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[Jon Little Bird]

They wouldn't let Jon in to see her, so he waited impatiently outside the visitor's area, sending furious messages back and forth with Caroline as they considered their legal strategy. He was going to give them another fifteen minutes, perhaps, and file the civil rights complaint in federal court for the violation of her sixth amendment right to an attorney.

Jon shot a wry glance at the two guards standing by the holding room, MP's dragged out from Kirtland Air Force Base, clutching their stubby M6 carbines as they waited for absolutely nothing to happen. Their weekend plans likely ruined, their presence was as pointless as it was futile. The young woman – named Katchina Makawee, Jon had learned – had surrendered without protest to the first BIA officers on the scene. They'd made her lie down on the ground with her hands behind her head, zip-tied her wrists together, and searched her for weapons, more equally pointless and futile maneuvers. His erstwhile savior was going to cooperate until she chose not to cooperate, and that would be that. The prison could not hold her if she chose to escape, of that Jon was certain. It couldn't have held him against his will.

But perhaps cooperation was best at this juncture. Getting the courts to agree with Jon's desired outcome was his specialty, and Jon was eager to return the favor, especially since he knew so little about anyone else on the proper side of the ocean having the ability to use the power. Especially a woman.

Jon was able to dig up precious few details on his prospective client. Born in Michigan, the daughter of the last significant Saginaw Chippewa chief, she played college basketball for one year at Michigan State. Then she dropped off the radar until turning up in Atlanta and going on expeditions to third-world Latin American countries. Then she showed up as a credentialed tribal representative. Then she saved Jon's life by throwing a lightning bolt at his would-be-assassin.

Someone cleared a throat. Jon looked up to see … Special Agent...Sheridon. The one who had refused to let Jon in. They had exchanged some words. His lips twisted in a scowl like he'd just eaten a fistful of sour grapes. “The federal prosecutor has demanded the detainee be allowed to see her counsel,” he spat out. “Come with me.”

John winked at him and stood. “Guess you won't have to dust off your resume after all.”
The guards moved aside and the two went through the double doors. Jon was sent through a sally port and searched – the wrapped bundle in his pocket explained away as a curio – before he was checked in at a second guard post. They were in the deepest, most secure holding cells, reserved for criminals too dangerous to put in with the general population. Jon could hear muffled shouts and screams.

Finally, they led him to a room with a plain square concrete slab for a table and four benches, one on each side, made from the same material. Katchina looked up as he came in. The young woman, with brown eyes and facial features that screamed her Algonquin heritage, was still wearing the same clothes. Her eyes were fixed and her lips pursed in a stoic expression of forced calm. “It's you,”
she said.

“Miss Makawee, I would like to provide pro bono legal services to you as your attorney,”
he replied. He took a seat to her left and slid his Wallet in front of her. “Please sign here if you wish to accept and appoint me as your attorney. If you wish I will contact another attorney for you instead. But I will promise you that there is no other lawyer in the country better suited to represent you given the circumstances of the case.”
Katchina shook her head and scrawled her finger across the Wallet.

Jon set his Wallet down on the table and pressed a button to begin recording. Now that that formality was out of the way, he removed his spectacles, laid them on the table next to his Wallet, and rubbed his weary eyes. He should really look into corrective surgery, but who had the time? “Anything said between you and I from here on out is privileged information. It is as inviolate as the confessional. And I have no doubt in your mind that what you did was necessary, and that it saved my life. I am in your debt, and I have anything to say about it--”


“Did you mean what you said, that you can use the Great Power too?”
she interrupted.

Jon blinked. “Yes,”
he replied. “If that is what you call it. The power of the Great Spirit. But I have some questions about what --”


“--How long have you been able to do it?”


“A few years. Now if we could –”


“How did you learn to control it?”


Jon clapped his hands together. “Miss Makawee. Would it be agreeable to you if we got you released first and then I satisfy your curiosities? Believe me when I say I am just as eager to ask you questions about these things on a personal level.
”

She put her hands on the table. “I didn't mean to do it, you know. Kill him. I just had to do something to stop him. It just happened so fast. That's what I told them on the way here.”


Jon held up a hand. “Wait. You told who what on the way here?”


“The guards. The M.P.s. They were nervous, so I told them I wasn't going to hurt anyone else.”


Jon rubbed his temples. Great Spirit please don't tell me she talked...
“Start from the beginning. When they handcuffed you and put you in the armored patrol vehicle, what did you say?”


Her eyes glanced up at the ceiling. “Let's see. In the vehicle, the guard had his gun pointed at me, so I said, uh, 'I won't hurt you' and then he said 'I don't believe you,' and then I said 'I wasn't intending to kill him and maybe I used too much but it all happened so fast, but they didn't have to be afraid of me,' and then there was an agent who asked me 'what happened' and I told him what happened.”


“Wait. Okay. What did you tell him? Exact words.”


She bit her lip. “I said that when you said you were one of 'them' --”


“--You told them that? You told them I could use the power?”
She nodded. Good grief!
He bit back the urge to shout down her foolishness. Didn't she realized secrets like this could be used against him or others like weapons? The truth about Jon was likely to end up on the national news, now. His headache was getting worse. “Okay, okay then what?”

“Then I saw the guy next to me stand up and pull a gun and scream, and I pulled in the power and threw it all at him so he wouldn't shoot you. Then I saw he was down so I ran over and tried to use the power to cure him but he was already dead --”


“You can do that?”
He pinched the bridge of his nose to relieve the pressure on his sinuses.

“Sure. Let me show you.”
Jon felt goosebumps. Then Katchina reached out and placed a hand on his head. A ripple went through his body like he'd had a bucket of ice dumped on him. He gasped and his eyes shot open. “Looks like just a little sinus pressure from flying and not enough sleep.”


Jon caught his breath, and blinked. Blessedly, the headache was gone. No, this woman didn't belong in a jail cell. “Back to the case at hand. So you told this agent you knew the man was already dead. What else?”


“He asked me how long I was able to use the power, and I said five years. And then he asked me what other magic death spells I knew, so I explained that it's not like that but that the Power has different currents like air and fire and water. And that's it.”


Jon paused, chewing on her testimony. “Did you have your Miranda rights read to you?”
Katchina nodded. “When?”


“Before they put me in the armored vehicle.”


Damnit
. Jon's headache was about to come back. “Did you sign anything? Any waivers of your rights? ”
She shook her head. That was something then. Jon sent a quick message to Caroline along with the audio. Then he stood up. “I think we have something to work with. Sit tight. From here on out, don't answer any – any – question unless I say it's okay. Any questions?”


“Do you think we can really do what you said? Start an institute for learning to control the Power?”


Jon hadn't meant questions about that, but fair enough. “I do,”
he replied. He reached for the holding room door and gave it a sharp rap with his knuckles.