Mind Control: A Science Fiction Telepathy Thriller (Perceivers Book 2) (29 page)

“Tony,” corrected Patterson, holding out his hand for her to shake.

Pauline accepted. She blushed a little as they shook quickly and she reclaimed her hand to her side. Patterson, it seemed, was a bit of a charmer on the quiet.

“Look, Michael, I’m sorry about your father …” Patterson said.

“Don’t be,” said Michael. “He committed the crime he was convicted of, there’s nothing anyone could have done.”

“Anyway,” said Patterson. He filled the uncomfortable moment with a nervous cough. “I came to tell you that I have completed the report into your involvement with the Metropolitan Police.”

“Did I get a gold star?” said Michael. It was his attempt to make a joke to break the tension.

Patterson smiled out of politeness. “My recommendation to the Chief Constable is that we continue to experiment with …” He was going to say
perceivers
, but thought better of it out in public. “… people like yourself within the investigative branches of the service in the hope that your skills may be utilised to greater affect in the future.”

“That’s a lot of long words, Sergeant Patterson,” said Michael.

“Yeah, well, Inspector Jones may have written that bit,” he said with a grin.

The sound of a car horn caused all three of them to look round. A black Audi A4 had pulled up at the kerb next to them. Hodges waved from the driver’s seat.

“This is our ride,” said Michael.

“Do you want a lift?” offered Pauline.

“No, no,” said Patterson. “It’s a short walk to the tube.”

Hodges wound down his window. “Hurry up, I’m on a double yellow!”

Pauline hurried over and got into the back of the car, but Michael wasn’t quite ready to leave. “Say hello to Inspector Jones for me, won’t you?”

“Sure,” said Patterson. “And I look forward to working with you again.”

“Really?” said Michael, even though he perceived the policeman was being perfectly honest.

“Really,” said Patterson. “Just try not to get involved with international espionage next time.”

“It’s a deal.”

Hodges sounded the car horn again.

Michael didn’t know what else to say and so he left Sergeant Patterson and got into the back of the car with Pauline.

He’d barely closed the door before Hodges was pulling away and attempting to reach a set of traffic lights before they changed to red. Michael watched Patterson turn in the direction of the nearest tube station and walk away until a bus drew up behind them and blocked his view.

CHAPTER TWENTY–EIGHT

PAULINE SAT NEXT
to Michael on the sofa in his room. There wasn’t space for Alex, so he sat cross-legged on the floor for what felt like a party to celebrate their safe return from Russia. Although, as they were still inside the military base where they lived, it was a party without balloons, without alcohol and before ‘lights out’. They drank fizzy sugary stuff from cans and listened to music streamed through the television speakers from Alex’s phone and laughed about things that no one else would find funny.

“I found out today I got a job,” said Pauline.

“Congratulations!” said Michael. He raised his can of Coke in salute and took a sip. “Doing what?”

“Stacking shelves?” said Alex.

Pauline kicked his knee with her toe. “An assignment,” she clarified. “I’m going to be working with the police, like Michael.”

“After this last week, I hope not like Michael,” said Alex.

It was Michael who kicked Alex’s knee this time.

“Tell me again why I’m the one who has to sit on the floor?” said Alex.

“Because it’s my sofa,” said Michael.

“I’ll be assigned to CID,” Pauline interrupted before the boys got into a pointless argument. “So, looking into the minds of murderers, that sort of thing.”

“Well, I’m pleased,” said Alex. He raised his can of some sort of fizzy orange stuff and sipped. “They’re keeping me in the court system for a while longer, so it looks like perceivers really are being deployed out there in the world.”

“Yes,” said Michael. Not that he really believed it. He’d been ordered to write a report on his experiences so far working with the police force, but he had a feeling his suggestions would be ignored. He may have won over Patterson, but he doubted many norms were ready to accept perceivers working alongside them just yet. Especially when they were all still so young compared to the people they were working with.

Michael finished off the last of his Coke and allowed his body to gather all of its bubbles inside of him and let them out in one, large, resonating burp.

“Euw!” said Pauline. She pushed him away from her playfully. “
Not
attractive.”

“Sorry,” said Michael, but he wasn’t really thinking about her anymore. He was thinking about the empty Coke can. He put it down on the floor in front of him.

Alex went to pick it up.

“Don’t,” said Michael.

“I was only going to put it in the bin,” he said.

“I want to try something.”

He could tell the others perceived there was something going on in his head, but they did not see enough to understand what.

Michael stared at the Coke can. He stared at it until he thought he knew every inch of it, from the dent in the side where Alex had squeezed it with his thumb, to the angle of the ring pull at the top. Once he had assessed it with his eyes, he covered it with his perception, as if holding it in his mind. He concentrated. He wanted the can to go into the rubbish bin. He wanted it badly, to the exclusion of everything. There was no sofa, no Pauline and Alex, no room, only the can and the bin. As he focussed all of his willpower, the can wobbled on the carpet.

