The Spatial Shard

The water felt incredible. So cool and refreshing! She felt like it had been a lifetime since her skin had last been immersed in the ocean. Imogene played around with Gordon and the others for a few moments, but when Sharon snuck off and came back with Genie’s board and spring suit, Imogene could not hold back the tears. Her open crying had an effect on everyone who witnessed the presentation.

“Righteous!” Wayne said. He was the only one who could speak before Sharon declared a hands-off moment for her best friend.

“Go out there and catch me a wave!” she whispered to Imogene. She did not need to repeat herself. Imogene took up the board and a few followers, Javier among them, and sped off to put on her spring suit.

“Dude, I could feel that all the way over here,” Cullen said, thinking it was too low to be heard.

“You think that’s something,” Gordon bragged, “wait ’til she uses that thing! Hey Sharon, did you bring my board too?”

“Sure did, Sport!” Sharon said as she tapped Wayne. He turned around and picked up a surfboard that was more Gordon’s size.

“Coolness!” Gordon said as he took hold of it.

“You surf, Gordon?” Milania asked in a very soft tone.

“Not as good as Genie,” he answered. “But it’s fun! Do you surf?”

“No,” Milania answered, shaking her head. “My brother says it’s too dangerous and I might get hurt.”

“Too dangerous?!” Gordon repeated just before he caught a glimpse of Sharon looking at him with a wary eye. Her smile was gentle and to one who had not grown up with her, the point would have been missed. But Gordon was reminded of how sacred family matters were to him. It would be the right thing for him to extend the same courtesy to Javier and Milania. “Well, why don’t we watch the others then,” he suggested and Milania was equally excited to do that. They ran off toward the edge of the beach.

“And I thought only white girls stuck their noses into other people’s business,” Wayne said, nudging Sharon.

“They do!” Sharon quickly agreed. “Black girls handle other people’s business.” The two of them laughed hard and loud and Wayne took hold of Sharon’s arm.

“Go, catch a wave of your own,” Wayne said.

“I’m good,” Sharon said quickly. “Besides, there are two major points you and I have yet to cover.”

“You’re finally going to admit that white chocolate is sweeter than dark chocolate?” Wayne joked.

“Too sweet!” Sharon replied, choking. “You do notice that when white chocolate is used, it’s always mixed with something else. White chocolate alone makes you sick real fast. But the only thing that comes with a Hershey bar is a wrapper… which is also dark brown.” She paused. “But you forgot to tell me about Marcia,” Sharon reminded her friend.

“And the other point?”

“You know you want to know what my girl looks like on her board again,” Sharon said, nudging Wayne who had to hold up his hands in surrender.

“You’re right,” Wayne admitted as he took hold of Sharon’s extended arm. “But I can sum up Marcia real quick,” he said as they walked over to their sandcastle.

“How the hell did he make a freakin’ drawbridge?!” Sharon thought.

“She cut up my steak for me.” Wayne explained.

“Oh, that’s not good,” Sharon winced.

“At all,” Wayne agreed as the two of them sat down. “And then she became my Seeing Eye Dog. ‘Okay, we’re coming up to a step… a step downward. It’s kind of steep and it looks like it’s concrete, so be very careful.’ Of course, this was as we’re leaving her house.” Sharon blurted out a loud laugh before she covered her mouth. “I knew I could trust you to be sensitive,” Wayne remarked.

“You want a sensitive friend?” Sharon laughed as she spoke. “Take out an ad! I’ll drive you over to their place too!” Wayne put his hand on her face and pushed her over into the sand and Sharon only laughed harder.

“Oh, get over it and tell me if she’s on the water,” Wayne said as Sharon sat up, half-covered with sand and still chuckling.

“Okay,” she said a she looked out on to the water. “Well, she’s wet, I can tell you that. Did not take my girl long to put on her suit either! You can tell she’s had some sun, thank goodness. She’s got a nice soft bronze look to her skin. Girl’s got great legs!”

“You want some privacy?” Wayne ribbed.

“Look, she did not get cute until she started getting darker! And the only thing a girl can do for me is tell me where I can find me a man! Tall, dark and handsome!” Sharon shouted.

“Right, because I’ve never heard that before,” Wayne said. “What’s she doing now?”

“Paddling,” Sharon reported. “Looks like CJ is going out too.”

