Chapter 2

Maureen has the Narrative:

Over the next week or so, I relaxed at the Hardtrick farm, mostly. The Children were old enough now and had assumed all of the chores that had previously been mine, so that I had little to do other than to supervise and occasionally help with a little Magic. Their Talents were surely as strong as their Father’s was, and would be even stronger when they came into their full Magic power. For now, though, they were still learning to use those Talents.

There were also day trips to visit the O’Donnells and the Kanes. I had lived for several years with each of them. There was also a trip of a day and a half to visit Angus, Calisa, and their Son, Steve. I had found and read an old book of Magic while in Ireland, and had brought it back with me. I presented it to Angus to add to his library of Magic books. I had found its contents very interesting and was sure that he would too. He certainly did, and told me that it filled in certain blank areas between other books that he had. I had also found it to be so.

All of this time, I had been thinking about the FBI agent who had tried to arrest me, Agent Parks. Having detected that he carried the Talent, but that it was inactive as far as I could tell during our brief encounter, left me wondering what was wrong. The question certainly intrigued me, and I wanted to learn more about it and him. This would require research, something that I was well acquainted with, having gone with Max and Jill many times over the years when they did theirs.

Even thought the internet and WiFi had come to Hancock County and Sneedville, Tennessee some time ago, I didn’t believe it would be wise to do research on the FBI from the farm. It was possible that they could track who was interested in their office locations, and I didn’t need them coming around here to investigate. The same held true for using the computer at my Mother’s house or Grandfather’s. Instead, I would transfer to North Charleston and use a public computer at one of the libraries there to do my research on the FBI’s Boston offices.

It proved easy to learn where their offices were in the Boston area, as there were still several articles on the internet about their move in late 2016 to Chelsea, just outside of Boston proper, but still in the Boston area. One article stated that they had rented the building for twenty years, which would mean that the lease would end later this year. There were no recent articles about them moving, but one could never be sure of that. It would be better to visit them soon just in case they were moving again in the near future. Therefore, I decided to visit them on Monday, the 31st of March. That would give me the whole weekend to prepare for the move.

Most of the weekend was spent at my Mother’s house with her, her Husband, and my Siblings. The two cats also monopolized a part of my time, plus I helped my half brother and sister with their Magic studies. On Sunday afternoon, I transferred to Grandfather Paddy’s house to visit with him for a time and spend the night.

Monday morning, the 31st, I went out to East Broadway in Southie and flagged down a taxi.

“Where to?” the drive asked.

“201 Maple St., Chelsea ... the FBI building,” I told him. He didn’t look well on hearing this.

“You’re sure you want to go there?” he asked rather nervously.

“You can drop me off near there. I’ll find my way back,” I told him.

“Okay, lady,” he said as he dropped the meter flag.

The trip wasn’t that long, but the traffic, getting out of Southie and on the interstate, and then off again plus the maze of streets in the area required someone who knew his way around Boston, which was something that I didn’t. The driver left me off on Everett Ave. near Maple St., and I walked toward the building. Returning wouldn’t be a problem, however.

The building at 201 Maple St. was quite large and was eight stories tall. The several articles that I had read disagreed on just how large the building was. The area given ranged from 220,000-square-feet to 275,000-square-feet with even one that stated that it was 280,000 SF. One had to wonder which was correct, and if the missing area was under the building in hidden facilities.

If one took the figure of 220,000 SF as the correct area for the eight visible stories of the building, this would work out to 27,500 SF per floor. Further, if one took the 275,000 SF figure as the actual area of the building, the missing 55,000 SF would be just sufficient for an additional two stories hidden underground. It was a tantalizing problem, but one that I wasn’t interested in presently.

The cabby had let me out in a parking lot just south of the train tracks that Everett Ave. passed over. Approaching the building at 201 Maple St., one had the feeling that they were approaching a fortified location rather than an office building. Most of the 5.1 acres the building sat on was surrounded by a steel stake fence which was about eight feet high. There were a couple of trees and some grass near the entrance from Everett Ave. where the sign identifying the building was, and there was some more grass and some trees inside the fenced area, but most of the area around the building was asphalt and dedicated to parking.

When I had downloaded a satellite image of the FBI building and the area around it, I had been shocked to discover that the two buildings across Maple St. from it were hotels. One faced Everett Ave, and the other one faced Maple St. Both were large facilities with a lot of rooms and onsite parking.

