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The Strength of his Spirit

By Kathleen James © revised 11-12-07

Steve McGarrett was floating over Honolulu. How could he be flying? Was he being drugged and hallucinating? The red haze of the sun sinking over the horizon reminded him of his last coherent thoughts. He remembered his blood running over his chest as he fainted from the searing pain.

He was enveloped in an abnormal haze that covered Honolulu. He sensed a criminal element to its gaseous tendrils. Criminal element contained in a gas? How crazy a thought was that? His ability to fly and a gaseous haze that emanated criminal elements must be connected in some crazy supernatural way. He snapped his fingers; the old habit helped him think. He looked down at his hand in confusion. He had not heard the usual reassuring snap of his fingers. In shock he saw that the physical form of his hand and his body were gone. He tried to curtail his panic. Was he dead, was he a spirit? In his early years he remembered reading in his biology about the brain controlling all functions. Could it control a body without flesh and bone? He decided to try. He had to regain control of his body.

He concentrated with his mind on the action of snapping his fingers again. Sensations flooded in. He felt every ridge in his skin and every sweat pore. Good, he could do it. He breathed a sigh of relief. At least he had control again. He was a cop on the prowl. His sense of smell, sight, hearing, and touch seemed to be amplified, he didn’t know by what degree, but he would use his heightened senses to his advantage.

He now knew why he saw the criminal haze over the city. It involved his cop instincts and it was his duty to finish his day even though he had been shot. He winkled his nose; his sense of smell though amplified was now under his control. The haze brought up an obnoxious odor to his attention. Criminals had an odor of their own? He could now smell them. He laughed. He knew now why criminals smelled like scum, it made sense, they were nothing but garbage. Now he could use this new forensics clue that he had at his fingertips. He smiled, wondering what Danno would say if he told him to investigate the different scents on their cases. Danno would probably send him to the funny farm and throw away the key.

A scream in a dark alley below distracted him from his thoughts. Since his sight was amplified too, the alley wasn’t dark for him. He grinned. Having a cat’s vision of turning night into day was helpful. Since he also found himself flying, he was now probably capable of almost anything. He dived down head first and at the last minute before hitting the ground, he flipped and landed feet first. Two would-be rapists were throwing a woman to the ground tearing at her clothes.

He was the boss of Five-0. No way was he going to condone what he was witnessing. His Irish temper exploded. His temper made the garbage dump explode and garbage was strewn all over the alley. Boy, what powers he had. His temper was a bit out control. He grimaced, surely in his normal state his temper hadn’t been that bad, had it? He sheepishly wondered about its impact with his friends.

McGarrett grinned with satisfaction when the piercing wail of fear from one of the would-be rapists pounded against his eardrums. He could smell the cowardice ingrained in the men’s pores. No wonder they picked on helpless women. One of the men was baying like a hound whose bark was being held back by something. McGarrett smirked. The walls of the garbage dump had landed on top of both men, and he laughed when he saw the wads of leftover toilet paper shoved into their mouths. He wondered briefly why someone had thrown away their toilet paper in the dumpster. Their toilet must have been broken.

The wide-eyed woman was left unharmed. She quickly got up and crossed herself holding her torn blouse with her other hand. “Thank you, hail Mary, mother of grace.”

Steve grinned wryly. He didn’t want her to think that the holy Mary had an Irish temper but maybe she had a Hebrew one. He didn’t think he would want to be around if Mary, the mother of Jesus, lost her temper.

Steve decided to show himself to the now relieved woman.

The young woman’s eyes glazed with shock as she witnessed a glimmer of light, and a transparent form of a man in a blue business suit stood before her.

He grinned. “Hello, ma’am, I am Steve McGarrett.”

The woman bolted.

The rest of his words faded away unspoken as he stared bemused after the screaming hysterical woman. He felt like he had victimized her again. She had already been victimized by those two scrums. He had better not show himself to any future victims again.

Later, the woman would regret that she had run. The shadow man had had a kind smile and had been drop-dead handsome. Too bad he was dead, she would have liked to have met him when he was alive. 

A drunk woke up from his stupor when he was disturbed by all the commotion. He witnessed the ghost appearing before the startled woman before she took off running. He heard the man identify himself as Steve McGarrett. The drunk rubbed his eyes hard. The man was all blurry. “Hey you’re the big man aren’t you, the chief of Hawaii Five-0?”

