She smiled.
If she could neutralize — thank you, Dent, for the lingo — the guard behind Cherry, maybe Sheriff Bobseyn wouldn’t be so susceptible to Jeffery’s forced emotions. And she knew one thing that could motivate a man to do something stupid.
Hold on, Dent, she silently pleaded. Please, just hold on for a minute longer.
“Cherry’s pretty, huh?” she asked over her shoulder, holding back a wince as Dent was kneed in the ribs. She tried blocking out her worry for him, because she didn’t want that emotion to be forced.
“What?” Cat-man snapped, kind of distractedly. “I told you to keep quiet.”
Now that she had some of Cat-man’s attention, Kasumi focused on Cherry’s hair, how it managed to shimmer with every small move, how it brought out the woman’s beauty. Kasumi wondered it would be like to have hair like that, those high cheekbones, that athletic body. It wasn’t too hard for Kasumi to feel positively jealous of Cherry.
She put all of that raw jealousy into her words, forcing the emotion out and into Cat-man. In a mocking tone, she said, “So you’re in charge, but your buddy over there gets to keep an eye on the hot girl?”
She could feel him wriggle behind her, his grip on her neck loosen, but for the most part he kept his composure. The eBlocker was keeping her at bay. Anger and frustration bubbled up to mix with the jealousy she was holding on to. Dent needed her, Sheriff Bobseyn needed her, this whole damned room needed her!
Anger, frustration, jealousy, they all swelled up in her, churning her mind. Her nails bit into her palms and her jaw clenched tight. She lifted her hand, slowly at first, and with each heartbeat it moved faster and faster. Up and around, she reached behind her, grabbed Cat-man’s forearm, and squeezed, somehow slamming her emotions into him through that point of contact.
Cat-man let out a growl as anger and jealousy and fear tore into him, all of it forced into him with everything Kasumi had.
He moved, like lightning. A searing flash and the thunderclap came right after, scaring the living crap out of her. The loud, single gunshot that erupted behind her felt like it had scrambled her brains.
---
Bobseyn paused in his beating, and Dent took the opportunity to take a desperate gulp of air. He was on his hands and knees and didn’t understand why Bobseyn had briefly relented.
That was when a single gunshot rang out, tearing through the room and his senses. It had come from Fifth’s direction.
He threw himself forward, bruising elbows and knees on the hardwood, and just as he gripped his gun, another shot rang out, this one much closer.
In one fluid motion, Dent spun, gun leading.
He swept past Fifth — alive, he quickly noted — with her hands covering her ears. The guard behind her had crumpled to the floor, blood pulsing from his torn neck. Left, Dent continued his sweep, to see Cherry huddled into a ball on the floor, screaming. The guard that had been covering her was also down and no longer moving. Dent could not readily see the bullet wound that had brought him down. And then there was Bobseyn, directly to Dent’s left, arm still raised in Fifth’s direction, wisps of smoke wafting from the barrel of his service weapon. Dent centered his sights on the sheriff as his mind filled in the most likely scenario, unlikely as it was.
Fifth’s guard fires at Cherry’s guard. Then Bobseyn — quicker than Dent would have expected from the man — retrieves his weapon and fires at Fifth’s guard. No clue what tipped the first domino, but in less than three seconds, the only armed men still breathing in the room were Dent and Bobseyn.
And Dent still had no idea on which side Bobseyn stood.
Bobseyn stepped back from Dent, lowering his gun but not backing down. He put his back to Jeffery and the child trembling into his side. He attempted to keep an eye on Dent while flicking his head back toward Cherry. His daughter was unharmed — crying and rocking with her knees pulled up to her chest, but physically unharmed.
Ignoring Bobseyn’s gun and the dead guard at her feet, Fifth ran to Dent, flying into him with arms around his waist. He was forced to lift the barrel of his gun lest the girl run into it. He could feel her mumble into his side, her voice vibrating into the numbness that was likely two or three badly-bruised ribs. He gently patted her head with his left hand.
Which was the wrong thing to do as her indistinct mumbling turned into very distinct words.
“I am not a dog, Dent!”
