Trying to Determine What Happened

I let Alyson lead the way to this Shipwrecked Smuggler’s Shack, down by the beach. For the first bunch of blocks, it is mostly just heading towards the beach, though we do end up turning southward. Then, it becomes more evident where the tiki bar is, as we approach. It becomes clear that she’s leading us towards the trailing smoke. And once we hit the edge of the buildings and the beach, we see it.

A small shack on the beach side of the street, shaped enough like a boat for tourists to find it adorable, is a bar. Flames engulf its wooden walls, and people around are in a state of panic. Some are running, some seem frozen in place. Screams. I try to spot why this is happening, or if our older compatriot is anywhere to be seen.

Lyle nudges Alyson and says quietly, without gesturing, “Isn’t that Mister Jennings, frozen at the bar?”

I look, and he’s right. The old man from the elevator, was sitting, but his expression seems more confused than scared. “Think so,” I confirm.

Alyson sighs and looks over at the group. “We need to get him out of there.”

I add, “He doesn’t seem scared, more confused.”

“In that case, we need to get him out of there fast,” she says, adding as an explanation, “Because either that means he’s in shock, or that means something pulse-related is going on. Neither case do we want him stuck in there.”

“Or both,” Lyle offers. Meanwhile, I can’t quite explain how, but Winsten seems to descend quickly and vertically into the concrete of the street. I look at Alyson. “Did you know he could do that?”

Alyson shakes her head. “I figured someone could do something,” she replies.

As we wait, I say, “So, let’s get a quick laydown of what we all figured out we can do. Katrina says I was more confident, and I can get people to do what I ask. Other than that, when I was bathing last night there was some sparking on my fingertips.”

“Really?” Lyle says, “That’s cool. I just sort of felt like my arm was in the wrong place, and pushed it into the proper placement, and it healed fully basically immediately. Oh, and I feel strong. Like real superhero, I almost broke the faucet turning on the sink kind of strong.”

“I really don’t know,” Alyson replies, “I’m sure it’s happening to me too, but I mostly feel the same.”

I nod. “Maybe you’re lucky. Or we might figure stuff out once we’re all in one place. I have no idea. And clearly Winsten can go into the ground somehow.”

“Win also fully vanished for about an hour last night,” Lyle adds. Alyson looks at him, a bit confused. Hmm, I muse, clearly they had different experiences. I wonder what that means. As I’m thinking about that, I watch as Mister Jennings seems to fall into the floor of the bar. Not onto, into, vanishing beneath the tile.

“And he can bring people with him,” I say.

Alyson looks at me confused, and I nod in the direction of the bar, of the empty spot where the old man once sat. “Odd,” she says, and takes a deep breath. “Any idea what’s happening to us?”

I shake my head. “Again, regroup, figure it out as a whole,” I say.

Coming out from the ground below us, Winsten begins to rise from the ground, carrying an unconscious young woman. Mister Jennings follows behind, holding onto the college kid’s shoulder. “What’s going on?” the old man stutters out as Winsten sets the woman down on the sand.

“Who’s that, Win?” Alyson asks him.

Winsten shrugs, “Bartender,” he states nonchalantly, “Old man insisted.”

Mister Jennings shakes his head. “Cold. The fire, it was cold,” he sputters out.

I sit down beside the old man. “Listen,” I say, “We will figure this all out, and everything will be okay.” I wait for him to acknowledge me.

It takes a moment before he looks up and nods. “Okay,” he finally says, taking a deep breath.

“That said,” I add, “I’d love for some context. What happened here?”

He looks confused. “I really don’t know. Some guy at the bar was being very loud, irritating, boisterous, you know. Insulting everyone and the like. He spilled his drink on me, started yelling, blaming me. When she,” he gestures towards the unconscious woman, “Stood up for me, he started threatening her. Then it’s all a blur but the place seemed to basically just erupt in flames. Everything was aflame, even the angry man. Except the flames didn’t feel hot.”

Winsten lets out a deep exhale. “Nope, it was definitely burning hot.”

I frown. That might mean he somehow caused the flames. “What were you feeling, when the fires started?”

“Upset, angry? Why?” he asks right back at me.

I take a moment to breath, to figure out when and how best to phrase this. As I do, I notice the storm on the horizon, approaching. It’ll be making landfall close by and soon. And I hear the sirens approaching. Too many eyes, too many variables, not enough time. “Come now, let’s head back to the hotel or the hospital. We can talk more there,” I state.

Mister Jennings replies, “I don’t have a room anymore, now that it’s past eleven, and I felt trapped in that hospital. Not being trapped like that again.”

“No need to worry about your room,” Alyson adds, “Jackson here says he convinced them to let us keep our rooms another week.”

“They’re that afraid of us suing?” Mister Jennings wonders aloud.

I shake my head as I stand up and help the veteran up as well. “Not exactly,” I reply, “But that’s what people will probably assume.”

We begin to walk back to the hotel, Winsten quickly stopping off to leave the woman with the other escaped injured people. Hopefully she gets the help from whatever smoke inhalation knocked her unconscious. “Other than the fires, have you noticed anything else odd?” I ask the veteran as I walk with him.

“Not really,” he says, “Nothing stands out.”

