Mindgames - Part 3
by Pangur Bàn
(With thanks to La Lurker, whose images fire my imagination.)
Sydney felt the two pairs of eyes on him as he stood over his small bag in the airport gate. Sweepers. The Centre was watching him. Oh, well, he'd dealt with this before. He'd picked up on the tail as he left his hotel today. Arriving at the airport, he consulted the departures monitors and found his gate. Quickly he located another, suitable flight, this one going to Wilmington, Delaware, boarding at a gate nearby. Dover would have been better, but was a later flight, boarding further away. He made a show of checking his watch, then got in line to buy a ticket. Now he stood, thankful for the building crowd and the lack of empty seats. He just needed an opportunity to slip away.
*** *** *** *** ***
In the restroom, Grace looked up at the girls towering over her. They regarded her from behind menancing, half-closed eyelids. Grace reached into her pocket and brought out a wad of bills.
"Two hundred." The eyes narrowed further. Grace smiled. "A little extra." She handed the packet to one of the girls, and addressed another, obviously the leader. "You're clear on what I need?"
The tall girl smiled back. "No problem. We'll give 'em a show."
"Be careful. Don't let security tag you."
Another girl laughed. "Ain't no way."
The leader was confident. "Just give me the sign. We'll keep 'em busy."
"Good. Thanks for your help," Grace said sincerely.
More laughter. "Next time you need help like this, call us."
The group slipped out of the bathroom. Grace picked up her things and followed a moment later. She made her way to the gate where she had spotted Sydney, and his tail, of course. Making sure that she had a clear path to him, she made eye contact with the tall girl who was watching her and nodded.
"Bitch! You keep yo skanky hands offa my man!"
All heads turned, Sydney's included. The catfight erupted suddenly and loudly, a dozen feet from the Sweeper pair. Sydney was just beginning to recognize his opportunity when he heard a quiet greeting. Startled, he turned to see Grace in front of him, smiling.
"Quickly. Take off your coat." She reached for the overcoat hanging over his arm as he rapidly removed his suit coat. "Put these on." She held out a well-aged leather flight jacket and a leather baseball cap. Rifling his pockets, she found the ticket she had given him the previous evening. Grace turned and handed his garments to another tall, greying man. Sydney paused. This man could have been a brother to him, although not quite a twin. The double was hurriedly donning the coat. The psychologist understood immediately, but hesitated. "My things," he said.
"They'll all be returned," Grace urged, "Hurry now." She took his arm and led him through the crowd. Behind them, a trash container was overturned as the catfight continued. The Sweepers looked across the gate, and spotted their charge benignly watching the spectacle, as was everyone. They nodded at each other, and then turned back in time to see a flash of breast. They smiled at each other, and were disappointed when just a minute later the fight broke up and the girls scattered as security arrived.
Four gates down, Grace and Sydney huddled against a wall. They watched as the Wilmington flight was called and Sydney's double boarded. The Sweepers immediately made a call, and left the gate after the ramp door had been locked.
And came directly at them. Grace grabbed Sydney by the waist and swung him around, his back toward the Sweepers. There faces were close, and for a moment Sydney thought she was going to kiss him. The two men passed by without incident. Sydney laughed a little as she released him. She smiled up into his face. "How's that for a little drama?"
He raised his eyebrows. "I have the distinct impression that it's only just begun."
*** *** *** *** ***
They settled into their seats. She spoke softly, giving him the barest details.
"Okay, here's the deal. I need to get you to a place where we can talk. You need to decide whether or not you want to take the risk of seeing Jarod."
"I'll risk it." Sydney didn't hesitate.
Grace took a breath and continued. "This is different. The Centre is obviously watching you, and your disappearance now would undoubtedly make things much worse. There are a few things you have to hear before you can make this decision."
"Such as?"
She shook her head. "Not here. All you need to know now is that we have arranged an alibi for you, if you decide it's best to not to see Jarod and return to the Centre. That's about all I can tell you at the moment. That, and we'll get into Detroit in an hour. We'll talk there. Think you can live with that for now?"
