Journey Into the Flame (18 page)

“Wait,” Logan said. “Let me look at the drawing of the study again. I want to make sure I can remember what the room looks like.” Mr. Perrot handed him the sheet with the drawing. Logan opened and closed his eyes a few times, ensuring that the layout was etched in his mind. “OK. I think I’ve got it.”

“Do you have the sheet of paper with our question?” Logan held up the folded sheet. Mr. Perrot lit the candle.

The only light in the apartment came from the candle. To Logan, Mr. Perrot soon appeared to be nothing more than a shadow. The candle flame crackled. Logan tried to relax, taking deep breaths and exhaling slowly. His mind was racing as he recalled the extraordinary events of the day: uncovering the secret tunnel, locating the hidden box, being apprehended by the police, seeing Valerie, and all he’d learned from reading the torn-out pages of Camden Ford’s journal. He continued to stare at the flame, but the harder he concentrated on it, the louder his mind-chatter became. The flame was dancing like an anxious child as the minutes slowly passed. Logan could see the shadowed image of
Mr. Perrot on the couch, and he heard the ticking of a clock that was hanging on the wall.

“I don’t think I’m getting it,” Logan said out loud, adjusting his posture and flexing his shoulders.

“You have to hold still, fight any desire to move,” Mr. Perrot whispered. “Camden said to start by focusing on something we enjoyed doing or some task we were good at performing. He told us it would help slow down our minds and help block out the chatter.”

Logan readjusted until he found a more comfortable position. He scanned his memories for a pleasant moment and began to focus on a day when he was teaching his children how to paint. It was a scene of the ocean. He remembered how he’d taught them to draw the waves and sketch the sky with many floating clouds. He remembered his daughter, Jamie, coloring in her first whale and his son, Jordan, drawing a submarine. As Mr. Perrot predicted, Logan was feeling more relaxed, his mind clearing. The flame, which had been frantically moving to and fro, settled down before his eyes. His mind was finding a peaceful place, and the flame was matching it.

Mr. Perrot sat perfectly still, watching Logan as he stopped squirming, as his breathing slowed, with his chest expanding and contracting less often. Several long moments passed. Mr. Perrot also started to focus on the flame, trying to recreate his focus from long ago. But then, suddenly Logan began to shake his head. The calm was broken. Logan rubbed his ears fiercely.

“What’s wrong?” Mr. Perrot asked as he jolted back from his own meditation.

“The ringing is back, worse than ever. It’s almost unbearable.”

Mr. Perrot sighed. “And for a moment there, it looked like you had achieved it.”

“Things got better once I started focusing on my children. But . . .” Logan looked up and braced himself with determination. “Let’s try again. I doubt even the great Camden Ford got it the first time.”

“Maybe you can do as Baté instructed,” Mr. Perrot suggested. “Allow
yourself into the sound. Remember to embrace it as if it were a piece of music.”

“Right—a piece of music.”

Logan once again adjusted his body and began to refocus on the burning flame. It did not take very long for the ringing to start again. He remained steadfast this time, trying not to move. The more he attempted to dismiss the ringing, the louder it became.
Embrace it like music,
he thought.
Like music . . .
He brought to his mind the melody of a lullaby his mother used to sing to him. The ringing got louder, but so did the melody he was remembering. Soon the ringing sounded like a high-pitched whistle. He was fighting and struggling, caught up in a battle between the whistle and the song. It was becoming more and more unbearable, more and more impossible. But his eyes remained fixed on the flame, ever on the flame. He was about to give up, when the ringing suddenly stopped, the ghostly image of Mr. Perrot disappeared, and the slowly wavering flame faded into blackness.

18

Empty space exists because you believe it is real. What if the space between your assumptions was filled with real and tangible things?

—THE CHRONICLES OF SATRAYA

WASHINGTON, D.C., 10:50 P.M. LOCAL TIME,

5 DAYS UNTIL FREEDOM DAY

“We are standing outside the Council of Satraya offices,” a reporter announced in a live broadcast. “Late last night, three Council members and a young woman identified as the niece of one of the members were found dead. Details are still limited at this time, but a source has told us that the deaths are being investigated as homicides. The source, who did not want to be identified, also confirmed that lead investigator Valerie Perrot of the World Crime Federation has been assigned to this high-profile case. Ms. Perrot began her meteoric rise in the WCF six years ago, when she cracked the Double-R kidnapping case involving six-year-old twin sisters in a suburb of New Chicago. Last year, in a raid she coordinated and led, she took down a global prostitution cartel based in Singapore. Ms. Perrot has been unavailable for comment, but we expect to hear from her shortly.

