Mind Secrets: A Science Fiction Telepathy Thriller (Perceivers Book 1) (8 page)

“It’s so strange.” Elaine looked across at Michael. “It’s like you’re here, but you’re not here.”

“What do you mean?” said Michael.

“I can see you, but I can’t feel you.”

“You mean, you can’t perceive me?”

She thought about it for a moment. “I can’t perceive anything. It’s weird.”

“Do you remember what happened?”

“Mum held my hand while the doctor gave me an injection.”

“Anything else?”

“The recovery room.” She smiled. “They gave me chocolate.”

Her mum called out from the driver’s seat. “I’ve enrolled Elaine in a new school. Isn’t that right, ’Laine?”

“I can make new friends,” said Elaine. “No one will ever know I was a perceiver.” Then she stopped talking and gazed out of the window. There was something serene about her. Disoriented, but oddly happy. Looking at her, it was difficult for Michael to believe what Otis had said, that the cure had taken part of her soul and thrown it in the rubbish.

The car braked suddenly. “Bloody hell!” gasped Elaine’s mum. The tyres skidded on the gravel and the car jolted them against the seatbelts with a sudden stop.

A large black car had turned into the driveway as they neared the entrance which was only wide enough for one vehicle. They’d come to a stop centimetres from the other car’s front bumper.

“Don’t these people look where they’re going?!” said Elaine’s mum. She sat there resolutely and made some gestures out the window. After a few moments, the other car backed down. It reversed slowly out onto the road.

Elaine’s mum put her car into gear and, with the scattering of stones from her wheels, continued out of the driveway.

Michael looked out of the side window at the offending car as they passed – it was large, imposing, sleek and black. He caught a glimpse of its front seat passenger: He was a middle-aged man with a full head of dark hair, dressed in a suit. He had his elbow resting at the base of the window while he gazed out at the scenery.

With a chill, Michael recognised him.

It was Cooper.

Even though he knew who it was, Michael continued to stare. A moment too long. Cooper turned his attention from the scenery towards him. Their eyes locked.

Michael ducked down into the footwell, out of sight of the window. Too late, he feared.

“What you doing down there?” said Elaine.

Michael kept quiet. He held his breath. And hoped.

Above him, he heard the tick-tock of the car’s indicators. A rev of the engine. He held onto the back seat as the Renault jolted forward and sped away from the clinic.

CHAPTER NINE

MICHAEL THREW OPEN
the passenger door of Otis’s ugly, dented hatchback. “We need to go.”

Otis – caught by surprise – jolted in the driver’s seat, almost dropping his phone. “Jesus!”

Michael hopped in and shut the door. “We need to go now!”

“What happened?”

“Go now, ask questions later.”

Otis started up the engine, put the car into gear and pulled out of the lay-by onto the main road. Michael swung his head round to look out of the back window. There was no sign of Cooper’s sleek, black car.

“Is someone following you?” said Otis.

“I don’t think so.”

Michael sat round to face front and allowed himself a relieved sigh. The road ahead was clear. The speedometer on Otis’s dashboard pushed sixty.

He braked sharply at the approach to a roundabout. They swung round to the third exit. He put his foot down as soon as they turned off onto the dual carriageway.

“So what happened?” said Otis.

Michael checked behind him again to make sure Cooper wasn’t there, then he explained everything.

“This nurse
perceived
you?”

“Yeah,” said Michael.

“Not possible.”

“He looked into me. Like you and Jennifer sometimes do.”

“Adults aren’t ’ceivers.”

“You can’t know that for sure.”

Otis glanced in his rear-view mirror and slipped into the left hand lane. “No one had it before us teenagers. That’s why they hate us. Among perceivers, I’m about the oldest there is. It couldn’t have existed before that, people would’ve noticed.”

“Are you sure? Because this nurse … he must be about ten years older than you – and he had it. I’m telling you, he really had it. You can perceive me if you don’t believe me.”

“I perceive you believe it, Michael mate, but there’s no way it’s true.”

“I think it is,” said Michael. “I think they’re lying to you.”

