by R. A. Rock
When I could think straight again, I immediately got up and started running to where it had come from. There’s only one reason Yumi would do that. To defend herself when she had absolutely no other way. The screaming had stopped and I dropped my shield so I could hear again. That’s when I caught her desperate broadcast.
“Help. Chad, Audrey, Shiv, Grace, Ernest. I need help. Hadley is after me and he wants Penny.”
I put on a burst of speed and was in the clearing where she was limping in about twenty seconds.
“Yumi? I got here as fast as I could.”
I moved towards her because she looked like she was going to pass out and her arm had a really weird angle to it.
“Shit what happened? Is your arm broken?”
“He took her,” she began to sob. “I swore I would protect her. I swore to myself I wouldn’t let him get her. But I couldn’t stop him and he took her. He ripped her away from me. And I couldn’t do anything about it. Just like before. I couldn’t save her.”
I grabbed her before she collapsed and held her for a moment as she cried. Then it all was too much and she went unconscious. Gracie moved in immediately.
“Lay her down, Chad, and make a two person Circle with me. I need to heal her.”
We clasped hands and Grace and I each took one of Yumi’s limp hands. We connected our minds faster than we ever had before and I fed Grace energy as she went to work.
“Fuck,” she sent, her thoughts aghast.
“What’s wrong?”
“I can’t do it, Chad. My kinetic powers. I don’t have them. I can’t heal her.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN
Chad
This night seemed as though it would never end and what a nightmare it had been so far. I couldn’t believe that Grace didn’t have her powers. This was the worst news yet.
Grace is a Kinetic. She moves things with her mind. She can move very big things or extremely minute objects, doesn’t matter. She is trained as a kinetic surgeon and she is extremely good at it.
“But you can send,” I sent back.
“It’s no good. We need to get out of here. Can you carry her?”
“Of course.”
“Shiv?” Grace sent. “Audrey? Ernest? Where is everyone?”
Grace led us to where the group had partially reassembled at a point far from the outpost. I set Yumi down on the ground and checked her over.
“Grace, Shiv, Ernest,” Audrey said, her words terse. “You’re with me. We need to track down the rest of our people. Find out from Matt who’s still missing?”
Matt stood up from where he was holding a shellshocked Nessa and took a head count. Audrey moved out with her group.
“That lunatic almost killed her,” Nessa said into the silence. “She would have let him if it had meant that she could save me and Penny.”
I stared down at Yumi’s pale face.
“I know,” I said. “She’s the bravest person I know.”
We sat in silence until Audrey came back with the others.
“I have bad news,” she said and everyone sat up and paid attention. “Not only does Brett have Zoe and now your daughter, but he’s captured Cynthia, too.”
She moved to where Yumi lay and I sat beside her and dropped to the ground at her feet. Audrey pulled her knees up to her chest and put her hand to her head. She was the picture of defeat. She looked the way I felt.
“How’s Yumi doing?” Grace said, kneeling on the opposite side from where I sat.
I shrugged.
“She only has a sprained ankle and a broken arm but she hasn’t woken up yet.”
Grace frowned.
“Not at all? She should have regained consciousness by now.”
“Look Grace, she was really freaked out when I got there. She was babbling about how she swore she’d protect her but she couldn’t. Again.”
“Oh no. She was thinking of her…”
“Exactly. And she was completely destroyed that she couldn’t protect this child either.”
I sent her a video replay of what Yumi had said and tears welled up in Grace’s eyes.
“You have to go into her mind, Chad. You have to check on her.”
“Gracie. I’m not good at that, like Yumi is. It’s hard for me to go to her mind.”
“You go and do it right now, Chad Dvorski,” Grace sent and I had never heard her mental voice sound more fierce. “She should have woken up by now. She should be yelling at us and complaining about how she knew something was wrong and we should have listened to her. She should be berating us for our ineptitude. A little broken arm and sprained ankle is nothing to her. You know something else is going on, Chad. Please.”
“Okay, okay,” I held up my hands. “I’ll go. But you know it’s not easy for me to go into her mind. Last time the only reason I made it was because she pulled me in.”
“I’ll boost you. Come on. You have to do this.”
“Fine,” I said out loud and lay down next to Yumi. “Boost me.”
I took Yumi’s and Grace’s hand and we made a Circle. Then I sent a thought to Yumi and caught on to its tail, following it into her mind. From behind I felt a huge mental push and my consciousness went flying.
That was when I blacked out.
***
When I came to, I was inside Yumi’s public mind. I was surprised again at how… frilly, and girly, and soft, and white it was. It was as if she had taken every part of herself that she didn’t like and created a place that was the exact opposite. Yumi’s hard and tough and there isn’t a frill to be seen in her life.
