~EstE: A Beginning~
****present****
A young woman slapped down a five-dollar bill on the counter. She didn't bother waiting for the cash register operator to come up with change--she darted out to her car with a bag of chips and a Diet soda in hand. As soon as she got in, she revved the engine and took off, nervous sweat causing her make-up to run.
She was scared, damn, she was scared. The full impact of everything that had happened hadn't hit her yet, but she knew it would. Soon. Very soon. And would she be able to take that?
The soft snores of the seven year old boy in the passenger seat drifted within her hearing. The knees of his jeans were dirty, and his black hair (the same color as his father's) was oily from lack of wash. There had been no time for baths in the past few days.
Rebecca Crawford kept her hands firmly at ten and two 'o'clock as she sped down the Interstate.
****eight years before****
It had been a cool day in February that the experiment had taken place. James Crawford, in his Senior year of college, about to graduate sixty- sixth in a class of four hundred and twenty four, needed money. Badly. His financial situation was anything but good. He had been planning to go into his father's furniture business, but had abandoned that idea three years before in favor of architecture.
His father had been decidedly opposed.
"Fine, if you really want to abandon your family, that's fine by me," Gerald Crawford had said hotly.
"Dad, I'm not 'abandoning' the family. I'm simply going into a new venture."
"New venture my ass. Make your own money from now on."
That had been the worst blow to James; without his father's money, he had to get a part-time job to pay his college tuition. He worked afternoons and Saturdays in a fast food restaurant on Seller Avenue. But free money was always welcome.
His roommate, Bobby Dillan, had recommended James to the experiment.
"It's really safe," he'd assured James, who had been writing an essay at the time. "Three hundred bucks just for taking a fucking survey and letting them test a harmless chemical on you..."
"Then why aren't you doing it?"
"I have a game that weekend," Bobby had replied. Bobby was a member of the campus soccer team. Triton University was really very remarkable, sports- wise; it had a basketball team that won every game and a soccer team that lost every game.
James thought it was too good a deal to pass up. He filled out a registration form and was told to go to the science lab that Sunday.
The receptionist at the desk outside the lab raised an eyebrow at James, popping her gum.
"Kid. You even know what this is all about?"
"No," he answered truthfully.
The lady grinned and crossed her legs. He noted there was a run in her hose. "Guess you'll figure it out soon enough, eh?"
He shrugged. He didn't particularly care what the experiment was for, as long as he got the three hundred bucks.
The professor conducting the tests was tall, thin, with bushy eyebrows. His cold gaze unnerved James, who sat in a desk beside a pretty girl with bushy red hair. There were maybe sixty students crammed into the room, most of whom James didn't recognize. The girl with the red hair was anxiously tapping a pencil on the scratched wood of the desk.
"They're going to stick us with needles," she said softly. "I hate needles..."
"But you need the money, right?" James said. She nodded. He smiled. "Yeah, me too."
The professor called for quiet. His name was Borgan or Barton or something like that. Assistants handed out paper with small printed words on them. Surveys. "Please use a number two pencil," the professor said.
The questions were weird, but James answered them all. 'Have you ever had a psychic experience before...did you ever know about things before they happened...have you ever heard someone else's thoughts...well, not that I know of.' He answered no.
The surveys were taken up and all of the students were dismissed. A week later, James received a letter asking him to return to the Lab. He thought of it as the Lab now, with a capital 'L'.
Professor B. (James wasn't blessed with the gift to remember names) was standing calmly by the entrance in uniform white. The red-headed girl who he'd spoken to during the survey was there, too. She smiled at him and said, "Only a few of us passed. Me and you, too, I guess."
She was cute, in her short skirt and blue sweater. He felt terribly self conscious, hoping she wouldn't notice the pimple on his forehead that he'd struggled to cover with his unruly black hair that morning. He hated acne. He let her go in ahead of him. She said her name was Rebecca Hamand. What was his?
Abruptly, she clapped a hand to her mouth.
"I'm James...James...Craw...ford..." He gaped in astonishment at the Lab. White, so much white. A man dressed in white (a GA, he assumed) clapped a hand on James' shoulder and led him to a narrow cot. 'Like a hospital...IVs and needles and people in white...'
The students, all thirteen of them (fifteen including Rebecca Hamand and him) were laid out on other cots. The one James was situated on was hard against his spine and he shifted uncomfortably.
Was all of this really worth three hundred dollars? 'No turning back, now...'
Rebecca was next to him, her face as pale as the makeshift bed she was on, as pale as the coat of the man who loomed over her.
Professor B. entered and came to a standstill in the center of it all. His smile was chilly. "Welcome. You are about to be injected with SIA, a completely harmless chemical, with effects much like the positive ones of recreational drugs.. You may hallucinate, see strange things. Do not be frightened. You are in a scientific environment, and perfectly safe."
The GA hovering over James wrapped a rubber flex around the boy's upper arm and said, "Make a fist." A vein popped up clearly against James' tanned skin. The GA grinned frostily. He picked up a shot needle filled with a clear fluid.
