Page 61 of Shielding Instinct

“Terry! You aren’t going to hear me for a minute. I’ve figured out how to get you out, but I need more equipment. My being gone is me getting you help faster. Do you understand?”

“Helping me. Hurry. Please.” There was a sob. “Please.”

“You’ll be back with Melissa very soon. Hang on.”

Petra tipped her head and called up the chimney, “Okay, bring me up.”

Even tethered the way she was, even braced with back pressed into the chimney opening and feet shoving her into place, the tide here was exhausting.

She was exhausted.

As inch by careful inch, the bystanders above pulled her up, Petra pressed against the stone wall realizing how smooth it was comparatively speaking. The sea buffed down the edges with the continual pounding of surf.

Hands reached under Petra’s armpits to help her the last of the way up and out.

Sopping wet, Petra sat on her butt, hands under her thighs, breathing heavily.

“Terry?” Melissa was on her knees in front of Petra, her hands clasped as if in supplication.

“Talking. Able to do math.” Petra loosened her helmet and held it in her hands, looking it over.

“Math?” Melissa whispered in confusion.

Petra didn’t mean to be mean, but “Melissa, can you go away for a minute? I need to think about what I saw and what can be done, and I need my whole brain to do that right now.”

Melissa blinked with her eyebrows held so high up on her forehead that the skin rippled. From a crouch, she backed away.

Could Petra have been nicer about it? More empathetic? Sure.

Did she have time for that right now?

Terry didn’t.

Normally, Petra's head swirled with ideas that tried to catch her attention. It often made her feel claustrophobic and overwhelmed, even in the great outdoors.

But when the chaos of a crisis rose and those around her lost their minds in panic, she was calm, methodical, and able to function.

Petra always seemed to be experiencing the opposite of those around her. It was like she was in some kind of parallel existence where her rail held a reverse charge. Her brain was anxious and overwrought on the daily, and calm in crisis. Others were calm on the daily and panicked in crisis.

If Petra had to choose which rails to ride, she’d rather have everyday anxiety and clarity in a crisis than the other way around.

With people’s lives on the line, that’s when Petra wanted to be performing at her best.

In those instances, something in Petra’s brain usually found the best possibilities for a successful outcome and lifted it into her awareness like a lantern being held aloft in a twilight wood, exposing the right path home.

But her brainneededboth space and quiet to work through the data she’d collected in her descent.

The problem was that there was a tunnel that inclined from the sea to what she thought was a small cave. The waternever fully emptied. Based on the cave entrance, it was a big enough space to shove a man inside. But Terry’s silence followed by sputtering after a wave rolled in, meant that he was probably underwater with each wave. Then he’d use the time after to gulp at air and, to some extent, communicate.

There was something that was stopping Terry from coming out of the cave, at least to the area below the chimney.

Petra suspected a lack of a mental picture of what he was up against and a lack of air.

If she was chronically oxygen-deprived, it would be hard to prime her body to explore.

Right now, Terry knew he had access to air.

He didn’t know how far under the rocks he was, how far it was to the shore, how the chimney worked where he could hear the voice instructing him.

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