new without having half the medical faculty screaming at me that I¡¯m wasting their precious budget. Being the first medical school to have this system is going to make me the envy of all the deans.¡± Harry was beaming and as I looked at him, I could see that he had lost more weight. Not only did he look healthier, he looked years younger than when he¡¯d been over for supper eight or nine months ago.


    Felicia showed up at our side and said, ¡°You know, Harry, that if you don¡¯t snap her up for your medical school, then someone else will and they¡¯ll get to say that she went to medical school there.¡±


    ¡°She¡¯s already refused me, repeatedly Felicia.¡±


    Felicia gave me a questioning look. I sighed and explained again, ¡°I won¡¯t spend ten years learning to do what I can already do now.¡±


    ¡°Then how do you plan on practicing medicine? Surely you won¡¯t let your skills go to waste.¡± She protested.


    I gave her a smile. ¡°I¡¯m thinking of becoming one of those mob doctors, working under the table in hidden surgery rooms with dim lighting and antiquated metal tables.¡±


    Felicia was not amused. ¡°Harry! Do something about her. You can¡¯t let her skills go to waste. Find a way to get her certified. She¡¯s earned it. Anyone that can take Rebeccah down a peg by outperforming her in surgery deserves special consideration.¡±


    Harry agreed and said he¡¯d see what options he had.


    While the two of them thrashed out ideas for my future, Ethan, Mark, Rebeccah and Lilly came up on stage. Mark came up and gave me a proper boyfriend greeting and after a few seconds Lilly suggested that we get a room. We ignored her for a few more seconds just for spite. Well, it was also very nice.


    After the kiss, I stepped back from Mark and poked him gently in the chest. ¡°What¡¯s with the ambush, Mark? Why didn¡¯t you tell me that you were coming and bringing guests?¡±


    ¡°Don¡¯t blame me. This is a Jake thing. I only found out this morning that I was picking up this lot in Washington and heading over here. From what I¡¯ve pieced together, Harry mentioned this presentation to Jake and Jake called Felicia. Felicia called Ethan and they¡¯re the ones who set up this ambush.¡±


    I turned to Ethan, questions dancing in my eyes. He said, ¡°I was going to let the bet go. It was Felicia who insisted that we needed to see it through. She said something about closure and about Rebeccah needing to respect my judgement.¡±


    ¡°Everything with mother is a lesson and I¡¯ve learned this one. When it comes to understanding and dealing with people, Ethan¡¯s instincts are better than mine and I should listen to him. It¡¯s a good lesson, but it leaves me with a big problem. I have no idea what I¡¯m going to live on for the next twelve months. I¡¯ve never been a good saver.¡± Rebeccah sighed heavily and batted her eyelashes at Ethan. She was clearly hinting that Ethan could help her out.


    ¡°I suppose I could give you a loan. Just to help you out. How does eighteen percent interest sound?¡± Ethan was grinning at his own offer, until Rebeccah elbowed him in the ribs.


    ¡°It sounds like you¡¯ll be spending some time in a hospital very soon.¡±


    ¡°I suppose that you could work off some of the interest.¡± Ethan was leering this time and Lilly made gagging sounds.


    ¡°That is so gross. Seriously? I don¡¯t need to hear that stuff about my sister.¡±


    ¡°You sure you can handle being a doctor, Lilly? I can just see you talking to your pregnant patient and saying, ¡°Oh my God! You let him touch you? Down there? Ewww. Gross!¡± Ethan¡¯s voice had changed to a high falsetto in a bad imitation of Lilly¡¯s voice.


    Rebeccah, Mark and I couldn¡¯t hold in our laughter and Lilly turned red with embarrassment. She also managed to elbow Ethan on the other side of his ribs.


    ¡°Sisters! Sheesh.¡± Ethan exclaimed while rubbing both sides of his ribs. The sisters just looked at each other and high-fived.


    ¡°I have another option for you, Rebeccah. You could consult with VR Health and do the same type of work that I¡¯m doing. I can¡¯t pay you the massive salary that you¡¯re making at your hospital, but depending on how much time you can put in, you should have enough to pay your share of the rent and be able to take your man out for a bite to eat every now and then. The best part is that working with the programmers will make you questions every aspect of your surgical technique and it should make you an even better doctor. You¡¯ll also be the standard for every surgery that your model for the programmers. Every surgeon will have to work to measure up to you.¡±


    ¡°I think I like that a lot. Is there enough work for the two of us?¡±


    ¡°More than enough. I have grand plans for this system, Rebeccah. I¡¯m not sure if this system can ever be finished. Besides, I have a specific project that I think you¡¯d be great for. It won¡¯t be ready to start until this fall, though. In the meantime, you can work on modelling some surgeries and mastering the system.¡±


    ¡°In that case, I accept.¡± Rebeccah and I shook hands on it while Ethan murmured aloud about my stealing his business. We ignored his complaints and Mark invited us all out for dinner.


    ¡°Uhm, Mark? It¡¯s only three o¡¯clock.¡± Lilly reminded him.


    ¡°Call it lunner, then, or maybe dinch. It doesn¡¯t matter. I¡¯m hungry.¡± Mark extended the invitation to Harry, Felicia and Jenny, and soon we were off to the Olive Garden. It¡¯s good when the guy buying dinner is your boyfriend and knows exactly what you want.


    As we packed up the VR gear and got ready to leave, I managed to take Ethan aside for a minute and let him know that I had a few extra diamonds laying around, just in case he happened to be looking for one for Rebeccah. He turned a few shades redder and I had my answer.

 B3: Chapter 55 - Heli-Services

    On Saturday, I picked up Howie and we headed off to meet with Terrance and Julie at Heli-Services. I had called up my lawyers, highly expensive but recommended by Jake, and had them draw up the documents we needed for the deal. Terrance¡¯s lawyers had approved everything and Howie and I expected that we¡¯d be attending a simple signing. Terrance had other ideas.


    ¡°I¡¯m well aware that beggars can¡¯t be choosers and that we need this deal to keep the company solvent, but Howie explained your reasons for investing and Julie and I won¡¯t agree to put your life at risk to save our company. Even though your instructor told us that you¡¯ll be an excellent pilot, Julie and I need to see for ourselves. If we don¡¯t agree that you can handle flying the helicopter, we¡¯re not going to let you use it, regardless of your level of ownership. If that means the deal doesn¡¯t happen, then it doesn¡¯t happen.¡±


    Terrance was looking at me with earnest determination. He was risking the whole deal falling through just as it was ready to be signed and it was killing him. Beside him, Julie¡¯s expression seemed calm, except that she was fiddling with her necklace and her knee was bouncing up and down. She was nervous and having spoken with her for a little while before we sat down, I had the impression that she felt guilty for having gotten sick and put their company in this situation.


    ¡°Let¡¯s go take a ride. Hopefully, you¡¯ll like my flying, because being able to take out a helicopter on my own whenever I need to is an absolute requirement for me. Non-negotiable.¡±


    They nodded at my words and we all went out to the field. Howie tried to beg off and I had to pull him along. ¡°I have young children at home that depend on me, Abby. I can watch your progress safely from the ground.¡±


    ¡°Come on, Howie, you¡¯ll love it! It¡¯s just like being carried along in a basket. You¡¯ll probably fall asleep.¡±


    Howie wasn¡¯t buying my sales pitch, but he didn¡¯t fight too hard and was soon strapped in and wearing earphones to dull the sound and so he could speak with everyone.


    Terrance and Julie didn¡¯t try to help me in any way as I made my way through my mental pre-flight checklist. I¡¯d long ago scan read the list into my brain and it was second nature to me. I got all my permissions from the control tower and a few moments later we were in the air. Terrance gave me directions that took us out towards the mountains and along the way he and Julie tested my ground school knowledge.


    They kept at it until we reached our destination and then shifted their focus to putting my flying to the test, sometimes shutting down key systems and having me use alternative ways to keep us in the air. Howie was less than pleased when Terrance simulated stall conditions and he yelled at Terrance to ¡®Turn the engine back on, right now and stop playing games!¡¯. Once I had finished my autorotative descent and landed the helicopter, I assured Howie that it was a normal part of pilot testing and it was something that I¡¯d trained for both in the simulator and in the air many times.


    An hour after the testing began, I set us back down gently onto the exact spot that I¡¯d taken off from. Terrance and Julie watched as I followed another checklist sequence and powered down the craft. I finished all my checks and we headed back inside.


    ¡°Are we ready sign?¡± I asked when we were all back in the conference room.


    Julie answered quickly, ¡°Yes! I know experienced pilots with hundreds of flight hours who couldn¡¯t do as well as you did today. It¡¯s like the difference between a skilled dancer and a ballerina. Andy wasn¡¯t kidding when he said you were a natural. I¡¯ve never seen anyone go from zero to your level of skill in so short a time. The only reason Terrance isn¡¯t telling you this is because he¡¯s too shocked. He fully expected to have to turn your offer down based on your flight performance. He¡¯s still getting used to the idea that we won¡¯t lose the company.¡±


    When the documents were all verified and signed, and I had given over my certified check for a lot more money that I had spent on buying Hannah¡¯s Home, I asked Terrance and Julie for a few more minutes of their time. I had another pressing issue to discuss.


