Mind Control: A Science Fiction Telepathy Thriller (Perceivers Book 2) (2 page)

“Aww, come on!” teased Peter. “Don’t be such a skank.”

Michael frowned at him. “You really want to know?”

Murmurs from the others confirmed that they did. He could tell many of them had already opened their perception.

“Okay,” said Michael. He dropped his filters and played back the memory of Tyler crashing to the floor and feeling the crack of his jaw shooting pain through his body.

Eighteen teenagers winced and immediately shut their perception back down again.

Cries of, “Michael!” and “Whaddyado that for?” rose from the group. Michael smiled and buried the memory again. Served them right for being curious.

Michael retrieved his dinner from where it was being kept warm on the rack brought from the catering building and took it over to where his best friend, Alex, was sitting.

“That was mean,” said Alex as Michael sat down beside him.

“They asked for it,” said Michael.

“Even so …” said Alex.

Alex was a year younger than Michael and, unlike him, had embraced army life. He was athletic, sported a muscular frame and beat almost everyone at anything that involved running, climbing or crawling under barbed wire. He was less good at intellectual challenges, but was a fast learner and a strong perceiver. They got on because, like Michael, he didn’t have much of a family to speak of. Alex came from a home with an absent father and a mother with mental health problems, so life at Galen House was the most stable he had ever had.

Michael forked over his chicken curry with the lacklustre movements of someone who wished he had ordered the fish. After the day he’d had, he wanted something bland not spicy.

Alex waited as much as thirty seconds before he said what he was desperate to ask. “Are you going to tell me what happened or not?”

Michael chewed on a piece of spicy chicken and swallowed. “I was thinking not.”

Alex lowered his voice. “Seriously, Mike, was it okay?”

“They were norms,” said Michael. “Norms hate perceivers.”

Alex nodded as if to say he understood.

Something entered the edge of Michael’s perception: an anxiety – distant at first – but getting closer.

The others sensed it too, as it got closer and became strong enough to break through their everyday filters. The chatter of the people and clatter of cutlery stopped. They all turned to face the door.

The squeak of highly polished leather from military boots and the click-click of the heels of a woman’s shoes announced the arrival of two people into the building. Through the door first was a young woman. Like the perceivers, she was a teenager – maybe fifteen or sixteen years old – her naturally tall body made taller by the four inch heels on her black calf-length boots. All her clothes were black. A black baggy coat hung in folds over a black T-shirt with a half-obscured slogan and black skinny jeans which hugged her shapely legs. Even her hair was jet black, hanging straight from a middle parting down to the tops of her shoulders. It made her face look even paler than it might otherwise have been, despite the make-up she had applied to give her cheeks a red glow and her lips a strong shape of glossy maroon.

As soon as he touched her mind, Michael knew she was a perceiver.

Her anxiety intensified.
What are they looking at?
she thought.

It was a thought strong enough for them all to perceive. But still, the perceivers kept looking.

Beside her, having walked through the door almost unnoticed, was Sergeant Norman Macaulay, the officer in charge of the Perceivers Corps. He was a small man, in his forties and slightly overweight but otherwise in good shape, who had lived and breathed the army since he joined up at the age of sixteen. He always wore a dress uniform: khaki trousers and shirt ironed to within an inch of their lives, tie meticulously tied with a Windsor knot and a jacket which he kept smooth and buttoned unless he was sitting down. On his chest were a collection of medals which he wore proudly, but never talked about. He dressed like this, rather than in fatigues like many of the officers on the base, because he believed the uniform gave him authority. Michael knew this because he had perceived it from him. He had perceived everything about Sergeant Norman Macaulay over the months since he had met him, as had – he was sure – every other perceiver in the room, except the new girl.

“This is Pauline Sarkis,” said Sergeant Norman Macaulay, or ‘Norm the Norm’, as the perceivers called him.

Some of the perceivers mumbled a ‘hello’, others offered a slight wave. Pauline stretched her glossy maroon lips across her teeth into a forced smile.