“What’s the deal with you and him anyway?” Wayne asked.

“No dice there, Wayne,” Sharon said, a slight drop in her enthusiasm. “There we were, talking it up real good in school and he walks me to my locker, right?”

“Sounds positive,” Wayne graded.

“Me too! And it kinda remained that way, until he saw the team pic I have of me and my girl in my locker.”

“And you want to get mad when I ask the obvious question,” Wayne remarked.

“Oh stop it!” Sharon exclaimed. “What’s a girl supposed to do? She stopped nine shots on goal, I scored nine goals and it was our ninth game of the season!”

“Wow!”

“I know, right?!” Sharon said, obviously excited just to remember that afternoon.

“Now if it had only been September 9th...”

“It wouldn’t have been soccer season, you idiot!” Sharon pointed out.

“Oh. Right. Sorry. So, you were saying?”

“Well, he took one look at her picture and it was like, Sharon who? I told him about Genie and he started asking ’round about her.”

“So, that was when he got sick of her,” Wayne inserted.

“What did you say?” Sharon asked and Wayne realized that he had revealed something that somehow had never been told to Sharon. But he could not generate a comeback fast enough to hope it would actually work. The truth was his only option.

“Well, he did ask around about Genie,” Wayne muttered and Sharon punched him in the ribs. “Ow!”

“Oh, so you do have a voice,” Sharon barked, sounding like a drill instructor. “Then let’s hear it!”

“Okay, Sergeant Thaxton,” Wayne said in a louder voice. “He started asking around and when you’re talking about someone like Genie, people don’t just stop at, ‘oh, she’s nice’ and I don’t think anyone really tried to keep it brief. No one worth mentioning, anyway.”

“And why aren’t they worth mentioning?” Sharon pressed.

“Because I won’t have you going around and offing people for having their own opinions!” Wayne snapped back.

“Hmmm. You might have something there,” Sharon conceded. “And?”

Wayne shrugged his shoulders as he stammered a bit. But he knew Sharon was short on patience with any subject matter that was Imogene-related. “And… I’m sure he got his fill of the hearsay! Everyone’s got a Genie-story. Most of them have something mainstream, like the soccer games or the stuff she did while she was at school. And there’s no telling what private stories are out there. And no!” Wayne said as he took firm hold of Sharon’s shoulder.

“No what?” she asked with a smile.

“So, what’s happening now?” Wayne asked, dismissing the topic of discussion. He could hear Sharon laugh and the sound relieved him. Everyone knew the two girls were the best of friends and the last thing Wayne wanted to do was to come between that friendship. But there was very little about Imogene Schultz of which Sharon Thaxton had no knowledge. On that short list would be what the young girl, who some called Genie, had done for him before she had to leave the country and go with her father to follow his work.

“Uh, it looks like they are finally out far enough,” Sharon said as she stood up to get a better view. “I think they’re just out there gabbin’ it up while they wait for their wave.

“Wayne?” she said softly in a very clear tone, and though she had lowered her volume, there was more effect to her voice. Sharon moved her foot over and nudged the young man. “Don’t turn your head or anything like that. Just grab my ankle. Left hand, nine o’clock, and seven centimeters.” Wayne knew better than to ask questions when her voice sounded as it did at the moment.

The first time he had heard such a tone in Sharon’s voice was the first time he met Sharon and Imogene. It had been a rare rainy day in California; the local high school had just let out their students. Wayne was usually on his way home by that time, but he had missed his bus. Three of his fellow schoolmates thought it would be fun to tease the local freak.

“Whattsahmatter?” one boy called out as they danced around Wayne. “Why are you wearing sun glasses on a rainy day?” They had already helped themselves to his book bag, and he had heard one of his books hit the ground. Braille books were expensive and he knew his family could not afford to replace them. So a normally composed and calm Wayne Jefferson was on the verge of having a nervous breakdown, yelling at the boys as they taunted him.

“Here, catch!” one said as he threw a book at Wayne and it struck him in the face, knocking his glasses off his face. The book dropped the ground as Wayne fell into a puddle. His tears mixed with the rain, but the taunting had stopped and he knew all too well what gave them pause.