    ¡°Now that we¡¯re partners, I have an offer to make you. You are free to accept it or not. I didn¡¯t mention it before we signed because I didn¡¯t want you to feel that you had to accept it in order to get me to sign. Howie has known me for two years and he knows that I am often unconventional. I have my own way of getting things done. He also knows that I don¡¯t discuss those methods. Not because they¡¯re illegal or immoral. It¡¯s merely that I prefer them kept secret. One of the things that I do in an unconventional way is medicine and I believe that I can remove the bullet that¡¯s lodged right next to your heart, without any risk to you whatsoever.¡±


    Terrance and Julie didn¡¯t say anything and Howie stepped in to fill the void. ¡°Abby, you need to work on your subtlety. You don¡¯t just spring that on people. You have to ease them into it. Right now they¡¯re probably wondering what kind of a kook they¡¯ve partnered up with and they¡¯re starting to think of ways to erase their names off of those documents. They think that what you just told them isn¡¯t possible. They¡¯ve checked with hospitals and doctors from all over.¡±


    ¡°Nevertheless, I can do it. The how doesn¡¯t matter. Only results count. It¡¯s a ten-minute office procedure. You don¡¯t need to decide now. It¡¯s an open offer. One thing that you need to ask yourselves is, what do you have to lose?¡±


    Terrance finally spoke up. ¡°That depends on what you¡¯re asking for in exchange. An offer has two sides.¡±


    ¡°Yes, it does. If I succeed, I want two things from you. One is a helicopter that¡¯s at my disposal full-time. I¡¯ll keep it with me and only bring it in for maintenance and refueling as required. This helicopter can be one of the ones that we already have or, if it hurts the business to be short that helicopter, it can be a used helicopter that the company purchases and refurbishes. I¡¯d be really interested in a Hughes 500D.¡±


    The author''s narrative has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.


    Julie smiled at that. ¡°That wouldn¡¯t be a problem. I know where to get one of those at a great price. What¡¯s the other thing?¡±


    ¡°Howie has a no questions asked policy. I¡¯d want the same from you two. This would apply to the procedure and to anything related to my use of the helicopter. As I¡¯ve already mentioned, I won¡¯t be using the helicopter for anything illegal or immoral.¡±


    ¡°I noticed that you¡¯re not making that assertion on the procedure.¡± Terrance answered.


    ¡°No. I can¡¯t. Only certified licensed medical professionals are allowed to perform medical procedures in this county. Although I¡¯ve studied extensively, in my own way, I don¡¯t have a license to practice medicine.¡±


    ¡°Have you ever done anything like this before? Can we talk to someone that can verify your claims?¡± I could tell that I¡¯d gotten Julie¡¯s attention. Terrance was still very skeptical.


    ¡°Why don¡¯t you come down to Hannah¡¯s Home tomorrow morning at eight? There are a few people there that I believe will vouch for my effectiveness.¡±


    Howie and I left the bewildered couple to their day and headed back to Charlotte. On the way, Howie asked, ¡°Can you really get that bullet out of her safely?¡±


    ¡°Yes, I can. Why don¡¯t you come by tomorrow morning as well? I¡¯ve been meaning to talk to you about what I¡¯m doing there. I think that I¡¯m going to need your help finding more donors for my foundation.¡±


    The next morning, I greeted Howie, Julie and Terrance as I came out of the meditation building with a nine-year-old girl. She ran to her parents and I took a moment to talk to them before I waved Julie, Terrance and Howie over.


    After the introductions, I left Julie and Terrance to ask their questions. I¡¯d just finished curing their daughter of cancer and I felt confident that I¡¯d get a strong recommendation. They didn¡¯t have her final test results, but the very fact that she ran to her parents was enough for them. Their daughter had been bedridden for weeks prior to coming here from their home in Alabama.


    I let them talk in private for awhile with the first family before walking them over to speak with my other patient for the week, a young man in his early twenties. He¡¯d come on his own, not wanting to disappoint his mother with a failed hail-Mary cure. Sister Mary had chosen him based on a recommendation of a priest out in Vermont. He¡¯d known the family for generations and the mother had been his parishioner since she was a little girl. Again, I confidently left them to talk to him alone. While he hadn¡¯t needed a wheelchair when he¡¯d arrived, he¡¯d wasn¡¯t far from it. He was walking tall again, if still too gaunt in the face.


    Howie broke off from the discussion and came by to join me. ¡°I¡¯m having trouble believing what they¡¯re telling me, Abby. Did you really cure them of their cancer?¡±


    ¡°Yes. I used a rare medication on them. It¡¯s not approved and I¡¯m only offering it to those that have no other choice. That¡¯s what I need you for. I have two people already looking for potential candidates among the very wealthy and their families. For twenty million dollars in donations to the foundation and fees to me, I¡¯ll provide one cure to them and nineteen other cures to those that can¡¯t afford it. People like the ones that you¡¯ve just met. If I fail to cure them, then there¡¯s no charge. The cure is validated by an independent facility. I have all the paperwork arranged. What I need from you is to let me know if there are any candidates in the off-grid community or even among your customers. I can only take a few donors from you a year and everyone who signs up has to sign a non-disclosure agreement.¡±


    ¡°Do I get a finder¡¯s fee?¡±


    ¡°Two and a half percent of the total. For that kind of money though, you need to seriously vet anyone you bring to me. Don¡¯t bring me mobsters, murderers and thieves.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m in.¡±


    Just then Julie and Terrance came up to us. Julie had a light in her eyes and Terrance looked to have been hit by a truck.


    ¡°When can we start?¡± Julie asked.


    ¡°We can start and finish right now. I¡¯ll just get someone to give Howie and Terrance a tour of Hannah¡¯s Home while we¡¯re occupied.¡±


    Soon, I had left the men in Diane¡¯s capable hands and brought Julie to the Sister Clara¡¯s clinic for a scan. I didn¡¯t need it, as I¡¯d already scanned her yesterday and had my bullet extraction technique all figured out. The scan was for her peace of mind. Showing her a scan of her bullet would add legitimacy to the whole experience for her.


    In anticipation of Julie¡¯s agreement to do the procedure, I¡¯d prepared the scan from memory early this morning when I¡¯d arrived. Having gone through so many different types of imaging over the years, as doctors tried to figure out if they should remove the bullet, she was extremely impressed with the speed of the scan and the ease at which she could understand what she was seeing.


    We had a short discussion as to where she would like the tiny scar that I would leave and she opted for me to put it right next to one of her other scars, so that she could still wear a bathing suit without it showing. Leaving a scar was another thing that I was doing only for show, since there was no way to explain the bullet removal otherwise. I didn¡¯t feel comfortable with leaving her a permanent scar though and so I wouldn¡¯t be cutting through all her dermal layers. I¡¯d make the cut as superficial as I could and still have it be believable. With the addition of some stitches, it should pass muster.


    I gave Julie a pill to swallow and chatted with her for a minute while pretending to get all my instruments in order. She was just finishing telling me about her niece when I sent her to R1. Within five seconds, I had wrapped the bullet in a field and shifted it out to L2. A small nick and three stitches later, I was done. In all, the procedure had taken a minute. I bent down to pick up the bullet in L2 and took it to the sink to wash off and disinfect. Thinking that she¡¯d appreciate the souvenir, I dried it off and put it in a little baggie for her.


    I tidied up and brought her back to reality. ¡°What? How did you get over there? You were just next to me.¡±


    ¡°The pill I gave you has that effect on people. Most patients find it slightly disorienting when they wake up. Anyways, the procedure went perfectly and you¡¯re ready to go. We should go hunting for the men and make sure they¡¯re alright.¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s done? I just lay down a minute ago.¡±


    ¡°Check your stitches.¡± Julie looked down and marveled at the three neat stitches. I swabbed them down with alcohol and covered them with a small bandage for protection. ¡°If the incision gets red and painful, come back and I¡¯ll take care of it. I don¡¯t think it will though. Oh, I almost forgot. This is for you.¡± I handed her the bullet in the baggie and enjoyed her wonder.


    ¡°Just like that?¡±


    ¡°Just like that.¡±


    ¡°I haven¡¯t flown for the past two years because of this thing. I was terrified that I¡¯d have something start to go wrong with my body while I was in the air. The anemia, the gastro-problems, the kidney issues. Will it all go away now?¡±


    ¡°If they were caused by toxicity issues related to lead poisoning from the bullet, then yes. Those symptoms should all disappear as the toxic substance leaves your body. My scans didn¡¯t show anything else wrong with you. I can¡¯t see why you shouldn¡¯t fly as soon as you¡¯re feeling better. It¡¯s probably best to give it a week, just to be sure.¡±


    Julie got off the table and hugged me, tears running down her face. After a bit, we wiped our eyes and went to find Terrance to tell him the good news.

 B3: Chapter 56 - Taken!

    Terrance and Julie insisted that I was ready to test for my license and set up both my written and practical tests for the following week. I passed on my first try and I was added to the company¡¯s liability insurance plan. We had a small celebration in the office and Julie brought me out to a hanger that I¡¯d never been inside before. She unlocked the door and turned on the lights.


    Inside I could see a row of seven helicopters, all gleaming and seemingly ready to fly at a moment¡¯s notice. At the center of the group was a Hughes 500D with the same paint job as TC¡¯s copter from Magnum PI!! Although it was the smallest helicopter of the bunch and by far the least expensive, it was the only one I had eyes for. I ran up to it and looked through the doors at the control panels.


    ¡°Part of our business is to provide hanger space and maintenance services for some of our clients with their own craft. The client that owns that helicopter asked me to find him a buyer that will love it as much as he does. It¡¯s in excellent shape and only has a few thousand hours on it. I have all the maintenance records ready for you, if you¡¯re interested. Terrance and I can arrange for you to use of the company helicopter, just as you asked, or I can get you a deal of lifetime on this one.¡±


    I squeaked in joy and told her that I¡¯d take the deal! Uncle Paul was going to flip out when he saw this and I couldn¡¯t wait to show it to him. Julie brought me down to Earth a bit, explaining that she¡¯d need several weeks to finalize the deal, in which the company would be forgiving a large debt from the old owner in exchange as part of that amazing deal, and to get the papers transferred over. However, she did say that she was allowed to give short test flights to prospective buyers and we took it for a fifteen-minute ride. It was just as wonderful as I¡¯d thought it would be and it took a few days for the constant smile to leave my face.


