Marked

by Alex Hughes

  Jamie looked at the man, who nodded and walked back to the end of the row, keeping an eye on the surroundings but giving her some privacy.

  Her mind was strong enough that even through the insane shielding between us, I could feel an echo of it.

  “I just finished giving my testimony to a roomful of Council members. They wanted to know if you were reliable.” She held up a hand to stave off my automatic objections. “They wanted to know if you were a reliable Cooperist all those years ago. I told them that you, like Cooper, believed in unbreakable ethics. That you believed the ethics and the rules mattered more than the cost you had to pay to keep them. And even your drug habit was induced by an experiment that you did not fully understand the consequences of. I told them you were reliable, once, and that if your experience with the normal police should prove anything, it’s that you’ve learned to be reliable again.” She paused. “Did I tell them the truth?”

  I stood, inches from a door that warped reality with an electrical field that might kill me if I touched it. I stood, an unthinkable distance from Jamie, in ways that had everything and nothing to do with that electrical field.

  “Are you still a good person?” Jamie asked, her old wise eyes demanding me to tell her the truth.

  “Yes,” I said, in a rush. “Yes, I’m a good person—I am now. I want to be. I want to stand up for something that matters. I want to do something that matters, again. The Guild is getting too arrogant, Jamie. They’re doing things that could break the world. And what’s worse is, I don’t think all of you believe in those things. Do you realize what Guild First will cost you if some of their tactics come out into the world?”

  “Do you realize what it will cost us if they don’t?” Jamie asked sadly.

  I was floored. Jamie was . . . she was a Cooperist. She’d always been. She’d taught me!

  “I’m sorry, Adam. I can’t stand for idealism anymore. The normals are arming themselves against us. Not just detection devices built into their very skin, as if that wasn’t worrisome enough. No, their military is arming themselves with what they’re calling bats, small devices they believe will immobilize anyone with Ability through repeated bursts of Mindspace waves, like a bat’s call paralyzes its insect prey.”

  I took a breath. That was terrifying. “Does it work?” I asked. I had no reason to doubt her; Jamie’s family, like Kara’s family, was an old Guild family heavily involved in the normal military under contract. If anyone in the Guild would have military information that was supposed to be secure, it would be one of these two old families.

  She smiled, but it wasn’t a happy smile. “It works somewhat. But not on all Abilities, and not nearly as well as they think. There’s too much bleed-off into electromagnetic waves, and not enough into Mindspace directly. This will change, Adam. They will get better.”

  “You’re Guild First?” I asked, still in shock with all of this. “You’re in favor of arming yourself against the normals?”

  “I’m a pragmatist, not a proponent of podium-slapping and propaganda,” Jamie said. “You know me well enough to know I believe in discourse and freedom. I’d like to try every other conceivable tactic before we use anything irrevocable. But if you’re asking whether I’ll side with the Guild in a war against the normals . . .” She smiled that not-smile again. “Isn’t the choice obvious? There’s still a place for you here, Adam. There’s always been a place for you here.”

  “There hasn’t been a place for me here since I got kicked out!” I spat. “And now you come here to gloat while they decide to do it again, only worse? That’s nothing at all like the Jamie I used to know.”

  “That’s really what you think? That I’m here to gloat?”

  “Isn’t it?”

  “I’m here to show you support. To visit you in your dark hour. The deep-scan has already begun. If you’re certain of your course, you have nothing left to fear.” She took a breath. “Tobias Nelson is an incredibly powerful man. If he has done things to hurt the Guild, someone had to speak up against it. I’m proud of you for being that person. Whatever else you have become, you’ve become brave. And that much I recognize.” She turned, as if to walk away.

  “Jamie?” I asked, more quietly.

  “Yes?”

  “The Council sided with me for the deep-scan?”

  “They recognize your training”—and there was a real smile—“and the expertise you’ve built the last years. The vote was overwhelmingly in your favor.”

  “They’ll still wipe me if I’m wrong, though,” I said.