Wayne Andrew Jefferson was a very special child. He had not been born blind, and he could not blame anything man-made for the development of his blindness. If he exerted any effort, he could recite the verbiage of his condition word-for-word. In the simplest terms, there was an infection that had found its way to his optic nerve in both eyes. The nerves had stopped working and one morning Wayne Jefferson awoke and opened his eyes, but was still in the dark. That was something else he could remember well, the first morning he was blind. He was supposed to play baseball. He was very good at baseball, everyone had called him The Big WB and he was a switch hitter; amazing hand-eye coordination, one of the coaches had once said he possessed. He was fast and very strong, playing centerfield and batting clean-up. The Cardinals had a real shot of going to the Little League World Series, especially with the Big WB batting .788 and leading the team with stolen bases. But he never played in that game, and for the longest time the sound of baseball being played sent him into a tirade. He could also recall the glasses his aunt had bought. They felt more like safety glasses, as big as they were on his face. His mother hated them, but his father agreed with his sister and Wayne wore them to keep the peace at home.

The boys were silent because his safety glasses were gone and the truth was visible, even to the young blind boy. His eyes had not just lost color, the whites of his eyes had turned gray and the blood vessels in the eyeball had turned dark. He had never seen his eyes, of course, but he had seen a number of horror movies and Wayne was not short on imagination.

“What are you?” one boy had asked and Wayne closed his eyes, praying that God would kill the rest of him just as He had killed his eyes.

“Probably sick to his stomach,” a young, strong and very angry female voice had answered the question for Wayne. “Especially if he’s standing downwind of you, Haskins.” One of the boys, Wayne guessed it was Haskins, snorted just before he heard the loudest slap of flesh against flesh he had ever encountered. In all the years he had known Sharon, he still ranked that slap as the loudest. “What’s wrong, Haskins?” she said, still quite angry. “You didn’t see that coming? He’s blind, what’s your excuse? Oh right, you’re just plain stupid!” The kick Wayne heard next was followed by the sound of a body hitting the ground.

Then there was another sound, to the right of Sharon. It was a deeper male voice grunting in pain after a body had been hit pretty hard. Another body fell.

“I got the big one, Sharon,” Imogene had said.

“Thanks, Genie,” Sharon had replied and Wayne could also hear knuckles cracking. The fight had been short, but it had been amazing to hear. Two girls, middle school students who were just using the high school field for soccer practice, beat the crap out of three high school jocks who had nothing better to do than pick on a blind kid. But it was the way they beat them up that was incredible. Sharon barked orders like they were running a play and the closest one of them came to placing an offensive hand on either girl was when Sharon told Imogene to flip out of the way and Haskins grabbed Sharon instead. She put Haskins into a hip toss and he was on the ground again.

“You okay?” Sharon had asked as she walked over to him and Imogene collected his books. “My hand is in front of your face, two o’clock!” Wayne’s hand found Sharon’s in the middle of the darkness and she pulled him up to his feet. “I asked if you were okay!” she repeated and he jumped at the tone of her voice. It was easy to follow a command given by her voice, and over the years Wayne had come to find comfort inside of its sound.

Wayne moved his hand to the given coordinates and found that Sharon was still very good with her approximations. He took a hold of her ankle and he could hear her take a whiff of the air. His nostrils flared wide as he too took a sample, the smell of the grill was very strong and seemed to cover everything.

“I can’t quite see them,” she said playfully. That was a lie and Wayne now had an idea as to what was wrong. Someone or something new was inside her perimeter.

“You smell that?” Sharon asked in her lowered voice. “Like way too much after-shave?” Wayne took another whiff of air and he found the scent.

“Could be just some adults coming to the beach,” Wayne offered as Sharon moved her leg away and stood up.

“I can smell ’em, but I can’t hear ’em,” Sharon said as she jumped up and down.

“Oh, I see them!” she shouted happily before she stepped back while lowering to her knee. Wayne could hear a muffled thud and a man grunt in pain.

“Scoop and throw to your six!” Sharon barked, pulling her elbow away from the crotch of the man she had just struck. She stood up with a turning uppercut she placed right on his eye. Sand hit against the back of her head as it landed in the face, and therefore the mouth, of the man she had just punched, and the eyes of his partner.

“Grown men!” Sharon thought as her father’s training, along with her dojo lessons, kicked into play.