“Do you want some food?” Norm asked her.

“I ate on the train,” she almost whispered. Her mind showed a memory of nibbling at a sandwich which had gone stale at the edges, while the English countryside sped past outside the carriage window.

“I’ll show you to your quarters,” said Norm. “You’ll meet these reprobates properly tomorrow.”

They turned towards the accommodation block, Norm’s shoes still squeaking, while Pauline’s heels were dampened by the carpet. Her anxiety lessened as she moved away from the group of grey-clad teenagers who stared at her. Michael blocked out her mind: there was nothing more to be gained by perceiving her any further.

Chatter rose into the room again.

Alex turned to Michael. “Why do they dump perceivers into this place without any preparation?” he said.

“Because they are norms,” said Michael. “And norms hate perceivers.”

~

LIGHTS OUT
.

In theory, Michael had control of the lights in his own room and no one would say anything if he decided to turn them on again, but the army discipline of a regular bedtime had been instilled in him across a year of training and he couldn’t shake it off. So when the lights extinguished themselves, he let them be.

Michael’s room became a mosaic of shadows. Shapes sketched out in shades of black indicated the wardrobe in the corner, the chest of drawers on the far wall, his desk with a chair tucked under and his clothes piled across the back of it. The only concession to this room being his home was a two-seater sofa jammed next to the door where he would sometimes sit and read or watch the television. Only the window displayed a hint of colour from the faint glow of a lamppost on the road outside which illuminated the dark blue of the curtains.

There was a bed too, of course, but Michael couldn’t see it very well because he was lying under the bedclothes.

Not as if he could sleep. Jerome Tyler’s thoughts continued to persist inside of him.

Michael had perceived a lot of minds in the past and none of them had been like Tyler’s. People were complicated, they thought a variety of things. If they were walking down the road, they might be thinking about all the things they had to buy at the shop, but they would also be thinking about the best place to cross the road, the disgusting state of all the litter in the street and what they planned to do at the weekend. Sometimes they would think these things one after the other, sometimes they would be thinking them all at once. They would be feeling cold from the wind, an ache in their foot from an old football injury and slightly out of breath from walking faster than usual. But not Tyler. There was one singular thought in his head: he had to go.

Even allowing for the fact that Tyler had been on his way to commit some terrorist atrocity, it didn’t make sense. Surely a person like that – if they were concentrating on anything at all – they would be concentrating on the moment they were to detonate the bomb, not getting on a number 10 bus.

As the remembered perceptions turned over in his head, the noise of someone else crept into his consciousness. She – because the perception was of a woman – was lonely and scared.

He knew the emotions were from Pauline’s mind. Not that he could recognise her yet – it often takes a few close perceptions to recognise the mind of an individual – but it could only be her. It was likely Norm the Norm had probably given her the room next to Michael’s, which had been empty for a long time, while all the rest of the perceivers had learnt to screen their thoughts.

Michael pushed her away. He pushed Tyler away. He concentrated on his breathing and tried to relax. Sleep would come eventually.

But the more he relaxed, the more Pauline was in his head. Her anxiety at being brought to Galen House made her thoughts louder than a normal, relaxed mind. There were images of a man and a woman – her parents? – and a younger girl who looked a bit like her, possibly a sister. He perceived a sudden stab of fear as an image of a woman in a white coat flashed through Pauline’s mind and the images of her family faded away.

She was broadcasting so loudly, Michael had to make an effort to block her out. Not that it was a problem, he could block signals far stronger than hers, but every time he relaxed and tried to sleep, her thoughts came back. He was often glad that his perception was stronger than anyone else in the group, but there were other times when it was a burden. This was one of those times.

Michael sat up in bed. Sleeping was useless. And Pauline’s broadcast was giving him a headache.

He got up and grappled for his trousers in the semi-dark. He put them on, threw a shirt over his naked chest and padded his bare feet out into the corridor.