He looked up at the sky – or rather the bottom of the overhead storage compartment. "For now. But I'm most curious to hear how you arranged all this."
"What would you like to drink?" the stew interrupted. "Ginger ale?" Grace asked. Her stomach was still touchy. She handed her peanuts to Sydney and leaned back, hoping the Dramamine would kick in.
*** *** *** *** ***
In Detroit, the pair made their way to the exit and Grace led them to a hotel shuttle. At the desk, she picked up a key for the room Jarod had reserved for her. Sydney, a little on edge from all the intrigue, followed her with just a bit of trepidation.
They dropped their things inside the door. Moving into the suite, Grace was pleased to see a room service cart waiting for them. Sydney picked up the note on the cart and recognized Jarod's hand. "Sydney – believe what she has to tell you. Be careful. –J. P.S. Try the trifle." Looking up, he smiled at Grace. "Jarod recommends the trifle. He's developed quite the sweet tooth in the last few years."
Grace was opening a bottle of seltzer water. "Dig in – we can eat while we talk." Sydney uncovered a couple of Waldorf salads, a plate of paté and a couple of baguettes. He carried them to the table and laid the spread before them.
Grace sat down and tore off a piece of baguette. Sipping her water, she watched as Sydney tried the salad. He grunted as he realized how hungry he was. He swallowed a mouthful, and then looked up. "Can you tell me how you met Jarod?"
"Just like you know – a car accident. He really did swerve to miss a child, and I got in the way."
"Ms. Hanover, is he all right?"
"Please, call me Grace. Yes, he's all right. He needs to talk to you, and wants to do it face-to-face. To do that safely, we needed to get you out of sight of the Centre for a while."
Grace nibbled at the bread and sipped at the water. She talked while Sydney ate. By the time he had opened the bottle of Bordeaux and cut into a Bosc pear, she had filled him in on what Jarod had discovered about the Centre's surveillance of Sydney. Now came the more difficult part.
"Sydney, Jarod's not the only child the Centre has abducted." Sydney looked at her as she went on. "Nor is he the only one to have escaped from there."
He leaned forward slightly. "His brother, Kyle."
She nodded. "And me," she said quietly.
Sydney put down the pear slowly. "What?" he breathed.
"I was one of Dr. Raines' experiments." She kept her voice even, not wanting to sound like she was accusing the man across from her. "Apparently, very few people knew about me. This experiment was kept pretty dark."
Sydney hesitated, searching her eyes for permission to ask. Finding it, he did. "Grace, what did he do to you?"
Slowly, she told him what she had told Jarod. He sat back listening, thinking of Jarod's note: "Believe what she has to tell you." When it came to the Centre, the unbelievable happened almost daily. Still, this was hard to accept. Sydney recognized that part of his reluctance stemmed from his connection with the organization that did such despicable things. And look at what Angelo could do. But mind-reading?
When she stopped, he looked at her frankly. "What you are telling me is difficult to believe." She agreed. "You said you saw practically all of Jarod's life in an instant. That you can 'see' other's thoughts and memories at will." She nodded. "Can you see my thoughts?"
"I don't do that." she said.
"But could you?" he insisted.
She was afraid where this might be leading. "Yes," she admitted slowly.
"Show me." The words fell like a hammer blow.
Grace sighed. "Sydney, you have to understand. This is a very distasteful thing to do. It's not a parlor game, not something to do for amusement. It's invasive and unsettling. Even if you don't think so now, it's something that will most likely come back and disturb you – and me – later on."
"I need to be sure."
"Jarod's word isn't enough for you?" It was a low blow, but he stood firm. Before he would accept her story – and by extension, his culpability, even though in ignorance – he wanted absolute proof.
She tried her best to scare him off. "You'd have no way to stop me. If I choose, I could rummage around in your mind – mentally rape you. There's nothing you could do about it."
"If what you say is true, there's nothing I could do about it right now. If you had that in mind, you wouldn't need an invitation from me to read my mind," he said reasonably.
Grace stood, frustrated. He would not be put off, she saw. And, quite frankly, he had a right to want to see it for himself. He was being asked to risk his life, after all.