    Two weeks later, the ¡®Chopper¡¯ was mine and I flew it all around in reality and in the layers. The best part was being able to park it right in front of my house. That was just so cool. I didn¡¯t need a car anymore. Mom needed some milk? No problem, I¡¯ll just fly over to the grocery store and pick up a quart. Once, I even flew it into the store in R3, just because I could. I had to shift into R2 to be able to land on the floor though. I took mom and dad on a ride and although they enjoyed, it wasn¡¯t their thing. On the other hand, Uncle Paul nearly blew a gasket he was so excited. He understood. It was really good to have the mustache and the Chopper reunited again.


    One phone call put an end to the fun and games.


    ¡°Hi Abby, it¡¯s Kevin. Senator Daniel¡¯s daughter was just taken.¡±


    ¡°What happened?¡± I was having breakfast with dad before we went to work and my words caught his attention. He looked up at me, waiting to hear more.


    ¡°Daniels was ordered to vote to kill a bill yesterday. He didn¡¯t and we had agents at his house and at the governor¡¯s house. We had all the manpower we needed. Somehow, someone got in and took her anyways. We still don¡¯t know how it happened. He took her in the few minutes between the senator¡¯s wife waking her up and her going down to breakfast. Can you please call Roger? We could really use his help on this one.¡±


    Kevin sounded defeated and I assured him that I would call Roger right away. Instead of calling myself, I used my phone to log on to the cameras I¡¯d set up in the kid¡¯s rooms. While I waited for the cameras to download the data for the past thirty minutes, I filled dad in on what was going on. He waited with me as the video finally finished downloading.


    ¡°That¡¯s very bad, Abby.¡± Dad voiced my thoughts exactly as we watched, or rather failed to watch, the kidnapping. One moment the little girl coming out of her bathroom, all ready for school, and the next she was gone. Gone. As in no longer there. No longer in reality.


    Someone else had my abilities and they were using them to help human traffickers.


    ¡°Can you run it back again, Abby? To just before she disappears. I thought I saw something.¡±


    This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it


    Dad¡¯s words shook me out of my stunned disbelief. I did as he asked and once I had her back on the video, I advanced it frame by frame. Dad was right. He did see something. In the five frames before the girl disappeared, a man can be seen taking a step towards her. Then they both disappear.


    ¡°He¡¯s not as practiced as you are. You wouldn¡¯t have needed to come back to reality to take her.¡±


    Dad¡¯s brain was moving faster than mine. It took me a few seconds to catch up to what he was saying and I thought about it. ¡°No. It¡¯s not a matter of practice. He either can¡¯t create the connections between layers and sublayers, or he doesn¡¯t know how to do it. He could also have wrapped her in a field and sent her to whatever layer he was in and not even needed the connecting field.¡±


    We both considered the implications of this. Bad Shifter couldn¡¯t do things that I could. That should give me a strong advantage in a confrontation. However, it was never a good idea to underestimate your opponent. He probably had other ways of using the field that I hadn¡¯t even considered. Regardless of his abilities, I would have to hit him fast and hard. The trick was to end the fight before he even had chance to use any of his abilities on me.


    ¡°Abby, I know what I¡¯ve told you about the slippery slope of killing, but in this case, I don¡¯t see that you have any choice. This man cannot be allowed to go free. He is like you, but without your moral compass, your compassion, or your drive to help people. There is no telling how much damage he can do to people¡¯s lives. He is too dangerous. You will need to permanently stop him.¡±


    I heard dad¡¯s words and felt the conviction behind them. Admitting that truth to me was not easy for him and it only served to underscore the seriousness of the situation. I nodded to him in acceptance and started heading out the door when I remembered that I had to get my gear. Shifting to L2, I ran to my room and grabbed my Roger outfit and the rest of my usual gear, including all my medical backpacks. I had no idea what I¡¯d find at the end of my searches and I was determined to be prepared. Before leaving my room, I remembered to grab a diamuby from the shelf. It would have sucked to start my search only to have to come back because I had forgotten the very thing I needed to track the girl.


    Dad was at the front door, waiting to see me off. I shifted back to reality and he gave me a fierce hug and wished me luck. I kissed his cheek and disappeared into L2, where the Chopper was waiting for me. Before I went through my pre-flight checklist, I remembered to call Shauna and ask her to move my morning cancer sessions to tonight. Then, with my gear loaded and the pre-flight checklist verified in record speed, I took off in the direction of Raleigh.


    Once again, Waze was my friend. I clipped in my phone into the holder and set Waze to Raleigh, before connecting the phone to the clip with a field and sending the phone to reality. This allowed me to make sure that I was going in the right direction, without having to make tons of calculations in my head. I simply had to make sure that the dot was heading in the right direction. Fewer distractions meant that I could focus my attention on the pulse-scans that I¡¯d need to use to find the little girl.


    To get a better view of reality as I was flying, I shifted the Chopper to R1. Highway 85 was the main highway linking Charlotte to Greensboro and you have to link to Highway 40 from there to get to Raleigh. However, flying allowed me to take a more direct route over the Routes 49 and 64 and shave over forty miles from the trip. Every minute saved was important because I didn¡¯t know in which direction the girl had been taken and with every passing moment the search sphere was growing.


    With that in mind, I started multi-scanning the area below and in front of me for miles. After a few minutes I realized that I might be making a mistake. If the kidnapper was leaving Raleigh and heading towards Charlotte, then I would miss him entirely, since he would probably use or be directed to use the faster and more heavily used highways, which were all too far for me to scan from my position. Luckily, it was still early enough in my flight that there wasn¡¯t much chance that the kidnapper had reached my position. The girl had been taken less than an hour ago and the drive time to Charlotte from Raleigh was over two hours.


    I corrected my course and soon found the highway I needed. For the next half hour, I sent out my multi-scan out looking for a diamuby like the one in my pocket. I sent out hundred of multi-pulses and found nothing. The idea of having to do this along every direction leading out of Raleigh was daunting. I had severely underestimated the magnitude of the task. A twenty-mile range was extremely impressive, until you realized how many directions you needed to send it out in. Couple this with the limited amount of fuel that the helicopter could hold and I had a situation that was more that slightly depressing. At this point, my best-case scenario was that the kidnapper had holed up someplace in Raleigh until the search died down. Although, that logic fell apart when it occurred to me that a search would never be able to find me and that the kidnapper had my abilities.

 B3: Chapter 57 - Searching

    I called Julie to ask where the best place to refuel in Raleigh was and she suggested using the Signature Services FBO at the Raleigh-Durhman International Airport. Heli-services had an account with them, and Julie told me that I should have them put the fuel on the account. The FBO was to the northwest of Raleigh, almost exactly in between Eva¡¯s dorm and Edgar¡¯s house, and I planned to start searching the city using a grid pattern, starting in the south and working my way up. That way, I¡¯d be near the refueling station by the time I as done and if I didn¡¯t find anything, I would either expand the grid or pick a direction to go in from there. I¡¯d probably need to take a short rest by that point. I could already feel the draining effects of my constant multi-scanning.


    Chopper zigzagged the city, moving up northward with every pass, as I sent out scan after scan and making sure that each scan overlapped with the last so that nothing was missed. Before long, I was hovering above Edgar¡¯s house and my fuel gauge was emptier that full. From there, I headed west to the FBO, shifted Chopper to reality and radioed in my need to refuel. I was directed the appropriate place and I made my way to the pilot¡¯s lounge while the tank was topped off.


    The lounge chairs were very relaxing and I set my alarm to wake me in half an hour. Feeling well rested upon waking, I freshened up and had a snack before signing for the bill and heading out again. Where to go from here? I¡¯d come by way of Charlotte and found nothing on the way. Raleigh had been cleared. I could head south to check out Fayetteville, southeast for Jacksonville and Wilmington, or west to Greensboro and Salem. There wasn¡¯t any reason to go to one over the others, but I needed to go somewhere and start looking.


    Where would I go if I were a scumbag kidnapper? Would I hide in the city or find a hidey-hole somewhere in the middle of nowhere? I¡¯d just hide in the layers and keep my captive in L2. The kidnapper wasn¡¯t as skilled as I was, though, and may not have found L2. If he was only at the sublayer stage, then he would need somewhere to keep his prize and not be noticed by nosy neighbors. A secluded house, like Edgar''s, would be the perfect spot for that; hidden from prying neighbors yet still close enough for groceries and other comforts.


    Thinking of Edgar¡¯s house, I thought back to Edgar''s co-conspirator Phil and the safehouse that I¡¯d found him in. There had been four other safehouses that I had never checked out. Could the kidnapper be using one of those? I didn¡¯t have Edgar¡¯s go-bag with the list in its pocket with me, but had taken a picture of the list and it was still on my phone somewhere. I flipped through my picture album until I found the list and then I entered the four remaining addresses into Waze. Two of them were along the northern limits of the city, in an area that I¡¯d already covered. Another was twenty-five miles further north from Edgar¡¯s house and the fourth was out past the city of Oxford, not too far from the state line shared with Virginia.


    I decided to fly further north and check them out. If the girl wasn¡¯t there, I would start expanding my search grid from there, effectively expanding my prior search grid out by forty or fifty miles in every direction. It only took a few minutes to get back to Edgar¡¯s house and turn north. From there, my first few scans were enough to show me that the kidnapper wasn¡¯t in the closer of the two safehouses and I kept going, flying farther and sending out more multi-scans. Ten minutes later, I was hovering in R1 over the last safehouse with nothing to show for my efforts. Feeling disheartened that my guess had been wrong and dreading the long hours of searching that I saw in my future, I turned east towards Henderson and then south to continue my grid search.


