We each knew what we had to do. In close proximity to me, I was able to sneak a little energy to probe him. He was Mr. Maple’s first cousin. Then he seemed to sense someone trying to read him and he went blank. He looked slowly from face to face. He must have some powers too and was assessing us. We were all shut down tightly as I had passed that onto the others. He nodded his head slowly with a sly grin on his face and said, “Ok, very well then. You are ours now.” We had all stood there impassively, not having said a word.
As soon as six of them put their weapons down and reached on their hips to get what looked like wrist and leg cuffs, we each leaned forward and forced the energy we had collected right back down the beams back to each person who still held a weapon on us. Each of them simply vanished without sound. A slight drift of dust slowly collected where each person had stood wafting with the breeze in our direction. Not even their laser weapons survived.
Gooch, and the six remaining Outlaws took a moment to register that something was very wrong. He partly turned around to look back, I suppose when it dawned on him that there were no laser lights playing on our faces. The color drained from his face. The six others whose job it was to have secured us, made a move to reach for their weapons, but froze. I guess they realized what their fate would be. Twenty four of their colleagues were gone, vaporized instantaneously, without a sound. Slowly all seven of them reached for the sky, hands held high in surrender.
We reached out collectively and levitated their weapons off their shoulders and turned them around mid air to point at them. They kneeled as a unit in front of us. Cherese was the one who addressed them.
She said, “You will come with us. Get up. Walk in front of us. We are going toward the gate.”
Very reluctantly they did as commanded. Gooch looked absolutely crestfallen, but he shambled along with that painful looking gait of his. We were very alert to any tricks they may try as well as to possibly hidden members of their group.
We could hear the vishes beyond the sinkhole just behind us and kept a wary eye in that direction, but they did not seem game to crossing along the thin ledge available between the chasm and the rock wall. Somehow the Outlaws had set up a brilliant plan to capture us. I kept trying to interrogate Gooch and his six remaining henchmen. He was distressed and filled with a terrible foreboding as he must be contemplating his fate. We mined him as much as we could while his defenses were down and I stockpiled his information. I am certain that Securinet would be able to use the data. Clearly in my case, he had been able to glean information about me from that Waple fellow I realized. He was a Modern and was a student like us at one point and he knew Choka and Jongi.
We rounded a bend in the path and there was the second gate that we were told to expect. Standing in front of it was Jongi, arms crossed. She was a diminutive little figure but as we grew closer, we could feel her power. We moved the laser weapons so that they pointed at our prisoners from the sides of the gravel pathway. She said with a strong voice for someone so old, “Welcome Gooch, we see that you’ve finally met your match. You have a lot to account for.” Gooch looked like a man facing the executioner’s axe. He looked totally defeated.
Two men came out of the foliage on the side of the gate as Gooch and his men approached Jongi’s position and flung something at him and his men so quickly that the movement was barely discernible. All of a sudden they each had what looked like shackles connecting their ankles together. They then gestured for them to put their hands behind their backs and those were shackled in the blink of an eye too it seemed. They were then instructed to shuffle forward. The shackles were over their grungy looking socks into which their baggy trousers seemed to have been stuffed. They all were wearing brownish baggy trousers with dull grey colored tops that were full of pockets and pouches, undoubtably filled with weapons and likely food. The two men with Jongi walked up to each of them and collected all of the contents of their jackets and pants. It was incredible how much stuff they each carried. After a thorough search, a open-bed transport appeared beyond the gate which was opened with a groan; they were chained in and driven off. That was our first morning of our first day here!
Jongi turned around and indicated we should follow her. The gate closed behind us and a second transport appeared and we climbed in. Jongi was in the front passenger seat next to the driver. Once we were all in, she turned around and looked at each of us. She said, “Good job, well done. You all have grown together so well. To be honest, you all have exceeded expectations. We will take you to the lodge now. You will need to rest your minds and bodies, refresh yourselves and we will debrief you at 6 pm. So you have at least six hours to do so. We will send someone to rouse you at 5pm. You all have accomplished so much by capturing Gooch and his closest men. Securinet has come close several times but was unable to do that for the last eighteen years. So thank you all.”
I told her what Gooch had said, that there were cloaked transports somewhere around on which we would have been spirited out.
She said, “Yes we have already located those, detained their pilots and guards. Thank you.”
At the lodge we were shown to our rooms each with its own shower and fully stocked with clean bedding. We thought to each other, “ No bunking under the stars on bedrolls tonight.”
There was a small but delicious lunch set out for the six of us too by the time we had freshened up. We ploughing in like people who hadn’t seen food for a week. I suppose that in the three hours since being dropped off by my Dad, we had used up such a prodigious amount of physical and psychic energy that we truly needed that nourishment.