“Haul it to the water, Wayne!” she shouted as she punched the neck of the blinded man. Wayne popped up from his spot and started running as fast as he could. Sharon did not mention a significant drop or anything that might have been in his path so Wayne could afford to throw caution to the wind.

“Scramble it, Gordo!” Sharon shouted as she did a foot sweep.

“No way!” Gordon gasped as he looked up the beach. Right next to the awesome sandcastle Wayne and Sharon had built, he could see Wayne running toward the water and Sharon fighting two men. They were kind of big, but she seemed to be getting the better of them. Growing up around a man who had very devoted militaristic disciplines had its perks. None of Sharon’s friends were ignorant of the codes. ‘Scramble it’ was a panic code and it meant get to safety and call for help and in that order! The only trouble with following that code was that his sister could not have heard Sharon, since he barely did, and Imogene was ten times the distance Gordon was from Sharon.

“Milania,” Gordon said as he turned to face the young girl. “Do you see that telephone pole down there?” Milania looked and saw what he was describing some eighty meters away. “You need to run, as fast as you can, to that pole. You’ll find a phone and you need to call Frank. Tell him we’ve got a scramble code and Sharon’s in a fight!”

“What about you?” Milania asked, quite worried that what she saw might be INS related.

“I can’t leave her!” Gordon said as he ran toward Sharon. Milania called after him and Gordon stopped. He turned to face her and pointed at the pole. She was crying but she turned and ran. “One of us has got to do what we’re told!” he thought as he ran for Sharon.

“You’re stalling,” Cullen said with a smile as he paddled back out to her.

“You wish!” Imogene replied. “When this is done right, you can’t rush it. Everything has its own time… its own place. You’ve had fun, riding those ankle ticklers of yours,” Imogene looked out into the ocean and smiled. “My ride is coming, I can feel it!”

“Just about everyone has gone once, except you.” Cullen sat up on his board and looked out into the water. “I can really appreciate this Zen-surfing approach, but you’re burning daylight.”

“Can you?” Imogene asked, looking at Cullen. “Can you really appreciate it, or is that what your macking dance card told you to say?”

“Where did that come from?” Imogene thought as her smile was replaced with a look of shock.

“Excuse me?” Cullen asked, somewhat surprised.

“Nothing!” Imogene said quickly as she looked out into the sea, praying for anything to come along. For once, it seemed that she was going to be saved by things outside her control. “See, here comes my wave right now,” she said as she started paddling loudly. “Coming down!” she cried though there was no need to do so. There were not that many people out and they were mostly of the same mind as Cullen, waiting for Imogene to take her turn.

“I cannot I believe I said that,” Imogene thought, feeling even more embarrassed than when she had fallen down after getting up too quickly. “Way to make an impression, Genie!”

“Figure it out later,” she whispered as she could feel the wave under her. “This is a ride you’ve been waiting for. Now pop it!” Imogene came up off her board and took her stance. The waves for this time of day and time of year would be small, hardly any tunnels to speak of. But that did not mean it was not a wave worth riding. Mists of cool water sprayed into her face as she guided her board to her right, playing with the crest of the wave and picking up speed. Imogene almost closed her eyes as the water smashed against the underside of her surfboard. She could feel the solid force of the water that splashed around her as she steered her board to the left, back toward the heart of the wave. She crouched low and let her hand touch the surface of the moving water.

“Santa Maria!” Javier whispered, thinking that she had lost the wave, only to see her head again, still surfing. “She is good!”

“She is better than that,” Cullen thought as he strained his eyes to watch her. “Major Cooha!” As she went back and forth, something caught Cullen’s eye.

“What is Wayne doing in the water?” Cullen asked.

“Looks like he is just splashing around,” Javier answered, shrugging his shoulders. He panned down the beach to the last place he had seen his sister, but she was not there. He could see Gordon running along the beach toward the sandcastle that had just collapsed under the weight of a man who had just been thrown into it. “They’re in trouble!” Javier said as he began paddling. Cullen was quick to follow.

A hip toss, foot sweep and a rolling somersault were all Sharon had put together against the two men, but she knew she was having little effect on them.

“What I wouldn’t do for a stick right now,” Sharon thought as she started breathing heavily. “These boys are way too big and too trained for me to keep this up.”