McGarrett turned to answer the drunk when he was interrupted by a muffled shout of horror from one of the would-be rapists who had overheard the drunk who lay nearby.

“Steve McGarrett, the chief of Five-0?” The man huddled on the ground and groaned. He and Joe were in for it now. Not many men escaped the wrath of the big man.

“Yes, you lowborn scum, I am Steve McGarrett. And you’re under arrest.”

He would use his ghostly form to his advantage. He would scare these low lifes within the inch of their lives. Steve, in his zeal, accidentally made his form more solid when he wanted to appear more ghostly. He now looked like a normal man who had no gun.

The other man looked at his partner in crime who huddled on the ground in defeat. “You were always a coward, Sam,” Joe scoffed. He turned back to McGarrett. “And how do you propose to arrest us? There are two of us and only one of you.”

McGarrett was startled. Why wasn’t the man screaming like the woman had done? Steve glanced down at his body. His body had solidified and no longer looked ghostly. Now he understood. He looked like a normal man without a gun. His gun must now be lying next to his physical body that still lay at the crime scene two miles away.

The boss of Five-0, his Irish temper simpering yet again, was getting tired of listening to the whining of these two men. McGarrett’s eyes pierced Joe’s mind. The man screamed in pain. McGarrett’s blue eyes showed their scorn as he watched Joe whimpering. His whimpering now joined with the moaning Sam who still lay on the ground. Steve grabbed his ears; their voices were pounding against his eardrums. Enough of this, Joe was now begging. “Leave me alone, leave me alone.”

McGarrett smiled. “I’ll leave you alone, on one condition.”

“What’s that?” Joe was now on his knees groveling at his feet, eager to obey.

“You two are going straight to HPD headquarters and confess to attempted rape. You are going to tell them the name of the lady you tried to rape and you will tell them where the rape almost occurred.”

“But we don’t know the woman’s name,” Joe whined.

“It’s Eva Marshall.”

In spite of his trepidation, Joe wondered how McGarrett knew the woman’s name. “How do you know that?”

McGarrett smirked. “I saw her name in her wallet.”

Joe was puzzled. “She didn’t take her wallet out. She just screamed and ran.”

Steve’s had seen her name in her wallet that resided in her pocket. With the need of evidence for the prosecution of these scums, Steve had still been a cop. He had concentrated his X-ray vision on her pockets to find out who she was.  Steve returned his thoughts to the matter at hand. “So get going. HPD headquarters is that way.” Steve pointed.

Sam was incredulous that McGarrett was not handcuffing them. The man was so arrogant. He actually thought they were going to meekly go like lambs to the slaughter without being restrained? Maybe McGarrett was off the job and had been drinking. He also noticed for the first time, that McGarrett was not waving a gun.

Sam, still unaware of McGarrett’s supernatural powers was having second thoughts. He would not commit himself to years in prison. He snarled. “We’re not going, McGarrett.”

McGarrett’s eyes pierced into Sam like laser beams. Sam screamed as he felt the pain. He was confused. McGarrett didn’t have a weapon so where did this searing pain like fire come from? Was he being burned? In a panic, Sam looked down at his body. There was nothing there and yet he could feel the burning pain. Sam kneeled on his knees before McGarrett. “Please I beg your pardon, we won’t do it again, we promise.”

“You get yourselves booked and that’s an order.” Otherwise I will haunt you until even prison will be a paradise, and don’t forget to tell them your victim’s name; she’ll be needed for your prosecution.” Steve winced, remembering the number of times that he had ordered Danno to book em. Poor Danno, he had probably got tired of it but then Danno was loyal to a fault.

“Yes, Mr. McGarrett, we will do that for you.” Their voices answered almost together.” Startled, the two men stared at each other. Now how had they said the very same words at the same time when they answered McGarrett?

McGarrett smirked, reading their thoughts. He had used a bit of his new powers, controlling the timing of their own words just a little. But he had been a little off. One man had started speaking a few seconds before the other.

He watched them disappear down the dark street hurrying to the nearest HPD station. He floated back into the air over the city. He felt dissatisfied. This flying business without air resistance was becoming monotonous. He sighed. He sure missed his Mercury and the feel of the road’s resistance on its wheels and the squeal of the tires and the sensation of stopping on a dime when he put his foot on the brakes.