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    Within three multi-scans after turning south, I picked up a diamuby. I had found her! My heart soared and I sent out another scan. She was moving back the way I¡¯d just come and I turned around to follow her. Subsequent scans led me to her and within three minutes, I had the Chopper keeping pace with the white van she was in, as it slowly made its way back to towards the Oxford area and the last safehouse. I had guessed right, but my timing had been off. It seemed that the kidnapper had taken his time and tried to confuse his trail before making his way to his hideout. I had come so close to missing them entirely. I knew that I¡¯d gotten extremely lucky. I definitely needed to up my scanning strength in the future.


    Now that I had the van in my sights, I had enough time to give it a full scan and saw that I wasn¡¯t dealing with one kidnapper. There were three men in the van. Two up front and one in the back. The man in the back was sitting on the second-row bench, keeping an eye on the tied-up girl fastened horizontally on the third-row bench. The girl¡¯s heart rate showed me that she was awake and scared. I gave some serious thought to shifting her to L2 and flying in to pick her up, but I didn¡¯t know the capabilities of the kidnapper and I wanted the element of surprise on my side. Also, if I rescued the girl and failed to stop the kidnappers, there was no way to keep the girl from being kidnapped again.


    The kidnappers reached the safehouse and the one from the back seat carried the girl into the house, while the other two carried their bags inside and made themselves comfortable on the couch. I let out a breath that I didn¡¯t realize I¡¯d been holding when the third man joined the others. I¡¯d been worried that I would have to move-in right away if he stayed to bother the girl.


    Shifting the Chopper to L3, I landed it fifty yards away from the house. In reality, my landing area was densely packed with trees and you couldn¡¯t see it from the house. In L3, it was a clearing. I spend some time getting dressed up as Roger and donning my exosuit. This time I added the Glock that I¡¯d taken from Edgar¡¯s go-back and my trusty baseball bat. The bat was strapped on my back in an oversized sword sheath and the gun was tucked into my pants at the base of my back. By connecting the gun to my base field and shifting it to L1, there was no chance of accidentally shooting myself. These precautions probably wouldn¡¯t be necessary, but I felt badass wearing them.


    Of the three kidnappers, the one from the backseat was the only one with a base field surrounding him. At six feet, four inches in height, he towered over the other men. This was the dragon that I had come to slay. Yet his scrawny build, stooped posture and youth made him seem smaller, almost fragile. He couldn¡¯t have been any older than Mark. After watching him interact with his fellow kidnappers, he looked more like a rabbit among wolves than a dragon. He clearly wasn¡¯t the one in charge and I couldn¡¯t understand why. With his abilities, I¡¯d have thought that he¡¯d be a powerhouse, not a mouse.


    From my vantage point in R1 at the window overlooking the den where the three men were watching TV, I wrapped the two without my ability in an inactive field and watched to see if the mouse would notice. I gave him five minutes and when he didn¡¯t bat an eye, I wrapped the girl in a field and shifted her to L2. Her safety was my first priority. Tall, dark and mousy didn¡¯t notice that either and I went over to the girl¡¯s room and carried her back to the Chopper. She wasn¡¯t back with her parents yet, but she was safe. I was halfway done. Now I just had to go back into the safehouse, incapacitate the thugs and kill the dragon. Except that the dragon wasn¡¯t a dragon. He wasn¡¯t even wolf or a husky.

 B3: Chapter 58 - An Epic Battle?

    Back at the window, I debated whether it would be more impactful to shift mouse boy away to L2 first or the thugs. The first would shock mouse boy, the second would terrify him and then shock him. I chose to terrify him. It also had the added bonus of not having to worry about what the thugs might do while I was taking care of mouse boy in L2.


    Mouse boy, whom I decided to dub Mickey for obvious reasons, was still glued to the boob-tube as his fellow kidnappers disappeared. I wondered what he was watching with such interest that he could fail to notice that his two comrades weren¡¯t there anymore. Perhaps it was a rerun of Baywatch. Uncle Paul had sure seemed captivated by that show. While I waited for him to notice that he was all alone, I shifted the white van that the kidnappers had come in to L2. If Mickey decided to make a break for it, I didn¡¯t want to have to chase him down.


    With a few unexpected minutes to think about my strategy, I thought of one more thing that I could do to tip the scales in my favor, especially now that I was trying to get his attention. With as much subtlety as I could muster, I carefully wrapped Mickey in an inactive field. He really was clueless. He just continued watching his show, oblivious to everything. I considered activating the field and shifting him to one of the layers, but in the end decided to let my original plan play out.


    A commercial break finally brought him out of his stupor and he blearily looked around. Confusion marred his features as he saw that he was alone and he called out for his companions. When no one answered his call, he got up and started looking for them. He searched the whole house, not a very long task, and ended up in front of the room where the girl had been kept. He slowly opened the door, perhaps expecting the men to be in their amusing themselves with the girl, and froze when he found that it was empty.


    ¡°No, no, no, no, no¡­¡± Mickey began to panic and he ran for the front door. I realized that with the van gone, he¡¯d assume that they left him. That conclusion wasn¡¯t what I was trying to achieve, so I shifted the van back before he could get to the door. I was going to disable the car before realizing that one of the thugs had been driving and still had the key in his pocket in L2.


    Mickey opened the front door and saw the van. Instead of the terror I¡¯d expected, he sunk to the floor, knees bent to meet his chest, and covered his face as he started to cry. What. The. Hell? I had no clue what was going on. My mind and body were keyed up, having come here expecting an epic fight with someone who could shift between planes of existence. I had pictured a cat and mouse game of shifting between layers and hurling fields, as each of us tried to get the upper hand and find a way to kill the other. This wasn¡¯t at all what I¡¯d expected. This was just¡­pathetic. Mickey was already beaten and I hadn¡¯t done anything to him yet. I could kill him right now with a thought.


    The crying tapered off and Mickey spoke into empty air. ¡°I know you¡¯re out there. Watching. They know about you. I¡¯ve heard them talking and they want to catch you and control you. They know your weaknesses.¡± That didn¡¯t sound good. Who is ¡®they¡¯? What weaknesses? Was Mickey implying that he was being controlled? How?


    ¡°Please. Whoever you are, I need your help. You¡¯ve taken the girl and they¡¯re going to blame me for it. They¡¯re going to think that I¡¯ve betrayed them and they¡¯re going to put my sister to work in the house. She¡¯s fifteen. She won¡¯t survive. She¡¯ll die, just like all the others.¡± Mickey lost control again and tears made their way down his face again. Was I really feeling sorry for this guy? A few hours ago he¡¯d kidnapped a little girl and I was feeling pity for him? Her parents were probably going out of their minds with worry and this guy was the reason.


    That thought reminded me that I needed to let Kevin know that the girl was safe. I quickly typed out a text and shifted the phone to reality for it to send. ¡°Roger sent me a message saying that the girl is safe and unharmed. He said he¡¯d drop her off later.¡± Once I knew more about Mickey¡¯s sister, I¡¯d see about calling him with more details.


    I walked outside and reappeared in reality twenty feet from Mickey. His body jerked in surprise and he tried to scramble back, only his back was already against the door frame and there was nowhere to go. Dressed all in black with a hood covering my head and a mask over my face, I must have seemed terrifying to him as I blinked into existence. I shifted away and then reappeared again. This time, I was ten feet away from him. He visibly paled and I knew that I had his full attention.


    ¡°Tell me who ¡®they¡¯ are.¡± Roger¡¯s voice didn¡¯t boom out the mask, but it was loud in secluded forest area.


    Mickey took a moment to get hold of himself before answering. ¡°I don¡¯t know the people in charge. I¡¯m too low down. The guys that were here before, Randy and Jerry, get their instructions and we have to follow them. The organization is the Master Typhon Collective and they¡¯re based out in Fayetteville. Everyone thinks they¡¯re some sort of hippy farming commune that follows the ways of an ancient dragon god. That¡¯s just a front. They¡¯re traffickers. They kidnap people and force them into prostitution or use them for physical labor.¡±


    This was the third group that Len had sold women to. MTC. Despite my excitement at finally knowing what those letters stood for, I kept my voice even and continued asking my questions. ¡°How did you start working for them?¡±


    ¡°My parents were killed in a car accident when I was seventeen. My sister, Shari was only ten at the time. We don¡¯t have any family that could have taken us in and protective services wanted to put us in foster care and split us up. Before they could do that, I took Shari and we ran away. We were surviving on the streets for six months before Randy and his gang found us. When the came to grab us, I tried to protect Shari, but everything became grey and they went right through me. It only lasted a few seconds and when it ended, Randy had Shari and three guys tackled me and tied me up. Since then, Randy¡¯s been using the threat of hurting my sister to keep me working for them. They keep her confined in the basement of their compound. I can¡¯t phase into the room, since it¡¯s underground and even if I could get in, there¡¯s no way for me to get her out. They let me spend an hour talking to her every day. I¡¯m on the main level and we talk through a trapdoor they build in the floor to lower food down to her. If I don¡¯t agree to do what they say, they¡¯ll send her to a house at the edge of their property where women are forced to be sex slaves. I can¡¯t let that happen to her.¡±


    ¡°How long have you been kidnapping people for them?¡±


    ¡°Two years. Before that they had me stealing things for them while I learned to control my phasing. I still can¡¯t understand why sometimes I can phase through doors and sometimes I can¡¯t.¡±


    Wow. He really didn¡¯t understand his abilities at all. He could get into R1 and R2, but he still had no control over which one he ended up in. Given his description of the room they kept his sister in, he¡¯d never made it to R3. I wondered what would happen if I shifted him to one of the layers. It had taken him five years to get to his low level of understanding and control. If I stranded him in L1, he¡¯d die of thirst before he could figure out how to get back.