She turned to face him. He waited patiently, his expression calm. Her shoulders slumped, and he knew she had agreed to his request. Moving back to the table, she pulled her chair around to face his. She sat down.
"I promise you, I'm not going to do that." He nodded. "I trust you."
"Great," she said to the ceiling. "He trusts me not to hurt him, so that I can prove to him that I'm capable of hurting him." He smiled a little at that.
"What do I do?" he asked.
"Give me just a minute first. In the meantime, think of something visual, some object with a personal and private meaning to you. You'll want to be thinking of only that image and what it means to you, nothing else." He nodded.
She closed her eyes and took a steady breath, then another. She reopened her eyes and saw him waiting patiently for her. Grace extended a hand, and he took it. "It's not too late to change your mind," she offered. He shook his head. Grace nodded in return, and dropped her gaze to his knee.
"Flowers." Her voice was almost a whisper. Sydney froze. She continued. "A stone wall. White roses. You think of them as 'Gretas' – they were one of your mother's passions." A brief pause. Sydney wasn't breathing. "Jacob planted them – the year you bought the house. A kind of memorial – to your roots," she smiled up at him.''
The look on his face told her all she needed to know. She released his hand gently and sat back.
"Mon Dieu," he breathed, unable to say more.
"It was a good choice of image," she said. He stared at her, then blinked. "You're bleeding."
She furrowed her brow, and reached up to touch her nose. Her fingertip found the trickle, and she examined it with dull surprise.
"Here." Sydney was offering a linen napkin from the table. She took it with thanks, and applied pressure. "Are you all right?" he worried.
"I'm fine," she said nasally, smiling. "Don't worry. This has happened before. It'll stop quickly. Although I must admit, I'm surprised it happened now. This was not a difficult task." She wanted to laugh at his expression. "And no, you're not an open book."
Sydney's face went stony. Those were the exact words he had just been thinking. "Are you reading my mind now?"
"God, no, Syd – I'm reading your face. I just meant it was a good image, and your mind seems well-disciplined, and compatible." She reached across with her free hand to touch his leg, and he stiffened. She withdrew her hand and cursed silently. "Sydney, listen." Her voice was nasal and muffled. Irritated by it, she put the napkin down. "I'm not in your mind now. It's over. You have my word. And in this case, the touching really has nothing to do with it – it's just a device, like concentrating on a candle flame."
Sydney forced himself to relax a little. "I had just been thinking, God, I hope I'm not that much of an open book." He laughed, a little shakily, still keeping an eye on her.
She sighed. "Yeah. Your expression said as much. This is what I was talking about, Syd. 'The morning after' regrets."
He nodded. "I'm sorry. I do trust you. It's just all a little..."
"Spooky?" she suggested with a smile.
"Unnerving," he said, a little louder than he'd meant to.
"Welcome to the club," she said dryly. She stood and walked a few steps, then turned back. "Well, what's the verdict?"
"It's incredible," he said.
"Incredible as in wow, or as in you still don't believe it?" she asked.
"I absolutely believe you. I'm sorry to have doubted you at first."
"That's an awful lot to get hit with at once," she said kindly. "Quite frankly, I sometimes don't believe it myself."
"My God! What must that be like? To actually know what another person is thinking?"
She laughed and sat down again. "I'd think that in your job, you'd do that all the time."
"No. I can make an educated guess, or at best, be confident that I'm right about what they are thinking. But to actually know it for a fact. My God!"
Her face grew pensive. She snorted lightly. "Well, turnabout is fair play," she said.
"What?" He wasn't following her.
She was looking at him meaningfully. "This kind of connection – it's a two-way street," she said. "Most people wouldn't think that, or even if they did, couldn't exploit it. And to be honest, Sydney, even if they had an awful lot of skill in this, I wouldn't let them try it. Anyone who tried to force their way into my head, I'd fight tooth and nail. It would probably do a lot of damage to me and to them."
She went on. "Okay, I guess that's my way of warning you. I won't let you poke around in my mind. But if you want to know what it's like to see another person's thoughts, we can do that."