But here, everything was smooth and comfy. Anything that could have a frill, did. There were beautiful, peaceful paintings on the wall. And furniture that looked comfy enough to sleep in, as tired as I was. It all made me a little sad. Yumi had never had anything like this. She said she didn’t want it, didn’t need it. But maybe she did. She had never had anything luxurious. Ever.
I shook my head and focused on why I was here.
Yumi.
I was supposed to check on her.
I glanced around. Well, she wasn’t in her public mind. I stood up and crossed the room, tripping on a braided rug with a unicorn on it. I couldn’t help but smile. I thought Yumi didn’t believe in unicorns.
In Telepaths, the public mind in most people’s heads looks like a living room — the private mind, like a bedroom. The subconscious mind is inaccessible unless you know how to get there. And it’s full of creepy shit, so I don’t recommend visiting. Don’t ask me how I know that.
I arrived at the door that led into her private mind and hesitated. I had never been in her private mind before. The last time I was here was for the same reason. I was checking up on her. And we hadn’t exactly been getting along then, either. Needless to say she hadn’t given me the tour.
I took a deep breath and turned the knob. I stepped through the door and saw it wasn’t lit. I imagined a candle and it appeared in my hands. (It’s the mind so I can do almost anything.) I held the light up and looked around. Yumi’s private mind was also soft and comfortable looking but without all the frills and whatnot. There was a double bed pushed up against the wall. An arm chair in one corner. And a tall dresser that had some pictures on it.
The dresser caught my eyes and I walked over and smiled to see what memories she kept there. There was the one of her and Grace and me when we were kids. There was another one of the two of us standing on the bridge of the Class 4 starship we had commanded together. There was a picture of my parents. And beside the pictures there was a stone.
I frowned at that damn stone.
I had given it to her.
It was supposed to be a friendship stone. We were supposed to be friends forever.
Of course, I had been a kid when I had given it to her and things had changed a bit since then. Still, I felt as though our fighting had gone against what this stone had meant.
Gathering my courage, I went over to where she lay in the bed. She was d
ressed in shorts and a tank top and she was lovely. She was like a gorgeous black haired sleeping beauty, with her black hair fanned out around her head.
“Yumi?” I said softly.
There was no answer. She didn’t stir.
“Yumi?” I said in a louder voice. “You awake?”
No response.
I put my hands on her shoulders and shook her gently and then more firmly.
Nothing.
Damn it.
If she wasn’t awake in her private mind that meant that she had retreated deep inside. She might even be wandering around in her subconscious, though I sincerely hoped that wasn’t the case. This was bad. This was very bad. If Yumi wasn’t awake in her private mind that meant she had slipped into a coma or something like that.
“Chad? What’s going on? We’re making camp here for the night, so your body is safe,” Gracie’s words rang like the voice of God in Yumi’s mind.
“I can’t wake her, Gracie. She’s gone somewhere.”
“What happened was too painful. She’s hiding out, away from the pain. You have to go find her, Chad. You’re her only hope. If she’s hiding in her subconscious or I don’t know where, she might get lost and never come out. We might lose her.”
Lose her?
I couldn’t lose Yumi.
The thought was unthinkable.
And yet, I knew Gracie was right. If I didn’t go find her, she might get lost in her mind. And the body cannot live without the mind.
We might really lose her.
Forever.
CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT
CHAD
I stood in Yumi’s private mind and wondered where I should start to look for her. Yumi wouldn’t voluntarily go into her subconscious mind again. I was sure of that. But what if she had somehow got pulled in there or trapped somehow.
How could I find her?
I looked at her sleeping body and felt mine respond.
I needed to focus but it didn’t help that she looked so sexy.
Fuck, Chad. Get a grip, I told myself. You need to help her. You need to find her. Not ogle her.
That gave me an idea.
I placed my hand gently on her forehead and tried the same mental gymnastics that I had used to get into her mind in the first place. A second later and I was sitting in my parents’ house, watching TV on the couch beside Yumi, who was staring at the screen without blinking.
What the fuck?
***
“Yumi? Yumi!” I yelled but she didn’t answer me.
I grabbed her shoulders and shook her again but she only kept staring at the screen. Damn, I needed to break the spell that TV had on her.
A stupid thought popped into my head… but it had worked before.
I pressed a kiss on to her lips and all of a sudden I was on the floor, where she had pushed me and Yumi was standing over me with her hands on her hips.
“What the hell, Dvorski?”
“Oh, thank goodness you’re awake, Yumi. You have to come out of here. You have to come back to your body.” The relief I felt made me feel weak and I got up on wobbly legs.
“What are you talking about? We’re visiting your parents. And I’m just watching some TV. Everything’s cool. You need to chill out.” Her face looked peaceful and content as she said the words. More so than I had ever seen it in real life.
I stared at her.
“No, no, no,” I said, trying to snap her out of her trance or whatever it was. “We’re at Sipwesk with Matt and Nessa and Ernest. Remember? We’re helping them get Zoe back. And the mission all went to hell…”
Her serene face flickered once and then smoothed out again.