  “I don’t know. If they do, I’ll sit with you while it happens,” she said, that gentle, grandmother’s voice.

  “You won’t stand up for me?” I asked.

  She took a step toward the door. “Adam, if you’re lying, you’re putting one of the most powerful men in the Guild through an incredible amount of pain and suffering because you were too lazy to do the job you were set to. Or, I suppose, too incompetent. I’ll sit with you. I’ll make your transition as easy as I can make it. You were my student. But at that point you will have earned your fate.”

  “That’s a hell of a vote of confidence,” I said.

  “I’m reasonably certain you’re telling the truth as you understand it,” Jamie returned gently. “I must go.”

  “Wait. Don’t—”

  But she’d pushed the button already and couldn’t hear me. I watched her walk away, and wondered all over again in the silence: Had I done the right thing? Fiske had to be behind this, but apparently the Guild First persons were far more concerned about their maneuvering against the normals than they were about the letter of the Koshna Accords. Would it even matter that Nelson had been making deals with the devil? Would the Council even care if people had to die as collateral damage? I realized all over again that the mind-scanners all worked directly for Nelson. They would have every reason to cover this up.

  And then even Jamie wouldn’t speak for me.

  • • •

  I was dragged out into the elevator again, then across the walkway to the main elevator for the professional building. Johanna was there when I was marched out, in cuffs.

  “You’re everywhere,” I said. “Why are you everywhere?”

  She smiled a smile that felt a little empty. “This is a Health and Human Services crisis, which is demanding the full Council vote. My boss is out of town at the conference and has empowered me at this point to take her role on the Council. Plus there is a great deal to be done and I have the expertise to do it. Here, I’ll show you where you’re to go.”

  Back to the top floor, where a central open area had plenty of flowering plants that set off my allergies immediately. I sneezed. The guard pulled me along anyway.

  “How do we tell they’re ready?” the guard asked her.

  “There’s a light. We’ll go ahead and get queued up.”

  We passed through two hallways, me sneezing like mad, finally settling in front of a closed double wooden door. No benches or anything stood in front of it, just the door and some empty carpet, no windows.

  We waited there for maybe five minutes while we looked at the red light above the door. My tension kept ratcheting higher, and it was everything I could do to remain standing and not broadcast in Mindspace.

  Johanna looked bored. It struck me as odd.

  “Aren’t you going to wish me good luck?” I finally asked her, more to keep my focus off what was to happen than anything else.

  She glanced at me. “Luck has nothing to do with it.” She was certain, then, even in Mindspace, certain about something I didn’t understand. The job promotion had been good for her, maybe. Or she was pretty sure I’d get exonerated. Only she didn’t feel pretty sure. She felt certain.

  “Do you know what the deep-scan found?” I asked her.

  A green light turned on, and she smiled.

 
• • •

  My first time in the Guild Council room opened as the doors did.

  “I’ll walk under my own power, thanks,” I told the guard, and did.

  The room was a massive thing, raised desks in a row curving around a central open space while behind, ten-foot-high frost-free windows looked out over the city. Talk about perspective.

  The raised desks meant the Council members looked down on me, literally. I was too worried about what was to come to feel anything but impatience.

  Behind me, a line of chairs rimmed the outside of the wall nearest the door. Several of the chairs were filled, and it bothered me that I couldn’t watch both them and the Council at once.

  A woman beside me announced loudly in Mindspace, Adam Ward, no status, removed from Guild for improper conduct, provisionally reacquired, under judgment for accusation against Tobias Nelson, Guild member First Class, voting rights, all privileges.

  Don’t you think that’s prejudicing the room? I broadcast back to her.

  The prisoner will be silent until spoken to, Rex’s voice said with hard condemnation.

  A feeling of movement, of mass discussions in Mindspace, then private thoughts flying back and forth, causing waves I could feel. I couldn’t intercept the thoughts without a lot more time and the willingness to be terrifically obvious. So I started cataloging my surroundings instead.