Brogan got up and shielded his one good eye. This young lady was far too fond of throwing sand in his face. Porter was still finding it difficult to breathe with the throat punch she had landed. But Brogan was not going to charge in on her again. While there was Intel that the girl’s father had been in the military, it had failed to mention that his wife gave birth to a regiment!

“Circle left, Porter,” Brogan ordered. “We don’t want to kill her. Not yet anyway.”

“High road!” a voice cried out and Sharon went down to one knee, bracing her hands in the sand. She felt Gordon step on to her back and jump. She did not see the combination the young man had used, but it was loud and potent enough to make the man nearly complete a full spin as he fell.

“No you don’t!” Sharon said as she threw sand in the face of the man who advanced from her side. Porter cursed the young girl as he tried to clear his eyes of the sand. Sharon charged and jumped toward him. She grabbed his shoulders and pulled against them as she lifted her knee between his legs. Porter went up on his toes, wishing he could have flown. He was still blinded by the sand and his breathing was labored, but now he could not move or speak.

“Thanks for the assist, Gordon,” Sharon said with a smile but gasped as she turned around. There were more than two of them and the third man had a gun to Gordon’s head. Sharon immediately put her hands up and her head went down. She scanned her immediate area and found a blessing of chance. Fate was being kind, or it liked a really good fight.

“Thanks for making it simple,” the man said as he motioned her to kneel. “And cross your ankles.”

“Yes, sir,” Sharon said quickly, dropping to her knees. “Please don’t hurt him!” she pleaded.

“Well, it’s good to know this one has a soft spot somewhere, eh, Brogan?” Tavares said, almost laughing.

“Shut up and keep an eye on her!” Brogan commanded on all fours, the world still spinning. That boy had power, unheard-of power! “Either one of them moves, shoot them.”

“You got it,” Tavares answered, grinning behind his brown eyes. He did not like Brogan, but he liked Kotai even less. He was hoping those two would take each other out and give him an opportunity to restore the honor of the Viper Team. “If they move funny, I’ll kill a kid!”

“Their funeral,” Brogan said as he reached for his binoculars.

“That’s exactly what you’re all looking at if you don’t listen to me,” a male voice warned.

“Dad?!” Gordon said with a sudden brightness coming from his face.

“It’s okay, son,” Timothy said as he slowly approached, his hands up. Sharon’s eyes narrowed as she watched how Timothy Schultz approached. He was not walking directly at them. It was more of a slant to his left. Three steps exactly.

“He’s spotting!” Sharon concluded. “He just confirmed the number of targets. I love you, Daddy!” Sharon looked up at the men who were now targets and made sure none of them were looking at her. None of them were and she moved her lips, speaking without making a sound.

“The man with the binoculars is in charge. Safeties are off!” she mouthed as she looked at the gun trained on Gordon, and the shallow-breathing man drew as he walked up behind Sharon. “Light body armor. Ready to go for Gordon on your first shot.”

“Take it easy,” Brogan directed. “Unlike his kids, this guy’s got no skills.”

“Oh, yeah? Then where are the two that were on him?” Tavares asked, becoming a little more concerned.

“I think you guys need to be more concerned with the man you can’t see,” Timothy suggested. “Because he’s already taken care of your fourth man. You know, long-haired blonde fellow with a five o’clock shadow,” Timothy said, rubbing his face. “He looked like a nice guy. Well, his jaw is broken and he’s been cuffed in a manner I’d rather not say in front of my son.”

“Keep your gun on the kids,” Brogan said as he glared at Timothy. “Even if the sheriff is a ghost, he’s not got the gear that can take us.”

“Bad career move,” Sharon said as she lowered her head and readied herself to move quickly.

“You shut up!” Porter said, smacking Sharon across the back of the head. She waited for the sound, the soft sound of the bullet hitting the body armor. That was her release, but it did not come. Then again, Sharon did notice that Timothy’s hands were still up.

“I see your trigger,” she mouthed.

“Sharon!” Imogene yelled from the water.

“Here she comes,” Brogan smiled as he put his hand to his ear to steady his earpiece. “And talk about timing!”

“What are you talking about?” Tavares asked.

“We just got clearance to pick up the Schultz girl,” Brogan reported.

“No!” Timothy said as he looked at Sharon who was looking at his hands. The clarity her face displayed shook Timothy Schultz.

