He wondered, sometimes, what he could have done differently when Melody was younger to prevent moments like this. Spend more time with her? He had tried. He had come home in the evenings and made sure to talk to her whenever he could- had tried to make weekends available to her. Had it been enough? He didn't know. Perhaps not. Or perhaps he had spent too much time with her, been too overbearing, not permitted enough independence. Had he pushed her too hard, and left her bitter? Had he not pushed her hard enough, and left her purposeless? Or was it simply that a child needed a father and a mother both, and he could only ever be one? He didn't know. He didn't know how to know. The studies and books he had read all seemed limp and useless in the face of these realities.

He let the curse word pass without comment. It was bad behavior, but now was not the time to pile condemnation. It would only shut her down. Really, he thought, this whole conversation would go much better in the morning.

"No, you're certainly not an idiot," he said. He'd seen her IQ scores; her intelligence was not the issue. "Instead, you are choosing behaviors which you know full well are dangerous and potentially destructive, and choosing them anyway, which to my mind is worse. You did read that study I gave you?" It was a new study on the effect of marijuana on developing brains that suggested the drug might cause long-term cognitive deficits. One passage in particular suggested that people with ADHD were particularly at risk. College level reading, or perhaps a bit higher, but he knew she could handle it.

He sighed internally when she said she'd probably get only community service. She was right, of course, but he hated to admit it. She would take it as a sort of endorsement of future behavior along the same lines. Instead he said, "No, you're not dead. But you could have been- easily. So you should take this as a warning and not put yourself in that situation again."

Upset and focused on his driving, he didn't notice the discomfort her condition was beginning to inflict.

Melody Newton

It was a Hollywood myth that people who were arrested always got one phone call. Actually, rules varied widely by jurisdiction, and in this case, it was a police matron that called Melvin as he sat in the chair where he had fallen asleep, waiting for his dinner.

He answered his phone, listened, and face hardened slightly. “I see. Thank you for calling me. I'll be over shortly.”

He stood, picked up his sportcoat from where he had left it on the table, and went to the garage where his BMW was parked. His driving measured, cautious, and scrupulously safe. His mind he did his best to keep silent. He had guesses, of course, and suspicions in plenty, but the call had been short on details and he was resolved to keep an open mind as much as possible.

He parked outside the police station, car under a street lamp that made the blue paint look black and went inside. The walls were surprisingly white; the floor a sort of off gray. There was a woman sitting a desk with a computer and he went over to here.

“I'm Melvin Newton,” he said. “I received a call that my daughter is back there.” He gestured further inside.

“ID?”

He produced it.

“What's your daughter's name?”

“Melody.”

She tapped at her computer. “Holding room 3. Follow me, please.”

He followed her through a metal door painted red and found himself in a hall, wide and clean. To one side he could see offices. In another direction he saw a reinforced door that he guessed led to the cells. They passed a break room, an alcove with vending machines, and two long windows that looked into rooms with benches and people sitting around uncomfortably, some chained in place. There was a room for men and a much smaller one for women. Room 3 was at the very end of the hall. This one was mixed gender, and apparently for minors. Teens sat on uncomfortable looking benches, boys on one side and girls on the other, an annoyed-looking police officer standing watch with his arms cross. It took Melvin a moment to realize what was strange about the scene, and when he did he had to smile slightly. Absolutely none of the teens was on a cell phone.

There was a small table near the door where another police officer sat and a fat woman who Melvin presumed was a child welfare social worker listening to headphones and reading a copy of 50 Shades Freed. The officer at the table looked up as Melvin and his guide came in, and Melvin realized that she was a woman- almost no bust, and hair cut very short.

“Melody Newton,” Melvin's guide said.

The policewoman nodded and stood. The fat woman took her headphones off of one ear and set her gaze firmly on Melvin as the policewoman walked to the back of the room. Here there was one final bench set against the wall, divided into sections by metal partitions that kept the seated separate from each other. In contrast to the rest of the room, everyone sitting on the partitioned bench was restrained in some fashion.

Ah. The difficult cases.

Melody was at the very end of the partitioned bench. Her hands were cuffed in front of her and a chain ran from her left ankle to the underside of the bench. Her voice, when she spoke, was quiet. “Hey, dad...”

“Melody,” he said, voice carefully neutral.

The policewoman unlocked the chain at Melody's ankle and led her by the upper arm to the table near the door. The woman who had brought Melvin to the room had produced a clipboard from somewhere and was making marks on the paper, while the fat woman had put her book down and was watching everything through narrowed eyes.

