Chapter 14: What Light Thoughts?

Remember Milla talking about light thoughts make you levitate better? What real emotions does Sasha have right now? Besides his feelings having to do with Milla, of course.

So now there's a scandal with Clavd, Sasha's a levitator, and… yeah. I wonder why they'd have to teach levitation. Quote: Everyone knew that doors were only a formality.

He had, of course, missed Milla. He had gone for at least two months without her, and now he was taking levitation. Most of the time he just sat near the ceiling and thought about his girlfriend. She had, of course, send him letters, and he had done likewise, but he doubted that, with all of the things that she had written about having to do in the two months, she even had enough time to get a decent amount of sleep. He knew that she would read them eventually.

One day, he was sitting on the ceiling, as always, when someone came into the room.

"Psycadet Nein! Your presence is requested in the main office!"

He sighed – what had he done wrong? – and headed for the main office, where students registered, saw visitors, all that stuff.

As he entered the office – this being an "as," not a "right after" – Milla hugged him.

"Oh, darling, I'm so glad to see you again, it was so bad not having you there all the time!"

He was fairly sure that he saw the lady at the desk smirking at them.

"I missed you, too, Milla, but… you pulled me out of training. You could get in trouble for that."

"I don't care, darling, I'm just so glad to be back!" She squeezed him harder and he was aware that if she were to squeeze him any harder, his arms, shirt, and jacket might melt together.

"Did you think about me, darling?"

"Yeah, I sit on the ceiling every day. Everyone thinks I'm weird."

"Psychics are weird, darling. I'm just so glad to be back here again!" She finally released him.

As they walked back to the levitation class, she talked almost nonstop – they had a lot to catch up on.

"I heard there was a big scandal with the telepathy teacher."

"Yeah, he thought I was cheating, and he tried to get all of the teachers to keep me from passing."

"My senior, Mayasa, kept calling it 'Clavdgate.' Do you know what that means, darling?"

"There was a big scandal in America a long time ago called 'Watergate.' I think Agent Mayasa was referring to that."

"Oh." She smiled at the joke. "Sasha, darling, what would you say if I told you that I want you to be my partner once you're a Psychonaut?"

"That would be… fun. It could be distracting, though."

"Who cares, darling?" At this point, they were floating to the only entrance to the Levitation room: a window that was as close as it could be to the ceiling.

"The government, for one."

"Well… Oh, and I'm called the Mental Minx now. Just wanted you to know, darling."

She kissed him on the cheek, hugged him, and left him to think about their conversation for the rest of the class.

As he left, of course, there she was. They went to the atrium in the middle of the headquarters. They discussed how they had come to the academy. Baisically, that meant how they had discovered their skills.

"Well, I read a lot when I was young. Picture books and things, you know, darling? Sometimes, I'd levitate and act out the stories. Once, my parents saw me doing it. I didn't think it was odd. I thought it was normal. I was only five, Sasha. I got shipped off to a boarding school when I was five, Sasha!"

For a moment, he thought she was going to cry again, but she didn't. She was a survivor. He respected that.

He was pulled out of his thoughts by her musical voice.

"How did they discover you, Sasha?"

"They didn't. I did. I was ten. My father was fixing dinner, and he was thinking about my mom and… well… they were strong emotions. I ran away because I was afraid of him. I'm pretty sure that my sister is the German equivalent of a Psychonaut now. We got it from our mother. I never knew her. She died when I was young."

"Oh… I feel kind of selfish now. At least I had a childhood."

"I did. Then it stopped."

"Yes, Sasha, but childhoods aren't supposed to end with you being an adult. They're supposed to end with you in puberty."

"I had a puberty. My voice is deeper than a ten-year-old's, right?"

"An emotional puberty, Sasha!" She was laughing at him. He could tell from her tone and her smile.

"I did. It was just faster that usual."

sigh "You just don't get it, darling."

"I do, put I'm fooling with you."

"You have a complete sense of humor, too? I never knew!"

She squeezed him for a second.

He sighed. He was just trying to make her happy for the short amount of time that she was back.

Apparently, she didn't want to talk about her past any more than she just had, because she changed the subject right then.

"So, darling, have you seen Alicia or Esphere since I left?"

"No. I only knew them because I knew you. I don't really talk to them much anymore."

"Well, I e-mailed them while I was coming back, and… do you have and e-mail address, darling?"

"No."

"Oh. Well, anyway, darling, when I got back, we had a little party. We listened to the cricket tapes that I left them when I became a psychonaut, and meditated around the sand garden, then we had smoothies. It was so fun!" She smiled that sunbeam smile at him. It made butterflies flit around his cube until he shoved them back in.

"It sounds like something that you would enjoy."

"Yeah, it was." She kissed him on the cheek for the second time that day. He smiled, a half-smile that fit his usual attitude. She had so many different sides… if a circle was 360 degrees, then no wonder there were so many rounded areas in her mind. He didn't want to figure out how many degrees that made.

"Glad you think I'm so original, darling."

"Oh, uh, yeah. I've never met a spiritual person with such a, uh, bright personality."

She smiled again. "Thank you."

See? I told you she wouldn't be an assistant. She goes away the next day, though. It sux for both of them, especially since Sasha's taking levitation courses now. The Mental Minx levitates everywhere.

And the thing about her discovering her power isn't in the game. I haven't even finished it yet, which is why the Meat Circus sux heckuva lot. I can't even get past the first part, where you chuck the bunnies off the slabs of meat. I can't get onto the slab above the spinning thingy.