~

NIGHT LIGHTS CLUNG
to the ceiling down the length of the corridor, dimly illuminating the space below each one with faint circles. Michael padded to the next room along. Standing outside the door, he confirmed Pauline’s thoughts were coming from inside it.

Michael stopped at the door. He knocked, softly and politely.

There was no reply. Images still poured from the mind inside: of people she loved, of the long lonely train ride to the base, of the perceivers laying down their cutlery to stare at her. She was on the edge of sleep, in that dreamy state where semi-conscious thoughts pass in and out.

He knocked louder.

She must have heard that because the images faded. “Who is it?” came a sleepy voice.

“My name’s Michael.”

He perceived uncertainty and distrust from inside the room.

He realised she had no clue who he was. “I’m one of the other perceivers,” he said.

“I’m trying to sleep,” said her words.
Is the door locked? Did I lock the door?
said her thoughts.

“So am I,” said Michael, “but you’re bleeding everywhere.”

Panic from behind the door. “What?”

He realised he had used the wrong words. “You’re in a building full of perceivers, you need to block your mind.”

“Wait a minute,” she called. There were scrambling noises from inside.

The door opened just enough for Pauline’s face to peer out. She looked paler without her make-up and was dressed in a white bathrobe which appeared hastily thrown on. Her black hair lay unbrushed and untidy on her shoulders, looking more straggly because the strands were illuminated from behind by a lamp on the bedside table behind her.

Her anxiety swelled. “You can perceive me?” she said.

“Someone needs to show you how to block,” said Michael. “Can I come in?”

She paused, keeping the door open just enough for her to look out and not enough for him to step through. She was suspicious of his motives, he could perceive it.

“I’m not going to hurt you,” said Michael. “Perceive me if you like.” He allowed his arms to fall to his sides and turned his palms outwards to show he was harmless. At the same time, he let his blocks fall.

She perceived him. He could feel her inside his mind. She took a good, long look.

“Okay,” she said. She stood aside and let Michael in.

Her room was still regulation army issue. The wardrobe, the desk, the chair, the bed, the dark blue curtains were all the same as his. He was slightly jealous of the bedside table and lamp, which he made a mental note that he would have to ask for. She didn’t have a sofa, like in his room, and in the space where it might have been were two unpacked suitcases. The only things of hers out on display were her clothes draped over the chair by the desk and a phone laid face down on the table by her bed.

Michael came in and closed the door behind him. Pauline picked up a pillow and placed it like a cushion against the headboard. She sat up against it and folded her legs up underneath her. Michael took this as a cue for him to sit at the other end of the bed. She was still wary of him, however, and he kept a respectable distance between them.

“You’ve not been with perceivers before, have you?” said Michael.

“What’s that got to do with anything?” said Pauline.

“It’s not like being around norms. You can open your mind with norms and they won’t know. But with perceivers, it’s different. We have to maintain blocks and filters otherwise we live in each other’s heads all the time.”

“Even in here?” She looked around the room with its enclosing four walls.

“Being able to see someone makes perception easier, but strong emotions and thoughts can leak through walls,” he said.

Especially the thoughts and emotions of someone who had been taken from their family to live in a strange place with a group of people she didn’t know. All the perceivers in the building understood that, because they had all gone through it.

“You said there are filters and blocks …?” said Pauline. “I don’t understand.”

She was panicking again, afraid she had made some terrible mistake. Her emotions were putting Michael on edge. He made a conscious effort to block her out. “It’s a bit like going into a place where there are a lot of people,” he said. “Like a school playground or a shopping centre. Do you know what I mean?”

“It’s loud,” said Pauline. “I mean, it’s loud in my head. So many minds …”

Michael nodded, knowing that feeling. “So what do you do?”

“Make them shut up,” said Pauline.

“That’s a block,” said Michael. “We do it all the time. We would go crazy if we didn’t. If we don’t want to silence them all, just stop the unwanted noise, we call that a filter.”

“What’s that got to do with you perceiving me?”