by K. A. Excell
CRYSTAL
MIND
A Novel in the Projector War Saga
Other books by K. A. Excell
Crystal Choice
Crystal Truth
CRYSTAL
MIND
A Novel in the Projector War Saga
K. A. Excell
CRYSTAL MIND
Copyright © 2020 Katerina Ann Excell
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher.
ISBN-13: 978-1-952856-00-6 (Paperback)
ISBN-13: 978-1-952856-01-3 (Hardcover)
LCCN: 2020910898
Any references to historical events, real people, or real places are used fictitiously. Names, characters, and places are products of the author’s imagination.
Front cover image by Jesh Art Studios.
First printing edition 2020.
Katerina Ann Excell
Hurricane, UT
www.KAExcell.com
For Jase, who started me on this path.
Chapter One
“Watch it, Crystal!” someone snarled.
My head snapped up, but I registered the collision too late. I sat down hard rather than try to correct my balance. The loose-leaf english homework in my arms slid to the floor, still more or less in order. I reached down to gather it back up as a half-hearted kick—fueled by frustration, not violence—sent them fluttering around.
Blue lines sputtered to life, bringing numbers with them as I mobilized half my mind to calculate a course to retrieve the papers. The other half of my mind held blue lines ready in case the foot that had kicked at my homework decided to kick at me next. As part of the evaluation, a portion of my blue lines flicked over the person I’d run into.
My lips tightened as I read the white name tag. Ollie Peters. A moment later, the tag was joined by a memory of her entering her apartment across the hall from Zach. A dozen cross-references presented themselves—all featuring her in close proximity to him.
“Sorry, Ollie,” I mumbled as I reached for my homework.
Ollie snorted. “Sorry’s right. Tell me again how a dunderhead like you caught the most attractive guy in the neighborhood last year?”
I stiffened further as a picture of Zachary’s leer superimposed itself on my world. I tried to force the memory away by looking up at Ollie. Her eyes were hot and uneven, full of anger and hurt.
She kicked at my homework again. I calculated the airwaves and noted where my homework would land so I could plot intercepts for later retrieval.
“That’s right, only someone like you could just watch as he gets hit by a drunk driver. Useless freak.” Her words were low. Mean.
The image of Zachary pushed itself on me again, and I flinched away. The memory was returning, full force. I tried to hold on to the real-life images in front of me, but they faded as I watched—to be replaced by images of the past.
Not here, not again!
But it wouldn’t obey. The memories flooded past my mental fingers, and there was nothing I could do to stop them.
I shrank down into a ball as I remembered the projected path and force reading on his hand coming toward my face. I could see it coming, but the same tools that let me know when to expect the pain told me I couldn’t get out of the way fast enough.
His hands came up again, and again, and again, but I couldn’t avoid them. I was too slow and too scared. The intercepts flashed red, and pain lanced through me. I tucked my head to protect my skull, but that didn’t save my ribs.
I woke up in the hospital later. Mom said I fell down the stairs.
She would have reported him if she’d known, but I couldn’t find the courage to tell her and she wasn’t in any shape to figure it out by herself.
“Oh, grow up, Farina!” Ollie said. I heard the words in passing, and then they faded out again. I was still caught in the memory. The fear, adrenaline and pain built a prison of images that forced me to relive it all over again. My mental fingers clawed at the walls, but there was nothing I could do.
I saw the car flying toward Zachary, and then his screams. The sirens flowed past like water.
A hand touched me, and I reacted.
A moment later, my vision was clear of the memory, and Ollie was doubled over clutching her neck. I looked down at my bladed hand and replayed the moment in my mind. Ollie had grabbed my arm. l had turned and jabbed my fingers into the soft part of Ollie’s throat. The pressure reading was below the threshold to damage the human body, but it still left her gagging on the floor.
“What in the blazing rages is going on here?” Principal Pierce appeared from around the corner. His face darkened as he took in the scene. “Crystal Farina, I should have known. Come with me.”
I followed him wordlessly—leaving my homework discarded in the hallway. It didn’t matter anymore. A moment later, I sat in the chair he pointed to.
I didn’t have to hear his words to know what he was saying—I’d heard this same speech three times, now, about how problems were to be solved with communication and compassion instead of with fists.
I looked down at my feet while the Principal droned on and on. The memory was still fresh in my mind—the images, anyway. Sounds were still mushy groans, barely decipherable on a good day. Today was not a good day.
Finally, the memories slowed, and I caught my breath.
“—Crystal?”
I pointed my face toward him, still avoiding his eyes. “What?”
He pinched the bridge of his nose with a sigh. “I asked if you even understood why what you did was serious.”
I bit my lower lip. “It would have been fine if she hadn’t touched me.”
“Ollie said she was asking whether you were alright, and I believe her. She’s a good kid. She couldn’t have meant any harm.”
