Timebomb Central

Chapter 7: Hope

Thank you to Roon and the others at TER for the support.

The cab pulled up a few blocks from the wire mesh fence. She wasn't stupid. No need to put unnecessary suspicion in the mind of the driver...or any of the naive people that still haunted the perimeter yelling hateful words. It was time to return, to go to back to those like her. She'd turned her back on them before. Set out for a new life, an ordinary life. That hadn't worked out. Instead she had been staying mobile, keeping her head low and not attracting attention. Manticore hadn't made it easy with their brand mark in such an obvious place. Yet, she had kept off the radar, apart from a few small incidence that she had been able to neutralize. Now she was back to try and set right some of the wrongs she had been a part of. This was what she had been created to do. It gave her a sense of purpose, something she had been sorely missing since the incineration of her home.

As she approached an area that seemed deserted, she made one last furtive look around. Slipping through a carefully concealed joint in the fence, she moved through the darkness effortlessly. She sensed she had company well before they chose to make their presence known. Not knowing what the response would be to her presence, she let them initiate contact.

Hope. That was her bargaining chip with these people. For once in her life, she feared what they were. She knew what they were capable of, and in desperate times a caged animal could be unpredictable. The pain and confusion that consumed the Terminal City inhabitants was like a tangible thing. It created a cloud of darkness in her mind that she had to forcibly push back. Desperate was what these people certainly were. Squaring her shoulders, she followed the two large X5s that had intercepted her. Her barcode had given her entry, now she needed to have her logical reasoning to get them to let her help.

Angel looked down at the heavily sedated woman and felt her last shreds of hope vanishing. Even with the patterns Dix had identified, she couldn't see what was the cause. The overcrowded wards were filled with others, like Max. They too were sedated and confined. Those unaffected had a haunted look, not sure whether they too would become inflicted. Manticore had made them feel immortal, this was just bringing home their vulnerability.

In some ways it had been better when Max was away on the trail of information. At least then there had been flickering hope that she might unearth the answers they needed. They had gone through Max's things and come up with little to indicate she had been successful. There seemed to be no further clues from the death of Sam than there had been with the ones that had occurred on their own turf. Terminal City had sort of created its own quarantine. Yet, the fact that those outside of its gates had been effected tended to suggest something else entirely.

The feeling of helpless that she tried to restrain on a daily basis was beginning to rise again. Angel looked around the room at the enforced comatose patients she was responsible for. Could she ever find a way to restore their minds to peace? It was the soft knocking at the door that interrupted the doctors train of thought. Turning she noticed a small woman with unusual eyes looking past her to the restrained figure of Max. The look of anguish and guilt on the woman's face made Angel suddenly curious as to who she was.

"Can I help you?" Her question brought the other woman's focus away from Max.

"I was hoping in fact that I could help you."

The calm assurance, the slight inflection in her voice, the pacifying tone made Angel step back. She'd heard that before, been subjected to it in Manticore more than once. This woman was a product of psy-ops. Trained to get past the defenses and destroy from within. In TC they were one type of transgen that was absent, not being popular amongst the others was most probably an important reason, given the torture they had dished out. Careful to keep her thoughts shielded she moved towards the door and ushered the woman along the corridor to her office. She needed to know how this thing believed she could help.

Once seated in the office, Mia began relaying to the doctor what she knew of the situation. She acknowledged the doctor's suspicions, took responsibility for her actions. Her interpretation of the deaths left Angel nodding sagely. It was the sort of cruel thing that she should of expected from her creators. The idea of them being created as a toy that was exclusively for use by its manufacturers wasn't a surprise, really. The fact that they had been booby-trapped was the ingenious sort of thing that left no visible mark and created no obvious pattern. No wonder they hadn't been able to find any evidence. Dix had definitely been on to something but they would never had grasped the true meaning in time.

Mia's eyes showed a level of remorse that startled the doctor. Psy Ops personnel weren't known for their compassion or for their guilt. What she proposed seem risky but given the alternatives seemed worth taking a chance. Even if they could get one success it would provide hope for all those not affected...and prove that it wasn't something more sinister. Manticore, even after it had been brought to its knees appeared to be having the last laugh on them all.