"This won't hurt a bit..."
****present****
She could see them. Men in gray suits, Lab men. How she longed for the charcoal pigment of their clothing to change to dove white! white was the color she associated with many things. The room where she'd been injected with SIA. Her dress on the day she'd married James Crawford. The emptiness in her mind when she wasn't using It. It could be very bad, especially now.
There was a reason she always wore gloves. Powerful clairvoyants had to wear gloves, unless they wanted to pick up images from every object they touched.
It. She sometimes hated It.
White was, most of all, the color of the uniforms that the people of EstE wore. So far away. The EstE base was in Austria, right at the heart of its training facility, Rosenkreuz.
She had no money, and the Lab men were after Rebecca and her son. 'Little Bradley,' she thought as she turned into a rest area, guzzling down the Diet Coke. 'We'll survive this. We'll find a way.'
****eight years before****
James felt...funny. Colors were bleeding into each other, and he thought he might be sick. So much...his thoughts wouldn't seem to focus. Hey, a table just floated across the room. And that was fine.
He was hot, he was ohhhh, so hot. He asked for water but not with his lips and a voice answered in his head, calling, /James?/
'Who are you? Why can I hear you?'
/It's Rebecca...I'm so confused./
'You're talking to me. But I'm looking right at you. Your lips are still.'
/Yes. Strange. Look. That boy is weeping./
James stared as a boy across the room rocked back and forth, clutching his head, crying. Why was he crying? Too hot in here.
"James." Hands cool against his forehead. GA gazed down at him. Studied him. "I see. Professor. We have pyrokinesis over here."
'Pyro-whatsit?' Something was growing in him, and he had to let it go, had to get rid of it. Thumping began in his head, behind his eyeballs.
Professor B. The man was standing in a way that he blocked everything else.
"Interesting. Bring me a match."
'Hot...hot...hot...'
The GA brought one, and the red stood out in James' mind's eye. The weeping boy's cries increased; someone screamed.
Professor B. held the match before James, said, "Light this."
James made a grab for the match, but it was pulled away.
"No, no, no, with that heat INSIDE of you."
'In...side?'
So...hot...
The match burst into flame. James watched it, trying to catch his mind up to what had occurred. Fire. It wasn't hot anymore.
"Yes, definitely pyrokinesis. Be sure to have plenty of water at hand," and then Professor B. walked away. James grinned sleepily and slowly fell into unconsciousness...
****present****
A young woman slapped down a five-dollar bill on the counter. She didn't bother waiting for the cash register operator to come up with change--she darted out to her car with a bag of chips and a Diet soda in hand. As soon as she got in, she revved the engine and took off, nervous sweat causing her make-up to run.
She was scared, damn, she was scared. The full impact of everything that had happened hadn't hit her yet, but she knew it would. Soon. Very soon. And would she be able to take that?
The soft snores of the seven year old boy in the passenger seat drifted within her hearing. The knees of his jeans were dirty, and his black hair (the same color as his father's) was oily from lack of wash. There had been no time for baths in the past few days.
Rebecca Crawford kept her hands firmly at ten and two 'o'clock as she sped down the Interstate.
****eight years before****
It had been a cool day in February that the experiment had taken place. James Crawford, in his Senior year of college, about to graduate sixty- sixth in a class of four hundred and twenty four, needed money. Badly. His financial situation was anything but good. He had been planning to go into his father's furniture business, but had abandoned that idea three years before in favor of architecture.
His father had been decidedly opposed.
"Fine, if you really want to abandon your family, that's fine by me," Gerald Crawford had said hotly.
"Dad, I'm not 'abandoning' the family. I'm simply going into a new venture."
"New venture my ass. Make your own money from now on."
That had been the worst blow to James; without his father's money, he had to get a part-time job to pay his college tuition. He worked afternoons and Saturdays in a fast food restaurant on Seller Avenue. But free money was always welcome.
His roommate, Bobby Dillan, had recommended James to the experiment.
"It's really safe," he'd assured James, who had been writing an essay at the time. "Three hundred bucks just for taking a fucking survey and letting them test a harmless chemical on you..."
"Then why aren't you doing it?"
"I have a game that weekend," Bobby had replied. Bobby was a member of the campus soccer team. Triton University was really very remarkable, sports- wise; it had a basketball team that won every game and a soccer team that lost every game.
James thought it was too good a deal to pass up. He filled out a registration form and was told to go to the science lab that Sunday.
The receptionist at the desk outside the lab raised an eyebrow at James, popping her gum.
"Kid. You even know what this is all about?"
"No," he answered truthfully.
The lady grinned and crossed her legs. He noted there was a run in her hose. "Guess you'll figure it out soon enough, eh?"
He shrugged. He didn't particularly care what the experiment was for, as long as he got the three hundred bucks.