I blinked away images of Zachary and the feel of his skin against mine. The kisses he stole that I hadn’t given. The worst was over, but I was still trapped in two different times. I took another slow breath and martialled my blue lines.
“Point-six pounds of pressure will stun. It’s non-lethal—even non-damaging. She’ll be fine.” My voice was toneless. Hopefully. Mom said that sometimes my voice went cold. Cold meant angry. Angry with the Principal would get me kicked out of school.
“We have a zero tolerance policy, Miss Farina. Do you know what that means?”
Finally, another image to focus on! I located the image of the school handbook and read off the section about zero-tolerance while he blinked at me.
“Even within the zero-tolerance policy, you have the option to suspend from the institution. In that context, zero-tolerance does not immediately lead to expulsion,” I said, after I finished reading.
He frowned, and I risked a quick glance at his eyes. He didn’t seem to like me much—but I didn’t really like myself right then, either.
“That’s for people who need a second chance,” he said. “You’ve already been kicked out of three schools for violence.”
“But—”
He raised a hand. “They almost charged you for assaulting that poor boy back at your first school. Since then, you’ve been expelled from two more in as many weeks. ”
I grimaced. “I know it looks bad, but—”
“—there is no ‘but’, Miss Farina
. You have troubles, and I get that. You need a school for troubled children then, not a public school. We are simply not equipped to help you.” He shrugged.
Whatever he was going to say next was interrupted by a knock on the door.
I knew it was Mom before I turned around to look. I always knew when Mom was near, just like I always knew her voice, and could never look at her eyes.
“Crystal, are you alright?” she asked.
I hesitated a moment, unsure that the words Mom had said were the words I had actually heard.
“Mom, I did it again.” The words felt rough in my throat. How could she not be furious? The secretary must have told her what happened. The first time had shocked her. The second and third time had made her angry.
She stepped up next to the chair so I could see her out of the side of my vision, even bent, studying my shoes as I was.
“I know. It’s alright.”
The principal coughed. “No, it’s not. Miss Farina, you are hereby expelled from the school. As this is your fourth expulsion, I feel required to explain that you will not be admitted to any more public schools. Someone will email you with a list of schools for troubled youth in the area.”
Mom glared at the principal. She opened her mouth to say something—then closed it again. She took my hand firmly and walked out of the office without even saying goodbye. Mom glared at everyone who looked our way. I studied my feet until we reached the car. Did it matter what any of them thought about me? They couldn’t possibly know what it was like inside of my mind.
We drove home in silence. I looked toward her a few times with explanation on the tip of my tongue, but every time I looked at her slender form staring intently at the road, the words died.
She parked the car on the side of the street in front of our place, checked the lock, and opened the apartment door with the ‘spare’ key.
She never remembered her keys.
Once inside, habit took over. I started the kettle and pulled two chipped tea cups from the cupboard. I sniffed the tea bags as I laid them in the cups. They were old, but drinkable. I flipped the oven broiler on, then off, then on again. The coils still didn’t light, so I flipped the broiler off again and found a frying pan. Six minutes and twenty-seven seconds later the tea was steeping and I finished plating the cheese sandwiches. Lunch.
Only then did I look back at Mom.
“Crystal, it’s 10:30,” she said, but she took a sip of the tea, anyway.
I checked the clock in the top center of my vision. “10:32.” Rounded, it could be called 10:30. Then I frowned. “Why didn’t you stop me? This is lunch food. It’s not lunch.”
“I tried, but you couldn’t hear me and you wouldn’t look at me.”
I looked down at the cheese sandwich for a long time. “I don’t want to eat cheese sandwiches for lunch anymore. Most kids don’t come home for lunch. They eat at the cafeteria. Most kids go to school all day.”
“Do you want to go to school all day?” Mom asked. Her eyes were soft. Kind.
Images of children playing, screaming, and running together on the playground flooded my mind. I’d played like that once—or that was what Mom said. I didn’t remember much from before Dad left.
“Yes.”
But it was too late. Even if people didn’t ignore me or make fun of me, I couldn’t go back. I hurt people when I went to school.
“Are you sure?” Mom asked.
I laughed, and Mom flinched. “I shouldn’t want to, but I do.”
She moved an upturned hand toward me and then back. It was a small gesture, but easier to process than a verbal question.
I clenched my fists at the sudden image of Zach’s face. He had hurt people because I was at school; because they looked at me. I had to hurt Zach. Now I hurt people who did nothing to me. I reached back in my mind to Ollie’s shocked face after I hit her only an hour ago. She hadn’t really been trying to hurt me—not physically, anyway—but all it took was Zach’s name and one touch for me to react.
What had I done to myself?
I examined my mind for protocols that told me to hurt people, but nothing was there except one line in red. “It’s alright to protect yourself.”
“Yes,” Mom said. I looked up. “It is alright to protect yourself.”