  Nelson sat in a small chair near the tall desks, almost literally overshadowed by them. He looked like he’d been awake for days. His presence in Mindspace flickered like a bad lightbulb. Next to him was a man in clothes so plain they were almost a uniform. He had the quiet intensity I associated with a bodyguard or a Minder.

  “Can I speak?” Nelson asked the court, in a voice that sounded . . . pained.

  If you must, Diaz said. Try to keep it to a minimum. Did you have something to say?

  “No, just the question.” He looked at me, and it wasn’t a pleasant look. It wouldn’t be the first time someone had blamed me for the consequences of their own actions, but making an enemy so high up in the Guild was not something pleasant.

  Is the scanner here? the man sitting highest, in the middle, broadcast. The chatter in Mindspace eased off.

  I assumed this was Julio Diaz, head of the Council, and by all accounts, neutral between the various factions. He looked ancient, wrinkles upon wrinkles, balding, gray, and possessed of a brittle strength in Mindspace, but he did not look familiar.

  She’s on her way, the woman next to me said. An officer of the court, there to keep things moving. I returned my attention to the raised seats in front.

  Of the ten seats, only six were currently filled, Thaddeus Rex, whom I recognized next to Diaz, a pale woman with a blue badge of an acting member next to him at Financial and Budgets, a woman I vaguely recognized from Research—was her name Chin, or was I making that up?—and Chris Tubbs, Kara’s ultimate boss, behind Guild-World Relations. Charlie Walker, whom I’d gone to school with, was currently sitting behind Military. Had it been that long that one of my classmates had risen so high?

  The Employment Guild chair was noticeably empty; with Meyers and his assistant both dead, and others at this conference I’d heard so much about, there was likely no one to fill it.

  Johanna Wendell climbed the steps to take her seat at the second-to-smallest chair, her own blue badge clearly displayed. Where she’d gotten it in the last few minutes, I had no idea. She sat, of course, behind Health and Human Services, where her boss worked.

  The last permanent Council member was Joe Green, my accuser of deep-thought theft from earlier. He sat behind Academics and Training, a decision bad enough to make me cringe internally; that man had no business leading teachers and students.

  Ethics, the chair specifically set aside by Cooper to question the Council’s actions, was noticeably empty. I hoped the member was at the conference. I hoped.

  The door behind me opened, and I turned. A tired woman in scrubs entered. She reminded me of a younger Paulsen in looks, the shape of their faces and the way they held themselves similar, though this woman’s complexion was a shade or two darker. She was also far more ordered, more precise in her presence in Mindspace, but then again she’d have to be, living among telepaths, working as a scanner. She’d had to learn to get along, not to lead, and her mind reflected that.

  Latisha Jones, reporting as requested, she said in a way that broadcast both her mental exhaustion and her high-level control. She “spoke” just loud enough to be heard by all, and not a fraction louder.

  Thank you for agreeing to speak so soon after a scan, Diaz said, with overtones of great respect and appreciation. She’d just labored at one of the most demanding jobs at the Guild, his mind put in, on very little notice and with no rest. Going through a person’s entire life with a fine-tooth comb while the person tried to stop you . . . well, it was exhausting to say the least, and required a great deal of pain and suffering on all sides. If it was not an emergency, they would gladly have provided rest time. We appreciate your sacrifice.

  She nodded. The whole room was strangely silent.

  The woman beside me, the officer of the court, then broadcast as though reading from a script, Adam Ward, no status, formerly of the Guild, has accused Tobias Nelson, Guild member first class, voting rights, all honor, of two serious crimes: one, the consorting with a known normal criminal whose interests lie in opposition to the Guild’s, without the knowledge of his superiors and for the clear detriment of Guild interests, and two, the knowing and planned manipulation of Council member Del Meyers and his senior assistant to the Council, John Spirale, for the purposes of their death and the creation of a contagious madness crisis in the Guild, for unknown reasons. Latisha Jones, senior deep-scanner first class, voting rights, all honor, has been asked to determine the truth or falsehood of these claims beyond argument through the application of a total scan of Tobias Nelson. She paused, a clear sense of waiting coming from her mind next to me.

