Tales of the Red Panda: The Mind Master

by Gregg Taylor

  “Meanwhile, I think our intrepid young policeman was about to reveal our mysterious destination,” Peters grinned at Parker.

  “Are you two about done?” Parker said seriously. “I usually work alone, so clever banter isn’t my forte.”

  “I’m done if he’s done,” Mac promised.

  “The seventh body was just I.D.’d. It belonged to Randall Allyn. His family estate is up this way.” Parker looked grim.

  “Who’s Randall Allyn?” Mac seemed puzzled.

  “The Allyns are old money, Mister Tully,” Peters said, clicking his teeth a little. “They carry a lot of water in this town, and there’s no particular reason why a wealthy young man like Allyn should be anywhere near Joshua Cain.”

  “Or any of the gorilla squad on their way to the morgue right now,” Parker added, nodding.

  Tully shook his head. “I still don’t see–”

  “Think about it, Mac,” Parker said with a glance at Tully in the rear-view mirror. “Our contacts are worried enough about the Chief that they sent us out without orders, right?”

  “Sure,” Mac said, only slightly annoyed.

  Peters picked up the thread. “And whoever the Chief might be under that mask, he’s pretty clearly got some money at his disposal and some time on his hands.”

  Mac turned pale. “You don’t think that Randall Allyn–”

  “No, I don’t,” said Peters. “I don’t buy the Red Panda as some soft rich bird. I know it makes sense, but I’ve met a lot of these society types, and they’re nothing like him. And unless I’m wrong, I think Allyn was too young for the part.”

  Parker’s car screeched to a halt in front of the Allyn estate. “I hope you’re right, Jack,” he said grimly. “But we have to make sure.”

  The three men climbed out of the car and moved quietly across the lawn.

  “How do you want to play this?” Peters asked.

  “Quickly and quietly,” Parker said seriously.

  “What does that mean?” the reporter asked.

  Parker thought for a moment. “It just sounded like what he might say,” he admitted at last.

  Mac Tully drew a .32 revolver from his coat. “Let’s not keep still,” he said. “We’re sitting ducks like this.”

  “Indeed you are,” said a voice that seemed to come from everywhere. The agents spun around, trying to pick the speaker out of the darkness. They could see a dozen forms moving towards them through the shadows. “Drop the pistol, young man,” the voice commanded. Even were it not for the obvious logic of the situation, Mac Tully still would have been forced to comply. There was something about the voice that would not be disobeyed.

  The three men stood, surrounded, as the shapes moved closer and resolved themselves into the best-dressed gang of toughs in history. Jack Peters gave a low whistle.

  “Ambushed by the swellest of swells,” he said quietly. “A genuine Who’s Who of the rich and richer.”

  The tuxedoed men surrounding them stood as still and grave as statues. Only one man stepped forward, a smile creeping across his hawk-like visage.

  “Well, well,” he said in a quiet voice that rolled like thunder. “Not at all who I expected.” The smile grew even larger. “How marvelous,” he said.

  Thirty-Two

  The Red Panda opened his eyes and blinked hard. The lights seemed to swirl before him as he struggled to focus. He blinked again and shook his head. He was seated in the passenger seat of a sleek, powerful roadster, and if the sensations were unfamiliar to him, he put it down to the fact that the car was parked and quite still as opposed to roaring through the city streets at gut-wrenching speeds.

  He relaxed back into the seat. The passenger door was sitting open, and as he recovered his senses he could see that the car was parked in the hidden garage in the Underground Lair. His hat lay on the dashboard and he moved to replace it on his head, but changed his mind and pulled his mask and gloves off instead. His ears were ringing, but he was clearly unharmed.

  “Kit?” he said at last. There was no reply.

  “Kit?” he called with more urgency.

  There was a small, flustered squeak from down the hall.

  “Kit?” he said again, genuinely concerned and trying without much success to pull himself to his feet.

  “I’m here,” came her voice from down the hall. “I’m fine.”

  “Where are you?”

