by P. S. Power
Being rude would be too memorable, and might get the woman to lie about him to the establishment. It was a problem that happened to men, if they weren't good looking enough. Women would pretend to feel threatened, and make up things about them to cause problems. Not a lot of women did things like that, but if this one wasn't that kind of person...
The thing there was that Ben had no real reason to think she was. She'd been a bit sharp sounding and accusatory, that was all. She also didn't seem to buy his story of vast wealth and him buying an attractive boyfriend. That was on her face as well.
Even with Clark moving over and putting a damp arm over his shoulder, protectively.
Thankfully Lissa had a plan.
"We should go and get something to eat. I've been in the hot water long enough. We all have."
That got Ben to move quickly, the heavyset lady making doubting noises about him the whole time. As if saying that an unattractive man might not have made something of himself. True, it wasn't likely, given his apparent age, and it was a lie, but she'd started it.
Which wasn't a good reason for him not to get out of the situation, smiling and being polite.
"That sounds great. Come on everyone."
He meant his group, but the women weren't going to be deterred by something as simple as them leaving the water. They climbed out as well, and tried to act as if they'd been invited to eat with them. Which got Ben to feel about eighty times more suspicious suddenly. That wasn't normal behavior. Not that he'd ever heard. There was a co-ed changing area, so Ben hurried, changing into his nice clothing again. His body was a bit damp, so nothing fit right, but sure enough as quickly as he moved, Lissa didn't manage it, and they were stuck with the plumper gang being hard on their heels as they moved through the building, which had red carpets on the floors, as they walked into the restaurant.
Apparently you were allowed to seat yourself, the thing being largely robotic, so they all ended up at a large table together, the three women acting like they were supposed to just pull up chairs and share with them. It was creepy on a level that Ben could hardly express.
Carlos, looked at them with at least as much suspicion.
Luckily they had Mags with them. She might be doing better, but if the one heavy woman was a bit pushy and rude, Mags had lived that way for years. With additional cutting.
"I'm sorry... Why are you sitting with us? I don't know you, and we didn't invite you along. Perhaps you should find another table?" It was nearly polite sounding, but she was fondling a knife when she spoke the words. A butter knife, but the implied threat was still there.
The mouthy one that Ben already didn't like sneered at her.
"Listen, you skinny bitch, I'll sit wherever I damn well please!" Then she tried to reach across the table to slap at Mags. It was ridiculous looking, and had Clark waving the human attendant over.
"Excuse me? These ladies are trying to assault my friend here. We simply asked them not to sit with us, since we don't know them, and they were kind of rude to us in the pool. Would it be possible to have the police called? We came here to relax, not have stalkers all over us. We were promised you didn't run that kind of establishment." He sounded a bit fussy, which didn't work with the size and muscles very well, but the man there nodded, and glared at the three women a bit.
"Certainly. I was warned about you ladies already. Let me call the manager first? I'm certain she can deal with this without police involvement."
Ben hoped that was the case. After all, he wanted to get some space between them, not to be hassled by the cops for hours. That road led to possible arrest, which was a thing he didn't think he could survive. Even thinking about it sent a chill of fear through his middle.
Thankfully the large women got up then, and stormed off. One of them tipped a chair over, on purpose, as if that was going to make a statement to the spa. It made sense to him, when he saw that part however.
"VR overlay. I bet that's the issue." He spoke gently, even if the whole thing had been more than a little tense for him. Ben felt oddly like he was responsible for the whole thing. As if his lack of top end looks made him the culprit. It wasn't true however, though he thought he understood what had been going on.
Mags looked at him, and nodded a little bit.
"They probably aren't used to doing things in real life. Most people aren't anymore. So they come here, and are treated nicely, in comfortable surroundings, and then see people that look a bit odd, like us, and can't make the jump to the fact that they're actually in reality. I'd feel sorry for them, but as adults they're responsible for not making a nuisance of themselves like that."
They changed the conversation, from the women that had annoyed them to the food being offered. Ben had a salad, since it was as close as he could get to something made of fruit or vegetables. It came with chicken, which was roasted, if the menu could be believed. Then the whole thing was covered with a sweet and sour vinaigrette. It didn't sound good to him, but short of just getting a burger platter, nothing they had there really did.
Really, it all seemed more than a bit pretentious.
They ate in silence, and didn't have to pay anything for the food, since the manager, a woman that looked to be about sixty, who was mortified at the behavior of the other guests, comped it for them. It was nice of her.
She'd also let them know that the troublesome women had been asked to leave. Apparently that didn't go over very well, but they'd left without the police being needed. Just with some yelling and shouting, which Ben hadn't noticed.
Mags wrinkled her nose after the manager left however.
"I think your call was right, Ben. They couldn't separate what was really going on from a simulation. They, um, made some threats. Toward us. We need to keep an eye out for that."
Since she was in the null zone around him, and connected to it, Ben worked out what that had to mean.
"You can hear them? That's neat." He meant it. He had weird stuff happening, but other than the thing with the maps, it was less of a power and more just him losing his mind, as far as Ben could tell.
