Polished

by P. S. Power

  So, Tor Baker might be simply acting sad, in order to influence what Rich was thinking about him. Putting on a show that was designed to have Rich thinking of the man as being a feeling and even good human being, instead of a pain inducing monster who acted without thought. If so… Well, it was kind of working.

  For instance, he didn't feel like hitting the man in the kidney in retaliation for the last day of mental training, hardly at all. A thing which was probably a good idea to hold on to, since the other man was a giant and Richard Drake simply wasn’t. Plus, it was kind of clear that the fellow was pushing him for a solid reason, not just to be a jerk. Why that was didn’t make a lot of sense, on the surface. Still, the man was taking hours, even days, from his own schedule to teach Rich to focus his mind, for some reason. He had to admit that he did feel clear that way, so it was probably working.

  Richard got to his feet, since like it or not, he was in training it seemed. How this was going to relate to using his power, he didn’t totally see. Other than the idea that better focus generally helped with doing anything, of course. Instead of going for a run, which was part of his daily routine when time allowed, he paced for a while, making a big circle around the room he was in, until the other man came back in, holding a platter that contained a large piece of sliced bread with a single piece of white cheese on the top of it.

  “Eat this, please. We don’t really get to wait long, I fear. Your strength needs to be kept high for this, if we can manage that. Sleep isn’t allowed, by order of Taman, so food and a bit of exercise is all we can do for you.”

  Why the man felt as pressed for time as he seemed to feel didn’t make a lot of sense, either. The only thing that came to mind was that he might actually have a life to get to, which didn’t involve babysitting a strange man from a different reality.

  The pain rock was passed to Richard again instantly, as soon as the food was done, with pain ripping through his arm and back about twenty seconds after taking hold of the thing. Then, eyes watering, even if closed, he managed to slowly get his focus going again. It took longer than it felt like it should. Eventually the black glass in his hand was all he was thinking about.

  Then, six hours later, they repeated the whole thing, with a bathroom break thrown in for good measure.

  Sleep really wasn’t allowed, until past the next day, the stone being taken from his fingers by a sleepy looking tall man. One who honestly needed to change his too pretty face. Richard didn’t mention it, since they weren’t that close yet. It could seem too much like making fun of the fellow, if it was done wrong. Still, it had to be a problem for the guy and he lived in a world where making that kind of alteration was not only possible, but kind of easy for a certain Tor to get in on.

  Really, he could get his best students to do that kind of work on him and it would only show that he had faith in them. Given that it was hard to imagine why he hadn’t done it already. Unless the too pretty look was the result of that kind of thing already. In that case he needed to get with a different kid and have it updated.

  Without waiting for sleep to come first, the other man took a shudderingly deep breath, then touched the wall, making the whole thing turn into a reflective surface. It was flawless on a level that Richard had never seen before in his long life. There were no lines or subtle warping to it. No water spots on the surface or signs of age or any kind of imperfection in the slightest. The incredible mirrored surface was pure, unbroken by lines or warps and called to him, intensely. Almost begging him to go inside, even if he was exhausted at the moment.

  Every sparkling thing did that for him, of course, but this was special. Magical in a literal sense that his brain hadn’t allowed him to notice before that moment. The world around him wasn’t just nice, it was perfect. Which, in a way, was his problem with Tor’s face. The man wasn’t just attractive, he was busily doing that on a level that left Richard feeling slightly like he wanted to have relations with the man. A thing he didn't want, not being a funny boy by nature. Still, denying that some tickle of that kind of thing existed was just lying to himself.

  Before he could remark on that, how perfect the mirror was, not his annoying feelings of the moment, the other man waved him up. There was a commanding clap to go with the move, at the end. It seemed high handed enough to be rude, even if it probably wasn’t meant that way. Again, this was probably a thing that was different, given the culture. They, the people of Noram, as a group had seemed to work very hard not to seem out of place or commanding with the aliens they’d met. At least as far as Rich had ever seen.

  “Go into the world inside of yourself, using this reflection. There is another wall like this on the other side of the city, to the north. Bring those two points together and then walk through into the room you find there. Once you do that, you’ll go back and forth, until it becomes second nature. We’ll be timing you, as soon as you get there. Our agent on the other side is already waiting. You won’t miss it, I don’t think, since it should be the largest point of light in the area, other than this one, to your perception. This should be the largest set of mirrors on the planet at this moment, if that helps?”

  That was probably just the truth. The mirror in front of him was huge, at least. Rather than complain about being sleepy, which the other man had to know all about being just as tired, Richard let his face curl up into a grin. Sometimes you had to push in training, to make sure you had the skills you were going to need later. Being lazy never helped anyone.

  “Let’s see if I can manage that at all? I’ve done some smaller trips before, so… Here…” He hopped up, his legs feeling a little clumsy from disuse. He tried to hide that, moving directly to the mirrored wall, his right hand reaching toward it. The whole thing feeling warm to his finger tips as the middle and index finger made contact with the smooth surface.