Jeffery saved him from having to reply.
“That,” Jeffery said, his tone slightly higher than when he’d spoken earlier, “is why I detest people bringing guns into my facility. You never know what a person will do when you mess with the things they love.”
Bobseyn turned, gun still lowered at his side, to take in Jeffery.
Dent, as best he could manage with Fifth still clinging to him, angled himself to keep both Bobseyn and Jeffery in his line of sight.
Lifting his arm from the boy’s shoulder, Jeffery held it out to Bobseyn’s daughter. “Cherry,” he said lightly. “Come here.”
Bobseyn seemed to step toward Jeffery without realizing it while Cherry remained on the floor, shaking her head and sobbing. Dent thought he heard the word sorry bubble up a couple of times between the sobs.
“Cherry,” Jeffery tried again, this time his voice low, the two syllables almost running into a single one.
“She won’t go to you,” Fifth said, pulling herself from Dent. “She knows what you are now.”
Jeffery focused his narrowed eyes on Fifth. Dent wanted to throttle the man just for that. “Of course she knows what I am, girl. She’s known from the very beginning. She was pivotal to my … recruitment process.”
“You used her, you asshole!” screamed Fifth.
Dent refrained from admonishing the girl. Situation-wise, he figured her choice of words were warranted.
“I never made her do anything she didn’t want to do.”
“You messed with her emotions like you tried messing with mine, like you messed with Sheriff Bobseyn’s.”
Jeffery shrugged. “Bobseyn …,” he said. “It’s a wonder that the man didn’t give in so easily. He seems to have some ability at fighting off intrusive emotions. That’s something I’d very much like to figure out. It would make these,” he tapped one ear, “less of a necessity.”
Dent felt Fifth stiffen as she came back up to his side. He didn’t understand why. They knew some form of eTech was in use here. The eBlockers, though newer and smaller in design than what Dent and Fifth had come across before, were nothing unexpected.
“You … you sick bastard!” Fifth screamed at Jeffery.
Jeffery, apparently understanding what Dent had not, laughed out loud.
---
She had it all wrong. Kasumi had thought Jeffery himself was behind the forced emotions. But when the man tapped his ear, she’d realized just how wrong she was. And how evil the bastard was.
Jeffery was wearing an eBlocker.
Kasumi looked at Connor, really looked at him. Though his body was slumped over, his shoulders hanging loosely, his eyes cast downward more than on the world around him, she knew without a doubt now that he was the source of all of this.
Connor was like her. It was amazing and repulsive at the same time.
How he could let himself be used the way Jeffery was using him, she had no idea. “Connor,” she called out to him.
When he looked up at her voice, she didn’t see a boy capable of allowing his talent to lead to murder. She saw a scared animal. A trained dog that had been beaten into submission.
A tool.
“Ignore her, Connor,” Jeffery said down to the boy. “You have a job to do.”
Connor looked up to Jeffery then nodded, once. And when he settled his big, watery eyes on Bobseyn, Kasumi could feel him working his emotions on the man. It was like … like feeling a steady wind pushing you in a direction you didn’t want to go. But that wind teased that if you went with it, you would make it happy, and it would s
top pushing you so hard.
Connor was so strong that Kasumi felt the urge to distance herself from Dent, that Dent was a threat to Jeffery. She’d actually shuffled a few steps away from Dent before she realized what she’d done. If Connor was like her, how was he so strong? She shouldn’t be able to be influenced.
Balling her fists as her sides, she resisted Connor’s intrusion while at the same time she tried to understand it. It was as Jeffery had said earlier, about that love-drug thing. Connor was somehow manipulating that base part of her mind, her instincts, to protect the one she loved. Except Connor was projecting that love onto Jeffery, and by doing so he was forcing Sheriff Bobseyn to act on those urges.
Bobseyn’s shoulders trembled and she could see the muscles on his neck go taut. He was fighting Connor. When his gun slowly raised toward Dent, she knew he was losing. Dent began to lift his own gun up, but Kasumi snapped her hand out and grasped his arm. Dent was by far stronger than she, but for some reason he didn’t shrug her off. His gun stopped moving.