The fact that it would only be confined to a select group was somewhat of a relief. Not much, given that it still meant a large portion of their population was at risk, but at least they knew ahead of time who was likely to be effected. Mia believed the final trigger that had sped up the progress was probably the mutagens in T.C. effecting their brain chemicals. Even Sam had been exposed to them as well. Time would have lead to the same conclusion but the toxic waste had just hastened its onslaught. It was all falling into place, a not very nice place, but it was making a sort of sinister sense.

A meeting between those still left in charge was adjourned. They crowded around the table and stared at the small woman who was largely a stranger among them. Mia could feel the hostility mingled with hope. She had carefully avoided using her telecoercion since she had been in T.C. out of respect for their trust. Once again she told them what she knew and how she hoped to attempt to put right some the wrongs she had been a part of. They were willing to let her try and access the passwords, to see if she could reverse the effects. In the end they chose Alec as her first. Mainly cause Mia knew the mind of her subject more than others. He also was the longest suffering of those in the infirmary, longest surviving effected member of the community. He was also Alec.

Mole, Joshua and half of T.C. wanted to be there to see her work. She restricted the number of people present because she didn't want to be distracted by their thoughts. Only the two transhumans and Angel were allowed to stand vigil while she probed the mind of the man strapped to the bed. His medication had been gradually reduced until now he lay thrashing in obvious agony, before them. Mia worked fast. She could see the blood starting to ooze from where his constraints were cutting into his sweaty bare skin. Blocking out the image, she focused on entering his mind.

The darkness startled her. As did the horror filled images that confronted her.

She moved cautiously from passage to passage. Her destination was clear in her thoughts but she knew that a rogue mind, riddled with traps could draw her down if she wasn't careful.

It was dangerous work, but she was willing to risk it.

The knife that sliced through the darkness, barely scraped her as her mental agility let her move out of its path at the last minute. She had felt a slight tingling as it drew blood. Fear was in her mind, but she pushed it back and concentrated on Alec's internal confusion.

The corridors were getting tighter, the walls and floors converging until she was forced to crawl forward.

The sounds of wailing filled her ears but she ignored them. They were there to distract her, to make her focus on other than her goal, they were figments implanted in Alec's imagination to scare away intruders such as herself. To anyone trained by Psy-Ops, this was a normal day at the office. However, it had been a while since this part of her talents had been put to use and she was feeling the strain.

Manticore had been thorough with Alec. Obviously they had seen him as more valuable than most. She pushed past the barriers, clicking it into place like a puzzle, she knew what she was doing. The idea of implanting active operatives with a self-destruction code has been long carried out but seldom had it ever come to a situation where they would be activated. The fact that the destruction of Manticore had been unplanned was the only reason it was occurring now.

The little door was barely large enough for her to squeeze through.

She couldn't see in here. The darkness was heavy and foreboding but she knew she was in the right place. Placing her hands on the ground she felt around. The sensation of crawling didn't put her off, she knew it was only an illusion. So was the crackle of insect bodies under her knees and she shifted forward to explore more of the space. The solid box her hands encountered was what she had been looking for. The heavy lock that held it tight required extreme concentration. On the edges of her conscious she could feel hands propping up her physical body which was collapsing under the strain. As the lock fell away she lifted the lid.

As the box lid opened a whispered word released itself and echoed faintly through the walls.

The rippling effect was like a sonic boom. The tiny room began to expand into a great light filled hall. Mia nodded her head in satisfaction and began to extract herself from Alec's head as gently as she could. She found herself in a chair beside the bed. The hand of the doctor held her upright. She smiled wanly at Angel, and nodded her success.

Alec felt the room swim into focus. It wasn't the room he remembered. The faces that surrounded him were friends...but the gaunt tense looks on their faces showed time and a hell of a lot of pain had passed since he had last set sane eyes on them.

Joshua enveloped the thin man in his big arms and hugged tightly. It wasn't till Alec started gasping for air that he released his tight grip, a little. Mole moved over and clapped a hand warmly on the shoulder of his leader. Not a demonstrative lizard he was visibly overwhelmed by the sight of Alec, back from the edge of insanity. The warmth of the reunion was shattered when Alec realised that someone was absent. He looked around the room hoping to see her but...

"Where's Max?" His question was met with closed looks on the faces of his friends. He looked to Angel who had a look on her face that told him where his partner was.