  “I’m right here,” she said, her voice not getting any nearer.

  “What happened?” he said, sinking back into the seat.

  “What’s the last thing you remember?” came her voice again.

  He furrowed his brow. “We went out the window.”

  “I went out the window,” she corrected. “You were supposed to follow.”

  “Allyn was struggling,” he said slowly, as if piecing it together. “Trying to slow me down, to keep us both near the explosive. He fought like a madman. I couldn’t…” His voice trailed off.

  “You couldn’t force him out the window, you couldn’t get past the six goons blocking the door and you couldn’t get to the bomb to diffuse it,” she said grimly. “And you couldn’t bring yourself to cut and run.”

  “That’s more or less it, yes,” he said with a frown. “What are you doing?”

  “Nothing,” she said from the hallway.

  “Well, come in here and do it,” he said. “This is awkward.”

  “No,” she said.

  “What?”

  “I’m… I’m wearing a towel,” she said, embarrassed.

  “You’re what?”

  “I’m wearing a towel.”

  He nodded. “That’s what I thought you said. Why are you wearing a towel?”

  She peeked her head into the room. Her hair was dripping wet and he could just see one of her bare shoulders from around the corner, and the arm that was clearly locked to the top of a towel to keep it up. She was simply flustered, but might have seemed a little annoyed.

  “I’m wearing a towel because someone woke up and started hollering for me before I was dry,” she said quickly.

  “You took a shower?” he asked, surprised.

  “Yes.”

  “I was unconscious in the car and you took a shower?” he needled.

  “You were fine, you just got your bell rung,” she said, her mouth pulled into a cross little pout. “I’ve seen it often enough to know what it looks like. Besides, there wasn’t a mark on you, I checked.”

  That phrase hung between them for a few seconds before he bit his lip and turned away to keep from laughing. Her cheeks turned a deeply appealing shade of crimson and she pulled a little further back behind the corner.

  “That’s not what I meant,” she protested.

  “I know what you meant,” he said with a crooked smile.

  There was a small pause.

  “Okay,” she said, “I’m dripping on the floor here.”

  “Go,” he said, and then an instant later added, “Kit?”

  Her head popped back around the corner. Both shoulders followed it this time, and he was momentarily distracted.

  “What?” she asked.

  “How did I get out?” he asked, shaking his head a little.

  She held his eye hard. “You wouldn’t leave the kid, but the record was almost over. I snagged the back of your coat from the ground with my Grapple Gun and hit the retractor, hard,” she said. “The room blew when you were mid-air. Knocked you cold.”

  There was a small pause. He nodded. “Thanks, Kit,” he said.

  “Then a whole mess of rubble hit me, necessitating the shower. I smelled like an ash-can.”

  “I understand,” he said.

  “It hit me because I was standing between it and you,” she added.

  “Yes.”

  “On purpose,” she said, in case that hadn’t been clear.

  “Of course.”

  “Tore up a perfectly good Squirrel Suit, too,” she said, her chin leading ever so slightly as she watched f
or a reaction.

  “Kit?”

  “Yeah?”

  “Get dressed.”

  “Yes, Boss,” she grinned, turning to go. It is entirely possible that she did not intend to show a little leg on the way out, but it gave him something to think about while he waited for her to change.

  Ten minutes later, clad in the loose, comfortable clothes she kept on hand just for such an emergency, she found him in the trophy room. He was in shirt-sleeves, and his feet were bare as he sat cross-legged, seated on a mat they used for sparring practice. It seemed out of place away from the gym and she thought at first he might be meditating, but she saw his eyes were open and focused in the middle distance, and knew that he was lost in thought.

  He looked up at her. Her hair was mostly dry, and piled on top of her head in a manner best known to herself. A few damp strands hung by her left ear and she had a look that said she was a little embarrassed about her appearance, which was usually when Kit Baxter was at her most maddeningly attractive. It took a moment, but he forced himself to turn back to face the middle distance, which he did not intend to be the commentary on her appearance that she took it as.