Despite the fact that we seemed to be in a safe hideaway, we each felt it imperative to keep up a perimeter scan going. We could not bring ourselves to totally relax. The immersion had imparted a healthy instinctive distrust of complacency. If not for our preparedness, we would not have made it here. A lady in a white coat with a Doctor’s bag came walking down to our lodge from a transport and we monitored her closely.
She said, “Jongi seemed to think that one of you might need a medical checkup.”
“How did she know that? We had not told her.” We were thinking. We pointed to Dillion and she went to him. He lifted up his injured leg and she brought a three legged stool and he put his leg on it. She “tutted” a few times when he told her that a Vish scratched him. She seemed very pleased that the wound was properly cleaned and bandaged. She recleaned it and replaced the dressing and just said, “You are very lucky to be alive really.” She did not seem surprised to hear that vishes attacked us on this planet of Toigan.
We all ended up showering after the lunch and getting a nap. We may not have on our own, but Jongi came by just as we were finishing our meal to inform us that there will be four guards assigned to our section of the lodge. We were told to go lay down and take a good nap. We realized how drained we were and gladly complied.
Upon awakening, it was almost five pm and after another refreshing shower and change of clothing, we felt better than we had when we arrived at the first gate. Dillion did not seem worse for the wear. In fact the puzzling thing was that there was only a faint scar where the injury was only a few hours ago. He admitted to us that he had no tenderness there either. That was some unnaturally quick healing there we all agreed.
9. Trial by Fire
We were to gather in an area with relaxing couches best described as a living room. Mader was there already sitting opposite to Matt, as Cherese, Jessi, Dillion and I walked in. We said, “hi” all together and sat down three to three facing each other.
I sensed some unease coming from Matt in particular and sent out the mental feelers. Matt thought spoke back, “I want us to talk openly about silly stuff while I keep probing our immediate vicinity; something isn’t right here. A presence, an energy, cloaked maybe, on guard everyone!”
So I piped up loudly for everyone in the area to hear, “Am I the only one here who is feeling charged up after the events this morning? It still feels unreal to me
. I feel a little drained but also energized.”
The others chimed in with various comments, including remarks about our meal and rest period. In the meantime we had combined our talents to search the room for energy sources revealing to our inner senses all the wiring, speakers, microphones, piping as well as one previously cloaked human standing against the far wall. We scanned the room for more live ones. He was alone and as we all stared at him, a look of total amazement broke over his face as he looked down at his own arms and legs in disbelief. He looked like he was seeing a ghost. I suppose he was slowly realizing that his invisibility cloak was gone. Three of us with our backs to him had swerved around in our seats to skewer him with our eyes. We had sensed his presence, after Matt had clued us in and we used our newfound skill to suck up his energy and draw down his shield. He must have felt de-clothed and very naked! All the while we had been making innocuous small talk.
It was a very elderly sallow with looking gentleman, on whom sunshine must not have shone for a long time. He had to be over 300 years and made Choka and Jongi look like teenagers.
The spirit like man bowed from the waist with his hands clasped together in our direction. We felt certain that he would snap at the waist into two pieces. He chuckled, “ All good good things must come to an end! You all are truly extraordinarily. I did not believe Jongi when she told me about your group, but your powers are growing so rapidly, feeding off each other, expanding, multiplying, morphing, so adaptable. It is a joy to see. You all have outdone the predictions of our Artificial Intelligence on every level. So sorry, I must introduce myself. Ronald Breecher, I am Breecher. Head of the Security Council for all of Toigan. Never before have I ever been de-cloaked. Ok maybe when I was just learning to do it around the age of 12, but that’s been 332 years ago. No one has been powerful enough to do so since and there are only 8 of us left who are able to cloak. I have lived to see the day that this can happen. Toigan is blessed. Are any of you yet able to cloak?”
Matt spoke up audibly, “Until we verify who you are, such information is privileged.”
I tried to reach out to Jongi mentally, “Yes, I’m here.” Her face swam into view in our minds eye, “I see that you have revealed the presence of Mr. Breecher! I feel his distress. Good for you. He must surely have become cocky by now. That ought to take him down a notch or two! He is really the Director of the the whole Securinet apparatus of Toigan you see, so you can relax. I will be there in a few minutes myself.”
I looked at Mr. Beecher and said, “You must be tired standing there. Please come join us Mr. Breecher. Good to meet you. Jongi said that you’re ok.”
He shook his head as if to say, “I can’t believe this is happening.”
He came over toward the couches and sat crosswise from us on a double cushioned chair facing us as we sat three opposite three on our 3 seat couches. He glided more so than walking. Very odd I thought but his joints must not be in terrible shape at his age. Then it dawned on me that he teleports himself more than he walks really.
He said, “ Just look at your couch, it’s color, it’s pattern and just visualize your arm and other body parts taking on the same color and features. See yourself fading and morphing.”
We all attempted to invert ourselves into ourselves. We did not feel different, but I could see my colleagues grow fainter slowly becoming like outlines, though still visible.
