"Isolate them."
"Sir?"
"You heard me. Isolate them. National Security. Tell them it'll only be few days. Christ. Make up any damn story you want, but have it taken care of. Without my knowledge."
"Yessir."
"Then, find somebody who knows what the hell is going on."
* * * * *
Monday, January 11
Approaching New York City
Scott called Tyrone from the plane to discover that the hearings were being delayed a few days, so he flew back to New York after dropping Sonja off in Washington. They tore themselves apart from each other, she tearfully, at National Airport where they had met. He would be back in a few days, once the hearings were rescheduled. In the meantime, Scott wanted to go home and crash. While being in Jamaica with Sonja was as exhilarating as a man could want, relaxing and stimulating at once, he still was going on next to no rest.
While the plane was still on the tarmac in Washington, Scott had fallen fast asleep. On the descent into New York, he half awak- ened, to a hypnagogic state. Scott had learned over the years how to take advantage of such semi-conscious conditions. The mind seemingly floated in a place between reality and conjecture - where all possibilities are tangible, unencumbered by earthly concerns. The drone of the jet engines, even their occasional revving, enhanced the mental pleasure Scott experienced. Thoughts weightlessly drifted into and out of his head, some of them common and benign and others surprisingly original, if not out and out weird.
In such a state, the conscious mind becomes the observer of the activities of the unconscious mind. The ego of Scott Mason restrained itself from interfering with the sublime mental proc- esses that bordered on the realm of pure creativity. The germ of a thought, the inchoate idea, had the luxury of exploring itself in an infinity of possibilities and the conscious mind stood on the sidelines. The blissful experience was in constant jeopardy of being relegated to a weak memory, for any sudden disturbance could instantly cause the subconscious to retreat back into a merger with the conscious mind. Thus, he highly valued these spontaneous meditations.