He had no clue what was going on here, but he was giving her a chance. Bless the clueless man, but he was giving her a chance. And she wouldn’t let him down.
“Sheriff,” she said softly, not wanting to startle the man into doing something stupid.
He looked at her, and to her he seemed like a puppet whose master was half-asleep.
“You don’t want to do this,” she urged. She tried sending out calming thoughts to him, and his head twitched side to side in response. His gun was levelled at Dent’s chest now and started to tremble.
Jeffery took a step closer. “You want to save your daughter, Sheriff, don’t you?”
“Shut up!” Kasumi yelled, immediately regretting it as her emotional slip caused Sheriff Bobseyn to square his shoulders, drawing on her anger to stiffen his trembling hand, the hand with the gun pointed at Dent.
There was only one way to save Dent. She let go of Dent and balled her fists at her sides. You had to fight fire with fire.
Gritting her teeth, she threw everything she had at Connor and Sheriff Bobseyn.
XLVI
Dent’s index finger twitched. He didn’t know what was going on. He wanted to shoot someone. Anyone.
Fifth let go of his arm. He took that as the go ahead for him to shoot Bobseyn.
But she stopped him by saying, “Get Jeffery.” Her voice came through her teeth and seemed distant, like she wasn’t even aware she’d spoken.
Dent hesitated. Bobseyn still had his weapon aimed at Dent’s chest.
“Go, Dent,” Fifth said, her voice very different than normal. “I’ll handle Connor. Bobseyn won’t harm you. I promise.” He’d never heard Fifth speak so monotone, so uncharacteristically like herself.
He took a step toward Jeffery and Bobseyn’s gun followed him. When no bullet pierced his chest, Dent took another step. Then another. Past Bobseyn, Dent turned so that he faced Jeffery, and did what he was trained never to do — leave an armed threat at his back.
Jeffery pulled the boy in front of him, using him as a human shield. The boy looked completely unresponsive. A lifelike automaton.
Dent crested the single step and closed in on Jeffery. Bobseyn had failed to pull the trigger, to scratch that itch Dent felt between his shoulders.
“I was warned that you were a stubborn one,” Jeffery said, hand slipping behind his back. When it reappeared, it was gripping a five-inch serrated knife. The steel flashed as Jeffery held it to his side. The threat was obvious:
Step forward and I harm the boy.
Dent stepped forward.
Jeffery’s eyes went wide. Maybe in surprise. Maybe he’d expected Dent to care about the boy’s safety. The blade inched closer to the boy, Jeffery restating his unspoken threat.
Dent raised his gun, keeping the barrel centered at Jeffery’s chest, which happened to be behind the boy’s head. At this point, both targets were threats.
“Chisholme said you were predictable, that you wouldn’t let harm come to a child.”
That made Dent stop in his tracks. Chisholme. He knew the man was behind this facility, but to hear that he had spoken to Jeffery about Dent meant that Chisholme had anticipated Dent’s arrival here. Dent lowered his weapon, seeing if Jeffery would say more. If anything, at least Dent could buy Fifth time to do what she does best.
He was proved correct in his assumption.
“So, Chisholme was right,” Jeffery said when Dent’s gun no longer aimed in his direction. “He also said that the only way to keep you in check was to keep the girl in check.”
From the corner of his eye, Dent watched Fifth take a step. Whatever she was planning, she’d better do it fast.
Keeping Jeffery’s full attention, Dent asked, “Chisholme set this whole place up?”
“Of course. He called it a test. A trial run.”
“Trial for what?”
Jeffery shrugged, rolled his eyes. “I just follow orders.”
“And those orders were?”
“To assess the strengths and weaknesses of Connor. To find the best utilization of his talent. He may not be as well-rounded as Kasumi, but it’s a start. He only has the one specialty, and it’s one he’s been honing for years now, learning, growing stronger. It’s all he’s been allowed to do, the only thing he’s dedicated his life to. I doubt that even your girl can compete with him on this emotional field.”
A test run, Dent thought. “If Chisholme is behind this, then you know where he is.”
“I only speak with him through email. No clue where he’s at.”
