51: The Series

51: The Storm Chapter 15 Part 1

Lindsay was sitting at her desk reading some of the files Wren had brought to her office. The more of them she read, the more worried she became. Lindsay had read ten files since her shift started; seven were either dangerous or potentially dangerous. She finished the file in her hand and put it down on the desk. She wrote down a few notes on the pad of paper that was on her desk and looked at her computer sitting on the floor connected to the printer Wren had brought her from the base. Cat had begun printing the files on the hard drive, and the printer was going nonstop.

Little Bob walked and put a cup of coffee on her desk in front of her. He dropped into the chair across from her.

“How are you doing this morning?” he asked.

“You mean besides the fact that my husband and Max came back from a call looking like they had been in a world-class food fight? I am getting more worried with every file I read,” She told him. “What happened to them anyway, and how much is it going to cost the department?”

Little Bob started laughing and answered, “They tried to do the same thing that you do with that thing when it starts throwing things around. Your husband yelled at it, and it did not like it. The two of them wound up having everything in that kitchen that was food and a few things that weren't food, thrown at them. Max said it even opened the refrigerator and threw leftovers at them. Your husband then decided to call a team to come and clean up. Whoever it is he works for will be covering the cost of everything that those two broke trying to play tennis with it.”

“Tennis?”

“Well, sort of. It may have been more like badminton or something. When it started throwing things at them, Max grabbed a roll of paper towels, and Wren grabbed a skillet. Every time it threw something at them, they would hit it away, so they weren’t hurt by it,” Little Bob explained. “Oh, and you are not to know any of this, according to Max. Wren was a little upset that yelling at it didn’t work for him like it did for you.”

Lindsay put her elbows on her desk and face in her hands. She groaned and then began laughing. She did not know what else to do at that point.

“That explained why he told me that I need to take care of those calls from now on,” Lindsay said as she continued to laugh.

Little Bob waved toward the boxes of files stacked against her wall and asked, “What can we do to help? Since we have way more people here than we need, we can help you with all this.”

“Well, if some of you who are not taking calls right now want to start taking what is being printed and put the files together, that would be a big help,” Lindsay told him. “That hard drive is a terabyte, and it’s almost full of reports.”

“Wow! That is a lot of reports,” Little Bob said.

“Bob, that is on top of what is in the boxes. As far as we can tell, those boxes were not converted to digital format.”

“OK, then I guess I had better get some help to do it,” Little Bob said as he stood up. “You want us to do this in here or out there somewhere?”

“I think you should do it in here. I want to look like I have a little control over it even if I don’t,” Lindsay told him. “That and the last time our poltergeist friend was here, it trashed out there and left this office alone. I do not want it to start throwing these boxes around. It would take years to fix.”

“Good grief, that would be a nightmare. If we can make room, would you mind if we move a folding table in here to work on?” Little Bob asked.

“No, go ahead, and if you want to move those bulletin boards somewhere else, that is fine too,” Lindsay told him.

“Viktor just got back from a call, so I will grab him and Big Bob and start moving a few things around. Don’t worry, we’ll take care of it for you,” Little Bob told her. “You need to go get something to eat. We still have a lot of food in the back that Jenny sent in with Big Bob, and your Chinese food leftovers are still in the fridge. You want me to warm something up for you while I’m back there?”

“Thanks, but no. I can get my own food. Bob, I know that you want to watch over me and that Wren has been asking you to take care of me since he and I met, but please don’t treat me like I’m one of your daughters,” Lindsay told him. “I do thank you for it, but try to relax a little before I beat you with a stick.”

“I get it, but if you go down, I will be in charge of this place, and I don’t want that. The people who work here are all crazy,” Little Bob said seriously before he turned and left her office.

Lindsay laughed and got up from her desk. She set the box that was on her desk onto the floor and stretched. She watched Little Bob begin directing all the deputies as to what they needed to do, and Cat picked up a stack of files she had already put together, handing it to Annie. Lindsay took a drink of water from the bottle on her desk and headed out to where everyone else was.

“Hi, Sheriff,” Annie said, smiling from ear to ear.

“Hi, Annie. What are you still doing here?” Lindsay asked her, regretting the question as soon as the words left her mouth. She glanced at Big Bob, who just wrinkled his forehead and shook his head.

“Well, I went home for a little while, but it was really quiet, and I just really like it here with all of you. I like having people to talk to, and I really, really want to help you go through the files that Agent Gold brought here. What do you need me to do first? Just tell me, and I will do it,” Annie said without taking a breath.

“You know what? I am going to let Little Bob explain what you need to do first. I haven’t eaten since last night, so I will go grab something and be right back to my office if you need anything,” Lindsay told her and walked toward the refrigerator.

She warmed up her leftover Chinese food and went back to her office. She sat down and smiled as Viktor and Annie came in to move one of the bulletin boards. They carefully rolled it out and down the hall toward the storeroom. They came back for the second, and Viktor looked at it for a moment, then looked at the map on the wall.

“Sheriff Gold, would you like Annie and I to transfer the map and pins to this board? While we do, we can change the tags so there is a color for each month. That would allow it to be more easily read and faster to identify the changes in the areas where they are located. I see you had begun doing that but stopped,” Viktor offered.

“That would be wonderful, thank you,” Lindsay answered, taking a bite of her food. She stood up to move a box from the stack, but Annie grabbed it first.

“Where would you like this, ma’am,” she asked, smiling.

“Please set it on my desk, Annie,” Lindsay told her.

“But you need to eat. You sit down and eat, and as soon as you’re done, I will move it for you,” Annie quickly said as she put the box back where it had been.