Almost as if he'd been waiting for that thought to happen, deep inside himself, a grid pattern came up over his vision. This one was in orange, and had an aiming sight, like in a game. It wasn't tracking anything however, so he shook his head, setting that part aside for a bit.
What was surprising was that it came back.
Looking around the circle in the center glowed several times brighter when he looked out the window. In that direction he had a nice view of a parking lot. The woman that had been rude to him in the pool was a way off, but was holding up something that he couldn't make out. Ben nearly dove under the table, expecting a gun, but the writing next to it suggested it was a video camera. Probably one dedicated to that function, that had a zoom lens on it.
It wasn't illegal to take pictures in public, so there wasn't a lot they could do about it.
"We have company. Outside, about four hundred..." A green line popped into place, showing him that the woman, who was next to a small blue car that held the two other ladies, was closer than that. "Two hundred and ninety-three feet away. Getting us on camera. Our friends from earlier." Interestingly, Ben was able to work out that they were mainly focusing on Carlos, as far as the angle of the shot went.
The man didn't know that directly, but he made a face.
"That might be a problem. Hopefully they give up before we have to do anything. We have... Six hours."
Ben had no clue what to do, but tried to pay attention as best he could. When the food was delivered, coming on a self propelled silver cart that had arms with pincers to deliver the dishes to the table, it all looked good enough. His salad was decorated nicely, and while the dressing tasted like orange, and was a little stronger than he would have expected, it wasn't bad. They all ate carefully, feeling like someone was staring at them the whole time.
When the woman spoke, Ben saw the words come up alongside her.
"She's te
lling her friends they should go and get something to eat, then come back later. I can't see what either of the women in the car is saying. Hopefully that she's being a moron and that they should just go home and play a little less VR. They won't though. That would be too easy." Smiling, he waited for someone to respond, or ask how he was doing that, getting what the woman was saying, but no one did.
That probably meant they were all just way too jaded. Having seen a lot of people suddenly do things that didn't make sense for normal people. Ben felt mildly impressed, as long as the words he'd seen were correct and not just delusional guesses. Without testing that probably couldn't be known however. The ladies did drive off about two minutes later, staring at them all through the window as they left the lot.
Glaring at them, as if not letting them sit at the table with the cool kids was a personal affront to their sensibilities. Hopefully they'd get bored and go home, or at least move on with their day. The last thing that they needed at the moment was someone with a camera watching them as they committed federal crimes.
The rest of the meal was better, and after that they decided that massages were in order for the women. Which was fine, except that Clark needed to be kept as clear headed as possible, and Ben had to be there for that. Lissa wasn't going to let him get away from her either. That could be a problem, he realized, when it came time for them to work, later. She and Mags were supposed to stay back in the spa, but what had happened in the pool was instructive. There were just too many people around for that to be allowed to happen at the moment.
That probably meant taking them along with them, so that when the buffer was dropped there wouldn't be that many people around. Which defeated the purpose of having them there at the spa in the first place, since they needed to work out an alibi for the people that were gone. It was a headache just trying to work out how they were supposed to juggle it all. Ben really wanted to just dump that on Carlos, since he was the one in charge, but the man probably hadn't really considered the whole thing yet.
"Hey... Can we go back to the room first? I want to get something. Then we can all go and have people massage us. I promise." That was punctuated with a yawn. He'd only had about two hours’ worth of sleep the night before, which wasn't really enough for him.
They chattered while they walked, sounding like nearly normal people. It didn't take that long to get them into the room with Ali, who looked up at them from the bed. That was covered with bits of tech gear. Mainly things that didn't seem normal at all. There were actual wires out for instance, and she had headphones on.
"Things check out, so we should be able to stay in touch the whole time. Any trouble so far?" She grinned as if letting them know that their lazy, spa going ways were well understood.
Carlos growled.
"Fuck yes. We were accosted by three... I don't even know what to call them. Crazies? Three Caucasian women who seemed to be offended that we weren't their party in a VR game. The manager had to toss them out. We should have called the cops, since one of them tried to hit Mags, but couldn't risk it. Then they stalked us from the parking lot and seem intent on coming back later for some reason. I couldn't tell who they were after, in particular. Ben?" He was asking if that was there target, but it wasn't the case.
Looking at Ali, who was a little concerned about the whole thing, as could be seen by how hard she was trying not to laugh, Ben shook his head.
"The camera was getting close up footage of you, Carlos." He glanced at the others, and then shrugged. "Anyway, later... Do we have some way to drug Lissa and Mags?"
They looked shocked, as if that idea was a horrible and nearly abusive thing to suggest. Ali just nodded.
"Hypnol-seven. They'll be out for about four hours, hard."
Lissa didn't seem happy with the plan, but Mags kind of shrugged about the idea, and moved to the far bed, snagging Ben's hand on the way, pulling him onto the thing with her.
"No shit. I was wondering what we were going to do. My brain felt like it was on fire earlier, when you got too far from us in the pool. Not that I love the idea of being passed out when things might be happening. What time are you leaving?"