"I need to see her." As he attempted to move from the bed his restraints stilled his movements. He looked down at them in confusion until he saw the torn skin and bloody sheets. A dawning look of horror replaced the confusion as the others moved to unbind him. His body was too weak to hold him initially, Joshua held him up as they moved through the hospital corridor to the room Max was in. Even passing so many others obviously in the same mental place he had been, he was unprepared for the sight of her strapped down and doped up.

Attempting to free Max was the first thing Alec insisted on once he had grasp of the situation. In truth, Mia should have a greater grasp on Max's mind than his even. He hated seeing her like this. The sheen of sweat that coated her olive skin was unnerving.

Mia asked for a little time to prepare herself before she attempted to work on Max. It was a form of mental combat that she needed to be ready to take on. To do it twice in one day under these sorts of circumstances would be tricky enough. The dark circles under her eyes showed how great a strain the task of unlocking Alec's mind had been. His gratitude had been forthcoming, he bore the woman no ill will. They had all had their place in Manticore and not everything they had been expected to do had been pretty. When she indicated that she was ready to try again he was the first to step forward and offer her assistance to rise from her chair.

Max's meds had been reduced until her semiconscious ranting and constant body thrashing showed the pain she was in. The thin limbs pulled at the leather binding, and he held her down trying to prevent her causing the damage he had to himself. The marks on his torso and limbs would take a while to heal. The pain from the wounds was less than the anguish at the how far this had all progressed since his spiraling descent into craziness. He whispered quiet assurances to her. He was proof that they could beat this thing, Mia had provided them with hope.

This time sitting on the edge of the bed, Mia took hold of Max's face in both hands. She entered into the girl's mind carefully. She tried to enter a corridor to find a door slammed in her face. She pulled back out and looked at Max in surprise. Still Max lay, her mind a whirling mist of fear and paranoia. Mia tried again. Prodding into sections that were cloaked, peeking into sections that were claustrophobic. This woman was so different to the minds she was used to from Manticore. It contained pain, suffering and so many layers of confusion that it was like a hall of mirrors, each distorting the image till it was hard to make out what was . She reeled back after a while. Pulling her own mind back into order before turning to the hopeful faces that surrounded her. She couldn't quite meet their eyes. Alec moved forward and forced her to focus.

"Have you released her?"

The shaking of her head caused his shoulders to slump.

"I couldn't get a grasp on her mind. It's like a maze." She tried to clarify what she meant. "Some of it is 'cause of her different upbringing. She isn't ordered in her thoughts like we were all taught to be. Instead she has created safety barriers."

She seemed lost in thought for a moment. "Her mind-lock, I think was the work of someone more powerful. I can ease some of her pain. Create something so you don't need to sedate her so much. But we are going to need to find a true telepath. I'm sorry." Mia was truly crestfallen and Alec let his hands fall from the white knuckled grip he held on her arms. To her credit, she didn't flinch or complain at his rough treatment, even when it was clear he was going to leave bruises marring the skin.

Alec moved forward to the bedside and brushed some loose strands back away from Max's face. She seemed so peaceful. Angel had readministered the sedative and unconsciousness had once again claimed her. There was no sign on her face of the turmoil going on in her mind.

"Do what you can for her. Then we'll need leads." He turned to Dix who sprung to his feet and was ready for action. "Find out anything that would suggest a telepath from Manticore. Put out feelers...surely someone knows someone who knows the whereabouts of more psyops personnel." Dix nodded and turned to leave. "Do it fast!"

As his bike moved through the gates and into the world, Alec felt a chill of fear. Mia's arms around his waist gave him some hope. He could feel her in his mind, trying to bolster him. Even though he had been lying asleep for weeks now, he felt exhausted. Dix had some slight leads. Mia had managed to release the rest of those afflicted. She had even managed to spot a few who were just starting to show telltale signs. They needed to get in contact with others who might be walking timebombs, to get them to T.C. before things got out of hand. Angel was to keep them there in mental stasis, like Max, until they got back. Max had been under for about two weeks, nearly as long as Alec had been, but her mind was showing signs of degradation. Mia was being very quiet about it, but the worry she had shown and the whispered conversations she had been having with Angel lead Alec to believe that things were getting progressively worse.

Everyone was working flat out in HQ to get more information. The level of constant fear had died down but now they had to try and save Max before it was too late. Now it was a race against the clock. The bike moved swiftly out into the night in search of Max's salvation.

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