There was a need for opposition of all things. In physics, there had to be a resistance in order for energy to be expended. His car had followed that principle faithfully when he had put the energy in motion with his foot on its controls. Without his body though, the physics no longer applied to him. He surprised himself at his thoughts. He was sure being philosophical and scientific all the sudden. Maybe that’s what some spirits did when they didn’t have anything better to do, but not him. He was a cop; he needed action.

In spite of his resolution to quit thinking, his thoughts continued. Good and evil was an opposition, two forces that battered at each other. He realized why he was so good at solving his crimes. One had to know good before evil could be recognized. He now knew that the man upstairs had endowed him with this special gift of solving his cases. He was a cop, knowing the interaction of good and evil was natural for him. He shook his head, enough of these deep thoughts.

Where was his car? He wanted to feel the hum of its engine again instead of this flying and all of this philosophical and scientific thinking. He floated back to his car.

The car was depressed. Like a faithful puppy, it had waited for Steve to come back. She liked the feel of his firm foot on her pedals and brakes. She would miss his affectionate strokes. But Steve was either horribly hurt or dead. Was he ever coming back?

Steve was flabbergasted. The sorrow from his car washed over him. His car had feelings? His car was missing him? Boy, Shakespeare had been right. There was more in heaven and earth then one realized. He jumped in his car to start the controls.

The car purred in satisfaction when she felt his strong foot. “You’re back. I should have known you would be back. You’re the man, you are my master.”

Steve squirmed in his seat a bit embarrassed. He now knew his car was a female. He remembered the times he had hit the steering wheel in a temper and his swearing. He had been offending a lady and hitting her and he had not known it.

The car was puzzled. She could now talk to him inside his head. She had been unable to do so before, but no matter. The car laughed reading his thoughts. No, it’s ok. It is my main function to get you from A to B but I was also your sounding board to vent your frustrations on. I was happy to improve your health; your emotions would have otherwise been bottled up.

Steve was relieved. “Well ok, I’ll take your word for it. Let’s go for a ride.” The car eagerly roared her motor louder then usually when he put his foot to the accelerator. At that moment before the car took off, Danno was reaching for the car handle. Steve hadn’t sensed Danno’s presence. He was preoccupied feeling amazement that his car was a living entity. He winced at the callous treatment of other cars that had been dumped in junk yards. He could make it up to them with his car. He would give her love and affection by cleaning and polishing her more often. That is, if he wasn’t dead.

Danny was devastated. Steve was badly hurt. He wasn’t sure if he would make it. He choked back a sob. He had to pull himself together. He was in charge now. Steve would expect it of him. The forensics crew was long gone and Steve was in a coma at the hospital. Danny stared at Steve’s Mercury and reached for the handle to take it home. Suddenly there was a burning in his fingers as the handle of the car disappeared. There was a flash of red that filled the air. Danny staggered back and blinked. The car was gone. In the distance, he could hear the squeal of its tires. Danny laughed. He was going insane. He longed for Steve to be back so bad that his boss’s manner of driving the car was haunting his thoughts. Danny blinked rubbing his head. He must be exhausted. The car had never been here, someone must have driven it home. Danny turned and headed for his own car, his bones ached, his muscles were sore and his soul was in agony.

In the rear view mirror, Steve saw a defeated Danno. Even though he was two blocks away, Steve could feel the deep slump in Danno’s body and mind. He was not the cheerful Danno he had seen this morning. He slammed his foot on the brake, stopping on a dime. In his mind, he had literally created a dime on the road, which his front tire just missed. “Sorry pretty lady,” he said to his now very feminine car. “I have to take care of Danno.” Steve left his ever patient car and followed Danno, floating above Danno’s car to the hospital.

Danny sat slumped and dazed in the waiting room at the hospital. He stared at the butterflies in the wall paper. Before his tired mind, the butterflies were disappearing one by one in a deep hole that appeared in the wallpaper. “Now, why was there a deep hole in the wallpaper? Danny frowned and started to get up.

Steve looked down at Danno. No, no, Danno, he commanded mentally. Don’t get up. The deep hole is not one of your cases. I want you to count the butterflies one by one as they go through the hole until you’re asleep; I want you to sleep peacefully.

Danny obeyed the unheard voice and fell back into his chair.