“People are asking if the killings at the Council offices were politically motivated. One of the victims, Cynthia Brown, the head of the Council, was no stranger to controversy. Some security professionals
are speculating about the involvement of the Sentinel Coterie, a radical organization that has been at odds with the Council of Satraya for many years. The Sentinel Coterie has accused the Council of slowing down progress and denying society its right to advancement. A Coterie spokesman told me today that while they disagreed with Ms. Brown on a variety of issues, the Coterie does not condone the use of force.

“Many are asking if this tragedy will mark the end of the Council of Satraya. Sadly and ironically, Freedom Day, a day on which we celebrate freedom and peace, is only five days away. Now, back to you in the studio and an update on the streak of mysterious disappearances in the southern region of the former U.S.”

Valerie clicked off the 3-D image of the news broadcast being projected from her PCD.

“Hey, don’t you want to keep watching?” Charlie teased with a smile. “You’re a super sleuth!”

“No,” Valerie grumbled. “Those reporters just make our jobs harder.”

Valerie and Charlie were still in the basement of the Council of Satraya offices. More site investigators had arrived and joined the others who were still processing the newly discovered tunnel. “Anything from the Central Crime Lab on cause of death?” Valerie asked.

“Nothing yet,” Charlie said. “They said there are no apparent wounds on the bodies.”

“Let’s go over the time line again.”

Charlie brought his notes up on his PCD and relayed the victims’ activities from the night before. Valerie was most interested in the HoloPad malfunction in New Chicago at 9:45
p.m.
Central time, which ended Cynthia Brown’s participation in the auction, and the cleaning crew’s discovery of the victims’ bodies in the second-floor meeting room of the Council building at approximately 12:10 the next morning.

“Do we have any video of the auction in New Chicago?” Valerie asked.

“We sure do.” Valerie moved closer to Charlie as he brought up
the video feed. “The auction was covered by the local press. I didn’t see much when I looked at it earlier. The camera angle is from the back of the hall facing the auctioneer’s podium.” Charlie played with the video until he got to the part where the
Chronicles
was up for bidding.

“Stop—back it up,” Valerie said. “Looks like this is where Cynthia starts to bid on the books. And is that who I think it is?”

“Yep,” Charlie responded. “That’s Andrea Montavon.”

“I haven’t heard her name in a long time,” said Valerie. “She is certainly a beautiful woman.” She stared at the image for a moment. “Any other bidders for the books?”

“We are getting a list from the auction house.” Charlie resumed the video, and they watched the events unfold, intently looking for meaningful details. The camera panned the crowd as the bidding intensified. “I didn’t notice that before,” said Charlie, as he suddenly paused the video and backed it up a few frames. “Chief, isn’t that your friend Logan?” Charlie zoomed in on the image.

Valerie groaned. “Looks like Logan and my father have a bit more to explain than just the tunnel.”

Charlie resumed the video. A few seconds later, Valerie gasped at the flash of green light, the loud noise, and the sound of people screaming.

“We have our team in New Chicago checking out the data traces from the HoloPad to see what caused the malfunction and that flash,” Charlie said.

Valerie stood pensively for a few moments. “Does this office building have any security cameras?”

“There are three,” Charlie said. “One at the front door, one at the back entrance, and one outside the meeting room where we found the bodies. But I’ve looked at their files and didn’t see anything interesting. Once the auction started, we didn’t see anyone go in or out.”

“Bring up the files from the camera outside the meeting room,” Valerie said. “Can you put the two videos up side-by-side? Line them up so they start two minutes before Cynthia disappears. And roll slowly.”

With a few strokes on his PCD, Charlie brought up the surveillance video outside the meeting room and projected it next to the video of the auction. “Looking for anything in particular?” he asked, as he started them rolling.

Valerie was silent for a minute, then said, “Pause it—right now! Let’s move it frame by frame. Did you see that?”

“See what?”