I circled as much of the FBI building’s area that I could on foot to check it out, but there was no way to check the area that ran parallel to the train tracks as there was no sidewalk there, just a retaining wall and the fence. On returning to Maple St., I entered the Residence Inn Chelsea, walked through the lobby like I owned the place, and took the elevator to the top floor of the building. Once there, I transferred into one of the unoccupied rooms for a look at the FBI building from a high vantage point. The view was similar to a picture that I had downloaded from the internet, but I had a better view than the picture gave. I could see the entire front of the building and its entrance. I also had a clear view of the small entry gate building, and decided what my approach to the building would be when I returned tonight to check out the interior of the building when it was less busy.

Having reached a decision, I returned to the lobby and walked back up Maple St. to the area where the Double Tree Chelsea abutted Maple St ... There were some trees there to hide the other buildings from the guests of the hotel, and I moved into them before transferring back to the Hardtrick farm. Jill met me when I arrived there.

“Did you have an enjoyable weekend, dear?” she asked.

“Yes, I spent most of the weekend visiting my Mother and her Children, before spending some time with Grandfather. It was an excellent weekend,” I told her, but didn’t mention the trip to the FBI building this morning.

As ever the cats were very interested in where I had gone and what I had done. I shared where I had been and who I had seen including the time spent with their relatives, and my trip to the FBI building and my interest in the Agent.

“Kittens?” several of the older females asked.

“NO!” I told them, shocked at the thought, at least then.

That evening, I went to bed early and woke up at 2:00 AM prepared to transfer to Southie where I knew the destination from long practice, and then onto the FBI building in Chelsea.

Agent Parks has the Narrative:

While Maureen had spent a week visiting her family, friends, and the Hardtricks, Agent Allen Parks had not had an enjoyable week at all. It started as soon as they all returned from the airport on the 20th of March.

“I want detailed written reports from each of you on what occurred both times this afternoon. I’ll expect them on my desk in the morning.

“Meanwhile, I’ll have to explain to the Assistant Director why we don’t have that woman in custody,” the AIC finished in a disgusted voice.

I had my report finished in a couple of hours before going home for the night. Late Friday morning, I was called into the AIC’s office.

“Your report doesn’t state why you failed to arrest that woman, Parks,” the AIC shouted at me.

“I thought the reason was fairly obvious from what the report said,” I told him.

“And that would be?” he demanded in a sarcastic voice.

“We couldn’t arrest her because she escaped after knocking out the other three agents, freezing me in place for a number of minutes, and knocking out the lights and destroying all of the electronic devices in the area,” I told him.

“But how did she escape?” he demanded.

“I have no idea, as none of those present could see anything for more than a minute following the flash that accompanied the explosion. If I were to guess though, I would say by Magic, as no one saw her in the airport following that, and there is no sign of her from the still working cameras outside the affected area,” I told him.

“Why wasn’t that in your report?” he demanded.

“Because I wasn’t the one to confirm any of that,” I told him. “You said that you wanted a report on what WE had done,” I finished.

“Well, add it to your report anyway,” he told me in a huff. I went back and added the information to my report in the computer, but as an addendum at the end of the report and resubmitted it.

Saturday, the female agent who had been with us came to see me at my apartment.

“Hello, Cook, what’s up?” I asked on answering the door.

“I need to talk to you about that case,” she told me, as she pushed past me and into the apartment. Cook was a very pushy woman.

“What about it?” I asked.

“You have to change your report and get off this Magic kick. You have to put it down as a major Witch working, Parks,” she told me in a desperate voice.

“A Witch working wouldn’t have destroyed that machine that reads Magic signatures,” I pointed out to her before adding, “And there was no sign of her on the other cameras around the airport.”

“She could have been using a glamour,” she said with little conviction in her voice.

“What are you afraid of, Cook?” I finally asked. She didn’t answer for a long time, and then only after taking a deep breath.

“I’m afraid of this push against Magic users. You saw what that one did by herself. Besides all of my experience is with Witches and their covens. Most of them are female, as there don’t appear to be many male Witches, or Warlocks. I don’t know squat about Magic users or Magic, and what I saw, or rather didn’t see, at the airport scares the shit out of me,” she finally confessed.

“There haven’t been a lot of incidents of the use of major Magic in a long time. The last one was that guy Hardtrick, and all of the trouble that he stirred up starting in Atlanta and moving up the East Coast to Boston and then to Salem, before returning to the Washington area. Even then it was a good ten years before the Military admitted that he had used Magic and that it actually existed.

“The problem, of course, was that he left no fingerprints or other evidence, and we still don’t know how he did many of the things that he did. The Military left him retired, and he still gets his retirement check every month. I guess that it’s a form of security payment for the Military.