  “So what now?” she sighed. “We don’t have a single lead left, and more questions than answers.”

  “Do we?” the Red Panda said grimly.

  Kit blinked. “Well,” she said, “I guess not, because you only say things like that when you’re about to tell me that you’ve solved the mystery by looking at my shoes, like Sherlock Holmes.”

  He smiled and said nothing.

  “Okay,” she said, her lips pursed in mock annoyance, “we know whoever our baddie is, he’s tied up with Cain, which means he was behind the Empire Bank job.”

  “Right.”

  “And since he blew up Cain’s house with about as much gusto as the warehouse that dropped on our heads, we can assume that was his work too,” she said, tucking her stray hair absent-mindedly behind her ear as she thought.

  “Yes.”

  “He had Randall Allyn in some kind of trance, and he’s got hypnosis and… what did you call it?”

  “Telekinesis,” he said quietly.

  “Right…,” she said. “Which isn’t surprising, after what he did to the minds of the bank guards. You said he was a ‘master of the mind’. But it seemed a little…”

  “Yes?” he said, turning his head back to her a little in spite of himself.

  “Well, it was a little extreme, wasn’t it? Allyn fought like a bear to stay close to that explosion, and the goons just stood there and took it. I thought that was supposed to be impossible. Forcing people into suicide, I mean.” She frowned.

  He nodded. “It is. Even among those who truly know of such things, it is. A man of great power could trick a victim into a trap, or frighten him to death. But to force a mind to willingly embrace death through sheer mental coercion…” Fenwick trailed off.

  “Boss… if he had Randall Allyn there, he must be targeting the hoi polloi,” she said, her eyes narrowed. “He could have been behind the deaths of Richard Granville and Martin Davies. And maybe even Wallace Blake.”

  August Fenwick nodded. “I’m sure of it,” he said.

  “Okay,” she said, with a nod of her head. “So we know a few things after all. We could suppose that he’s calling himself Ajay Shah, even if that name doesn’t mean anything.”

  “It means something,” Fenwick said, his voice sounding tired. “It means ‘Unconquerable King’. But it isn’t his name. It’s his plan.”

  There was a small pause. “That’s crazy,” she said.

  “It isn’t either.” The steely resolve of the Red Panda crept back into Fenwick’s eyes. “Because I know who he really is. And I know why he’s here.”

  Kit Baxter wasn’t a girl easily surprised, but this moment was clearly an exception. “What?”

  He smiled at her and motioned for her to sit on the mat opposite him. “A fellow student of a master I trained with in Nepal. He had great power, great ambition and great anger. And unless I’m much mistaken, he might feel that I may be the only man alive that can stand in his way.”

  “Nice,” she said, settling down on the mat, her legs crossed. “Glad you’re on my side.”

  He shook his head. “I didn’t say that I liked my odds. But I’ve got a chance.”

  She crinkled her nose up slightly in confusion. “So what are we doin’?” she asked.

  He sighed. “Do you remember Nick Diablos?”

  She nodded. “Sure. That was an early case. A con man with hypnotic powers, made his marks think he was the Devil. He made me fight you as I recall.”

  The Red Panda nodded. “He made you think that I was him, and he was I. But still you broke free of that trick, because it was an action against your basic nature, and your subconscious mind rebelled.”

  “Right,” she smiled. “So what’s the problem?”

  He regarded her gravely. “The problem is that this… this Ajay Shah… would not have to trick you. He could make you want to fight me. Want to kill me. He could make you fight like a demon with no regard for your own safety. Either you kill me or he forces me to kill you. Either way, he wins.”

  She blinked hard at the thought. “But Boss, after Diablos… you trained me…”

  “I did what I could to give you a basic immunity to hypnotic attack, and reinforced it with non-invasive hypnotic suggestions of my own, yes.” His face was serious. “We’re going to spend the next few hours going over everything I taught you again.”

  “Sure,” Kit sighed. “Sleeping is for chumps.”