“Then you’re no good to me alive.”
Jeffery titled his head, chewed his lower lip. “You think you can take me? You aren’t the only one with military training, Dent. How do you think I got this cushy gig? I didn’t exactly have a resume posted online for Chisholme to find.”
“You’re former DUUP?” Dent concluded.
Jeffery pursed his lips and flicked his brows up and down quickly in silent acknowledgement.
It made practical sense. Chisholme had originally contracted Dent to do his dirty work because Dent was trained to handle circumstances related to eTech, trained by the government to understand and counteract the technology.
“I actually studied you in training,” Jeffery said lightly. “The top of our class did. You were a legend before you got yourself discharged. They use you as a prime example of what to do … As well as what not to do. Funny, how you of all people have strayed so far.”
“I’m sure I could still teach you a thing or two,” Dent replied.
Jeffery’s eyes widened and he pointed the knife Dent’s way. “So why don’t you put the gun down? Let the children play while we adults have us a good old-fashioned conversation. Old school versus new school.”
Dent looked to the boy, then the knife, then to Jeffery. After a moment, Jeffery took the hint and pushed the boy off to the side in a show of good faith. The boy stumbled slightly and Jeffery now stood alone.
“Your turn,” Jeffery said, indicating Dent to put his gun down. This was to be a fair fight.
Dent looked at his gun …
Then brought it up almost lazily and put a bullet in Jeffery’s right eye.
Fair fights favored the weak, Dent thought, as Jeffery’s body collapsed to the floor.
And the stupid.
---
Kasumi knew what she had to do.
And so she told Dent to handle Jeffery. When he hesitated, she promised him that Bobseyn wouldn’t hurt him. To Dent’s credit, he actually listened to her.
She now knew what Connor was doing. Not exactly, but enough to know what had to be done. When Bobseyn trailed Dent with his gun, Kasumi forced her own emotions into him. She knew that somehow the sheriff was able to resist any but the strongest forced emotions. That was the reason Connor was having so much trouble bending completely the man to his will. Knowing this, she added to what Connor was already forcing into the sheriff. She didn’t know how, just that she did.
She latched onto Connor’s forced emotion, added to it, hijacked it. She bent it to her own purposes.
Kasumi wrapped Sheriff Bobseyn with her own version of devotion. It was the devotion of a father for his daughter, but not the sick, twisted devotion that Jeffery talked about. This was a devotion based on the pain of living in an empty house because of past mistakes between the man and his daughter.
She felt bad for doing such a thing to the sheriff, she really did, but she had to push those feelings down, instead forcing images of the empty house into the sheriff, lacing them with the lack of love both he and Cherry must have felt. The love that had been lost could be found again, but only if the man accepted that hurting others now would only push that love he so much wanted further from him.
She had to break him in order to fix him.
Sheriff Bobseyn’s eyes began to tear up. Inside, she knew the man was struggling with what it meant to love someone to the point of blind devotion. His raised arm began to sag. She was getting to him and now she forced the only version of what she felt devotion was, the only true form of a caring bond that she’d experienced.
She sent her feelings for Dent, of how she would do whatever it took to keep Dent from going down too far into the emotionless hole he’d dug himself. She forced that devotion into Bobseyn, hoping the man would see that hurting others for the sake of love and devotion was a perversion of that very love.
Sheriff Bobseyn’s knees buckled, and they hit the floor just as his dropped gun did. Broken, he rocked back and forth, cheeks wet, chin dripping, until he hid his face in his hands and cried out apologies to his daughter over and over.
Suddenly, with tears of her own flowing freely, Cherry, who had no resistance to the forced emotions radiating out of both Connor and Kasumi, ran to her father’s side. She caught him up in her arms and the two held onto each other, finding solid ground in the unseen storm of emotions raging around them. And inside them.
Kasumi stepped past them. Toward Connor. Dent and Jeffery spoke to each other, but she was deaf to them, only focused on what needed to be done. Jeffery was keeping the boy in front of him, using him as a shield against Dent. But there was nothing that could shield Connor from her.
Hard Wired Page 22