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    Mickey continued, ¡°Once I managed to stay in phase for a whole minute, Randy¡¯s bosses decided that it was enough time to slip into a house and kidnap someone. They use me as a threat to make powerful people do what they want. Most of these powerful people end up agreeing after I drop off an envelope in a supposedly secure area that no one should have been able to get into. The key is that the Typhon people don¡¯t ask for too much and it¡¯s easier for their victims to follow their few instructions than to fight them. I¡¯ve only had to kidnap four kids so far. Five with this little girl. Each time, Randy, Jerry and I hold onto the kid for a few days and then I bring them back to their rooms. Their parents always fall in line or step down after that. The whole thing is kept very quiet and the FBI doesn¡¯t have to get involved.¡±


    I kept Mickey talking, telling me everything he knew about MTC¡¯s operations. Mickey was able to give me their address in Fayetteville, the layout of their compound and a description of what was in each building. He also gave me the addresses of some of MTC¡¯s businesses that weren¡¯t associated with MTC at all. When I squeezed him for the details of his kidnapping, Mickey pulled out his phone and listed off not only the addresses of the places where he kidnapped children, but also the addresses where he dropped off envelopes. Kevin could use the information to reassure those politicians that the threat had been dealt with.


    ¡°What did you mean when you said they know about me? What weaknesses do they know about?¡±


    ¡°They know that someone with the same abilities as me took down their operations in Wilmington and in Raleigh. In Wilmington you killed the guards in the basement cells without opening the steel reinforced door. The police needed thirty minutes to get that door open. You also crippled the people there without being seen. In Raleigh, you tied up all the guards and the president and none of them saw you. They know that you¡¯re out there hunting for them. They¡¯re scared of you and they either want you dead or working for them.


    Once they realized they were dealing with someone like me, their security chief, Andrew Frein, came to ask me all sorts of questions. He spent hours interrogating me, finding out what I could and couldn¡¯t do. They know that our abilities aren¡¯t useful underground, if they can somehow block off the entrances and exits and trap us there. Andrew also figured out that our ability is useless in the air. Even if we used our abilities and phased through a plane, we¡¯d still fall to our deaths.¡±


    Mickey kept talking about ¡®our abilities¡¯, as if I was merely a slightly stronger version of himself. I didn¡¯t disabuse him of that notion. If the bad guys thought that all I could do was disappear and move through walls, then so much the better for me. Being below ground did present some problems in using by abilities, like when I couldn¡¯t save the miners myself because the rock existed in all the layers, but short of being trapped in a mine, I had a few ways to get by just fine underground. As for airplanes and helicopters, I had my trusty backpack parachute on, in L3, anytime that I left the ground.


    One bright spot in Mickey¡¯s answers was that it didn¡¯t seem that the leaders of MTC had found the Roger name yet from the FBI files or the police files. That was really good news. On the other hand, it was possible that they did know, yet hadn¡¯t seen the need to tell Mickey about it. I know that I was keeping things from him.


    While these thoughts were going through my mind, Mickey gave me a pleading look and asked again, ¡°Will you help free my sister? I don¡¯t care what you do to me, as long as you get her away from them.¡±


    I¡¯d already decided to save his sister and any other victims at the MTC ranch. The only thing holding me back now was deciding what I should do with Mickey. Dad had pretty much given me the go-ahead to kill him based on his potential level of danger. Now that I¡¯d gotten to know him, I felt that the only way he¡¯d be a danger to anyone was if someone evil, like the people at MTC, had a hold over him. I didn¡¯t think that he deserved to die. Whereas I¡¯d been lucky enough to discover my powers without anyone noticing, his powers had effectively outed him in front of a human trafficking ring. He never had a chance.


    Despite my feelings of pity for Mickey, I couldn¡¯t let him continue to be a threat, even a weak one. When I¡¯d made plans to deal with the possibility that Ben would be born with a field, I¡¯d explored the ideas of field detection, suppression and elimination. For Mickey, I needed to see if my ideas for field elimination would work. I really hoped they did, because he seemed like a decent fellow and I¡¯d hate to kill him.


    ¡°It¡¯s a deal. I¡¯ll free your sister and bring her to you and in exchange you need to do something for me.¡±


    ¡°Anything!¡± Relief flooded his features and I though he¡¯d start crying again. Thankfully, he took a deep breath and got control of himself.


    ¡°Ok. I need you to hold still for a minute.¡± I walked up to him and crouched down, placing my gloved hand on his shoulder. To his credit, he didn¡¯t flinch, but it was a close thing. I could see his discomfort with my being so close to him.


    As soon as my hand touched his shoulder, I began trying to hack into his base field. I¡¯d never been able to remove mine, but that didn¡¯t mean I couldn¡¯t remove his. First, I had to connect our fields. That in itself was something new, as I¡¯d only ever connected fields that I controlled. Connecting to something that you can¡¯t feel is very challenging and I ended up having to use brute force and guesswork. Knowing how my base field hugged my skin, I jammed a needle-fine protrusion of my field down into his shoulder and then brought it back like a sewing needle. This created a loop that crossed through his field at two points. Like I¡¯d done when I¡¯d first gone into L1 and gotten stuck, I sent power into one point where our fields crossed while simultaneously pulling power out of the other point. Immediately, his field started to change frequency and he shifted to L1. Knowing what as happening, I stayed with him and saw as his eyes took in the change to his reality.


    With my power flowing through his field, I could sense it now and I used it to shift us both back to reality. Within a few more seconds, I was sending out pulse-scans using his field and sending out other fields from his to surround the van and some trees. As I prepared for the final step, I marveled that Mickey couldn¡¯t feel any of this happening.


    Taking a deep breath and praying that this would work, I stopped feeding power into one end of the field, yet I continued pulling power from the other end. I felt his base field weaken significantly and it felt thinner in my mind. I kept pulling power and suddenly realized that Mickey was passing out. He may not have been able to feel the changes to his field, but the power draw was draining him of his energy. If I kept up drawing the power from his field, he¡¯d eventually die. As that wasn¡¯t my goal, I stopped drawing the power out of his field and switched to drawing the field itself away from his, just as I would remove a field from anything else.


    The field held in place and I pulled harder, drawing it to me with more and more power. Even though the field was insubstantial, I almost overbalanced when I felt it start to give. Slowly, very slowly, his field retracted from his body and was absorbed by my field. It seemed to take forever until every last bit of it was gone from him and he was unconscious when it was done. I scanned to see if he was ok and felt relief when I saw that he was only in an exhausted sleep.


    I shifted us both to L2 and sat down heavily on the ground. I felt relieved and confused and horrible and elated, all at the same time. I¡¯d found a way to keep Mickey alive, but I¡¯d had to rip his powers out of him to do it. I¡¯d read many stories of superheroes losing their powers or willingly giving them up for a normal life and they always bothered me. I couldn¡¯t understand how a person could live an ordinary life after having lived with the extraordinary. It this case, I¡¯d stolen that life from Mickey and it seemed an evil thing to have done to him. Yes, he was alive. I just didn¡¯t think he¡¯d thank me for it when he woke up.

 B3: Chapter 59 - Promises to Keep

    Regardless of my feelings, I still had work to do. I¡¯d made a deal with Mickey to save his sister and I also had to get the little girl home to her parents. Getting back on my feet, I went back to the bring the helicopter closer. I had some thugs to load up into it.


    It wasn¡¯t long before I had the girl, Mickey and the two thugs strapped in their seats. Before I took off though, I shifted the van to L2. It was in good shape and I might come in handy one day. I¡¯d gotten an idea of how I could make it mine without leaving a trail back to me and if it panned out, I was going to do the same thing with Edgar¡¯s cars.


    Given the extra weight of four people in the Chopper, I worried that I¡¯d need to refuel in Fayetteville. I didn¡¯t want to do that and leave an ¡®Abby trail¡¯ for someone to follow and connect me to Roger. I was proud of myself when I came up with the idea to connect my four passengers to the Chopper with fields and then shift them to L2. This way, as long as the Chopper wasn¡¯t in L2, they¡¯d be carried along without the weight penalty. I was effectively treating them like my backpacks!


    Flight time to Fayetteville was fifty-two minutes and Waze took me directly to the MTC cult ranch. Mickey¡¯s description of the place was precise enough that I had no troubles in figuring out which building Shari was in. The large compound was surrounded by miles of fencing and only a modest house and the guard shack by the gate were visible from the road. The rest of the buildings were set well back and out of prying eyes. I landed next to a long, two story, stone building that would have looked at home on a university campus. Here though, it seemed out of place. Surrounded by more modest wooden houses and buildings, it came off feeling like a fortress. According to Mickey, Shari was being held in the basement level and I scanned the building to find her.


    I found Shari lying down on her bed, reading a book, and I could also see why Mickey had no chance of rescuing her. Her room, with an attached full bathroom, was at the end of a row of rooms and had been blocked off from the rest of basement with two feet of poured concrete. Without access to R3, the only access to the room was through a three-foot by three-foot wooden trapdoor in the ceiling that her captors had installed. In the ceiling, directly above the trapdoor, was a welded eye-bolt with a one-inch-thick rope attached to it. Currently, that rope was tied off to the side with a tray attached to its end. The tray would carry down food or books to her.


    Not content with simply imprisoning her, Shari was also under constant surveillance. Two cameras covered the room and the only privacy that she was given was when she used the bathroom. However, even that was limited, as the bathroom door had been removed and it seemed that one of the cameras could see at least partway inside.


    Examining the data from my scan, I found that Shari¡¯s room wasn¡¯t the only place under surveillance. The entire building was wired up with seventy-nine cameras. Most were visible, with only a handful being the hidden kind. Additionally, I could see that the whole building was wired with explosives, just like the Basilisk building. Surprisingly, Shari¡¯s room had no explosives in it. Maybe they build the concrete wall before they added the explosives and didn¡¯t bother with her room, figuring that if they had to set off the explosives, then it was sufficient for Shari to be buried alive in her room.


