Mindgames – Part 4
by Pangur Bàn
Rating
(PG, PG13, R) : PG13
Spoilers : probably
Disclaimer: Steven Long Mitchell & Craig W. Van Sickle created the characters of the television series "The Pretender." This fan fiction is purely for entertainment purposes (chiefly my own, admittedly.) No profit is being made here. No infringement is intended.
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Sydney decided to meet with Jarod. Grace explained that they were arranging an alibi for his disappearance for several days. The double who had taken Sydney's place at O'Hare had gotten on his flight to Wilmington, deplaning in Philadelphia. He ducked into an airport bathroom and emerged a changed man. The Sweepers who had been stationed to watch had to report that they had lost their quarry, much to the displeasure of Mr. Raines. A search began for the missing psychologist, who at that moment was sitting in a hotel room in Detroit.
From Detroit they flew to Milwaukee. Once again, a hotel shuttle delivered them to another pre-arranged room. It was late when they got into the suite to find another note from Jarod, letting them know that he would be there in the morning and that breakfast was arranged. He had left Grace's small bag in one room, and pajamas, toiletries and a change of clothing for Sydney in another. After the day's travels and travails, they quickly agreed that a good night's sleep was highly attractive. Within thirty minutes, each was in bed. Sydney dropped off immediately. Grace, on the other hand, lay awake for hours as she wrestled with the images that resurfaced in the still of the dark room. After some time, she got up and sat on the floor, her back to the bed, willing herself through meditation to slow down. The images abated for a while, and she finally fell into an exhausted sleep.
*** *** *** *** ***
Sydney was an early riser. He was washed, shaved and dressed well before seven, and sat reading quietly in the common area of the suite. A soft knock on the door brought him to his feet. "Room service," came the call through the door. Sydney peered through the peephole and saw the red-vested waiter, his head bowed over the trolley. He opened the door and watched the cart wheel past him, the smell of rich dark coffee awakening his sense of hunger. He dug into his pocket for some of the cash Grace and Jarod had provided. He held a five-dollar bill out to the waiter.
"Keep it," the waiter said, straightening up to face him.
"Jarod!" smiled Sydney.
"Did you sleep well?" the younger man inquired.
"Yesterday was a busy day," Sydney admitted. "Grace is still asleep."
Jarod handed his mentor a glass of orange juice and picked up another. "Let her sleep. She is still recovering from the concussion – and other things."
"She told me about her – condition."
"You believe her?"
"Yes. She showed me, reluctantly, at my insistence."
"I can imagine. She doesn't like to do that." Jarod drained his glass and poured two cups of coffee. Sydney sat down across the table from him, leaning forward slightly. "You're looking well, Jarod."
"We have a lot to talk about, Sydney." Jarod's companion nodded, his eyes on the Pretender's face as Jarod continued. "First, though, I need to know – did you know about Grace? About what Raines was doing?"
Sydney's gaze stayed locked with Jarod's. He shook his head as he spoke. "Jarod, I swear to you, if I had known what he was doing to her, or to Timmy, I would have put a stop to it, at any price. Raines' work was kept secret. I never even heard he was working with a little girl. There had been rumors of clandestine psychological experiments in those years, but nothing of this nature. Raines' influence was considerable, even then. I think he has had a protector quite high up in the Centre for a very long time."
Jarod looked at Sydney silently for a minute, evaluating what he'd heard. At last he nodded, accepting his word. "I want to help her, Sydney. And we both want Raines and the Centre stopped."
"What can I do to help?" With those six words, Sydney knew he had chosen the path from which he would not turn back, no matter what the consequences to himself. He felt a tremendous sense of this is it, this is right; this is what I need to be doing. A certain measure of serenity, which had eluded him for many years now, returned.
