Under the Gun

“What did he look like?” Will asked.

“Average height. Bushy eyebrows. I’m pretty sure the hair and mustache were fake. His shoulders sloped, sort of like a no-neck athlete, you know?”

Will sat quietly beside her as she examined the five photos Jack had sent with his first message. “Not any one of these guys,” she reported with a puff of frustration.

She opened the next e-mail, with more files attached. “Rats. This could take forever.”

For a long while there was no sound other than the click of the keys and her own occasional hum of disappointment.

Then Will said, almost to himself, “If I could get something of his, something he touched… I don’t know if I can read him that way, but did he drop anything?”

Holly thought for a minute. “Shell casings at the airport? He would have touched those while loading. The dart from the nurse’s neck?”

Will shrugged. “I don’t know. It was just a thought, something to try, but it’s pretty far-fetched. Tell Jack to send what he’s got, just in case. Eric’s probably tried everything already, since clairvoyance is his bag. Mine is… I don’t really know what mine is,” he admitted with a grunt. “If it’s anything at all.”

“It’s not like Joe’s snapshot images, is it?” She shook her head before he answered. “No, that’s pre-cognitive, and so are Clay’s visions, except that he has to seek them out, and then they’re too symbolic to mean much until after the fact. But yours seem to be real-time telepathy.”

“Added to remote viewing, apparently,” he added. “Like Matt’s.”

“Can you read me?” Holly asked. “Try it.”

He was silent for a while, then sighed. “No. Nothing. What are you thinking?”

“That we’ll ask Jack for the objects, anyway. It’s certainly worth a shot,” Holly said, and promptly fired off an e-mail to that effect.

She really should encourage Will to keep trying to get in touch with his newfound ability and explore it to the max. “If it’s not too painful for you, would you tell me about Matt and how you both dealt with his perceptions?”

“He had them and I didn’t. At least I never picked up on anything from other people. With Matt, I pretty much knew what he was thinking most of the time. We didn’t talk about it, it just was.”

“And you never even attempted to do what he did?”

Will shook his head. “Hell, no. He caught a lot of flack because of it when we were kids. He never denied it, though. It was part of him and he used it, just took it for granted most of the time.”

“Maybe you suppressed your ability early on because people gave him such a hard time about it,” Holly guessed. “That would be a natural reaction.”

“Spare me the pop psychology.”

“That’s my bag, in case you never noticed. People actually pay me for it.”

As usual, Will ignored her tone. “We were thoroughly analyzed by experts, believe me. Matt enjoyed confusing them. He really got into those so-called studies.”

“Matt was a show-off,” Holly said with a smile. “You were always the quiet one.”

“Were?”

She patted his arm and sighed. “Yep. You realize you’ve discussed more personal stuff with me in the last few hours than you have in all the time I’ve known you? And that’s a good thing, Will.”

“Forced proximity, I imagine. Nothing else to do.”

“No, it’s more than that. Different,” Holly argued. “You and I have been on secluded ops before with plenty of time and opportunity for conversation, and you hardly said anything at all about yourself.”

“Maybe you never let me get a word in,” he teased, then sobered a little. “I think I get what you’re trying to say. Maybe I’m even reading you a little right now. You’re worried I’m taking on Matt’s characteristics. Trying to be him now that he’s gone. I was his shadow for so long and now the substance of us is gone.”

“No, that’s wrong, Will. You’re obviously not reading my mind but projecting your own worry. Matt was not the substance. You were two separate and very valuable individuals. You might have looked identical, but you were so different from each other. Maybe you don’t see it that way, but I always have,” Holly assured him. “We chose you for the Sextant team. Just you.”

“Only because of the language thing.”

“No, not entirely. You do have a super background in Middle Eastern languages, but Matt had Russian.”

Will shrugged, looking slightly uncomfortable.

“No! Don’t tell me. You subbed for him in class. Will, that was cheating!”

“No, we never switched. He…we thought about it, but that would have put him at a big disadvantage if he’d ever had to use it. I only…well, sort of tutored him.”

She sat up straight and stared at him in surprise. “You speak Russian? You never listed that!”

He shrugged again. “I never formally studied it. Not in class. I might have had to justify that if I’d put it on my résumé.”

“Yeah, and it would have made Matt’s list of creds look even slimmer than yours, right?”

She slid her arm around his waist and laid her head on his shoulder. “Don’t ever sell yourself short, Will. You were never Matt’s shadow. You were his support. You were his anchor, his rudder.”

Will laughed. “His sail, too? If you knew how much both of us hated boats, you’d come up with another analogy.”

He rested his head against hers and patted the hand she had placed on his arm. “But I see what you’re saying and I appreciate the thought. Matt would have laughed his butt off at this whole conversation.”

“I bet he would. But you ought to listen to me.”

“I always listen to you,” he said softly. “It’s one of the great joys of my life, listening to you, even when you don’t make a lick of sense.”

They laughed together. Holly felt his steady warmth flow through her like a balm. It amazed her how they could be together this way with nothing sexual happening at all, and yet feel empowered with the energy of it.

“You should go back to work,” he said, lifting his head away from hers and disengaging. “I’m getting maudlin here. Must be the drugs.” But they both knew he hadn’t taken so much as an aspirin all day long.

He stood, catching his foot on the leg of the computer desk and cursing under his breath. She barely stopped herself from reaching out and giving him a hand. That fierce independence of his needed to assert itself, and she needed to help it do so more than he needed her in mom mode.

He recovered his balance and braced his hand on the edge of the desk. “If you’ll excuse me, I think I’ll make myself scarce for a while.”

“Going out to run a few laps?” she quipped to hide her disappointment.

“Sure, why not? Need me to pick up anything while I’m out? Be sure you describe it by feel.”

Holly groaned. “He made a joke! A blind joke, too! Red letter day in the life of Mr. Solemnity.”

“Point me to the door,” Will said with a disgusted shake of his head. “Now I’m all turned around.”

“Go to your two o’clock and straight ahead,” she suggested.