    The rest of the basement wasn¡¯t empty of bombs or of people. Like Serpentine, the lower level was reserved for transient slaves. They were delivered to MTC individually or in small groups and made ready to go out to their final customers. The Agora website that Basilisk had used had been shut down, but I wasn¡¯t na?ve enough to believe that it hadn¡¯t popped up under a different name within twenty-four hours. Shutting down places like this only put a minor dent in the human trafficking network.


    Before I could get Kevin to come clean out this nest of slavers, I would have to disarm all the bombs. Leaving Shari to continue with her reading, I walked around and scanned all the buildings on the property, as well as the land itself. Pearl Dragon had used underground tunnels and I wouldn¡¯t put it past these Typhon people to do it as well. Just to be sure, I scanned out one-hundred yards beyond their fence line. What I found was disturbing.


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    Of the eight other buildings in the compound, three were wired with explosives. The ones that weren¡¯t wired were all typical farm buildings like barns, sheds, and silos, as well as the house that was visible from the road. Besides the fortress, the two large barracks style buildings and one southern style mansion were ready to be destroyed at the push of a button.


    The barracks buildings were where MTC housed their slave labor; men in one building and women in the other. Beside each bed were a set of shackles bolted to the walls, ensuring that none of the slaves could escape in the night. Every bed also had an old-style chamber pot beside it so that the guards wouldn¡¯t have to take anyone to the bathrooms at night.


    While the men worked the farm, the women were put to work in the mansion as prostitutes. Although it was only shortly after one o¡¯clock in the afternoon, almost a dozen of the women were busy. Of the sixty female captives, some of whom were in the barracks sleeping and waiting for their shift, one third were teenagers. My blood boiled at the injustice of it all and I wanted to free them all immediately. The only thing that stopped me was the knowledge that if I acted without caution, not only would those in charge of MTC get away, but they¡¯d set off their explosives before I could get everyone out. I had to take this slowly, making sure that everything came together properly before I could free these people.


    My scan of the underground was interesting. Connected to the basement of the fortress building by a fifty-foot-long tunnel was an large bunker. Given the undisturbed state of the ground above it, this bunker was probably a holdover from the cold war days. Unlike it¡¯s modest beginnings as a sparse shelter from a nuclear attack, the bunker was tricked out like a New York City penthouse, complete with high ceilings, hardwood floors, a stainless-steel kitchen, and spectacular views from massive floor-to-ceiling monitor screens. Four people were living in the bunker, three men and a woman, and each had their own room. I watched as one of them used a keypad to open the door and made his way to the fortress. The entire tunnel was lined with explosives. If the compound was raided, the FBI wouldn¡¯t be able to get to them once that tunnels was blown. Those still inside the bunker would be able to slip away by crawling through a small escape tunnel on the other side of the bunker. This tunnel led hundreds of yards under the compound and come up in a storm drain that ran under the road. From there, they could make there way walking along the ditch beside the road until they were well out of sight of the authorities.


    I was amazed at the lengths these people had taken to cover their tracks. I supposed that having watched their two other operations get taken down over the past few years had instilled in them a strong sense of paranoia. It did my heart good to know that my actions had forced these people into a prison of their own making. Even though it was a really nice prison, it was still a prison.


    Besides the bedrooms, kitchen, and living area, the bunker also had offices for each of the residents, and a vault room. Unlike the floor safes or walk-in-vaults that I¡¯d seen at Serpentine and Basilisk, this vault room was set up to protect against someone with my abilities. Well, more like someone with Mickey¡¯s abilities. The vault was lined with racking and every shelf on the rack had a pressure plate that was wired to a switch that would activate explosives if the weight above was changed without having inputted the proper passcode into a keypad. Mickey wouldn¡¯t have been able to bypass this system, even if he could have gotten in. I, on the other hand, could simply send all the racks to L2.


    Even with my limited ability to see the details of all the items with my field, I could still make out that the racks were full of the kind of things a wealthy collector would own. Artworks, bottles of wine, jewelry, antique coins, and rare leather-bound books. I¡¯d never seen the point of spending so much money on things and then hiding them away. For me, money was a resource to be used to help you achieve your goals. Owning rare stuff wasn¡¯t one of my goals.


    Like their co-conspirators, the MTC people also kept a stash of cash on hand and paper files. I would need to come back for it later, once I¡¯d secured enough duffel bags to put it all in. That was for later though. Now that I¡¯d searched the compound, it was time to get started on cleaning it up.

 B3: Chapter 60 - Clean Up

    The first step was getting Kevin over to the Fayetteville area with a large team that could swoop in and save the day. For that, I needed to gather up some evidence and show them what was going on here. Carefully placing my cameras in R1, in places where MTC¡¯s cameras couldn¡¯t have been able to record me if I were in reality, I had them download their video to the Roger¡¯s Dropbox account. The cameras recorded the chained men and women in their barracks, the women in the mansion and some of the men working in the fields. My timing was excellent as I even managed to record a fertilizer delivery van come in and deliver five more captives to the loading dock of the fortress building. I got good pictures of the driver, his license plate, and the car¡¯s registration certificate that I¡¯d found in the glove compartment.


    Disarming the bombs was much more problematic. I was able to follow the wiring to the main controller, but I knew nothing about bombs and how they could be set off. Would the bombs go off if I sent the main controller to L2 and they lost their connection to it? Because I couldn¡¯t be sure, I would have to wrap all of the bombs in their own fields and try to shift them to L2 simultaneously. Last year, I couldn¡¯t handle twenty fields at once. This time I would need to shift fifty of them. I¡¯d practiced a lot over the past year, specifically for this kind of a situation. However, I¡¯d never gone as high as fifty.


    Complicating the matter further, my solution from last year of sending an entire building into L2 wasn¡¯t a good option in this case because there were four buildings that I¡¯d need to send away at once and too many people would witness what I¡¯d done. Last time I¡¯d only taken that chance because the building was about to explode with people in it. Now, I had the luxury of finding a better solution.


    While my subconscious mind worked on the problem, I found an out of the way spot and called Kevin. I gave him a summary of the situation and told him to check out the Dropbox videos. I instructed him to make his way to Fayetteville with a large, well armed team and I gave him the address. Before I hung up, I cautioned him to call me when he was ten miles out, as I hadn¡¯t managed to disarm the bombs yet.


    The trick to disarming the bombs was that they all had to go at once. My issue was that my mind couldn¡¯t keep track and control so many individual fields. I wondered if there was a way to use my pulse scan to find all the bombs and wrap them all in active L2 fields as it found them. I wrapped one of the bombs in a field and sent out a pulse scan to look for more. Forty bombs showed up. What happened to the other ten? I compared my field scans to the pulse scans and found that ten of the bombs, the ones in the men¡¯s barracks used a different explosive compound and were configured differently. I tried my scan again, this time only looking for the detonators. Now my count showed ninety-four detonators. What??!! How had I missed so many bombs? I checked my field scans of the compound and realized that I¡¯d forgotten about the bombs in the tunnel leading to the bunker, the bombs in the vault, and the box of twenty excess detonators that were kept in the bunker. I spent the next few minutes carefully scanning the entire compound again, including empty fields and forested land, just to be sure that I didn¡¯t forget or miss any other explosive materials.


    My pulse scan was created by connecting a brief flash of an inactive reality field to a specific object. What would happen if I used a brief flash of an inactive R1 field or and active one? The inactive R1 field should just surround the object and do nothing. The active R1 field should send the object to R1. I was about to try it on the detonators, when I realized how stupid that would be. Instead, I tried it on some of the cash that I had in my backpack. I took out five twenty-dollar bills and set them out. With no wind in L2, I didn¡¯t have to worry about them flying away. I wrapped one in a field and sent out a very low power regular scan that barely went out ten feet. The scan found the four other bills. I tried another scan, this time with an inactive R1 field. Sure enough, all four of the other bills were in fields, ready to be sent to R1. I removed the fields and tried the scan a third time, this time with an active R1 field. Success! All four bills were automatically shifted to R1. It was great having a better understanding of my power. It allowed me to cut way down on the trial-and-error portion of my life.


    I tried the pulse scans again using L1 and L2 fields, until I felt that I was ready for the real thing. I put my twenties back in my backpack and wrapped one of the excess detonators in a field. I was about to send out my active L2 pulse when I remembered that the control board might send out a warning of some kind to the people in the bunker. I couldn¡¯t get rid of it first, because that might set off the bombs, so I decided to get rid of it immediately after my pulse. I counted to three in my head and sent out my pulse.


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    All the detonators in the compound disappeared in one shot and a second later the control board followed them to L2. I held my breath, waiting to see if anyone had noticed or been alerted to the change. Everyone continued with their day. I sent out a field scan to each of the building with bombs and the only sign there was of my actions were some loose wires that were no longer connected to detonators. Most of those wires were in the ceilings or walls, so the loose wire wasn¡¯t visible. In the basement however, the ceiling was open and I had to shift the loose wired to L2.


    I still had time before Kevin could get here so I borrowed some paper from one of the offices in the fortress and drew a crude map of the compound, showing where all twenty-four guards were and where all the prisoners were kept. As much as I could, I added in distances and patrol routes. I took a picture of my handiwork and sent it on to Kevin once I was in a secluded place again. I let him know that I could turn off the power to the compound before he arrived, or I could shut down the camera and security system if he needed me to.


    Kevin called when he was ten minutes out and I assured him that the bombs were disabled. He got his men into position and I disabled the perimeter security system and cameras for one minute while his men climbed the fence and got into position. The guards were slow to react to the glitch in their system and by the time they started to take notice, the system was back up and running. It¡¯s amazing what you can do by sending one vital control box into R1 for a bit.