*** *** *** *** ***
The two talked for several hours, devouring most of the croissants and fruit, before they thought to wonder if Grace was all right. They knocked carefully on her door, and then entered. They found her sitting on the floor. Slowly, she looked up at them dopily. With an effort she brought herself back to the bright fall morning. She answered their questions with light-hearted responses. "I must have fallen asleep while meditating. Geez, I'm stiff. Give me a hand up, would you?" They boosted her up until she was sitting on the edge of the bed. Jarod and Sydney both watched her closely until she threw them out of her room, saying she wanted to shower and dress. As the door closed behind them her good-natured smile faded. Her face reflected the pain she felt, her head pounding, the images more insistent than ever.
Outside, Sydney looked at Jarod. "She's not well."
Jarod agreed. "I think this is getting to her, and getting worse."
"Can we find her friend, Jon?" Sydney asked. "I've already found him," Jarod said. "He's on his way here from England. He'll be here this afternoon."
"Jarod, I hate to say this, but..." Sydney hesitated.
"My presence seems to cause her more distress," Jarod finished for him. The older man nodded. "Do you think it might be better if you – stayed out of her way for the rest of the morning?" Jarod concurred grimly. "Can you stay with her? I'll bring her friend here when his flight gets in."
Jarod debated waiting for Grace to join them before departing himself, but decided to spare her any unnecessary discomfort. He left quietly. Grace felt her head clear somewhat, and misattributed it to the hot shower. She had not yet figured out the correlation between Jarod's proximity and her worsening condition. She did not know that Jarod had spent the night in the room directly below their suite – thus her uncomfortable night.
She walked into the main room to find that Sydney had ordered a fresh pot of coffee to be sent up. He explained that Jarod had to run some errands, and they would see him in a few hours. As she ate, he told her about his decision to work with them. She was aware of the weight of his decision, and told him so. He had taken care with her just the day before to try to help her understand that her guilt over Timmy's fate was out of place. Now she recognized that his own guilt over his involvement with the Centre drove him to his demons, and he needed to hear that he too deserved some peace.
*** *** *** *** ***
The midday found her in better spirits. Sydney's company kept her distracted, and his gentle way was soothing. Although the dark circles under her eyes testified differently, she was starting to believe that she was getting a handle on the worst of this. A little more rest, she thought, should have her back on top.
"...Grace? Are you all right?" She slowly became aware of Sydney's anxious face, inches from hers, breaking through the fog of pain. The tears were rolling down her face as she concentrated on the man in front of her. By sheer will, she managed to push down the terrible images that had been playing in her mind. She nodded, unable to speak. Sydney took her hand and remained silent, realizing that her battle was a private one, and prayed for Jarod's arrival with Grace's friend Jon. From what she had told him, Jon was the one person likely to be able to help her.
Grace inhaled deeply and blinked several times. She smiled wanly, squeezed his hand and released it. "Sorry about that. I let myself get lost for a minute there. What were you saying?"
Ignoring her question, he said, "It's getting worse, isn't it?"
She looked at him and nodded shortly. "I need to do a better job with the mental discipline. I guess I've gotten pretty rusty." She wiped the tear tracks away with the back of her hand and laughed shakily. "Don't let this scare you. I'll be fine, really."
Sydney was debating whether or not to tell her Jon was on his way. Jarod had said not to, in case there was some delay, but perhaps she needed to know that she would have some help with this private battle she was waging. He was about to tell her just that when the door opened. Grace turned her head and smiled. "There you are. I was just thinking about you." Sydney grunted quietly.
"Good things, I hope." Jarod had a satchel in his hand, which he put on the floor. "There's someone here who wants to see you."
"Me?" Grace was baffled. She looked briefly from Jarod to Sydney and back again. "Who?"
A grey head poked around the corner, followed by the rest of the man. Sydney and Jarod watched as Grace's face melted in pleasure and relief. Her eyes closed, and an instant later she smiled delightedly, her friend responding in kind. Opening her eyes, she moved quickly to the newcomer. They embraced fiercely, his smile as broad as hers.
"I'm here," he whispered. "Thank God," she returned.
Pulling away a little, they kept an arm about each other. "How in the world did you find me?" she asked.
"Jarod called me." Jon replied. Astonished, she turned toward Jarod. With only the slightest hint of sheepish apology, Jarod explained. "I checked your cell phone records."
