Mark Hadron looked out the window as the sun came up. He got ready for the new day before pulling out the equipment case from his go bag. It was the smallest they had been able to make their sensor with the electronics they had access to. He supposed it was a wonder that it actually worked.

He made his check in call to let Milton and Janie know that they were getting

breakfast and meeting the rep from the Israelis after breakfast. He had to make sure Harry was ready to go first.

He didn’t let them know about Harry’s prediction, but did enquire if it was possible to airdrop some carbines and lamps if they needed it. Janie said she would make a note so Milton could look into it.

After he hung up, he admitted he would feel better with the familiar blue flame close at hand. Surveys of turbulence shouldn’t be dangerous, but he had already seen three cases where the survey stirred up something that didn’t like humans knowing it was there.

Burning those monsters down had solved some heinous crimes for the locals when they were done.

Hadron had been glad to get out of the charnel houses when they were done.

He locked up his room after storing his bag back under the bed. He walked across the hall and knocked on the door to Harry’s room. He listened but didn’t hear any movement. He knocked louder.

“What you want?,” asked Harry through the door.

“It’s time to go to work,” said Hadron. “I’m going down to breakfast. Get ready.”

Hadron walked down to the elevator and headed down. He sniffed the air and

followed it to a bar of food and coffee. He got a plate of buns and a cup of coffee. He sat down at the table in the small café. He checked his watch as he ate.

Harry was going to miss breakfast if he didn’t get a move on.

He wondered how much they would have to do on the first day. He planned to figure out the area of the survey and a route to cover it before they went out. Tomorrow they could actually see the scene.

If the area was close enough, and small enough, they could probably handle it today, and fly back the next day. Milton would not like the end of the revenue stream.

Harry arrived with hat pushed back and case in hand. He put the case down and grabbed some food before settling at Hadron’s table. He had twice as much as his friend and dug in like a wolf.

“You got ten minutes before the rep is supposed to arrive,” said Hadron, sipping his coffee. It was a little stronger than he usually got but he could live with that.

“I’ll be finished before then,” said Harry. “You learn to eat fast if you want to get away from the table before a squabble breaks out.”

“I can believe it,” said Hadron.

Harry seemed to have as big a family as Columbo and Hadron couldn’t keep all of them straight in his head. He just shook his head at a story and kept moving. He had met some of them and they were as quirky as Harry said. He had no doubt that his friend’s ability ran strong in his family.

A man in a short sleeved shirt came into the lobby, glancing around. A smile cut through his beard as he spotted the Lamplighters at their table. He turned to approach their table.

“Mark Hadron, Harrison Cho,” said the stranger. “I’m Ishmael Levram, the

representative from the Department of Psychic Studies and Research. I’m here to show you the survey area, and talk about your technology.”

“We’ll call you Ishmael,” said Harry.

“That’s what everyone says,” said the representative. He smiled, but it was easy to see he wasn’t a fan of Moby Dick at this point in his life.

“What do you need to know about the technology?,” asked Hadron. He wasn’t

planning to sell anything. And he doubted Milton would agree to an end to their monopoly.

As long as they were the only ones using the lamps and carbines, then there was no worry that someone would do something stupid like collect blue flame until it exploded into a giant demon and started killing people.

“I’m interested in how it works, and how you can detect turbulence,” said Levram. “The region has had several problems that were stopped by chance. I want something preventative for the future.”

“We can’t give you anything like that,” said Hadron. “We can do the survey and point out where you might have problems in the future. We can’t give you equipment without some kind of binding agreement in place. Plus we’re not sure anyone else can make the lamps, sensors, and carbines right now. They seem to run on mind power at the very least.”

The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.

“Mind power?,” asked Levram.

“I can demonstrate right here before we go out on the survey,” said Hadron. He opened his case. He pulled out a box of electronics and a dish antenna to plug into one end. “This is the clerk.”

He pointed the sensor at the clerk and pushed the button. A small black and white screen gave a zero back. He pointed at Harry and got back a two. He knew that was because of his friend’s fortune telling ability. He pointed at Levram and he paused when the Israeli came back with a three.

“Borderline superhuman,” said Hadron. “What can you do? Talk to birds? Surround yourself with sand?”

“No,” said Levram. “But I have always had a knack with technology.”

“Really?,” said Hadron. He put the box back in the case after powering the machine down. “How good a knack?”

“I could rebuild your sensor to be easier to carry and have more range while using less battery power,” said Levram.

“Really?,” said Hadron. “This technology can be horribly abused in a lot of ways. Why should we trust you with this?”

“I can’t really justify my standing,” said Levram. “But I would like to see if I can use this to protect Israel from things coming out of the woodwork.”

