by Inc. HDWP
“I can’t quit. I won’t quit. The people want me to keep fighting. They want me—”
“We are the people. We don’t want you. You are nothing.”
“They want me. I can’t give up.” Helena collapsed face-down into a sobbing mass on the floor.
The Voices kept talking and insisting that she had no choice. “You are nothing. You will destroy everything if you don’t quit. Your husband will fall into insanity with you. Your son. Your daughter. You will be left with nothing and you will fail. You’ll fail your family, the people, your country. You are nothing. You must quit. It’s for the good of the people.”
Finally she stopped fighting and nodded her head in silent acceptance, tears dripping down her face.
“Say it,” the Voices said.
“I quit.” She could hardly hear her own voice. The pain of those words brought up the bile in her throat and she vomited until there was nothing left inside. Then she crawled away from the stinking mass, lay on the floor and sobbed for everything she had lost.
The sound of the front door opening forced Helena to sit up.
“Helena, I’m back and. . . Oh God! . . . ”
Helena pulled herself up into a sitting position just as Mark reached her. One look at the shock on Mark’s face and the tracks of tears that had poured down his cheeks, told her the truth.
“You heard them, didn’t you?” Helena’s voice croaked out of her swollen throat.
“I think I did. How did you know?”
“I saw it in a dream. I . . .” Helena swallowed the knot that made it difficult to speak. “I can’t do this, Mark. I can’t let them hurt you and our children. The Voices are right. I have to quit.”
Mark’s deep brown eyes filled with sadness and concern, and something she had never seen in them before—fear. He helped her up and settled her into the comfort of the couch. He placed the quilt over her legs, tucking her in. He grabbed tissues and began to wipe tears and vomit off of Helena’s face. All the while, he said nothing.
“What do you think, Mark? I told you I have to quit.”
He took her chin in his hands in a familiar caress. “I think . . . I don’t know what to think. I just heard Voices in my head, the same thing that has been haunting you for months. I’m scared . . . for you, for myself, for the kids, for the future. You know I’ll support any decision you make, but it has to be your decision. If you quit because of the Voices, then we’ve all lost. But if you don’t quit, then I don’t know what will happen.”
Helena felt fresh hot tears slide down her face. “I don’t know what else to do . . .”
Mark took her in his arms and they cried together.
* * *
In a secluded room across the country, a dark-haired man wearing a lab coat over his gray uniform put the phone down with a smile. He looked around at the group of men and women who sat in cushioned recliners around the large room. “He’ll be here soon,” he said. “He sounds pleased.”
“Can we disconnect for a while, Dr. Amnon?” a woman asked. “This last session was exhausting. I could use a break.”
Several others murmured in agreement.
“Well,” Dr. Amnon looked at a wall of screens which cycled through a variety of scenes that had occurred over the past day. Several of them, the ones focused on the immediate moment, showed an image of what seemed to be the inside of someone’s eyelids. “Nothing much seems to be happening at the moment, but I think we should stay connected, just in case she needs a nudge.”
“I’ll stay attached,” said one of the men. “I’m enjoying feeling this.”
“Me too,” said one of the women.
Dr. Amnon moved from person to person, disconnecting the cables that linked electrodes on their heads to the wall of computer monitors behind them. After detaching the last person, Dr. Amnon returned to his desk in the corner to observe and take some notes. He wanted to make sure they showed no adverse effects after this rather long and challenging session. Protecting this talented group of telepaths was important to him, as they had helped him prove the possibility of mind control across long distances. He’d poured years of time—and other people’s money—into this project, all leading to this day’s glorious success.
Still he didn’t want to take chances with these people; he had to make sure they remained healthy and safe. At the moment, the group looked happy and relaxed, even the two who remained connected. Some stretched and leaned back in their recliners with their eyes closed. A few flipped through magazines or played games and read on their e-readers. Some members of this eclectic group—identified as a group only by comfortable smoke-gray uniforms with a small red logo on the shoulder—stood by the refreshment table and chattered quietly.
“Great work today,” Dr. Amnon said. “This project has taken longer than expected, but we’ve finally achieved our goal.”
“I hope he shows up soon,” said one woman. “I think we could all use some time off.”
Several people nodded in agreement.
A knock on the door made everyone sit up or stand at attention. The door opened to admit an older man with salt and pepper hair, and an impeccably tailored smoke-gray suit.
“Welcome, Sir.” Dr. Amnon moved to greet him. “We’ve been waiting for you. Our mission is nearing completion. The invasion on our subject seems to have been successful.”
“Are you sure? Were there any problems?
“We did have to change plans slightly today. We were forced to enter her husband’s mind as well."
“Why?” Anger flared from the older man’s eyes. “We don’t want him to suspect anything. That’s dangerous.”
“I know, sir, but as soon as our subject chose to confide in him fully, and pushed away her doubts about his fidelity, her mind began to build defenses against our intrusion. There were several hours when nobody here was able to break in. All they could do was observe.”
The older gentleman looked around for confirmation. Several in the group nodded in silence.
“We only invaded his mind long enough to convince her that this was dangerous to her entire family. We showed her exactly what could happen. It worked. She’s quit.”
“Are you sure?”
“Watch, Sir.” Dr. Amnon moved to his desk and typed a few instructions into the computer. The entire group turned to watch. One monitor showed a video of the telepaths as they worked together in some mysterious way to speak out loud as one, or sometimes in separate voices but with the same goals. The rest of the monitors showed an image of a cabin in the woods. The perspective on each screen was skewed, as if looking at the same image through different eyes at different angles.