Amused, Grace looked at Sydney. "And you've put up with him for how long?"
Sydney agreed. "He is... resourceful."
Grace laughed and addressed the man at her side. He was easily twenty years Sydney's senior, small, with a thin fringe of grey hair and a deeply lined-face. "You've already met Jarod. This is Sydney. Syd, Jon Carriveau." The two men shook hands.
"Grace has told me a little about you. We're glad you're here," Sydney said. He didn't have to add, she needs your help, and desperately so. Jon felt that as soon as he walked in and lightly reached out to her with his mind.
"Why don't we leave the two of you to... catch up? Jarod and I have a few errands to run." Sydney's excuse was almost laughable, but the courtesy was appreciated. Grace smiled her gratitude. Jarod reached out to touch her arm lightly, but checked himself. Grace noted the action, however, and quickly put her hand on his arm, unconsciously steeling herself. Her soft smile belied the considerable effort this took. "Thank you for bringing him," she said. He covered her hand with his for a few seconds. "You're welcome." Looking at Jon, he queried, "We'll give a call in a few hours?" Jon nodded, and steered Grace further into the room, breaking the physical contact between Grace and Jarod. Jarod and Sydney left the room as Jon and Grace settled into the couch.
Neither spoke for a moment. Jon concentrated on Grace's slowly abating turmoil. He understood immediately what was happening to her. The images she had absorbed from Jarod were becoming more and more pervasive when he was near. She was more like Angelo than she knew; rather than submerging her own personality, however, it was as though the two psyches – hers and Jarod's – were simultaneously trying to occupy the same person. Jon reached out with his mind, reestablishing the link with long-standing familiarity. Grace welcomed him easily. Years of friendship on a most-intimate level accompanied the action. It was Jon who had saved her life and her sanity, but even more importantly, he was her touchpoint with humanity. Had it not been for him, she would have long ago drowned, overwhelmed with this ability she could neither understand nor control. They conversed as they always had back when he was teaching her, letting unspoken impressions accompany the spoken word. Truth be told, unspoken communication would have more efficient and complete, but Grace rarely allowed this. She had never achieved the level of acceptance of her abilities that Jon had, toward which he had occasionally pushed her. She was stubborn and steadfast about this, though, and concentrated only on those skills which served to suppress her 'gift.'
"How bad is it?" Jon asked. Grace still would not let her guard down, but was completely honest with him. "Very. I'm losing ground. I have less control now than I did the first night. It keeps washing back over me. Nothing I can do seems to work consistently. One minute I think I'm fine, and the next..."
"Jarod walks in," Jon finished. Grace stared at him. "Think, Grace – is it worse when he's nearby, and better when he's not?"
"My God." She had not seen the connection.
"Grace – you may need to get away from him in order to get this under control."
She shook her head. "No. I need to be here right now."
"We may be talking about months, or years, to achieve the kind of separation you had before" he said as gently as he could. "Do you honestly think you can live like this?"
Grace could not deny it. "I'd lose my mind." She paused. "But Jon, I can't leave this."
Jon looked closely at her. "On the phone, you said you needed to help him for both of you."
She took a deep breath and nodded. "The people who are after him are the same ones who held me as a child."
Jon felt the wind leave him. "The Centre."
Grace had told Jon very little about the Centre, and during those years when she lived with him, he did not pry, understanding her more immediate needs for healing and some modicum of personal privacy. In the past decade or so, however, since Grace had left his house, he became increasingly concerned with finding out more about this organization. He spent years meeting one dead end after another, unable to unearth any substantial information about the Centre. When one lead finally panned out, he was appalled at his findings. His concern grew to border on obsession, and, unknown to Grace, his attempts to penetrate more and more of their secrets had led him to actually set up a contract for their services. As a test, he had them initiate the toppling of one of his own companies. Jon was astounded when a perfectly sound business crumbled within days. He could afford the financial loss and scrambled to find situations for displaced employees, but the experience gave him a healthy dose of fear when it came to the Centre's considerable influence and power. He prudently backed off, but not before he had unknowingly tagged himself for further attention from the Centre.