“You would need a mobile team to protect the whole country,” said Harry. He

finished his meal. “How many people are in your department?”

“Me,” said Levram. “Of course, I answer to people above me, but I’m the only one in my department right now.”

“If we gave your our gear, you would be dead the first time you took something on,” said Hadron. “There’s no way that you could take anything over a five, or six, by yourself. Crenshaw is an eight, and you would be dead in the first five seconds if he showed up here.”

“I was hoping that we could work out something where I can set up sensors so I could pinpoint problems and solve them without the actual weapons,” said Levram.

“The sensors tend to set off whatever you are looking for,” said Hadron. “You would have agitated monsters exposing themselves to civilians and killing them just because they were spotted.”

“I think we should get back to the original problem,” said Harry. “Why did you need a survey in the first place?”

Hadron couldn’t help his face telling them he was getting ready to walk away. One of the uses for his sensors would be locating superhumans who didn’t want to be located. Some of them should be located because they were thieves and murderers, but most were just people trying to mind their business.

Why should he give any country the ability to round up any superhuman who didn’t want to work for them?

The world already knew some governments were doing just that.

“There is some kind of problem in the south,” said Levram. “We have observers marking a storm that hasn’t moved. At some point, something has to be done. The department has been asked to look into it, which is why I called your business.”

“So you are wondering if some kind of monster or ghost is there?,” said Harry. He pushed his hat back.

“I have ruled out other energy being present with my own equipment,” said Levram.

“I think we can do that,” said Harry. “I have to say this could go bad by the end of the week.”

“How bad?,” said Levram.

Harry made an explosion with his hands.

“That doesn’t look good,” said Levram.

“It’s in the future,” said Harry. “And we can change that if we work hard enough.”

“Do you have a shop?,” asked Hadron. “We might need carbines and lamps.”

“I would be glad to show you the workshop,” said Levram. “I have requisitioned everything that I could.”

“Everything?,” said Harry.

“Yes,” said Levram. “Some things have shown to be valuable in some of the cases I have dealt with for the ministry.”

“Let’s look at the area,” said Hadron. “Then we’re going to need access if I think we can handle it on our own. If we can’t, we’ll have to get Milton and Dyson here.”

“I will arrange a plane to fly them here from New York if that will solve the

problem,” said Levram.

“Can you do that?,” asked Hadron.

“I have tons of surplus in my budget,” said Levram. “Mostly I use it for replacement parts. Chartering a plane and getting it here on top of your fees will be fine.”

“All right,” said Hadron. “Let’s look at the problem in person. Then we can decide on what we want to do.”

“I have arranged for a flight to the scene,” said Levram. “I have an observation point buried out there so we can set up there until we decide what to do.”

“All right,” said Hadron. “Let’s go ahead and do this.”

“My car is outside,” said Levram. “The heli is at the airport. We can fly down in a few minutes.”

“All right,” said Hadron. “You finished, Harry?”

“Almost,” said Harry. “How long have you been with the government, Ishmael.”

“A few years,” said Levram. “I earned my position after my conscription. I have been the department since it was created. I was told that other governments have the same thing but I have only worked with the British.”

“Haven’t seen any American unit,” said Harry.

“We might depend a lot more on the Mark than people think,” said Hadron.

“Or they have one guy who’s glad that someone is doing stuff that he would normally be responsible for,” said Harry. “Where’s that report on the bridge troll? Lamplighters blew it up. I still need a report.”

“All right,” said Hadron. “Hurry up. I have a bad feeling about this.”

“You’ve always got a bad feeling,” said Harry. “You need to relax a lot more, maybe take Janie out on the town.”

“Why would I do that?,” asked Hadron.

“Because she’s interested in you,” said Harry. “Everybody sees it.”

“I would rather not,” said Hadron. The tone of his voice said he didn’t want to talk about it.

“Okay,” said Harry. “It’s just one future, but it’s something for you to consider. You don’t want to be alone if something happens to the rest of us. You’ll need her to keep steady.”

“If you were to drop dead, I would be fine,” said Hadron.

“All right,” said Harry. He shook his head in disbelief.

“Shall we?,” said Levram.

“I think so unless my friend has more romantic advice for me to dismiss,” said

Hadron.

“I’m good,” said Harry. “Let me grab some more of these cookies to take with us.”

Levram seemed amused. He stood and walked across the lobby. Hadron grabbed the equipment boxes and followed. Harry hurried to catch up with the two of them, putting cookies packed in bags in his jacket pocket.

Levram went to a Audi with government plates. He gestured for his guests to take seats as he got behind the wheel. The three of them rolled to the airport for their flight.