Otis looked at him. For as long as he could possibly keep his eyes off the road. Like he was really wondering if it was possible. Then he turned away, reached forward and switched on the radio. Music blared out of the speakers. Loud and raucous. He turned it up. The base shook the car in a steady rhythm that blocked out the sound of the tyres rumbling over the road, and chased away difficult thoughts.

~

OTIS ENTERED THE
flat and threw his keys into the kitchen. They hit the back wall and dropped onto the worktop below. Michael followed him in and closed the door.

Jennifer jumped up off the sofa, turning off the TV with the remote as she did so. “Well?” she said, approaching Michael. Her eyes looked intently at him. He knew she was trying to perceive him before he had a chance to tell her. “Did they …?”

“… cure me of something I don’t have?” said Michael. “No.”

She seemed relieved. She sat back down on the sofa. Otis joined her. He put his arm around her shoulders. She allowed it to rest there, but didn’t sink into his affection. “So,” she said, “what happened?”

He told her what he had told Otis. She sat, open-mouthed, listening to it all.

“What do you think, Jen?” said Otis. “Adult perceivers – is it possible?”

“Yesterday and I would’ve said no, but today …?” She let her doubt fade away.

Jennifer pulled her phone from her pocket. “We need to tell people.”

Otis reached across her and spread his hand over the screen. “No.”

“We can’t fight this together, Otis, if we don’t share information.”

“We don’t know anything for sure.”

“Then how are we gonna find out? You can’t send Michael back in there – and we can’t go without risking being cured.”

Something triggered in Michael’s mind. He’d been so focussed on escaping Cooper, he hadn’t thought about anything else. “I almost forgot.” He delved into his pocket and pulled out the vial of liquid he’d taken from the nurse’s desk. It was warm from being close to his skin. He handed it to Otis.

“What is it?” he said.

“That,” said Michael, “is the cure.”

Otis’s eyes widened. He turned the glass tube around in his hand. “This?”

It was about ten centimetres in length with a rubber stopper on one end and clear liquid inside. On the outside was a label that read:
CLINIC #1. 50ml. Serial no. 537986B

“Let’s see,” said Jennifer. She took it from him and held it up to the light. The liquid sparkled with purity. “It’s so small.”

“But powerful enough to change your life,” said Otis.

“What are we going to do with it?” said Jennifer.

“We should get it analysed,” said Otis.

“How are we going to do that?” she asked.

“I know someone.” He grabbed it back from her.

“Who?” Jennifer asked.

“No one you know.” Otis looked at his watch. “I’ll be a couple of hours.” He got off the sofa.

“You’re going now?” she called after him.

“You know what they say,” said Otis, halfway to reclaim his keys from the kitchen. “Strike while the women are hot!” He tossed his keys into the air and caught them again. He gave her a cheeky smile as he went out of the door.

CHAPTER TEN

FROM THE
Action Against Mind Invasion website,
www.aami.com
:

WHERE DID PERCEIVERS COME FROM?

The short answer is, nobody knows. One day teenagers were those young people who hung around on street corners looking glum, then four years ago we found out they were looking into our minds.

We found out. It’s almost certain they existed before then. As Professor Olong of the University of Birmingham says: “It seems likely these children were perceivers before their teenage years. The research we’ve been able to do so far suggests they were capable of perception in a limited form before puberty. Probably misunderstood as instinct, or the ability to read body language. While the children themselves kept quiet about the truth for fear of being singled out as abnormal.” [www.dailynews.co.uk/science/olong]

As for why perception appeared all of a sudden, the reasons are still unclear. “More research needs to be done,” says Olong. “But it seems to me that something in our environment must have triggered this change. For a fifth of teenagers to suddenly have this condition, it cannot be a coincidence.”

~

JENNIFER STOOD IN
the kitchen, her back resting against the worktop while reading something on her phone.

“Hi, Michael,” she said without looking up.

Michael stepped into the kitchen. It smelt of the curry Otis had cooked last night. The pans he put in soak were still in the sink, the bubbles from the washing up liquid no longer on the surface, just an orange goo floating in the water. A kettle on the side rumbled loudly as it boiled.