Grace's phone call a few days earlier had prompted his renewed investigation of them. Red flags went up at the Centre as they got wind of his inquiries. When he suddenly disappeared from England, the Centre, with its routine level of paranoia, assumed a possible danger to itself and began a search.
"The Centre," Grace replied. "Do you see why I can't leave now?"
Jon swallowed with difficulty, his throat dry. "Grace, they're dangerous."
"Very. Jon, I need to bring this under control, right now. Can you help me blank it out?"
Jon considered the options; there weren't many. The best was to take Grace and go underground, but he felt her resolve and knew she would never abandon Jarod and Sydney to their fate. Moreover, she would not be denied her role in this fight. Since she refused to distance herself from Jarod, his presence would be a constant catalyst, working against anything she might do to bar his memories from her own mind.
"That would take longer than we have," he said.
Her heart sank. "What else can we do?" she asked, swallowing the note of desperation that she felt trying to overtake her.
They slowly and carefully listed their options. Distance from this situation was the best buffer to erect, and he made it clear that this was his first choice. She understood, but maintained that it was unacceptable. The severity of her current decline made staying with the status quo a sure route to psychosis.
"I can't get away from these images. I can't deal with them like this for long. What I need is some way to lock them up, at least for now."
"You don't have those skills," he said regretfully. He knew just what she was capable of, and her refusal years ago to learn the skills that would have allowed her now to exploit her gift severely limited their options.
In the silence that followed, each desperately sought inspiration. Jon was mad at himself for not having pushed her harder to accept her ability. Perhaps if he had, she would not be in danger now. He shook himself mentally. There had to be an alternative.
"What else?" she insisted.
Jon was quiet for a moment, and then spoke slowly. "There might be another way." She waited, her breathing shallow. He knew her well, and this would be a hard sell. "It's not pretty. I do it for you."
Grace was slow to understand, and reluctantly he expanded on his word. "If you can't remove yourself from here, and you can't wall off your surroundings from your mind, we have to wall off your mind, or at least part of it, from the rest of it. If I created an oubliette for you, a place to lock these memories away, you would have a chance to learn how to deal with them, to develop your skills..."
This was definitely not what she had hoped. "What I want to do is shut it off, Jon! If Jarod's presence is triggering all this..."
"Even if you could, just shutting it off won't erase the memories of his that you already have."
"But they won't flood me like they do now, every time he's near."
"And how do you plan to suppress them?"
She had no ready answer. What she feared was coming, did. "I think," Jon said carefully, "that this is our only other choice. I need to get in."
"No. Absolutely no." She was adamant. Her head was aching now, not from fighting the images, but from the stress and the lack of sleep. This was going nowhere, and they decided that she should take advantage of the relative peace and try to rest. Jon helped her settle into a brief meditative state, and watched over her as she dropped off.
She slept deeply. Jon waited for her to awaken, using the time to scour his mind for any alternative. He saw only two: convince her by any means possible to let him do what he proposed, or to forcibly take her away. He was certain than she would welcome neither option.
*** *** *** *** ***
Grace awoke even more tired than before. He insisted she down a couple of glasses of juice. When she felt steadier, Jon spoke gently. "Grace, I understand you don't want me to see it all. I've never pried into your mind, never gone anywhere in there without your consent. This kind of self-revelation feels overwhelmingly vulnerable, defenseless."
She looked at him wearily. "You know I trust you, Jonnie, with anything that is mine. My life, my sanity. Hell, I owe you both those. As for your seeing my entire life, I could even live with that. But it's not that simple."
"Jarod's experiences," he said.
"They're not mine to show you, Jon." Her eyes pleaded for understanding.
"And you feel you have to protect them." She nodded mutely.
"Grace – what if we got Jarod's permission?"
She shook her head. "We can't do that."
"There's no other alternative."
"Then there's nothing we can do," she said with childish stubbornness. She didn't want to discuss it further. She tried to walk away, but he grabbed her arm, frustrated and angry. She was surprised. It had only been on rare occasion that she had seen him angry, and never directed at her.