Lyle frowns, looking at him. “I don’t see a watch, it’s real cloudy,” he notes, “And the bar’s clock wasn’t visible.”

I don’t exactly get what he’s talking about, until I look at my own watch. 11:08. “How did you know it was past eleven?” I ask Mister Jennings.

He frowns. “I don’t know, isn’t it?” he replies.

I nod. “It is. But only just.” Another oddity. I don’t know exactly what’s going on, but the more of these small points of data we get, the easier time we’ll have figuring it all out.

“I guess I just figured that it was,” he says with a shrug.

Once we make it to the hotel and head inside, Mister Montero nods in greeting. “I assume you got in touch with everyone,” he says.

“Of course,” I say, “Thank you so much for your help.”

The manager smiles. “It was nothing,” he says, “We appreciate what you’ve all been through.”

I nod, and lead people to the lounge. Before we can sit down, Mikey makes his way over from the stairwell. “You good?” he asks Lyle.

“It’s complicated,” Lyle replies. “You okay?” he asks, gesturing towards the man’s ankle, which he’s still walking gingerly on, but not as much as before.

“Close enough,” the man in his later twenties answers. Then turning to me, he adds, “By the way, Hil wanted to thank you for the extra week.”

“Happy to help. Kat told you about the pulses in the eyes, right?” I ask.

He shakes his head. “Not really, but something is definitely going on,” he replies, “Come with me.” Then, after he pauses, he adds, “After I grab some stuff from the door.” He walks towards the hotel’s front door. As he does, I look at the others. “I’m trying to understand this, so I’ll be headed up. You guys?”

Mister Jennings nods. “Definitely. Why was the fire cold?” he presses, still stuck on that point.

The college kids shrug. “Probably would be useful to know what’s happening,” Winsten admits.

“What about that woman taking all the notes down in the jungle?” Alyson asks.

“Seleste? I didn’t see her at breakfast,” I say, “Katrina was going to talk to her about it, but I don’t know if she ended up doing it.”

Winsten smiles. “Did you get her number? You know, for investigative reasons.”

I furrow my brow. “No, something about falling down an elevator shaft through reality kind of made my focus the what-the-heck was going on side of things.”

“Too bad,” the preppy college kid jokes. I shake my head.

Mikey returns, carrying bags of food delivery, presumably lunch for him and his girlfriend. He leads us up the stairs to the third floor. Lyle lifts up Mister Jennings with ease to help him up the stairs. And we walk through the first floor to Mikey and Hilary’s suite. He checks around us before unlocking and opening the door. “I brought guests from last night,” he says as he opens the doors.

We see almost immediately why Mikey knew something was up. The room was incredibly bright, despite the blinds and curtains being closed. And it was all because Hilary, sitting on a chair trying to work on her laptop, was glowing like an LED lightbulb.

“Do they have any idea what’s going on?” she asks as Mikey walks over, gives her a light kiss, and puts the food on the desk.

“Jackson says he’s got a theory.”

She looks up at me. “Mikey told you thanks, right?” she asks, “About the room?”

“He did,” I say, “And while none of us have been quite so obvious, we’ve been noticing some changes, too.”

Lyle puts Mister Jennings down in one of the nice chairs. “Speak for yourself, our new buddy here might have accidentally burned down his favorite nearby bar.”

“What?” the veteran asks, frightened and defensive. An old, dirty, military-looking gun appears in his hands. He immediately drops it in surprise. “Okay, what is going on?” he asks.

“The crack last night,” I say, “Ever since it happened, we’ve been different. In our eyes, it still drums and pulses, and now we are doing things that should be impossible.” I look to confirm it with them.

Mikey nods. “I may be exaggerating my ankle injury. It was twisted last night, and I basically no longer feel it.”

“I pushed my arm back into place, and it doesn’t even feel fractured anymore,” Lyle offers, as a sort of understanding.

Mikey chuckles. “I could tell that when you carried this guy up the stairs no problem.”

Lyle laughs and shakes his head. “Nope, I’m pretty sure that’s unrelated.”

“Okay?” Hilary says, confused. “What about you, Jackson?”

I sigh. “Um, so I asked the manager to extend our stays, he agreed to help happily. And according to both Alyson here and his receptionist, that’s not just abnormal in general, but was not something he wanted to do for us before I talked to him about doing it.”

“I can see why you said less obvious.”

“Win walks through the ground sometimes,” Alyson says, to emphasize not everyone is so unclear.

“How?” Mikey asks.

Winsten shrugs. “No idea.” I can tell he’s trying to, but he’s not falling this time.

Alyson waves her hand to explain. “It was on the beachside, to save Mr. Jennings,” she begins, and playing out before our eyes like a hologram is the scene. From her perspective. No, it’s her memory of what happened.

I look at her. “Did you know you could do that?” I ask.

She shakes her head. “Not until it started to appear. Then it was kind of second nature.” The image shuts down.

“How did you do that?” Hilary asks.

“I don’t know, I just thought about showing it,” Alyson begins.

Hilary shakes her head. “Not the display. How’d you make it stop?” she gestures towards her own, glowing body.

“Right,” Alyson realizes, “It’s like a hologram, right? But it also felt like my focus was powering it. So I kind of imagined unplugging it from my mind, then let it fade on its own.”

Hilary nods. “Worth a try,” she says.