    Kevin¡¯s raid was over in fifteen minutes. His men had the guard stunned and tied up before most of them could draw their weapons. While Kevin and his men were busy, I wasn¡¯t sitting idle. I disabled the two cameras in Shari¡¯s cell and shifted her to L2. I also shifted everything in the vaults to L2 and five expensive looking cars that were in the visitor¡¯s parking lot outside of the mansion. I didn¡¯t know which customers they belonged to, so I just shifted all the car keys that I found in their pockets to L2. I¡¯d sort them out later.


    Just prior to the raid, I¡¯d taken the precaution of cutting all the phone and security system lines to the bunker. As a result, while the raid was happening, no one in the bunker was alerted. The first inkling of danger they received was a loud knock on the door and an order to come out by order of the FBI. All four of the occupants raced for the back exit and I let them go. Kevin had a team waiting to take them as they exited the storm drain. I shifted to reality inside the bunker and started copying their server and personal computer files. The FBI could have the servers once I had my own copy and once I used some of Howie¡¯s special software to delete any information concerning their bank accounts. Howie¡¯s software wiped the information in a way that left the FBI no way in which to retrieve it.


    When my copies were made, I punched in the code to open the bunker door and shifted away to R1. Besides collecting my loot, my work was almost done. Back at the Chopper, I unloaded the two thugs and carried them to the trapdoor above Shari¡¯s room. Making sure that none of the agents were around, I shut down the cameras in the area and opened the trapdoor. Without fanfare, I dropped them down the hole. They were in L2 so they didn¡¯t get hurt at all. It was fast and it didn¡¯t require me to carry them down to the basement. It was one of those win-win situations.


    I retrieved Shari from her room and walked her through the concrete wall and up to the Chopper. I shifted her to R1 and placed her comfortably in the seat next to her brother. One more trip into the fortress netted me two boxes of Shari¡¯s things and I was able to leave the senator¡¯s daughter in one of the rooms upstairs. I texted Kevin where to find her and waited until he was just outside her door to bring her back to reality. I had planned on bringing he back to Hannah¡¯s Home, but this solution was much better for everyone involved. Having the girl be rescued at the compound would connect MTC with her kidnapping and ensure that the senator would help the FBI deal with anyone trying to lessen the charges against MTC¡¯s executives.


    I flew the Chopper halfway back to Charlotte in L2 before shifting to reality. My two passengers were safely in L1 when I made my phone call.


    ¡°Hi Shauna. Did Kevin call you about the raid in Fayetteville?¡±


    ¡°Diane and I are on the way already. We have the rest of the crew coming down in the bus. I tried to reach you to let you know about it. Check your messages.¡±


    ¡°I was just taking the Chopper for a spin and was a little busy when you called. Anyways, Roger called me and told me all about it. He says that there¡¯s over a hundred survivors there. You might need to charter another bus. I¡¯m heading to Fayetteville right now and I should be there in twenty minutes. I¡¯ll meet you guys there.¡±

 B3: Chapter 61 - Wonder Woman

    With a drive time of over two and half hours, but a flight time of only twenty minutes, Shauna asked me to pick her and Diane up along the way so that they could start getting everything organized. Ten minutes later, having taken a few moments to shed by Roger outfit, I was landing in a field and Shauna opened the door with a huge grin.


    ¡°I love your new toy!¡±, she said as she helped Diane strap in and get ready for takeoff. ¡°I haven¡¯t been on one of these since I left the army. Thanks for picking us up.¡± We bumped fists as she took her seat up front with me.


    Diane, not having ever been in a helicopter, was uncharacteristically quiet. In deference of her fear, I brought us up gently and took longer than usual to get us up to speed. Fifteen minutes of flying brought us to the MTC ranch and after checking in with Kevin, we landed not too far from where I¡¯d landed before.


    Kevin met us as soon as I¡¯d powered the Chopper down and took Shauna and Diane over to the barracks to meet with the survivors right away, while I finished up my shutdown checklist. As Mickey had mentioned, my abilities wouldn¡¯t do me any good if something failed in the helicopter and so I wouldn¡¯t cut any corners with the safety standards of the helicopter.


    Despite my being a few minutes late to the party, there wasn¡¯t any shortage of work for me. Soon, I was helping Shauna, Diane and a group of five FBI agents get the survivors sorted out and finding out where they were from, how they had gotten taken and if they had anyone that they needed to reach out to. It was a long process, with many of the survivors still being shellshocked from their sudden change in status. No longer were they slaves or property. They were free people again, with names and families and lives to get back to.


    Organizing the survivors would have been much harder without the help of the natural leaders among the survivors that had been instrumental in keeping their fellow captives sane and as safe as possible over the years. For the women, that person was Marta, a woman of eastern European decent, with strong features and even stronger arms. Her strength had kept her at MTC, working the fields with the men, long after most other women who aged out of working in the house were shipped off to other facilities or simply killed off. She knew every one of her fellow survivors, knew their stories, their fears, and their shame. She was the one that helped them stay sane. She helped them stay focused on the day that they would be free again.


    Her counterpart for the men was Danny, a wiry African-American man from Cleveland. The son of a pastor, he used God¡¯s words to ease the degradations of the field and the house and kept many of the men from killing themselves. He gave them hope and reminded them that someday the Lord would set them free, just as the Israelites had been freed from their slavery.


    As the hours went by, time and again I would see these two celebrating with their fellow survivors or sitting with those that couldn¡¯t stop crying. When the rest of the Hannah Foundation crew arrived, Marta and Danny stood alongside them to hand out blankets and food. They helped set up an orderly rotation for the showers in the fortress building and handed out the toiletries and new clothes that the foundation had brought.


    However, their hard work that day was eclipsed by their presentation to Shauna and Keven of a stack of papers, covered from top to bottom, with thousands of license plate numbers. Over the years, the slaves had kept a careful watch out and had secretly recorded the license plate of every car and truck that had entered the facility. Next to each plate, they¡¯d marked off if it was owned by a customer, an employee or a ¡®delivery¡¯ truck that brought in or took out slaves. If they¡¯d known the name of the customer or employee, they¡¯d included that as well. Many of the plate numbers had stars next to them, indicating how violent and sadistic the customer had been. The slaves kept duplicates of these lists hidden in several places around the ranch, often in the offices of the very people that were keeping them as slaves.


    Kevin gratefully took the list from them and had his team start running the plates. The list would allow the FBI to take down every aspect of the MTC network, including their customers.


    Somewhere in the midst of all this organized chaos, Senator Daniels and his wife showed up to pick up Renni. It was strange to think that it was only this morning that she¡¯d been taken. Renni had only been away from her parents for a total of seven hours, yet the joy of their reunion was no less than if she¡¯d been gone for years. When Renni was finally allowed to breathe, Kevin was given fierce hugs by her grateful parents and thanked profusely. Looking very embarrassed, Kevin quickly accepted their thanks and brought them over to meet with Shauna, Marta and Danny to help to them the horrors of human trafficking. Having a sitting U.S. senator and his wife become better acquainted with the good work that the FBI and Hannah Foundation were doing on behalf of the survivors wasn¡¯t an opportunity to be squandered.


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    Hours later, the last of the survivors had been loaded up on our chartered buses and they began their trip back to Hannah¡¯s Home. Diane and Shauna left on the buses with their new charges and I flew back ahead of them. With almost the entire staff away, I had the perfect opportunity to sneak Shari and her brother Mickey into one of the back cabins without being noticed.


    I lay them each down in their own rooms and shifted them to reality. Both were still asleep and while I waited for them to wake up, I brought in the boxes of Shari¡¯s things. Shari woke up first and I had to take her over to her brother¡¯s room to prove to her that I wasn¡¯t one of her captors. Letting her open the door and look outside helped as well. She hadn¡¯t been outdoors for almost five years. When she calmed somewhat, I explained to her where she was and told her that Roger had brought her and her brother here. I explained that he often rescued people from captivity and that we at the foundation helped them get their lives back. Shari was amazed that she could have been rescued without even realizing it.


    Mickey woke up a half hour later and I learned that his real name was Jeremy. He was overjoyed to see his sister freed and had lots of questions. As I¡¯d done with his sister, I brought him up to speed.


    ¡°Roger wanted me to give you a message. I don¡¯t know what it means, but he said that you would. He said to tell you, ¡°You¡¯re normal now. Better luck this time.¡±


    I watched Jeremy¡¯s face turn from confusion to realization and he and Shari shared a look that I couldn¡¯t interpret. Sensing that they needed some time to digest this new revelation, I told them that I had to register this cabin as occupied before everyone else got there and that I¡¯d be back soon to give them a tour of the facility.


    I closed the door behind me as I left and shifted to R2 to get back inside without being noticed. Eavesdropping isn¡¯t very nice, but I had to know how Jeremy felt about losing his powers. I wasn¡¯t expecting to hear Jeremy laughing and literally jumping for joy.


    ¡°It¡¯s gone! I can¡¯t phase anymore. Oh my God! Thank you, Roger!¡±


    ¡°Are you sure, Jeremy? You know how much trouble you have controlling it.¡±


    ¡°No Shari, I¡¯m sure. Even though I couldn¡¯t control it well, I got to the point where I could turn it on with a thought. There¡¯s nothing anymore. I¡¯m normal again. Just like Roger said.¡± Jeremy said this last part with awe in his voice.


