Brain Storm by Cat Gilbert (ebook reader computer .txt) 📕

already, crossing off names as I went. Knowing what I was looking for made it easy. I had saved the name Mac had underlined for the last, my gut telling me that he was right, and this was the guy I was looking for. Finally, I typed it in, hit the enter key and waited for the results to come in.

“Why didn’t they kill him?” The voice came from across the room, and I looked behind me to see Trinity rise up on one elbow on the bed. “Why didn’t they just kill Mac when they had the chance? He’s been nothing but trouble for them since this whole thing started.”

Excellent question, I thought as I turned back to the screen. If we’d thought to ask that 24 hours ago, I could have gotten some sleep. Then again, maybe I’d needed the time to figure it out. If necessity was the mother of invention, maybe exhaustion was the mother of thinking outside the box.

“They didn’t kill him,” I said over my shoulder as I scanned through the results. and smiled in satisfaction as the last piece of the puzzle fell into place. “for the same reason they didn’t kill our missing Dr. Brown.”

“They didn’t kill Brown because they didn’t need to. He’s out of their way,” Jonas interrupted. “Brown retired, remember?”

“How do we know that?” Trinity asked, swinging her legs off the bed. “If I was an award winning, highly respected expert in my field, with years ahead of me for research, and the project I’d been working on for years just started showing signs of promise, the last thing I’d do is walk away.”

“I agree, but if that’s the case, then he’s either involved in this, they took him, or he’s dead,” Jonas concluded, counting off the possibilities on his fingers. “Sam here, seems pretty certain he isn’t dead.”

“So what? You think Brown is working for them?” Trinity asked me.

“I think if he were behind this or involved in it, he would have stayed put.” I finished going through the search results as I answered her question. “It would be the easiest way to keep tabs on what’s happening and raise the least amount of suspicion unless of course, something unexpected happened and they moved him.”

“Something like Marcus disappearing?”

“Good a guess as any. That certainly would have sent up a red flag for me. The only thing we know for sure is he’s missing, and we can’t find him.”

“And why is that?” Jonas threw up his hands in surrender. “This guy has completely dropped off the radar. Not only is he no longer with the agency, but it’s almost like he never existed. According to Mac, he’s supposed to have won all these awards and be this big wig, but there’s nothing to support it. Where’s the paper trail?“ He stopped short, his eyes looking into the distance instead of focusing on me. I could practically see the wheels turning in his brain as he put it together.

“Marcus,” he whispered so softly I could barely make it out what he said, and I was expecting it. “They erased him. Just like Marcus. What makes you think they didn’t kill him?”

“Because they didn’t kill Marcus and more importantly, they didn’t kill Mac, even though it was the logical thing to do.” I got up, stretching my legs and giving my eyes a rest from the glare of the computer screen. “The question we need to ask ourselves isn’t why didn’t they kill him. It’s what was so important that they needed to keep him alive?”

“Isn’t that the same thing?” Jonas asked.

“No,” Trinity answered for me. “It’s not. Well, it is, but it’s not. It’s all in how you look at it. You can ask the same question over and over, and you’ll always get the same answer. Asked a different way, the brain responds to the new question, and you’ll trigger a different response. We use it all the time during trials and depositions. You use it too, Bryan. It’s called interrogation. You just don’t recognize it without a bright light shining in your face.”

I was impressed in spite of myself. She’d calmly explained and still managed to throw a jab in there at Jonas. I looked over at Mac, who’d been exceptionally quiet during the past few minutes. Where Jonas and Trinity needed to talk things through in a logical progression, Mac was more intuitive, relying primarily on his senses to find his way through a problem. Probably because he knew logic, as we knew it, had little do with it anymore. We’d entered a world where the impossible was now possible and the illogical made sense. The ramifications of what I alone could do was overwhelming. What if there were dozens like me? What if there were hundreds? How do you fight a war where there are no rules and no limits, except for those you set for yourself? I had a horrible feeling I was going to find out, and it gave me the shivers.

“It’s you,” Mac said quietly, breaking into my thoughts. “You’re the reason we’re alive. They’re after you, but you’re useless to them if you can’t control your power. They need Brown to train you, and they kept me around in case things didn’t work out and they needed me back in place.”

“So, we have to assume they have him.” Jonas rubbed his face with his hands, despair evident in his voice as realization sank in. “Question is whether he’s a willing participant or not. Either way, we’ll never find him. I hope you have a plan B, Samantha, or we’re in big trouble.”

“We don’t need a plan B,” I said. “Our objective is still the same. I need to learn to control this, and we need some answers. We have to find Caleb Brown.”

“Just how do you propose we do that?” Trinity asked. “They have him, and we have no idea where he is.”

“You’re right. We don’t know where he is, but someone at the Agency does. It’s too good a source of information for them to abandon it. There’s someone there. We find him, we find Brown.” I reached over and pulled Mac’s list of names over to the edge of the desk.

“I did searches on the names Mac gave me. They all came back with associated sites on recent and past activity with the exception of one.” I pointed to the name that Mac had underlined on the sheet of paper. “Matthew Hughes. He exists, but barely, and nothing in recent history. Just like Marcus Adams and Caleb Brown. I”m willing to bet he’s there at the Agency, keeping an eye on things. Who is this guy?” I looked over at Mac, waiting. This was the guy he’d picked out too. Now I wanted to know why.

“Matthew Hughes is the Head of Security. Doesn’t get much better for them, or much worse for us.”

No kidding. That was about the last thing I wanted to hear. If the Head of Security for the Agency was part of the problem, we couldn’t just walk in the front door looking for answers. His position gave him way too much power and too much freedom to use it however he wanted. It didn’t change our objective. Just made it way more complicated.

“We need to check him out. Find out what he knows and if he’s involved.”

“Well,” said Mac, dusting off his jeans as he rose, “there’s only one way to do that. When do you want to leave?“

“Leave? Wait a minute. We’re going to the Agency?” Trinity asked. “Is that safe?”

“No, it’s not,” Jonas answered, keeping his focus on me. “In fact, it puts everyone here in a great deal of danger.”

He was right. It would. This was what they signed up for, but now the rubber was meeting the road for the first time. Mac and I were committed, but it wasn’t too late for them to duck and run. I waited, not saying anything to break the silence. It was their move, and I wasn’t going to try to convince them either way.

“Okay.” Trinity popped up off the bed with a determined look on her face, making the decision for them. “Then I want a gun.”