He was floored. "How could I possibly..."
"Like I said, a two way street. It's up to you. You don't have to decide right now, if you..."
"Yes." He didn't hesitate.
"You should consider the same things. It's just as disturbing to be the looker as the lookee. And there's a high level of trust involved."
"What do I do?" he asked.
"Okay, let's try it. You need to clear your mind as best you can."
Sydney quelled his nervous excitement and focused on his breathing. She watched him as she did the same. After a moment, she rubbed her hands together, then held them out to him. They held hands lightly. "Close your eyes," she said, slowly and evenly. "Put all else aside. For this moment, there is nothing else except the warmth of our hands and the space between us." She felt his calm, and continued. "Imagine your mind extending across this space, toward mine. A conduit, ending in a window."
Sydney envisioned a window. He saw a rough wooden sill, the paint beginning to peel. He imagined the feel of the wood and paint flakes as he placed his hands on the sill. He looked through the window.
And saw Catherine Parker. She was bending down toward him. Come on, honey, she was saying. We're going to get you out of here. In a flash, he understood that he was seeing through a child's eyes, Grace's eyes. Her memory. He felt Catherine's hand take Grace's/his, and saw the dark corridor as they moved quickly and urgently through it. He heard the elevator doors close and felt the slight lurch as they started up. Catherine knelt down and reached for her/his wrist. Here, she was saying, let's get this off of you. You aren't his property any more...
Sydney gasped as his eyes flew open. Grace started at the shock, and dropped his hands. "It's okay, Syd, it's okay. It's over. We're both okay." She rubbed her head and laughed ruefully. "We may both wind up with a bit of a headache from that. It was a – less than graceful – disconnect."
He was staring at her. "Did you put that image in my head? Had you seen it there?"
Grace's heart sunk. It had seemed like a good idea at the time, but now she was regretting having started this. He was once again distrustful of her, it seemed.
She shook her head. "No, Sydney. That image was in my head, not yours. You were seeing my memory. You recognized the woman, I know."
"I'm not talking about Catherine Parker. I'm talking about the bracelet."
Grace's hand moved toward her wrist, and she looked at him closely. "It was engraved on the inside, wasn't it?" he insisted. "'SL-27'?"
Grace was astonished. "You've seen them before?"
"One. Miss Parker has one."
Grace's mind raced. Horrified, she thought, surely Miss Parker wasn't a captive there, was she? She understood better when Sydney said, "She found it among her mother's things. In an envelope marked 'rescued', along with a group of papers, children she had helped rescue from the Centre."
Grace nodded. "They all seemed to be infants, though. I remember thinking it odd that I was the only older child that she rescued, or tried to."
"When was this?" he queried.
"1966. I was eight years old."
"And you returned to the Centre, then escaped on your own later."
"Late 1969," she confirmed.
"Did you know that she planned to help at least two other older children to escape before she was killed?"
Grace looked away, ashamed. "Jarod and Timmy. I know. I threw away the chance they never got."
Sydney's voice was gentle. "From what you've told me, Raines had hurt you so badly that there was no way for you to survive away from the Centre then."
She shut her eyes, knowing she needed to tell someone about the guilt that had been gnawing at her for days. She couldn't bring herself to open her eyes, to see Sydney looking at her while she said this.
"What Raines did to Timmy. That was because of me. Because I hid what I could do. If I had let Raines see, he might not have destroyed that little boy."
"Grace." He wanted her to open her eyes. "Grace!" She refused, shaking her head. He reached across the space between them and took her hand. "If Raines had seen what you could do, don't you think he'd have tried to do the same to Timmy – and to others?"
"Maybe. And maybe Timmy would have survived it, like I did."
"What if Timmy hadn't found a friend in time to save his life, to help him, like you did?"
A sob escaped. Sydney waited until she could look at him before he continued. "You had to save yourself. You had no choice. You were a child, Grace. Raines was destroying you. It's a miracle that you survived him, and another miracle that you survived after that. You mustn't feel guilty for being alive and whole today."
"Tell that to Angelo."
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