The professor conducting the tests was tall, thin, with bushy eyebrows. His cold gaze unnerved James, who sat in a desk beside a pretty girl with bushy red hair. There were maybe sixty students crammed into the room, most of whom James didn't recognize. The girl with the red hair was anxiously tapping a pencil on the scratched wood of the desk.
"They're going to stick us with needles," she said softly. "I hate needles..."
"But you need the money, right?" James said. She nodded. He smiled. "Yeah, me too."
The professor called for quiet. His name was Borgan or Barton or something like that. Assistants handed out paper with small printed words on them. Surveys. "Please use a number two pencil," the professor said.
The questions were weird, but James answered them all. 'Have you ever had a psychic experience before...did you ever know about things before they happened...have you ever heard someone else's thoughts...well, not that I know of.' He answered no.
The surveys were taken up and all of the students were dismissed. A week later, James received a letter asking him to return to the Lab. He thought of it as the Lab now, with a capital 'L'.
Professor B. (James wasn't blessed with the gift to remember names) was standing calmly by the entrance in uniform white. The red-headed girl who he'd spoken to during the survey was there, too. She smiled at him and said, "Only a few of us passed. Me and you, too, I guess."
She was cute, in her short skirt and blue sweater. He felt terribly self conscious, hoping she wouldn't notice the pimple on his forehead that he'd struggled to cover with his unruly black hair that morning. He hated acne. He let her go in ahead of him. She said her name was Rebecca Hamand. What was his?
Abruptly, she clapped a hand to her mouth.
"I'm James...James...Craw...ford..." He gaped in astonishment at the Lab. White, so much white. A man dressed in white (a GA, he assumed) clapped a hand on James' shoulder and led him to a narrow cot. 'Like a hospital...IVs and needles and people in white...'
The students, all thirteen of them (fifteen including Rebecca Hamand and him) were laid out on other cots. The one James was situated on was hard against his spine and he shifted uncomfortably.
Was all of this really worth three hundred dollars? 'No turning back, now...'
Rebecca was next to him, her face as pale as the makeshift bed she was on, as pale as the coat of the man who loomed over her.
Professor B. entered and came to a standstill in the center of it all. His smile was chilly. "Welcome. You are about to be injected with SIA, a completely harmless chemical, with effects much like the positive ones of recreational drugs.. You may hallucinate, see strange things. Do not be frightened. You are in a scientific environment, and perfectly safe."
The GA hovering over James wrapped a rubber flex around the boy's upper arm and said, "Make a fist." A vein popped up clearly against James' tanned skin. The GA grinned frostily. He picked up a shot needle filled with a clear fluid.
"This won't hurt a bit..."
****present****
She could see them. Men in gray suits, Lab men. How she longed for the charcoal pigment of their clothing to change to dove white! white was the color she associated with many things. The room where she'd been injected with SIA. Her dress on the day she'd married James Crawford. The emptiness in her mind when she wasn't using It. It could be very bad, especially now.
There was a reason she always wore gloves. Powerful clairvoyants had to wear gloves, unless they wanted to pick up images from every object they touched.
It. She sometimes hated It.
White was, most of all, the color of the uniforms that the people of EstE wore. So far away. The EstE base was in Austria, right at the heart of its training facility, Rosenkreuz.
She had no money, and the Lab men were after Rebecca and her son. 'Little Bradley,' she thought as she turned into a rest area, guzzling down the Diet Coke. 'We'll survive this. We'll find a way.'
****eight years before****
James felt...funny. Colors were bleeding into each other, and he thought he might be sick. So much...his thoughts wouldn't seem to focus. Hey, a table just floated across the room. And that was fine.
He was hot, he was ohhhh, so hot. He asked for water but not with his lips and a voice answered in his head, calling, /James?/
'Who are you? Why can I hear you?'
/It's Rebecca...I'm so confused./
'You're talking to me. But I'm looking right at you. Your lips are still.'
/Yes. Strange. Look. That boy is weeping./
James stared as a boy across the room rocked back and forth, clutching his head, crying. Why was he crying? Too hot in here.
"James." Hands cool against his forehead. GA gazed down at him. Studied him. "I see. Professor. We have pyrokinesis over here."
'Pyro-whatsit?' Something was growing in him, and he had to let it go, had to get rid of it. Thumping began in his head, behind his eyeballs.
Professor B. The man was standing in a way that he blocked everything else.
"Interesting. Bring me a match."
'Hot...hot...hot...'
The GA brought one, and the red stood out in James' mind's eye. The weeping boy's cries increased; someone screamed.
Professor B. held the match before James, said, "Light this."
James made a grab for the match, but it was pulled away.
"No, no, no, with that heat INSIDE of you."
'In...side?'
So...hot...
The match burst into flame. James watched it, trying to catch his mind up to what had occurred. Fire. It wasn't hot anymore.
"Yes, definitely pyrokinesis. Be sure to have plenty of water at hand," and then Professor B. walked away. James grinned sleepily and slowly fell into unconsciousness...