“She’ll know,” Alan had said. “You just give me a count of how many targets there are and step to the side that many times. I’ll handle the rest.”

“And what will she do?” Timothy had asked, recalling his fondness for Alan’s daughter. Imogene might have called Alan ‘Coach’ but Timothy was Daddy Schultz to Sharon and it had come to be something he cherished, as if he had a third child.

“Whatever is necessary,” Alan had answered as he took a deep breath.

“Did you train her this much so you wouldn’t have to worry about her on dates?”

“I wish! I trained her this much because she asked me a question I didn’t have an answer for. ‘Do you love your country more than you love your family? Because you train men to defend the country, but you won’t train me to defend myself’.”

“Ouch,” Timothy had winced. “Yeah, that one could leave a mark.”

“Yeah, and she was six at the time,” Alan had further advised. “I figured it was just a phase, so I said that every morning she could come and wake me up, I’d train her. You have any idea what it’s like to have your daughter wake you up at the crack of dawn on Christmas morning, say, ‘Okay, I ran my mile, what are we doing today?’ and mean it?”

“No… and no offense, not looking to know what that feels like either!”

“No harm, no foul. Just remember, move to your left and keep moving!”

But before anything would happen, Timothy would have to lower his hands. That was the trigger and Sharon gazed at them, waiting for them to fall. But he had been told to move to his left, and that was away from his son… and Gordon needed him. More than that, Timothy had to come through for his son, just once! He had failed with Eleanor, he had failed in being able to stay in the States… he needed to come through now. But these men had been given orders to take his daughter, who was coming up from the water. She knew something was wrong and she was making it easier for them.

“Eleanor,” Timothy thought as his hands started to drop. “If you can hear me, baby… I’m sorry. I did the best I could!”

“Take him, Daddy,” Sharon thought as her eyes shifted to her objective, her little brother that she loved dearly. The soft pop echoed in her ears and she knew the man holding a gun on her was falling.

“Right knife-hand block!” Sharon yelled, rolling toward Gordon. She did not see him pivot and chop his right hand across the forearm of the man holding the gun on him. She was pretty certain that no one had seen the rock that had been between her ankles. A rock she had moved to her hand in the middle of her roll. As Tavares took hold of Gordon, a small stone struck him in the face. His gun fired into the sand, but he hit no one with the shot.

“Low road!” Sharon yelled and Gordon, who barely had any footing, jumped and pushed up with his hands as Sharon dove under him, placing her shoulder at the knees of the man she hit with the rock. Tavares fell to the sand quickly.

“I have had enough of you!” Brogan said as he drew his pistol, looking at Sharon who was already smiling up at him.

“Say cheese, baby!” she said, but Brogan did not hear her. While his body armor kept the shot from being fatal, shrugging off the force of the shot was something he was not able to do.

“Shadow me, Gordo!” Sharon cried as she got up to her feet and ran in the opposite direction in which Timothy had moved. Two more shots were fired and both hit.

“Roll over and put your forehead in the sand!” Sharon yelled as she held Gordon close, her body between him and the action. “Last warning before he starts hitting places that not even armor will help!” Tavares was the first to surrender; the other two were quick to follow. Sharon held up her hand and spelled out what side she was starting on and where she wanted her father to aim. She collected the three pistols and used their own handcuffs to restrain the three men.

“You are something el-”

“Stay clear, Daddy Schultz! Genie, Gordo, you stay put!” Sharon yelled as she finished cuffing the last man. She then checked for back-up firearms and each man had least one. She came away with eight pistols in all, a butterfly knife and an asp. “This one I might keep,” she whispered as she gave her father the all-clear sign. She then lay on her belly in a position where she could see, and therefore shoot, all three men.

“I got ’em, baby,” Alan said after a few moments and Sharon rolled over, smiling at her father.

“Either you ran really fast or you were really close,” Sharon joked. “You losin’ them 20/10 peepers of yours, old man?”

“Shut up,” Alan allowed himself a snort of laughter before he examined his daughter’s handiwork. Were it not for the dreams any parent has for their children, he would have fired Jarvis James in a heartbeat and let his daughter ride along with him. He would have felt a lot better in the tighter situations. “Okay, we’re good.” Alan backed away and called in for a couple of cruisers to come and pick up the men.