The woman who had led Melvin in slid the clipboard over to him. “Initial here and sign,” she said. Melvin picked up the clipboard, skimming the print. Stolen vehicle... reckless driving... possession of class II restricted substance... he gave a sideways glance at Melody but initialed and signed the paper without any comment.

The policewoman went over to a set of lockers on the other wall, opened one, and came back with a sealed plastic bag. Inside he saw Melody's phone, a few other odds and ends he assumed had come from her pockets, and a piece of paper listing the things they had found that they weren't giving back- 1 Marijuana cigarette. He took took the bag. The policewoman uncuffed Melody's wrists.

The woman from the front desk tore a copy of the paper he'd signed off the clipboard and handed it to him. “You'll get a follow-up in the mail,” she said. “Issues, court dates, anything like that.”

“Thank you,” said Melvin, taking the paper. He glanced at his daughter. “Melody,” he said, nodding at the door.

They went outside. The air was cool and the sky was a sort of washed-out brown from the streetlights. A few insects chirped. It smelled ever so slightly of pollen. He opened Melody's door for her, then went round to his own side, still carrying the plastic bag, and very deliberately set it at his feet instead of on the center console where she could reach. He started the car. Pulled out of the parking space. The engine was quiet, barely audible.

“Well, Melody,” he said as they pulled into the street. “Is there anything you'd like to tell me about what happened tonight?”

Melody Newton

The monitor showed a nervous-looking blonde woman in a blue hospital gown sitting in a padded black chair. A series of sensors were attached to her shaved scalp. The wires of others were visible sticking out from under the gown. Melvin glanced at the sensor readings. The woman was breathing fast.

"Try to relax, Miss Hartford," he said into the microphone. "You're not going to hurt anyone." Nor will you be hurt, he thought, but didn't say. He knew that wasn't what she was worried about.

"How are you feeling? Comfortable?"

The woman nodded. "Just... nervous, mostly."

"I understand," said Melvin. "Try to relax. Can you take some deep breaths for me?"

She did, breathing deep and slow. Signs of stress disappeared from her vital readings.

"All right," said Melvin. "If you're ready, I'll recline your chair now."

She nodded. Melvin's hand moved over the controls, tilting her chair back until she lay flat.

"All right," said Melvin again. "When you're ready, I'll induce a seizure. The medication should be administered less than a second once the seizure begins. If all goes well, the next thing you'll know will be waking up in your room." His hand moved to the switch. "When you're ready."

The woman hesitated. "Are you absolutely sure there's no one in range?"

"Miss Hartford, we've cleared the area to well outside your affected range. Once the medication takes effect, we'll be able to move you without issue."

"What if it doesn't work?"

"Then we'll let the seizure stop if its own accord. You won't hurt yourself in that chair. We'll just wait a few minutes and then move you as planned." Still the woman hesitated. Melvin carefully kept the annoyance out of his voice. "Miss Hartford, if this works- and I believe it will- we'll be three quarters of the way to a cure. There's nothing to be frightened of. Just relax."

Another hesitation. Then: "Okay."

Melvin nodded. "All right. Look at the screen."

The seizure started exactly on schedule, readings on the monitors going high and then abruptly slamming down below normal as the medication hit the bloodstream. On the monitor, the woman's body tensed and then abruptly slumped, falling limp as though she was asleep. Melvin nodded. "Test 1 is a success. If the nurses will please return Miss Hartford to her room." He turned away from the monitor as scrub-clad nurses entered with a gurney. The younger doctor was sitting behind him.

"Well, Dr. Havelock," he said. "I'd say the test is a success, as far as it went. Now the only problem is the medication."

They'd finally found a drug which could control the woman's seizures. Unfortunately, it was also a sedative and tended to make her sleep for hours when it was administered.

The problem was the pain that the woman's power inflicted on everyone in a twenty meter radius when she seized. That was what had led Melvin to design the device they had just tested: sensors that detected the onset of seizures linked to something like an insulin pump to instantly administer medication. If they gave her the device, they'd have to implant the sensors directly into her brain, but for right now external sensors worked fine. It dealt with the problem of pain broadcasting well enough, but it wasn't particularly conducive to a normal life when the dose required to stop her seizures left her unconscious for two hours. And at her worst she had five or six of them a day.

"I suppose it would be easy to have the device administer a counteragent for the sedative. The medication need only be in her bloodstream until the danger of a seizure is past. But I worry about the stress on her adrenal system in that case." He frowned. "Perhaps I'll discuss deep brain stimulation with her when she awakes."

Nathan Havelock