    ¡°Are you sure that you¡¯re not going to miss it?¡±


    ¡°Not even a little bit. The only good thing about it was that I was able to keep you out of that house. For that, I¡¯ll always be grateful for having the power. Other than that, it was awful. I always thought that having powers would be cool. This power though was tailor made for a villain or some sort of vigilante. There¡¯s no way to use it for good. It could turn you into an excellent thief or kidnapper or assassin. I¡¯m sure that eventually MTC would have tried to have me use it to murder someone. I don¡¯t know what I would have done, if they had. Now, no one can force me to do those things again. I feel free for the first time in years!¡±


    ¡°What about this Roger guy? How did he get rid of your power? Is he the guy MTC was so scared of?¡±


    ¡°Oh yeah, he¡¯s the guy. I have no clue how he got rid of my powers. He¡¯s very creepy and scary like you wouldn¡¯t believe. He has the power and he knows how to fully control it. You should have seen how easy it was for him to phase in and out. When he talked to me, I felt like I was being interrogated by a pissed-off Batman. I don¡¯t think that we should talk to anyone about his abilities. No one would believe us anyways. More importantly, he could be here right now and we wouldn¡¯t know it. Better to be safe than sorry when it comes to Roger or the European ones that Randy told me stories about.¡±


    European ones? What did that mean? Jeremy hadn¡¯t mentioned them when I was interrogating him earlier. I¡¯d have to look into that later, but I didn¡¯t think that Jeremy would tell me anything about them unless I showed up as Roger again. That would require some thought. In the meantime, there was a lot of work to do and I put that matter aside.


    As I headed for the administration building, I though about Jeremy¡¯s observation that Roger reminded him of Batman. He wasn¡¯t that far off of the mark. Like Batman, Roger worked with the law, but wasn¡¯t a part of it. Both moved silently through the night and hunted bad guys that preyed on the weak. However, Roger was just my alter ego. As Abby, I saw myself more as Wonder Woman, with a few updates. Instead of an invisible plane, I had a sometimes-invisible helicopter. Instead of a golden lasso that forced people to tell the truth, I had a field that could sometimes tell me if someone was lying. Other than those small differences, and the fact that I wasn¡¯t super strong, we were both warriors who fought for those that couldn¡¯t fight for themselves.


    With Jeremy¡¯s stunning pronouncement that he wasn¡¯t upset about losing his powers and his intention to keep Roger¡¯s powers a secret, I left them to their conversation and went to prepare for the large influx of survivors that Hannah¡¯s Home was about to get. Over a hundred survivors would be here soon and they would seriously strain our capacity. Some would be picked up by their families over the next day or so. However, while I was interviewing the survivors, I could tell that many of them weren¡¯t ready to rejoin their families, if they even had families to return to. A high percentage of them had been runaways before they¡¯d been taken. They had nowhere else to go and Hannah¡¯s Home wasn¡¯t set up to house so many of them long term.


    Fortunately, that was what the next evolution of Hannah¡¯s Home was all about and it was finally time to put the last part of my plan in place.

 B3: Chapter 62 - Epilogue

    I watched from R1 as the man walked up to the executive assistant sitting at her desk in the Governor¡¯s outer office. He was impeccably dressed and had a confident air about him. A smile curled his lips slightly and there was a mischievous glint in his eyes.


    ¡°I have a delivery for the Governor.¡±, he said as he reached her desk.


    ¡°Thank you. I¡¯ll give it to him shortly.¡± The assistant took the envelope and put it to the side of her desk.


    ¡°I¡¯ll need you to sign that you received it. It¡¯s now 3:58. Please indicate that on his sheet as well.¡± The man handed her a form for her to initial and after she did so, his face broke out into a full smile.


    ¡°Thank you! I wouldn¡¯t want to have missed the 4:15pm bid deadline for Project 49117.¡±


    ¡°Excuse me, sir? I¡¯m not familiar with any bid deadline.¡±


    ¡°Of course you are. You sent out the notice for it six months ago to twenty developers and invited them to bid on the property. If I¡¯m not mistaken, seven of them took you up on the offer and have submitted a bid. Now you have an eighth.¡± The man kept up his smile, as if he hadn¡¯t just called the assistant on her lie.


    Clearing her throat, the assistant tried to save the situation. ¡°I¡¯m sorry, sir. I was confused because the bidding for that project is by invitation only.¡±


    ¡°Yes, about that. State law specifically forbids closing the bidding to any qualified individual or organization. Your boss used some extremely convoluted reasoning to justify the classification of this project as vital to state security and bypassing the need to open the bidding to the public at large. However, those rules, even if they were legitimate, and I can assure you that they are not, only apply to the need to notify the general public of the bidding process. They do not remove the need for a formal bidding process, nor do they restrict unsolicited bids from contention.¡±


    The secretary managed to maintain her composure and retorted, ¡°I see. Well, according to the rules of the bidding process, the bids must be delivered to the Office of Administration, Procurement and Contracts division to be valid. I suppose that if you run there, you might make it in time, sir.¡± The assistant was wearing her own smile now. Reaching that office would take at least twenty minutes and the deadline would have passed by then.


    ¡°Not to worry, my dear. My colleague delivered a copy to that location earlier today. In case you¡¯re wondering, we¡¯ve also filed all the proper paperwork to become a qualified bidder for the state and submitted all the forms, including the one about financial conditions. In fact, earlier today, my offices delivered the full purchase price of the bid to the administration office, in anticipation of its acceptance. The administration office confirmed that everything was in order and my client has all the required approvals.¡±


    The executive assistant¡¯s smile vanished just as quickly as it had come and she picked up the envelope to get a better look at it.


    ¡°You¡¯re from Rochester and Williams? Your client is the Hannah Foundation?¡± She was stalling now. Trying to buy time to think of another excuse for why my bid wasn¡¯t valid.


    ¡°Yes. I¡¯m Mr. Rochester. The bidding should close in a few minutes and I¡¯m anxious to know the outcome of the bid, so I thought I¡¯d come by and hear it for myself. I believe the process calls for a thirty minute review of the bids by the Governor, with the participants welcome to watch the process and clarify any aspects of the bid that are unclear. Following this process, the preliminary winner will be announced, pending only on their ability to make payment. Will the Governor be having the review in his office or has a larger conference room been assigned? I do so hope that there will be refreshments. I had to skip lunch today to meet with my client.¡±


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    Alex Rochester was really enjoying himself and I couldn¡¯t blame him. The Governor had rigged things so that this property would go to one of his closest friends, a developer from Salem who also happened to be his largest campaign contributor, for a fraction of its appraised value. A very small fraction. Over the years, several of Alex¡¯s clients had been burned by the Governor paying back his political contributors using sleazy tactics like the one he was employing for this bidding process. Through my perusal of the Governor¡¯s computer, searching to piggy-back on his use of insider information, I came across the upcoming return of this piece of land from the federal government and of his plans for the parcel.


    Knowing the Governor¡¯s tricks, Alex had planned for every contingency and he was reaping the fruits of his labors now. He had cut off all of the Governor¡¯s escape routs and used the Governor¡¯s own rules against him.


    ¡°Excuse me. I¡¯ll go tell the Governor that there¡¯s a new bid.¡± She left her desk and disappeared into the Governor¡¯s office. I followed her inside and watched as she broke the news to him. He started off making the same objections that she had made to Alex and she gave him Alex¡¯s answers. Finally, the Governor ran out of options and asked to see the bid. She handed it over and he opened it, sucking in his breath as he read it.


    ¡°Shit! It¡¯s higher that Stan¡¯s bid by half-a-million dollars. That¡¯s too much to ignore. Stall Mr. Rochester. I¡¯ll call Stan and see if he can get here with a replacement offer in time. We¡¯ll put the new one in his first offer¡¯s envelope.¡±


    Stan wasn¡¯t pleased that the offer was falling through but he said that he¡¯d be right over with the new bid. I laughed to myself when I heard that because Alex and I had discussed this very possibility and he wasn¡¯t about to let Stan slip anything to the Governor or his assistant. I also decided to stack the deck in our favor by disabling Stan¡¯s car before coming here. The Governor would need some really fancy footsteps to be able to stall Alex past the decision deadline.


    I watched the cat and mouse game between Alex and the assistant for the next twenty minutes, as she cited a state emergency that had required the Governor¡¯s immediate attention. Alex asked about the nature of the emergency and the assistant stammered for a few seconds before saying something about water rights. Alex didn¡¯t buy into her attempts at delaying the review and reminded her that the timelines had been set by the Governor and that they had to be respected or he¡¯d be forced to file suit on behalf of his client. He also mentioned that he was wearing a body camera and was recording all of these discussions and attempts at delay for future use in court, should it be required. The assistant paled and ran into the Governor¡¯s office.


    Suddenly the Governor wasn¡¯t busy anymore and he invited Alex in to start the review process. He made a big show of it by going through every envelope, one at a time, and agonizing over the details of each one. He was still holding out for Stan to come crashing in at the last minute. Unfortunately for him, I¡¯d also shifted Stan¡¯s cellphone and wallet into L2 with a time-delayed field that wouldn¡¯t expire until 5:30pm. Even if Stan could get a taxi or an Uber in time, he couldn¡¯t pay them. It didn¡¯t help Stan that rush hour traffic was already starting to back things up.


    With further delay no longer possible, the Governor had to read out Stan¡¯s bid and soon acknowledged that the Hannah Foundation was the winner of the bidding process. The Hannah Foundation was the new owner of the soon to be decommissioned Ronald Reagan Military Training Base just north of Morganton, halfway between Charlotte and Asheville.


    With over twelve thousand acres of land, the military base currently housed over five thousand personnel and was effectively a small, self-contained city, with already build family housing, barracks, gun range, hospital, fire department, police station, administration buildings, theaters, bowling alley, schools, baseball fields, swimming pools, training centers and airfield.


    It had everything I would need to take Hannah¡¯s Home to the next level and create a city where victims of human trafficking could come and live and get a second chance at life. Second Chance City would be a place for survivors to call home.


    The End of Book Three