Breecher clapped his hands in delight, his scrawny thin face breaking into a big grin. “You are a certainly part way there. Keep practicing, you’ve got it.”
Just then the door opened and Jongi walked in also smiling broadly. She looked around appreciatively as if we were all her favorite children, well more like great grandchildren!
She must have heard my thoughts, “Choka is working on another project and he will visit us in a few days. We try not to have too many Council members in any one place for security reasons. Mr Breecher thought that he would be safe and not detected by you or anyone else and look, he has been made! You were able to de-cloak him! I suppose though that the silver lining is that he has been able to provoke you all into finding out more of your own skills, so that is the silver lining. Well done group!”
“So now we will take a walk and discuss the real reasons you all are here.” Jongi said.
She turned around and we all got up and followed her out the door.
She said, “ I know you all must be curious about Gooch and his group”
She raised her hand and pointed to a hill just off to the left as we walked up the path from which there were strong magnetic and electrical signals emanating. “They are now in the medical unit being debriefed and all their data being drawn out into data storage. They are undergoing the reverse of the Immersion and then we are going to deprogram them with the use of our AI and biologics. That will allow us to mop up a lot of the Badjan network.”
She continued, “We do not underestimate the Badjans of course. They are just as human as we are and therefore just as smart. They would have compartmentalized their information into hubs, so that no one person would know too much. However we have extremely good AI that can extrapolate and deduce patterns. That then gives us an advantage in predicting the behavior of their colleagues.”
She went on, as we walked along the pathway, “We built this outpost here on the edge of the Badlands in Bahoe because it was a very logical area to place it close to lots of small towns like Pommerose where we recruit. It is rugged, craggy and full of petered out mines, old factory shells and next to farming areas. We knew that there were vast hiding places for the Badjan Outlaws too and we placed low level surveillance technology around it, interspersed with a minimum of higher tech devices and systems. We made sure that whatever tech they were able to pilfer from security forces wouldn’t be top tier and we used a lot of biological surveillance like some of Breecher’s special colleagues and underlings to map out their entrances and egress points into their underground maze. We made sure they felt comfortable and safe. We’ve had their routes underground pinpointed. Occasionally we would give chase to map their bolt holes and mostly made sure that they would escape, painting ourselves as equivalent to them or of even lesser competence. We captured just enough of them to make sure they didn’t feel patronized.”
She went on, “We did a full scale honest analysis of their motives to ensure we wouldn’t be treating symptoms of a real problem with how our society is organized and thus continue to cause this ‘movement’ if you will, to regenerate itself. So it wasn’t chronic unemployment or discrimination against a certain segment of the population that was generating ill will and discontent. Otherwise we would be perpetuating the same kind of asinine conflicts and insurgencies that was a feature of early humans on earth in their first solar system. Treat the underlying conditions that create disease or social dissonance, not just the symptoms is how we felt we should approach the situation.” That kind of sensible approach seemed reasonable to us so we nodded mentally at least.
Breecher who had been in the living room with us and who had accompanied us to the door seemed to have disappeared. We had walked maybe 50 yards when that fact dawned on us. As a unit, we amped up our senses to vibration, sound and biological energy signatures. Oh yes, there he was ten feet behind us gliding along silently, well not so silently, now that we had him pegged. We did not attempt to peel off his layers and expose him visually as we felt sure he was playing a role, a protective one as we learned that we were in enemy territory. The Badjans would be looking for their bosses and colleagues. The Security System was much less robust in this area deliberately we were learning. So satellite and drone passes were infrequent and were made to be deliberately predictable. Sensors on the ground were low to average tech to allow the Outlaws the comfort of hacking into them and give them relatively free movement, we were learning. In effect, we were on our own during that trek into this compound, left to our own devices really. Maybe a few folks with special attributes had kept an eye on us, but that did not mean they
had the capabilities to intervene necessarily. I guessed, more like hoped, they could have followed us into the caverns if they wanted to, and effect a rescue should that have been deemed appropriate to the Security System. We were just mostly bait it seems. Anyway here we were safe, but still alert.
Breecher’s voice came into our heads suddenly, “Good thinking folks and thanks for keeping me transparent. We do not believe the Outlaws are aware of some of our newer attributes, not even Gooch. The only reason you know about my cloaking for example, is because you were able to deduce it yourselves. They are fully aware of cloaking on our drones and the like though; they can use their technology which mostly was stolen from us to unmask those assets. By getting into his head, we will siphon off his knowledge and then cut off his knowledge of his own special capabilities from himself by physically partitioning his brain with surgery. By now this would have been already accomplished, so if his colleagues were to break out somehow and grab him, they would be welcome to have him back. They are smart enough to know that he would not be the same person and would be a security risk to them instead.”
Outlaw Badjans (Six of Toigan) Page 6