“My God,” Pauline whispered.

“Are
you
doing that?” said Alex.

He barely heard them. Michael visualised the can lifting into the air and – in front of him – the can levitated. Only a few centimetres, but it was suspended above the carpet by nothing other than his thoughts. He gasped as he saw it and his concentration faltered. The can dropped to the floor and tipped over. A brown remnant of Coke dripped from the can onto the carpet.

Michael sat back into his seat, amazed at what he saw, but knowing that he had done it: he had moved the can with the power of his mind.

“Was that a trick?” said Alex, looking from the can to Michael and back to the can again.

“No trick,” said Michael.

Because they were perceivers, they knew he wasn’t lying.

“How…?” said Pauline.

He shrugged. “I’m not really sure. When I thought I was going to die, it just happened. The first time I thought I was hallucinating or something, but after the second time I found I could do it if I really concentrated.”

“Wow,” said Alex. “Could you teach me to do it?”

“I don’t know,” said Michael. “We could try.”

“Even with your super powers, you wouldn’t have got out of Russia without our help,” said Pauline.

“You’re not going to let me forget that, are you?” said Michael, playfully.

“Nope,” said Pauline. She disguised her grin behind her drinks can as she sipped.

Even though he didn’t say it, he made sure she perceived how grateful he was. He knew, if she hadn’t persuaded Hodges to fly them out to Moscow, he wouldn’t have survived.

“Any idea what they did to you in Russia?” Alex asked Michael.

“Not in those missing hours,” he replied.

Pauline turned to him. “Missing hours?”

“Didn’t he tell you?” said Alex. “He was drugged and taken somewhere for several hours.”

“No, he didn’t tell me,” said Pauline. She made her displeasure felt. “Taken where?”

“That’s the thing,” said Michael. “I was unconscious, I don’t know. I can only imagine Hetherington wanted to perceive my mind while I wasn’t awake to block him.”

“Can you do that?” said Pauline. “Perceive someone while they’re asleep? Apart from seeing into their dreams, I mean?”

Michael shrugged. “I don’t know. I wouldn’t put it past the Hetherington kid.”

“Maybe they carried out some sort of secret experiment,” said Alex.

“Like what?” said Michael.

“I don’t know. They could have taken some of your genetic material to forward their research.”

“They already had my blood,” said Michael. “What more would they want?”

But Michael couldn’t rule it out. Just as he couldn’t rule out that Hetherington pulled from his mind out all sorts of classified information in those missing hours: details about the British perceiver programme, where they were based, who was in charge. He could have passed that information to anyone in the Russian administration and who knows how they would use it to their advantage.

Unless the kid hadn’t got around to telling anybody and the information died at the same time as he was killed with Hodges’s bullets.

The only person who survived for sure was Lucas. Hodges didn’t remember seeing him in the complex and Michael hadn’t perceived his presence as they ran away. Lucas had already fled England with a wealth of knowledge about perceivers and that made him dangerous. If the Russians ever got around to giving him all the resources they promised, there was no telling what he would be able to do.

The music streaming through the television speakers suddenly skipped tracks and blasted loud rock music into the room.

Broken out of his thoughts, Michael saw that Alex had his phone in his hand and had chosen something more lively to play. “This is supposed to be a celebration, right?”

“I suppose,” said Michael.

“Then cheer up!” Alex drank the last of his fizzy sugary orange and put the empty can on the floor in front of him. “Teach me how to do that levitation thing.”

“What, now?” said Michael.

“Why not now?” said Alex.

“Go on,” said Pauline. “When he fails to do it, I can spend all week making fun of him.”

Michael smiled. “Okay.”

Alex grinned and sat up straight and put his fingers to his temples in the pose of someone who was ready to concentrate. “Tell me what to do.”

~ END ~

What to find out what happens to Michael, Pauline and Alex next? You can in
Mind Evolution: Perceivers #3

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When businessmen go mad, Michael investigates the shocking link to perceivers, as his relationship with Pauline grows, in:
Mind Evolution: Perceivers #3

janekillick.com/perceivers

The Perceivers series:

Mind Secrets

Mind Control

Mind Evolution

Mind Power

Table of Contents

Title Page

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

CHAPTER NINETEEN

CHAPTER TWENTY

CHAPTER TWENTY–ONE

CHAPTER TWENTY–TWO

CHAPTER TWENTY–THREE

CHAPTER TWENTY–FOUR

CHAPTER TWENTY–FIVE

CHAPTER TWENTY–SIX

CHAPTER TWENTY–SEVEN

CHAPTER TWENTY–EIGHT

Perceivers Series