“Did Little Bob tell you to say that?” Lindsay asked as she sat down at her desk.

“Say what? I don’t understand.” Annie said, clearly confused.

“Come with me, Annie, and help me find a table to use for sorting the files,” Viktor said.

Lindsay watched as the two of them walked to where the tables were kept, Annie, chattering at him the entire time. Just as she took another bite, she heard the door chime and looked to see Wren coming into the building and toward her office.

Lindsay smiled at him as he walked into her office and said, “You look better or at least cleaner than you did.”

“I do not ever want to do that again. I would tell you what happened, but I think you probably already know,” Wren said as he sat down across from her.

“I do know what happened, and it’s OK. No one got hurt, and we learned that I am the only one who can yell at whatever that thing is,” Lindsay told Wren as she pulled another fork out of her desk and handed it to him.

“It heard what I said, and it did stop for a moment. Then it acted like it was angry that I had told it to do something, and that is when things got messy,” Wren said, taking a bite of the food on her plate. “With all the food that Jenny made, you are eating days-old leftover Chinese food?”

“I am only eating because if I don’t, Big Bob will sit on me, and Little Bob will force-feed me.”

“I could see them doing that,” he said, taking another bite. “You do need to eat a little more. You have lost weight in the past few weeks, and your weight never changes.”

“I just haven’t felt like eating most of the time. I was not ready for all this when I took this job. If I would have known that all this was going to happen, I think I would have turned it down.”

“If I had known this was going to happen, I would have told you to turn it down,” Wren told her.

She looked at the weather forecast on her phone. They had been lucky when the worst of the last wave had gone south, but the next wave coming in looked like it would be a direct hit. She looked up at Wren.

“How were the kids when you were at the house?” she asked.

“They are doing great. Joe had stopped by and was checking on them when I got there, and they are ready to be there during the entire storm system if we let them. They looked at me as if I were crazy when I walked in, covered in food. Your dog followed me through the house, licking my pants' legs every time I stood still, which was a little weird,” he told her. “Eat,” he said as he pushed her food even closer to her. “You haven’t taken a bite since I came in.”

She took a bite and then pushed it back toward him.

“If you don’t eat, I will call Big Bob in here to make you eat,” Wren told her.

“No, you won’t,” she said flatly and changed the subject. “We may still be in trouble with the weather. There is another wave moving into the area soon.”

Viktor and Annie returned with the table and set it up between the map and boxes.

“Viktor, I haven’t seen Yuri and Andy for a while. Did they go home?” Lindsay asked him.

“No, they were sleeping in the storeroom. Andy just woke up, and Yuri is still sleeping. He took over the air mattress that Ekaterina brought to use,” Viktor told her. “Do you need me to go get them for you?”

“No, if anyone is trying to sleep when they are not on shift, let them sleep. We have another wave of bad weather that will be here soon, so you will all need it,” Lindsay told him.

Viktor and Annie began to put the stacks of paper that Cat had printed on the table they had just set up in Lindsay’s office. Lindsay watched them as they began to organize and sort the hundreds of pages and put them into folders. By the time she and Wren had finished eating, they had nearly filled the first file box. Cat came in carrying Lindsay’s computer and the hard drive, setting it on the table beside her brother. She left and came back with the printer and began connecting everything.

Little Bob and Big Bob came into Lindsay’s office and looked at the table. Not saying a word, they turned and walked back out, coming back in with more chairs.

“If I have to do this much paperwork, I will not be standing up to do it,” Big Bob said. “I’m just wondering what happens if your little friend that likes to throw things comes in here and starts tossing things around.”

“Don’t even think like that,” Lindsay said as Wren started to laugh.

After just a few moments of Little Bob sorting, he said, “Lindsay, you need to see this,” handing her a file he had just put together.

She took the file containing only a few sheets of paper, opened it, and began to read. It explained what had happened to Amber Clark. It was a creature that had been created years earlier as a weapon, but it had failed. It could not be controlled the way it had been planned. She looked up at Wren, still sitting across from her, and handed the file to him.

“Don’t worry, it’s dead now,” he told her after he had looked at the file and placed it on the desk. “It escaped within minutes of the incident, and we didn’t know it had gotten that far. I don’t want this,” he said, picking up the file off the desk, “to ever happen again. That is why all of this is here now.”

Lindsay glanced toward the table and saw that Little Bob and Big Bob were looking at them. Annie and Viktor were talking about how they would move the map to the bulletin board.

“I know,” Lindsay told him.

“Come with me for a minute. I want to tell you something,” Wren said as he stood up. He and Lindsay walked toward the back of the building to the loading dock door. “I have talked to the man that you want to meet. He was in charge of the program before I took over, and we worked together for a long time before that. I think he will be able to help us and give us even more information. I know that even with all of these files, there are things that are missing,” Wren told her quietly.

“That sounds good, but we have to do it after the weather breaks.”

“He wants us to go to his house the Saturday Dillon will be camping with the Jones kids. I told him I would speak with you and ensure it was a good time. This isn’t official, so we are just going to visit with a very old friend,” Wren said.

“Let him know that’s fine and that I am grateful for his help,” Lindsay said as they turned to walk back to her office.

Just as they reached her office, the department phone rang, and the building shook with a loud clap of thunder. Cat answered the department phone. Lindsay's cell phone rang in her pocket as they waited to find out what the call was. She pulled it out and saw that it was her son, Dillon. When she answered it, before she could say anything, she could hear Dillon yelling into the phone. She could not understand what he was saying but knew something was horribly wrong. She could hear Cat trying to ask questions and turned to see Cat’s eyes widen.

“There’s something at your house,” Cat said to Lindsay, still holding her phone.