"I won't let you accept this! It's a death sentence for your sanity! Your mind cannot survive this without help." As if on cue, the images once again slammed into her mind. She reeled from the force of it. Had Jon not been gripping her arm, she would have fallen over. As it was, he barely caught her and lowered her to the sofa.
"He's coming," she whispered, clawing for control. Jon's heart ached with frustration at not being able to protect her from this pain. He stayed close, raging at his impotence.
The pair walked in a few minutes later to see Grace sitting in a stupor, trying her best to disconnect from her surroundings. The old man was obviously upset, and for a brief moment Sydney and Jarod wondered if Jon hadn't somehow caused her distress, perhaps in an argument. He was collected, however, when he rose and turned to face them.
"We need your help, Jarod."
"Anything," he said.
Jon began to explain. "Grace has seen your life. Your memories dwell in her now. But it goes further than that. Your experiences, your emotions, everything you thought and felt, are all competing for her mind with her own experiences. This conflict is tearing her mind apart."
Jarod swallowed. "I am so sorry, Grace," he whispered. Then, stronger: "How can I help her?"
"No." The voice was weak but clear. All eyes turned to her. Her own were still distant, but she was returning to their presence. Sydney instinctively moved in closer, sitting next to her, picking up her hand. "Let us help you, Grace. Please," he said. She turned her head slowly toward Sydney, then back to Jon.
"Don't do this. Don't put him in this position."
Jon turned away from her, toward Jarod. Panicking, Grace struggled to stand. Sydney rose with her, supporting her unsteady frame. Jon forged ahead.
"I want to enter Grace's mind and compartmentalize your experiences – to lock them away from her consciousness. It's not ideal, and only a temporary solution at best. But to go on like this will destroy her mind."
Jarod nodded. "Why is she opposing this? Is it because she doesn't want you in her mind that – intimately?"
"She's protecting you, Jarod." Sydney's voice came from over Jon's shoulder. "She promised to keep your memories safe, to reveal them to no one."
Jarod looked from Sydney to Grace to Jon, who closed his eyes and nodded confirmation. Jarod remembered her vow that first night. At the time, his privacy so recently and completely invaded, it seemed like the most important thing in the world to him. He was certain that was exactly how she understood it. But in the face of what she now battled, how could she – or he – even think it was an issue?
He moved around Jon to face her. "Grace, it's all right," he said gently. "Let Jon help you. I release you from your promise."
She laughed brokenly. "You've got that backwards, Jarod. It's not your decision to make. I don't release me from my promise."
Jarod's eyes dropped to the floor as his mind raced. He suddenly looked back up. "All right," he said, "This decision is mine to make." He spun around to face Jon. "You can do what Grace can, telepathically?"
"I can."
"Then I want you to read my mind. I want you to see it all, everything about me."
All three of them understood. If Jarod's privacy were no longer Grace's responsibility...
"Jarod, no! Jon, you can't! Don't do this!" She was in tears, pleading. She looked wildly from one to the other. "Sydney, tell him... his privacy..." Sydney spoke softly, "He knows. It is his decision." She reached for Jarod.
"You're asking to have it all happen again. To be mentally raped. How can you ask such a thing?"
"Grace, we need you, here and whole. I trust you. And Jon. You won't hurt me." He turned back toward Jon. "I'm ready. What do we do first?"
"Wait." Grace's voice was shaky. They looked at her. "All right, Jon. You don't need to read Jarod. I'll do it." She looked at Jarod in despair. "I'm sorry I couldn't protect you."
He smiled tenderly, stooping slightly to capture her down-turned eyes. "You just did." He refrained from touching her, but whispered, "I owe you a hug."
She drew a quavering breath. "Jon, show him. Please." Jon understood. He explained to the others. "She wants me to show Jarod that he can trust me with what I will see."
"You don't have to..." Jarod began.
"Yes, he does," she said, her voice drained. "I need him to do this. I need you to know."
Jarod looked to Sydney. His mentor closed his eyes and nodded. Jarod smiled and said, "What do I do?"
*** *** *** *** ***
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