“Back up a few frames, and look at the closed door of the meeting room. See there—at the exact moment that Cynthia’s image disappears in a green flash in New Chicago, there is a simultaneous flash of green light coming from under the door.” Valerie continued to advance and rewind the frame so that Charlie could see what she was describing. “So the question is what caused the green light. The door was closed the whole time, and no one came in or went out.”

“Whatever caused the light was probably already in that room when they arrived,” Charlie said.

“Or one of them brought it in with them,” Valerie added. “Knowingly or unknowingly.”

“Hey!” a voice called out. “We have something over here.”

Charlie shut down his PCD, and he and Valerie walked over to an investigator standing by a desk a meter or so from the tunnel’s entrance.

The investigator spoke quickly. “There’s a strange burn mark on the top of this desk. Looks like something really hot was placed on it. It must have been recent—you can still smell the odor of scorched wood if you get real close.”

“Whatever it was, it certainly left a strangely shaped mark,” Valerie said, as Charlie took a picture of it with his PCD. The mark was three concentric circles with a cross in the middle.

“Any idea what caused the burn?” Charlie asked.

The investigator shook his head. “But check this out.” He pointed to the ceiling. There was a hole in it, about one centimeter in diameter. “The hole goes up into the conference room where we found the victims.”

“Let us know what you find,” Valerie said, turning back to Charlie. “What about the Federation banquet—do we have any video of it?”

Charlie nodded and brought up a projection of the hall. “The press was all over the event. I’ll start it with Cynthia’s speech.”

“Isn’t that the head of the Sentinel Coterie sitting at that table?” Valerie asked as the video started.

“The one and only Mr. Randolph Fenquist,” Charlie answered.

“The press may be right on this one,” Valerie said. “We need to bring him in for questioning.”

“We’ll try,” Charlie said. “Usually, when we try to speak to anyone in that group, they lawyer up. But I’ll get someone to check them out.”

The video continued to roll, now to Cynthia’s speech. “Who’s that girl at the side of the stage hugging Cynthia?”

“That is Monique Sato, Cynthia’s personal assistant,” Charlie answered. “She stayed at the banquet after the speeches. Witnesses said that Cynthia asked her to remain there to assist the other Council members as they met with the muckety-mucks.” Charlie gave a short laugh. Then he switched to another camera feed. “Here is where Cynthia and the three others leave the hall. That’s the last we see of her until the auction.”

“Stay with Monique,” Valerie ordered. They watched as she walked over to an older man with long, stringy brown hair and started talking to him. It was Randolph Fenquist.

“Why is Monique talking to the leader of the Sentinel Coterie?” Valerie asked. “What in the world could the assistant to the leader of the Council of Satraya possibly have to say to him?”

“Well, it’s a political banquet. Everyone’s your friend. Wait—what’s he giving to her?”

“Pause the video,” Valerie said. She and Charlie both tried to see what Fenquist had handed Monique, but she put it into her purse so quickly it was hard to tell. Charlie tried to adjust and pane the video but to no avail.

Something else had caught Valerie’s eye, though. She zoomed in
on the lower part of Monique’s image, then angled her head a moment to examine it. Valerie smiled. “Look at her shoes. They’re Pierre Masus.” Charlie gave her a blank look. “The same brand of shoe that left the prints in the tunnel. Charlie, I think we’ve found our number one suspect.”

Charlie gave an admiring nod. “And I bet you she’s working for Randolph Fenquist.”

19

What are you willing to do with what you know?

—THE CHRONICLES OF SATRAYA

WASHINGTON, D.C., 11:55 P.M. LOCAL TIME,

5 DAYS UNTIL FREEDOM DAY

Logan reached out and attempted to grab one of the many iridescent clouds that were floating by him. The ringing sound in his ears had stopped. He felt as if he were standing in the middle of a field in the frosty stillness of winter when a heavy snowfall hindered one’s vision. No two clouds were the same, each boasting its own color, shape, and size. A soothing electrical current entered Logan’s body as his hand passed through the clouds, as if he were a ghost walking through a wall. No matter how hard he tried to grasp a cloud, it would slip through his fingers and float away. A soft crackling sound came as the clouds, which were traveling in many directions, passed through one another.
Where am I?
Logan thought.
What is this place?
The clouds faded away, and the crackling sound diminished.