“What are you doing?” he asked her.

“Nothing.” Her eyes stayed focussed on the phone.

“You’re always on that thing.”

“Need to keep in touch with other perceivers.”

“Why?”

“I ask myself that sometimes.” She pressed a couple of buttons and held up the screen to him. “Some kid’s been told he can’t sit his exams because he might perceive the answers off other pupils.”

Michael hadn’t time to see the screen before she’d whipped it away again, tapped another button, and flashed a different screen. “A girl wants to know if she should go to her cure clinic appointment. What the skank are we supposed to do?” She tossed the phone down on the worktop. It bounced to rest by the toaster.

“What about your perceivers network?” said Michael.

“We text and post and chat. Anytime someone suggests doing something, it all breaks down into stupid arguments. No one knows what to do.”

The kettle shuddered to the boil.

“Fancy a coffee?” said Jennifer.

“Not for me,” said Michael.

She grabbed a single mug from the draining board and took the coffee jar from the cupboard. Michael enjoyed watching her coffee routine. She seemed at home doing it.

She shook a spoon from the draining board and unscrewed the coffee jar. She tipped the jar towards Michael so he saw the brown grains inside. “Sure?”

“Don’t like the stuff,” said Michael. “Not tea neither. Even with three sugars. Bleh!”

She took a spoonful of granules, dropped it in the mug with the clink of metal on china and poured water from the kettle. The coffee fizzed a little and sent a plume of its distinctive smell into the air. “I remember the first time I had coffee,” she said. “My dad used to drink it all the time. The smell would come wafting out of the kitchen. I kept asking to have some and he kept saying I was too young. When he finally caved in and made me a cup, it tasted horrible. Strong and bitter. But I drank it anyway. I wanted to be grown up, I suppose.”

She stirred her drink and dropped the spoon into the sink, where it plopped into one of the pans and sunk to the bottom of the cold curry water.

“I never heard you speak about your dad before,” said Michael.

Jennifer sniffed, bringing herself out of her nostalgic haze. “Yeah, well … Dad wanted a normal little girl.”

She picked up her mug, stuffed her phone into her pocket and made her way to the lounge. Michael followed and sat in the chair opposite her. “I … didn’t exactly tell Otis everything,” he said eventually.

“I know,” said Jennifer.

Michael’s eyes narrowed. “Do you have to perceive me all the time?”

“Sorry,” said Jennifer. “Your thoughts are loud, I can’t help it.”

Michael composed himself. “The doctor at the clinic … she knew me.”

“What do you mean, ‘knew you’?”

“Knew my name. She hugged me! Said she was glad I was okay.”

“Who was she? Did you ask her where you’re from and what happened to you?”

“Didn’t get a chance. Her name was Doctor Page, that’s all I know.”

“First name?”

“No.”

Jennifer frowned. She pulled out her phone and tapped her index finger across the screen. She nodded at the display. “Doctor Page, cure clinic – there you are.”

She handed the device to Michael. She’d pulled up several reports. All fairly bland and uninformative. They were blogs from parents or patients who mentioned her in passing:
“My son was treated by Doctor Page, a pleasant woman whose bedside manner … Doctor Page said my mum could hold my hand while she gave me the injection …”
and so on.

“I suppose it proves she works there,” said Michael, passing back Jennifer’s phone.

She perused it a little longer. Frowned again. “Hmm. No biographical details. No photo. No first name. Weird, though, that she should be working there.”

“Yeah, weird.” He thought about it for a moment. Everything he’d experienced at the clinic was still a jumble. Like a mixed up jigsaw puzzle he didn’t know how to put together.

“There’s something else, isn’t there?” said Jennifer.

“You’re perceiving me again.”

“But I won’t know what it is until you tell me.”

Michael sighed. “Cooper was there.”

“Cooper?” she said. “The man-you-ran-away-from-Cooper?”

“Yeah.”

“What’s he got to do with the cure clinic?”

“I don’t know!” said Michael in frustration. “The doctor said all the details get sent to him. Our names, pictures and addresses …”