Steve could see Danno’s eyes move as he started counting butterflies, then his eyes closed. He still was not used to the myriad of details that he could now see with his spirit eyes. He could see the dream Danno was having and his eyeballs moving. Steve wondered if criminals could give themselves away with the movement of their eyes. Maybe he would plant that idea in someone’s mind at a research lab.

Danny’s fist was now curled under his cheek like a small child. Now in a deep sleep, Satisfied that Danno was resting, he had one more thing to do before the day was over. He floated away.

He hovered over a house that was five miles from the hospital. He had followed the emotional scent of a criminal that thought he had achieved what other criminals had failed to do. He sensed the man gloating over his killing of the great Steve McGarrett, the criminal’s pompous arrogance bubbled out of his pores. Steve’s Irish temper started to simmer.

He was angry because this man had killed the eager young rookie that had followed McGarrett’s instructions faithfully. For this devotion, the rookie had died. He sighed. He could still see the young man’s eyes before death took their sight as he had begged McGarrett to save him. He had had so much faith in the chief of Five-0; the rookie had expected him to pull him back.  Steve’s pain tightened remembering the helplessness he had felt. Being occupied with the dying rookie, he had been taken by surprise and shot. The pain and rage had not left him as he had slumped over.

Now his spirit state made his emotions more acute, and the memory of the rookie was even sharper stabbing into his soul. He started snapping his fingers. Maybe,  just maybe. With his spirit eyes Steve located the young man lying on a morgue table. He concentrated his energy in trying to resurrect the young man from the dead. The young man did not stir.

McGarrett’s head snapped back with a wallop from a mental slap. He recognized he had just now been scolded for seeking too much power. He was just a cop and it was his duty only, to obtain justice for the dead rookie and no more. He sent up a silent apology to the man upstairs for his momentary lapse in misusing his powers.

McGarrett slipped through the walls of the man’s house and found the man asleep. Steve snapped his fingers thinking. He wanted the man shook up before he was hauled to jail. How was he going to do it without making the man upstairs mad at him? Then he got an idea. Fight evil with the techniques of the one who was the most evil, Satan himself. He grinned. Surely the man upstairs wouldn’t mind if he used the powers of the devil. He waited, wondering if he was going to be mentally walloped for his daring plan. He waited a bit more to make sure. Nothing happened. Steve satisfied, decided to proceed. He sensed the criminal’s name was Anders.

McGarrett raised the bed three feet into the air while the man slept. He released his power. The bed, now following normal physics again, fell back down to the floor with a jarring thud. Anders woke up to the crash of the bed hitting the floor. McGarrett grinned. This was going to be fun. Using his powers again, he made the bed behave like a bucking bronco in a rodeo. Anders’ eyes bulged in fear, he started screaming.

The man in the next apartment, not hearing the supernatural commotion banged on the wall. “Hey, cut out the caterwauling. People are trying to sleep.”

Steve laughed at the next door’s neighbors ignorance of what was really going on. He, at least now knew that his power was concentrated only on the source of his target. The surroundings of the rest of the world were unaffected.

He wanted Anders to see who was doing this to him. He was doing it for the dead rookie, not for himself. He stood before the man, his form shimmering before the man’s line of sight. He stopped the bed’s bucking but mentally held the man locked to his bed so he couldn’t move. “Hey, guess who coming to pay you a visit.”

Anders’ eyes widened. In the shadows he saw Steve McGarrett. But he had killed him. Why was he here?

McGarrett snarled reading Anders’ thoughts, “Yes, mister, maybe you have killed me, but before I’m through with you, you’re going to wish that you have not killed me. But I am not doing this for me; I am doing it for the young rookie you killed.”

He mentally shoved Anders into the mattress and McGarrett came out of the shadows.

Anders’ eyes were bulging again. He had not seen McGarrett’s hands reach out and yet he could feel their pressure against his body. The man blinked. McGarrett’s form was transparent, his body was not solid. McGarrett was a ghost.

McGarrett’s temper flared. A flash of memory about a story that he had read as a child came to his mind. Without thinking he glanced back at the bedroom door and commanded the doorknob to come out of the door. His mind was in a haze of anger over the rookie’s death. He forgot too that his anger was reinforced by his spiritual powers. 

He stepped back so that Anders could see the doorknob’s antics. The man seeing the doorknob hovering by the door choked on his rising hysteria. The doorknob slowly and tauntingly rose and slowly approached the bed. It wavered back and forth like a hissing cobra as it got closer to the man on the bed; finally it stopped and waited a foot above the man’s face.