  Everything in the area changed the instant he did that, of course. It was his super power, after all. A thing that took no real skill or effort for him to use, in its simplest form. The world inside the mirror looked different than where he’d just been by enough that he’d never be confused about which kind of space he was standing in, he didn't think. He was holding his right hand up still, touching the other side of the mirror, for a moment.

  The room was eerily unmoving around him, but as he stepped back he could see the emptiness inside of things, where the light couldn’t reach. Making them all seem perfectly hollow inside, while being perfect on the outside edge of the image. The only show he got at all from the whole thing was that Tor Baker moved, slightly, looking into the mirror, anxiously.

  As he did it, his eyes seemed to darken, becoming almost filled with grief. As if what he’d been asking Richard to do was simply too much.

  Except that, now that it was done, Drake had to figure that it was the right thing to do. The trainer of the hour had a plan in mind and was making certain that his student didn’t fail in the task at hand. Hence teaching him focus first. It was probably more of an indicator as to how the man himself worked, day to day, than what was truly needed for an Infected power to get things done. Still, being of clear mind and intent never harmed anything.

  Mastering any skill, no matter how strange, tended to lead to mastery of many, over time. Even being a thief had shown him that. First in that he had to learn about locks, which had led him to understanding how machining was done. Breaking into windows and doors had led him to actually build things, several times, to learn how they really worked. That focusing on a rock might be a bit like that, eventually, wasn’t lost on him.

  Looking around he did see a point of white light not that far away. Miles, which was a lot further than he’d worked with before, bringing points of light together in his head. Going to a different room without walking was possible though, so this might be as well. The other mirror was so big that he couldn’t confuse what he was seeing, even with thousands of other smaller points of light reflecting like a field of stars in that direction.

  At first he started
to walk, since it was too far away to touch yet, then stopped and shook his head.

  “Right. I need to bring the points together. How I do that at these distances, I have no clue.” The trick there was that, if he’d been told correctly, the whole thing was really just inside his own head.

  In that, what he saw, even the idea that he needed a mirror for it, was all just because of how he’d fallen as the Infection took him. His hand had touched a mirror as he’d gone into the flood waters, over the side of his bed. His old body not capable of holding Tabitha the cat up well enough as he fell. His desire to protect the package in his arms consuming him at that moment.

  He’d grasped at the only thing there, at that moment. The small mirror on the table next to his bed. A thing he hadn’t used for years, not wanting to see the wrecked old face that he’d become over the decades. The nurses had always kept it clean and ready for him, as a kindness. Using that to go inside his mind, making up a world that would allow him to survive.

  The whole thing wasn’t real in any way. It was a metaphor for being inside his own head.

  Meaning there was no real reason to be stuck that way, using the rules that had come into being in the first moments of his being Infected. They weren’t real, just a game that he’d played with himself in order to make sense of things at the time. Only now he was a bit stuck. It wasn’t reality that he was looking at in front of himself, those constellations of mirrors.

  It just seemed that way, from inside himself. There had been rules created, which didn’t really exist, even if they seemed hard to break at the moment. Luckily, he was good at that kind of thing. Making up his own internal laws had been part of how he’d always lived.

  So, he tried to simply will the other light to come closer to him. That, even using his new focus and bearing down for a long while didn’t really do much for him at all. He tried that particular strategy for about ten minutes with nothing to show for it in the end. Not even a headache or eyestrain from staring took place.

  It was annoying, so he cleared his throat.

  “If one thing doesn’t work, try another… What though? This is my subconscious mind here, so how do I influence it?”

  Looking around, nothing came to him. Not at first. Then he tried to think about the whole thing like a heist. That was something he was good at. A thing drilled into him for so long that even the deepest parts of himself had to respond to it. He had a window that he needed to get to, and couldn’t simply walk to it. There were no cars there, or boats to make the journey to his entrance point faster. There was no way, or even need, to jimmy the thing open, either.

  It just had to be closer to him, in order for him to climb through, in order to reach his goal.

  Finally, almost in frustration, he imagined a lasso, which he threw around the light in the distance, then used imaginary hands to pull on it. He nearly dropped the mental image in shock when the light suddenly got bigger for him. After all, the lasso itself wasn’t visible at all. It was no clearer to him than anything he might have pictured when in the normal world.

  Still, as he tugged the thing to himself, the point of light becoming larger, he grinned.

  “Seriously? A mental lasso is what does it? Well, yippee-ki-yay then. Come over here then, little doggy.” It had been nearly eighty-five years since he’d played cowboy and that had never been a thing he’d dreamed of being, even as a child. He’d played at it mainly because the other boys had been interested in that kind of thing. Personally, he’d always liked baseball better, back then. Other, more physical things as well.

  Still, it was working, so he mentally pulled harder, the light being right in front of him, inside touching distance, not half a minute later.

