Chapter 34

After Eitan’s long and detailed explanation, the only sound was the lapping of waves against the boat. The three siblings kept scanning each face, looking for clues to their thoughts. Reggie spoke first, “With this nano, we are all going to be able to jump?” He was leaning forward with his elbows on his knees.

Eitan held up his hands. “If not you, then your children, for sure. My abilities took at least six years to emerge and then a few more to really expand. We don’t know if Hobart was a happy accident or an act of brilliant insight. What I have now is untested. Well, I just had my first test of it today after acclimation. The extent of our human abilities is unknown, but each of you has an invitation to be a part of the grandest experiment in human history.

“My sales pitch is done, guys. I have given you a lot to digest. In the meantime, I’m hungry and I need to eat. What have we got?”

They congregated in the galley and in the hallway leading to it. As they watched the noodles boil, Bea stirred a red sauce in the saucepot. Eitan stepped over to Danielle as they waited in hallway, “You swing a mean beer bottle.”

“Wasn’t my first dance with a creepy man in my personal space,” Danielle said. “I wish I could have fired a backhand the first time, before the sleaze grabbed my boob.” She seemed to consider something. “You acted quick.”

“This wasn’t my first dance either; it was my second battle with Whitcomb. I wish that I had killed him the first time, but I was child compared to who I am now. Moreover, no one could have known he would spawn murderous rampages. This time I was prepared; this time I knew better.”

“You did ‘good,’” Danielle said. “I should have smashed the bottle over his head. I just reacted.”

“Correctly reacted, buying me time to tackle him,” Eitan said. “You did ‘good’ without knowing what was happening. You are already doing one better than me.”

“Of course, I am a Hawthorne of the New Hampshire Hawthorne’s.” She said with deliberate nonchalance until she could not hold back the snort of mirth. Eitan patted her shoulder.

Standing in companionable silence, Eitan listened to the spoon scrape the bottom of the pot. The sound gave him a nostalgic nudge when he did not expect it. He wondered what he did carry as memories.

“You understand that I did not want to believe you back then,” Danielle said without prompting. “Mom and dad talked about you constantly but not in front of me. You were the great secret that they tried to hide from me.”

“I was,” Eitan said. “They don’t have to hide it from you anymore.”

“Are we going to sleep together?” she asked.

“Only if you want the nano sooner,” Eitan said. “You can always ask Sten too. He loves to jump into beds.”

“What about Tanisha?”

Eitan grinned. “She will be glad to join you. Just ask nicely.” He relished the shocked look on her face. “Hey, this is a no judgment zone.”

Dinner was dished out. They gathered around the table in the cabin or wandered out onto the deck to find a comfortable place to sit with a bowl of spaghetti in their laps. As Akemi sat on one side and Kavita on the other, Eitan let the conversation swirl around him. He enjoyed hearing their voices. He had to touch Akemi’s arm and tap Kavita’s knee; he had to feel their skin.

“Stop it,” Akemi said in a whisper. “You’re making me horny.”

“This entire boat reeks of horny,” Kavita said softly as she leaned across Eitan. His pants became tight.

Sten walked over to them, scratching his two-day beard. “Nothing is happening on this boat tonight until we resolve the situation. Whitcomb may be dead, but how did he find us and how did he get to us?”

“What the hell is RAFT?” Kavita asked, adding to the list.

Eitan stood without answering. He went around, gathering all the dirty dishes from every person. In the galley, he started washing dishes until Leslie tapped him out, pushing him out of the way. Bea had hauled out a catering coffeemaker and was measuring out coffee grounds. As he leaned quietly against the cabinets, he watched the two women work. The others were using the head or making their way to the foredeck.

When the dishes were clean and dried, Eitan accompanied the two women to the foredeck carrying the coffee service. Akemi was pounding away furiously on a laptop while cursing the lack of throughput speed of the internet connection.

Sten slunk up to him. “You’re doing okay? You killed another person.”

“Yeah,” Eitan said slowly. “I did what I had to do to protect the family. He was going to murder us all. Whatever was rattling around in his addled brain, it was no longer about nano. Nothing he said was rational. Nothing he did made any sense. The world has some sort of minimally functioning equilibrium back while he wanted more chaos.”

“Broken man,” Sten said. “You’re solid though, right?”

“My family and friends are solid,” Eitan said. “Despite this afternoon, I have never felt so whole. I pulled someone into a jump, Sten; never tried that one before today.”

Akemi looked up, realizing that everyone was looking at her. “Sorry, I was doing a series of Boolean searches through restricted databases. Nothing pops up for RAFT.”

Leslie whispered something to her younger sister who nodded. “RAFT on the water, RAFT on the road: guaranteed delivery,” Leslie said in a faked gravelly voice.

Akemi typed some keys. “Ralston Ardmore Freight Transport: fifth largest trucking company in the United States with $540 million in revenue last year. They’re based in Ardmore, OK. RAFT is a privately owned company run by three brothers, Matthew, Mark, and Luke Ralston.”

“A freight company explains a lot of details,” Bea said. “A trucking company would not raise eyebrows delivering material to any point in the country. Put an extra man in the cab and no one would even think to raise a suspicion.”

“They could shift large amounts of currency,” Akemi said. “They could have eyes everywhere.”

Arjun stood up. “They could pilfer or redirect shipments of weapons, vests, armor, or anything else that the crazies needed. If Raft reported these thefts to the FBI, they would be above suspicion, because they were the victims of the theft.”

“Who is calling their FBI contact?” Reggie asked.

“We can’t call; none of us can,” Eitan said, rising from his seat and walking over to stand with Arjun. “We have a dead body in my old bedroom in Washington State while we are floating in a harbor in Connecticut.”

“There are no punctures or wounds on the body,” Bea said. “This is a perfect presentation of unknown causes. We want the FBI to retrieve the corpse while it is still fresh.”

“Eww,” Leslie said.

“Why did you jump to your old bedroom, Eitan?” Tanisha asked, putting down her cup. “You knew the village is gone.”

“I suppose that room was the safest place in my life,” Eitan said, uncertainty in his voice. “What happened to the village? I thought you said the farm family purchased the property, but my room was only partially renovated.”