Father, son and daughter embraced on the beach as friends and family watched. Sharon walked over to her father and he met her halfway, kneeling down and holding on to her tightly. He looked up into her face and for the first time he did not see a little girl. The young woman who smiled down on him, her big brown eyes filled with tears, had done what he had always had asked of her: to take what she was given and take it further than where she found it.

“I’m proud of you,” he whispered. “I’ve said ‘I love you’ a thousand times. Not sure if I ever told you that-”

“I’m proud to be your daughter,” Sharon said, hugging her father before she realized something. “Oh no, Wayne!”

“Right over here,” he said calmly, standing beside Javier and Cullen. All three were still breathing hard. “I was halfway to Hawaii, thanks to you, but CJ here pulled me back in.” Sharon laughed as she walked over to Gordon.

“And as for you,” she said while pointing her finger. “What does ‘scramble it’ mean?”

“It means if you bring me my eggs over easy, you’re in trouble,” Gordon replied.

“Thanks for breaking the order,” Sharon smiled, wiping her eyes.

“You would have done the same for me,” Gordon said dismissively.

“You better believe it, Sport!” Sharon replied as she looked up at Imogene. “So, how was your wave?”

There was a pregnant pause before everyone erupted in laughter. Imogene played at choking Sharon who played at being choked and Alan directed everyone to stand to one side so he would be between his perpetrators and his family.

Milania was the last to arrive and she ran, dragging Franklin with her. He was out of breath, but giving it his very best effort. He barely beat the arrival of the two squad cars.

“Jarvis!” Alan called out, perturbed that his directions had not been followed. “I told you to bring the van!”

Jarvis got out of the car and Alan knew immediately that something was not right. He reached for his gun.

The front passenger side door sprang open and Kotai came rolling out of the car, his gun already drawn and fixed on the crowd of children. “I wouldn’t, Sheriff!” he warned. “I’ll get off three shots before you get off one! And no offense, but I think I can guess which one of these young people is your daughter.”

“Not to mention who else we might shoot just for the fun of it!” Kaufman said as she got out of the second car, her gun fixed on Timothy. Both of their faces were covered with bandages and nose braces. Timothy winced in sympathetic pain at the sight of his handiwork. “Now you need to finish something you started, Thaxton. Only do it slowly.”

“Daddy,” Sharon whispered.

“Nix it, Thaxton,” Alan commanded. “Sometimes you can’t take the hill just because you want to.” Using his index finger and thumb only, Alan drew his weapon slowly. “Even if these two mummies can’t see too well, we are bunched up here and I’m the only one with a badge.”

“You’re a smart man, Sheriff,” Kotai said as he stood up. “And Jarvis, if you think I did not notice you unsnap your ankle holster, you’re dead wrong. You want me to erase the word ‘wrong’ from that assessment?” Jarvis held up his hands. “Good boy, Deputy.”

Kotai and Kaufman gathered up the Sheriff’s guns and began releasing their team.

“Genie, run!” Sharon whispered.

“What?!”

“It’s you they want,” Sharon said, “… and if they wanted you dead or alive this would have been over a long time ago!”

“Jeez, my girl is sharp!” Alan thought, already agreeing with her plan.

“And where do I run?”

“Grab your board and go,” Gordon said. “It’s the only way to be safe!”

“Safe,” Imogene thought. “How long ago did I leave that word behind?”

“You never left it,” the Shard answered. “You just realized it never existed. There is protected and there is vulnerable, Genie. But in a universe that we cannot hope to fully understand, why waste time trying to be safe?”

“So, I didn’t feel safe that night?” she thought. “No, I didn’t. I felt protected!” Imogene looked at her father and smiled. Timothy did not know where the look was coming from, but he did not let his confusion register in his eyes.

“I love you, Daddy!” Imogene said.

“I love you too, baby.”

“Well, I for one am so very glad everyone feels loved,” Kaufman said as she freed Tavares. “Now, Miss Schultz, if you would be so kind to- Oh my dear Lord!” Megan Kaufman had turned and saw a ripple in the air leave from the target and plunge into the sand where another ripple acknowledged its reception. Then there was a shudder in the air and a large hole formed in the beach. All of the captives were sinking into it.

“Stop them!” Brogan yelled as he snatched his pistol. He looked at all the faces lowering away from him and only one drew his attention. He sneered as he fired.

“No!”