  Rex shifted, but Diaz held up a hand before more than a sense of thought could come from him.

  Tell us what you found.

  The court officer nodded. Ms. Jones, your testimony is beyond reproach. Have you examined Tobias Nelson?

  I have.

  And what is your judgment of the charges laid against him?

  Ms. Jones shifted her weight, and I got a careful sense of not looking at me. There is both truth and falsehood to the charges.

  Explain, Rex said, leaning forward.

  Referencing the first charge, it is true that Tobias Nelson has met and bargained with a man named Garrett Fiske several times. He believes Fiske is both fully mind-deaf, as charged, and working for criminal interests, as charged. These criminal interests and power were referenced several times with full knowledge. Whether the criminal interests are in opposition to the Guild is undetermined.

  Diaz looked at me. Explain your knowledge of Fiske. The context was that I should transmit as much information as possible, in images and memories rather than simply words.

  I hesitated. Fiske is part of an ongoing police investigation. I am not to discuss the details of the investigation. Officers’ lives could be at stake. Most of what I know is the details of the investigation. I put my certainty of that fact into the words, and my mixed regret and determination.

  Rex leaned forward. You are no longer employed by the police. The results of this inquiry could result in your death or mind-wipe. We expect the full truth from you.

  I swallowed. I knew what I faced. But Cherabino was on that task force, along with other officers I knew and liked. Bellury had worked on that task force, to provide additional information. Could I let his work go to waste? Could I endanger Cherabino by talking with the Guild about her most difficult case, the one she’d spent years on the fringes of?

  I realized I’d thought those thoughts in my public space, and likely with enough
emotion that they’d broadcast to the room.

  I spoke out loud, for the illusion of control. “If you kill me or you don’t kill me, if you wipe me or not, I’m not going to endanger people who are just doing their jobs. Whoever wipes me is going to have to swear to keep the secrets until all of it is over, or I won’t cooperate.”

  Protecting your criminal friends will get you nowhere with the Guild, Green said then.

  You no longer work for the normals, the woman from Finance put in, after a glance at Green. There is no benefit to protecting them.

  Don’t they treat you badly? Tubbs, Kara’s boss asked.

  Most of the room was filled with a sense of seeking understanding, not anger.

  They took me in when I was nothing, and they gave me a chance to be useful. To make a difference. How they treat me doesn’t have anything to do with those essential facts, I said to the room, just realizing it.

  A long pause while people looked at Diaz and Diaz looked at me.

  For the first time, he spoke out loud, in a quavering baritone that sounded nothing like his sure mind-speech. “You may pick and choose what you say, out loud if needed, to tell us what we need to know about Fiske.”

  I was surprised, really, genuinely, surprised. “You don’t know this stuff already?”

  Would we ask if we did? the woman from Research asked me. Why do you believe he is dangerous to the Guild?

  “Fiske is dangerous to everyone,” I said. “He seeks power. He’s risen in the ranks dramatically in the last three years. And he’s already reached out to corrupt politicians and attempted to infiltrate the police. He’s . . . well, he’s getting involved in things I can’t talk about, in crimes I can’t talk about, and as near as the police can tell, there’s some kind of master plan they can’t see.” I realized I knew a lot more than I should as a direct result of my mind-Link with Cherabino these last months. What to choose? Stick to the question. “I believe he’s dangerous to the Guild because he’s tried so hard to get in here. He’s dealt with several people—including Nelson here. He’s meddling, and from what I know about him, his involvement is never for your benefit. It’s for his. He was the one who was working with Bradley and buying his technology, something that clearly was bad for the Guild. I know you paid attention to the Bradley case. You assigned me a Watcher, for crying out loud. You realize how dangerous these things were.”