“Did you have a bad dream again? Maybe you can tell me all about it after I finish watching my show. You want a cookie?”
She sat back down on the couch and her gaze was immediately snared by the infernal machine. She snagged two cookies from the plate on the coffee table and handed one to me without looking at me.
Oatmeal chocolate chip.
My favourite.
I took it from her and tried to think.
“Sit down, Red. It’s a good show. Lots of action, the way I like it.”
I sat down and attempted to figure out what I should do to get her to wake up but my attention was caught by what was playing on the TV. It was what looked like our last mission together before everything went to hell. Or more precisely, it was on that mission that everything went to hell. Why was Yumi remembering this?
“What are you watching?” I said, wondering if she would still speak to me or if she’d be back in the trance she was in when I first arrived.
“Oh, it’s this drama. It’s about these people that have mental powers. Like us. And they work for this organization called The Agency. Like us. And they’re going to save this planet that needs their help.”
She frowned as some awareness moved over her face for a second but then was gone.
She smiled and offered me another cookie, turning back to the TV.
“I like the guy with the red hair,” she said, biting into her cookie. “He’s cute.”
I blushed.
She had obviously retreated into her mind to a time before all the hellishness that had followed this mission. But why was she watching it? It was probably the worst moment of my life and though she had been unconscious for the worst part, it was definitely the worst moment of her life, too. What could possess her to want to relive it?
As I watched the battle unfold exactly the way I remembered it but from Yumi’s point of view, I felt myself being drawn in to the memory. And when it came near to the point where I had made the decision to save Yumi no matter the cost, all of a sudden the screen fuzzed out and then when it fuzzed back in a moment later, something different was happening. Grace had her hands on Yumi and was healing her.
A few minutes later, Yumi was standing up and we were all talking and laughing together. The battle was over and we had won. But the ending was totally different from what I remember. What the hell was going on?
And then it hit me.
Yumi didn’t like how it had ended, so in her mind she was rewriting the ending — happier.
“Man, I love this ending,” she said.
When I looked at her, she was holding a big bowl of popcorn and the story was playing again. And I realized that Yumi was playing this memory on an endless loop so that she would never have to get to the point where it had all gone south and our lives had been a painful mess ever since.
“Yumi?”
“Yeah, Red?” She didn’t look at me, only kept staring at the screen.
“Can you look at me? I need to talk to you.”
She glanced at me for a second and then turned back to the television.
“I’m watching my show, Red. Can’t it wait?”
I huffed out my breath in frustration, not knowing what to do.
I shrugged. When in Rome…
I grabbed a handful of popcorn and settled in to watch the battle again.
“That red headed guy is pretty badass in this one, eh? I said around a mouthful of popcorn.
I smiled as I saw myself whip my sword around in a deadly arc, keeping back my attackers. Then I swooped down and picked up one of the stun guns on the ground and with deadly precision, took out each one with a blast to the chest. They all fell down unconscious and I ran over to where Yumi lay, injured. Again.
She’s almost died so many times that I can’t even keep track anymore.
“He is a badass,” she murmured in a dreamy voice she had never used with the real me. “I almost wish we were in there with them.”
Oh no.
An instant later, I was crouched on the ground beside Yumi, who looked as pale as death. The scene was playing out exactly how it had in real life and I had no control over it. I was stuck in the worst moment of my life. Forced to relive every second that had been so terrible.
And there was nothing I could do to stop it.
***
No. I couldn’t do this again. I had to stop this.
And then I remembered. This was the mind.
I could make anything happen.
So, when we got to the point where her new ending started, I resisted the urge to say my lines and began to say what I had actually said when it had really happened.
Yumi’s eyes flew open.
“You’re saying it wrong,” she said. “That’s not what the badass red headed guy is supposed to say.”
“Yumi,” I said, going off script again. “I know you’re hurting. But staying here in an endless loop is not the answer. There are people out there who need you. You can’t abandon them like this.”
She sat up suddenly, the gaping wound on her torso opening and I almost threw up. She didn’t seem to notice.
“I don’t know who you’re talking about. Now, say the lines right.”
She lay back down and pretended to be passed out again.
“I won’t,” I said, folding my arms on my chest.
“Red,” she said opening her eyes again and giving me a furious look. “You’re doing it wrong. Stop it. You’re supposed to say… “Grace, come here and heal her.” Okay. Go ahead, I’m ready.”
She laid down again.
“I. Will. Not.” I said, getting up.
She jumped to her feet — paying no mind to the fact that she had a huge hole in her guts — and punched me hard on the left cheek. My head snapped to the side and I heard my neck crack she’d hit me so hard.
“Yumi, stop it. I’m not going to fight a girl with a huge hole in her abdomen.”
“I’m not a girl,” she said, sounding insulted as she glanced down at her stomach. “It’s just special effects anyway. Don’t worry about it.”