  In the reflection there was a decently nice-looking young lady. She didn't seem old, probably being ten or so. Possibly eleven or even twelve. His ability to see younger people had faded over the years. Her hair was blonde, and she had smooth dark skin, which was fairly normal for Noram. Tor was as white as Richard was, but almost everyone else was much darker than that. Technically Tor was lighter in color than he was.

  Richard had been born Jewish, but his family was from Lebanon originally. That left him looking a bit like he was from that part of the world, naturally.

  Reaching up he touched the mirror he’d just lassoed, which had him facing the other direction, touching the mirrored wall on the other side. The room obviously real, being in full color as it was, suddenly. Nothing was covered in darkness at the fringes or hollow seeming, which was a dead giveaway that it had worked for him. Plus, he was in a room, not a field of stars. It didn’t take a genius not to be confused that way.

  The young woman jumped a bit, then spoke to him, in English.

  “There you are, Richard! I was just about to get bored and call for you. How have you been doing? It’s been… Nearly two years, since I’ve seen you?”

  He wasn’t a moron, so tilted his head a bit, getting that the girl was little Sara. Even if she didn’t seem like any of the forms he’d seen from her before at all. She was cute, but in a normal, healthy seeming way. Also, she’d looked younger the last time he’d seen her. By about four years or so.

  “Two years? It’s only been a few months on my side, I swear. Sorry about that, kid. You look different, too. Good, though. How are things treating you here? I should have been around to check on you.” For a moment he felt a bit bad on that score, though the girl waved that thought away, rather sweetly. The movement held a slightly practiced air to it. Then, her words did as well. They could have been sulky or bratty, and simply weren’t.

  “Why would you be checking on me, in particular? We only met a few times, before I came here. I get visitors nearly every week, too. That’s almost every day, for the people back home. Things are… Different, here. I have a lot of classes. Mainly different languages, math and Noram history and traditions. That and learning to be a spy. I have friends though, so that’s good. Kids my own age. The Bakers take care of us all, like a real family. A big one, but no one rapes me or takes advantage, which can be a problem here, too. It beats the foster care system, let me tell you! Tiera even has me go to her place for two months every year, just to visit.” She sounded older, Richard noticed.

  Calm and almost happy. Even with a different face than he recalled her having, this one being a bit less attractive and a little younger looking, with a bigger nose and shoulder length hair, it was good to see. Her clothing was a simple brown uniform. The same one that his magical clothing amulet put him in every time he turned it on, at first.

  After a moment, the girl smiled at him.

  “I need to call Mr. Tor and tell him that you’re going to be going back now. You need to hurry as fast as you can on that. You were a bit slow this first time. If you do it right, you should be able to get places almost instantly. Let me do that part. Um…” It wasn’t at all hard for her to pull a handheld and get in touch with the man. The moves were quick and practiced in fact.

  When the good-looking face showed up in her palm on the white stone surface, Sara smiled. It was a look that spoke of being impressed with the person she was speaking to. As in, if he didn't know better, Richard would have thought that she had a crush on the man. Not that he was going to tease either of them on that score.

  It was more important to him to back his people than to score points or correct their thoughts. Both of them counted, if in different ways. Teasing was, most of the time, a good way to break down the bonds between people. As Sara had just pointed out, they weren’t that close. That was a mistake on his part, given how powerful the girl was already.

  That she was trying to be a good kid was simply amazing, given that she didn't really have to be. Of course, there was no wiggle room for a shape changer who could take on any powers she could think of. Either she was a good person, all on her own, or entire worlds would have to rise against her, attempting to survive. Probably failing, as well. The price of having a place to live with nice people in it was, for
her, being a good kid.

  That wasn’t a fair thing at all, of course. She was never going to be able to allow herself to be a moody and bratty teen for instance. When other girls ran to their rooms and cried into their pillows because the boy they liked didn’t like them back, she was going to have to be careful to control her emotions. Then again, if the boy wanted a prettier face, or even another boy, here was the one person in the world who could pull that off, if she wanted to. Not that it was the right thing for her to be doing, when that came up.

  That she might be able to impress Tor Baker enough to get his attention was… Oddly possible. Not that he was going to do anything with immoral a ten or eleven-year-old girl. None of which meant that Sara couldn’t like him, of course.

  When Tor said hello, seeming tired still, Sara looked up and nearly shouted at Richard. Being abrupt on purpose. There was even a push in his direction, though it didn't make contact. That was nice, since it meant he wasn’t propelled at the wall with superhuman force.

  “Go! Start the time in… Three, two… one!”

  Richard had to lunge at the mirror all on his own, in order to get inside of it on time. Then, scrambling, he used his mental lasso and pulled the correct light toward himself faster than before. It still took a while to do that portion of things. When he got into the correct room, with Tor standing behind him, the man called out.

  “That took you one minute and twenty seconds. Go back now. Do it faster. Ready?”

  Richard nodded, feeling a bit out of breath, even if he wasn’t breathing hard, physically. The surge of adrenalin he felt was responsible for that part of things.

  “Sure.”

  “Go! Use your focus.” There was a sense of urgency to the whole thing. Almost panic, from the other man.