  “But based on the way he used Randall Allyn, he’s almost certain to force me to choose.”

  “Choose what?” she asked.

  “Choose to sacrifice a life,” he said. “Either mine or yours. I’m not sure he’d care which, though I suspect he’d rather force me to kill you.”

  “And I thought the Parish school was tough,” Kit smiled. “You do have a way with people, don’t you?”

  “Whatever else happens, even if everything else fails, there may still be a way to fight against his power.” He spoke quickly now, urgently. “While we work, you must pick a single point of stillness within yourself. Something you can focus on, something you can use to find your way back to your true self.”

  “You talk in real pretty riddles, you know that?”

  “Kit, this is serious. It may be the most serious thing I’ve ever said to you.”

  Kit sat up straight. It might not be love poetry, but a girl couldn’t be too choosy, and she’d hate to miss the most serious thing he’d ever told her.

  “Okay,” she said. “What do you want me to do?”

  “A single point of stillness…” He cut himself off when he saw her brows furrow. “A single, simple image. Something you can see in your mind’s eye. It should be something easy to remember, something you know very well.”

  “Okay…,” she said, still not understanding.

  “If Shah should gain control, this may be your only way of fighting back. You must focus every scrap of energy left in you on this image. It must be something that you have a strong emotive response to. Something that reminds you of who you are, of the truest thing you know about yourself. Only with that as your anchor can you find yourself again.”

  As he spoke she watched his eyes, watched them more closely than she had ever dared. They were dark, so brown they were almost black, but they danced with energy. They were full of fire for the task ahead, full of concern for her safety. They looked tired from the fight and yet still bore great resolve. They were his eyes, and she memorized every detail as he spoke.

  “Gotcha,” she said with a smile.

  “Kit, this is serious. Promise me that you know what your anchor is.”

  She looked deep into his eyes again. So deep that she could see her own image reflected, grinning back at herself.

  “I promise,” she said.

  Thirty-Three

  The sky above was blood
-red with the first fires of sunset when Rashan awoke. The soldiers were gone at last, driven far down the mountain paths in fear and confusion; their memories of the terrors they had faced in the high valley were garbled, and would fade into fitful nightmares, but not before the legends had spread to the villages below. The tales of the angry spirits atop the mountains would keep the narrow pass free from intruders for a time, though for how long, not even the Master could say.

  Rashan walked slowly amongst the bodies of the fallen soldiers, their blood now black upon the rocks of the path that led into the valley. He walked in silence for a time, his face betraying nothing of his thoughts.

  His younger student stood alone on the high rock wall where he took his exercises. Motionless, the young man in the mask watched and said nothing.

  Rashan’s elder student waited smugly, as if expecting congratulations. Rashan did not hurry, but walked up to him slowly and held his eye firmly, but with sadness.

  “I have taught you nothing,” he said quietly.

  One started as if he had been slapped. “But Master–”

  “No,” Rashan said firmly. “No. There is nothing that can excuse this slaughter.”

  One’s jaw set firmly, his cheeks flushed with anger. “I did what I had to do to defend this place. To defend you.”

  “Liar!” the Master’s voice boomed. “You did what you did for your own pleasure and vanity. You reek of self-satisfaction.”

  The student’s eyes were wide with disbelief. “You taught me. You gave me the power to control the minds of men.”

  “Yes,” Rashan said with contempt, “I put a dangerous weapon into the hands of a cruel and spiteful child. I am a fool. But we were talking about you.”

  “I am no longer a child, and you cannot speak to me that way!” One said, drawing himself to his full height, and then seemingly still higher. Shadows lapped around his ankles like a shallow pool that might engulf him entirely.

  From his high perch, Fenwick watched and said nothing.

  “Get out of my sight,” Rashan said quietly. His student paused and then began to move away quickly.

  “No,” the Master called. “I do not mean for you to go away and sulk as you so often have when I have upbraided you. Waiting while I forget to be angry, all the while learning nothing.”