Steve taunting him, snarled. “What do you think it wants to do?”

Anders’ eyes flickered toward McGarrett. “Please stop this.”

“What makes you think I can? I just the dumb cop that you shot, remember?”

Anders closed his eyes trying to shut out the sight of the doorknob that waited above his face. The doorknob moved and touched Anders’ forehead. It was about to press and twist on his forehead. 

Anders started sobbing in heaving gasps fearing what the doorknob was about to do.  McGarrett could hear Anders' heart beating at a dangerous level. Horrified at what he had almost done McGarrett quickly pulled back the doorknob and made it return to the door.  What he had been about to do  would have made him no better than Anders.  He was a cop. Not a judge, jury, or an executioner.

 Anders seeing the doorknobs retreat sagged in relief.

“All right, Anders, you are going to prison for life. You go to the nearest HPD station and you confess and turn yourself in. I want you to give them the details so that they know you were the one. You got it, pal?” Don’t mention seeing me either. If you don’t do what I say, I will come back to haunt you, got it? If you see me again, I’m going to haunt you for the rest of your life.”

Anders nodded his assent mutely.

McGarrett turned to leave but an image entered his mind. He had to do it. “Oh, by the way, Anders, since you’ll be stuck in prison for the rest of your days, I am going to give you one last amusement ride to remember me by.”

“Amusement ride?” Anders started to tremble. As a kid, amusement rides had scared him. His friends had jeered at him for refusing to get on the roaster coaster.

Steve was amused at Anders’ old fear. “I’ll spare you the roaster coaster, Anders. Let’s turn you into a gymnast. You’re going to do a horizontal spin up in the air with ten fast rotations. How does that sound?” The crowd will really be impressed with your antics.” I’ll be a judge. Maybe I’ll give you a score of a perfect 10.”

Anders’ eyes were now, not just bulging. They wanted to jump out of his eye sockets. He started screaming again.

The thump from the next door neighbor started up again. “I thought I told you to shut up. Do you want me to come over? I’m going to make your head spin if you don’t shut up,” the man shouted.

McGarrett laughed. Mentally he said, No I’m going to do it for you.

The next door neighbor heard McGarrett’s assurance in his head. The man knew of Steve McGarrett’s reputation with the criminals. He went back to sleep. The next morning he would wake up and wonder at the voice he had heard. He would come to the conclusion that it was a bizarre dream. The detectives at Five-0 didn’t make house calls on people disturbing the peace.

Anders started his spins in mid air; his screams changed into shrieks. The next door neighbor slept peacefully on. Anders was dizzy; he slumped back onto the bed, gasping for air, he fainted.

A force suddenly yanked at McGarrett pulling at him. He was being tugged back to the hospital; his spirit sucked back into his pain-filled physical body which was waking up from its coma. McGarrett moaned as the regained physical world rushed in on him.

Hours later, Anders woke up from his heavy sleep. His head was pounding and his muscles were weak and his head was spinning. What a crazy dream he had had, there was no such things as ghosts. McGarrett was dead and the so-called big man was no longer there to come after him. He tried to get out of bed, but he was too weak. He was going to call for an ambulance.

A half-hour later, Anders was being conducted by a nurse in the corridor to be examined. Through an open door he saw McGarrett lying in bed. His eyes bulged. McGarrett was here. He wasn’t dead. Anders remembered McGarrett promising him that if he didn’t go straight to HPD to confess, he was going to haunt him forever.

Anders threw himself on the floor and started shrieking and baying like a hound.

The nurse alarmed, screamed for security.

Not recognizing him, Steve saw the strange man out in the hall going berserk. What was wrong with him?

Anders later was declared insane, sunk in a catatonic state. He was indeed haunted by Steve McGarrett forever. The super cop’s face would forever mock him in his hallucinations.

McGarrett, on the other hand would be frustrated for a time that he never solved the rookie’s murder. But other cases would occupy his mind. He would some day find out what transpired when he met with the young cop again beyond the veil, in the spirit world.

McGarrett, having only had a near death experience, had only obtained part of the powers of a full spirit who went through a full death. But with McGarrett’s unusual strength of character and his urgency for obtaining justice, his immature spirit had almost obtained the powers and strength of a full spirit.

PAU

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