I swallowed as the blue lines on my vision told me that her reaction was consistent with my having spoken aloud, even though I didn’t remember speaking. That happened sometimes.
“You still didn’t answer my question.”
I clenched my jaw. “I hurt people when I go to school.”
So many people. I couldn’t stop the flood of images in front of my eyes with pressure readings and dates. Pressure readings from the blows that had broken their bones, and dates from when I stood there and watched with the wall of blue lines between my emotions and my vision.
Now I wasn’t just watching. What had Zach done to me?
“I know that, Crystal. But why? What happened with Zach? That’s when this all started, isn’t it? When you two broke up after his accident?”
My shoulders hunched forward, and I reached for my tea. Mom’s hand got there first, though. Her skin was rough—like needles rubbing against my skin.
“No. Look at me, Crystal.”
I squeezed my eyes closed. “I can’t.”
She said something else, but the words mushed together enough that I couldn’t decipher them. I peeled my eyes open slowly, but kept them focused on the cracked, stained wood of the counter.
“You can. You’ve been doing better at meeting peoples’ eyes. You said you don’t want to be ruled by fear.”
I swallowed and pulled my hand away from Mom’s. Most eyes just brought fear, but Mom’s eyes weren’t just eyes.
Zachary’s face was abruptly in front of mine again. His mouth moved silently, but I knew what he was saying.
“Scared, huh? Eyes aren’t scary, sugar bun. See?” He took every opportunity to torment me. I could see the pleasure in his eyes when he grabbed my chin to make me look at him. He said he cared about me, but hurting me made him happy. It didn’t make sense—but people rarely did.
Were Mom’s eyes any scarier than Zachary’s were while he was in a rage?
It was a different kind of fear.
Slowly, I raised my eyes to meet hers. Everything else faded away. Everything except those emerald jewels inside her face. Pain. Fear. Memories better left alone. Nothing but me and her.
I tried to look away, but I couldn’t move my eyes. I tried to run, but my limbs were like lead. Couldn’t scream. Couldn’t cry. Couldn’t do anything except stare.
Finally, Mom blinked.
I fell back into my own mind with a strangled gasp.
“See?” Mom said. “That was better than last time.”
I tried to nod, but my head was heavy and I abandoned the effort halfway through. I started toward the door that led to my room.
Mom stopped me with a wave of her hand. “Why won’t you tell me about what happened between you and Zach?”
I looked back at her, but the words stuck in my head. I couldn’t tell her that I’d created a weapon that had pushed a car on top of him. Mom was the only one in the world that didn’t look at me like I was broken.
“I just can’t.”
I found my way into my room, locked the door behind me, fell on my bed, and finally felt safe enough to let go of the blue lines on my vision.
All at once, the anguish of this morning crashed into me.
My heartrate—suppressed along with my breathing—sprang back and the sweating started as repressed adrenaline flushed through my system. My hands shook as I finally gave into the memories and allowed my mind to process what had happened.
I bit down on a groan as I twitched away from Ollie’s hand in my memory.
Why couldn’t
Zachary leave me alone?
He was paralyzed from the waist down, spending most of his days in physical therapy, but he still haunted my every step. Why had I ever decided to go on that first date with him? Why hadn’t I gotten out while I still could? Why hadn’t I run instead of devoting hours of research, study, and practice to finding the weak points of the human body? Of all the ways to fix this, why hadn’t I found something that didn’t involve hurting others?
Why did his ghost still haunt me now that I’d finally gotten rid of him?
I was expelled from school. I hurt someone else.
I cried myself to sleep.
I woke up just after noon only to stare at the ceiling and compute the odds of earthquakes in various parts of the world for lack of anything else to do. Four minutes, and six countries later, Mom knocked on my door. I didn’t bother pretending I was asleep—she would know I wasn’t. She always knew.
I wanted to tell her I couldn’t answer more questions about Zachary today, but I didn’t. What would be the point? I couldn’t avoid her forever.
“Come in.”
She cracked the door open. “I just thought you might want some good news.”
What even was good news? The thought was dull, and I spared a millisecond to wonder when life had become so bleak. Still, I motioned for her to continue.
“I got another job,” she said.
I sat up and twisted my mouth into a smile. “That’s good.” For however long it would last.
Mom was forgetful about everything except me. She was barely ever on time, and sometimes she would even have nervous breakdowns and have to go to the hospital for sedation. She could never hold down a job for more than a few months. Dad’s child support checks weren’t enough to do more than keep a roof over our heads and make the car payment. She had some savings from before Dad left, but that was dangerously low. Now she was going to have to pay for my school—
I clenched my fists. Why did I have to be such a burden on her? She taught me how to understand people, how to communicate with the outside world, and how to stand on my own two feet and I rewarded her by becoming so violent I couldn’t even go to regular school?