That got Carlos to look at them, his face a bit blank. Not wanting to let them know about the plan until it was nearly time for it. Ben got that one. They weren't spies. As far as anyone could tell. Micha had gotten past them all however. Even with other psychics around. Brain drain equipment, too.
Lissa looked grumpy though, over the idea.
"I could have been drugged at home."
Ben shook his head then, and wrinkled his nose at her, trying to be cute. It wasn't working, if he could read her face well enough.
"And miss the spa treatments? If we have a plan, we should go and see about that now. Face peels or whatever they offer? This is a vacation for you, Lissa. You deserve it." She did, come to think of it. After all that time spent in pain, it only seemed fair.
Mags was in the same boat there, so he hugged her gently, with one arm.
"You too. Both of you have had it kind of hard for a long time. I think..." He stood quickly, and smiled at them both. "Come on. Let's go do that now?"
It was a lot more boring than it seemed like it would be, since there were only two masseurs at the place working that afternoon. Both older women, who looked like they had strong hands. Not that he was going to be petty about things like that. They weren't manly, just gray haired and slightly wrinkled. Also, from the sounds Lissa was making, good at their jobs. Mags seemed happy enough and neither were bothered that they were only covered with towels while they were oiled and stroked. Clark and he sat there, just waiting, since it was only polite to let the others go first.
Which didn't really work out, since the ladies were due for facial scrubs after that, which meant going with them, to prevent their heads from catching on fire. The mental equivalent of that anyway. So Clark and he just sat, not doing anything at all. There weren't even magazines to read. The people working with them both kept trying to hint that they leave, which made great sense in any normal kind of case. They probably felt watched, and like the situation was too weird to be real.
Finally, Lissa just lied.
"I'm... I have a condition where I can't stand to have my people too far away from me. It's pretty bad. I'm in treatment for it, but for right now I'd have a panic attack if they left..."
No one wanted that, so the women in their light blue smocks just smiled, like it wasn't the most insane thing they'd heard that day. It was interesting at first, seeing their faces being painted with blue goop, but then they all had to just sit there and wait for the things to dry. Then be scrubbed off.
In short, it was close to the most mind numbing thing that Ben had ever done. The only thing that had been worse for him was being locked in a black, soundproof room for forty-two days. Still, that adventure had left him stronger in a way, at least when it came time to sit and be bored. He did it and remembered to work on his meditation, while he had the time. It was better than wasting it, really.
The ladies who were working kept up almost a constant stream of talking, since Lissa and Mags weren't allowed. They even asked Clark questions, kind of ignoring Ben. Not that he couldn't see it happening. Nothing important was said, and after two more room changes, the women were allowed to get away. They seemed oddly happy with the whole thing however, even though it didn't really leave either of them looking better. Then, if they felt good, it was enough.
They didn't get in until nearly nine, which was early to go to bed, but late enough that no one would expect them to be in the pool, or sauna.
Ali waved the pampered pair over to the far bed.
"Shots. Get comfortable. This will send you both out hard. As soon as that happens, you three will take off. Each of you needs an ear bud. Here. Now..." She had two rather small needles ready. Lissa hissed when she was stuck with hers, but was nearly out when Mags went. The effect was so fast it nearly seemed like they were faking it. All the tension left both of
their faces, making them look different. Not bad, but it was enough that Ben saw it happening.
Ali shrugged, looking at the two women.
"This won't totally shut things off for them, and it isn't really healthy. If they wake up before you get back, I can't dose them twice. Not in the same ten-day period. At least not if they want kidney function to be left."
He waited, holding up his right hand, and tucking the ear piece into place. He was still dressed in the black suit he'd been given, with the red shirt, and even had a tie on. The shoes weren't going to be great for running if it came up, but he had to admit, a guy in a suit was less likely to attract attention than the same person in a gray Cymed outfit.
Carlos insisted on a sound check, but that was fine. Then he waved them out with him, and moved as if he had someplace to go.
"You both know the plan?" His words were tense, and he didn't seem to get that there was at least one camera trained on them.
Ben did though, an orange circle forming around it, to show where it was.
"Yep. First we pick up some burgers, and maybe some sundaes, then we hide the evidence from the girls by eating it in the van. That salad wasn't bad, but I'm starving again." He really was hungry, and his stomach growled, as if to explain what they'd better be doing soon.
Clark nodded at the words, with only a slight hitch in his step.
"I was hoping for Mexican. We don't normally get to have junk food, so we should make this count."
Carlos might have forgotten himself, feeling nervous, but he was smart enough to get back on the plan with that much of a reminder.
"We can do that. The trick here is not getting caught. So, get your game faces on and stay calm. If any of you squeal to the girls, we're all done for." It was good life advice, and only about fifty years out of date if not more. It made Ben wonder how old Carlos really was. He decided not to ask just then. It would look weird on the camera. Especially if he turned out to be eighty or something. There was the fact that the man didn't look it, for one thing.