The video showed the group in their comfortable chairs speaking as one across the distance, “You are nothing. You will destroy everything if you don’t quit. Your husband will fall into insanity with you. Your son. Your daughter . . .” Helena, lying in a crumpled mass on the floor, raised her head and nodded.
“Say it,” the Voices spoke, and in the merest whisper, Senator Helena Toral said, “I quit.”
“This is great news,” the older gentleman said. “Polls show I had no chance of winning against her. Now there’s no choice. She’ll quit the race, and I’ll be President. My backers will be pleased.” He turned to the group and embraced them with a smile. “You’ve all done well. A generous bonus will be placed in your bank accounts by the end of the day. However, be warned, if any of this leaks out to the press, I’m not responsible for what happens. There are more ways to destroy lives than invading people’s brains.”
The group shifted in discomfort but said nothing.
“Of course, I’m sure that I need not worry. You are all loyal to me, and realize this is for the good of the people and of the country. Most of you may take some well-earned time off, paid of course. I want at least two people to remain connected with Senator Torval at all times to ensure she follows through. Everyone must report back to duty on election day.”
“Yes, Sir,” Dr. Am
non said. “I’ll set up a schedule so everyone gets time off.”
“Meanwhile, however, I am concerned about this little glitch in the plan.” The older gentleman turned his intense stare onto Dr. Amnon, who tried not to wince away from the gleaming near-black eyes. “You must find a way to ensure that we have the ability to bypass any defenses people’s minds may set up. I don’t want people becoming suspicious, and that becomes more likely if they start sharing stories.”
“Why, Sir?” Dr. Amnon asked. “I thought we had accomplished our mission. What’s our next step?”
The older gentleman walked over and tapped a few keys on the computer. He brought up images of every member of the government that stood in opposition to him. They filled the monitors in rows and contained members of both parties.
“We expand operations.”
I Was a Teenage Alien
LJ Cohen
Leila was just going to have to learn to keep her dewclaws sheathed. The artificial nail covers that hid her primary claws made her hands feel thick and distant, but short of maiming herself, it was the best she could do. And she wasn’t willing to go that far, even to spite her parents. She rubbed her wrist. If she wore long sleeves, or some wide bracelets, that might work.
“Look, are you sure you still want to go through with this?” Tannar's pupils narrowed to a small slit in her bright green eyes. “You should talk to your folks. I think you’re making a mistake.”
The only mistake Leila had made was waiting so long to leave. “The contact lenses are safe, right?”
“My uncle has been using them for years." Tannar's claws extended and retracted as she paced the small room. “If he finds out. . .”
“No one will find out.” Leila reached out to her friend. The powerful muscles in her fingers twitched, pulling on the squat, squared off fake nails. “Wow, that feels weird.”
“Let me see,” Tannar said.
They sat down on Tannar's bed like this was just another ordinary sleep over. She took Leila's hands in hers and pushed on the thickened pads behind her fingers. The two girls giggled as the fake nails pushed forward in a parody of claws.
“I'm going to miss you,” she said, letting Leila's hands slip from her grasp.
“It's just for a little while. I'll be back in time for school next term. I promise." Tannar wouldn't meet her eyes. “Look, I can't back down now." And she wouldn't, no matter how uncomfortable the prosthetics and cosmetics felt. Leila had invested too much time and work to change her mind. This was the only way she could prove to her parents she was ready to make her own choices. And the timing was perfect. If her craft was observed entering the atmosphere, it would be mistaken for one of the abundant meteors predicted to streak across the sky over the next several Earth days.
She wouldn’t have to leave if she were more like Tannar -- quiet, obedient, yielding Tannar -- who could be bullied to raid her Uncle's office for the things she needed. But Tannar didn’t have to contend with Leila’s parents.
“Think of all the stories I'll have to share with you when I get back.”
That brought a smile to her friend’s face.
* * *
Leila blinked. The lenses were worse than she had imagined. Her eyes kept tearing and every time her inner membrane swept closed, the prosthetics shifted. But the anthropologists tolerated them, and so would she. Piloting the ‘borrowed’ skimmer was hard enough without the blurred vision, but Leila gripped the control stick and forced the craft to a bumpy landing in the early hours of dawn on this part of the continent. If Tannar had done her job right, by the time Leila was reported missing, she would be a strange needle in a very large haystack. She smiled, running her tongue over the unfamiliar flatness of her capped eye teeth. The Humans had such funny expressions.
The landfills of Staten Island made a perfect place to conceal the skimmer. Once its shields were engaged, the small craft would be virtually undetectable. She took one look back at where it lay hidden and a shiver crawled down her spine. There was no turning back now.
She called up visual memories of her maps and shifted magnification and scale until she had a walking path to the nearest public transit hub. With her standard issue backpack, Leila blended in with everyone else on their way to join the roughly one and a half million inhabitants of Manhattan Island. At least at this level of casual interaction, her concealment held.
The subway station was crowded enough that no one gave Leila a second glance, but not so crowded she was in danger of being swept away in a river of people. It gave her a minute to get used to the sight of so many of them. There were probably more people in this one subway terminal than in the entire research station.
She had been right to come. There was nothing for her up there but more simulations, more dry lessons, and more arguments with her father. Planet-side was real life. Earth was a living lab where she would learn more in a day than she had in the past five years.
But first she had to find her way into the city proper. Leila leaned against the station wall and studied people's transactions. Her heart sped up in a moment of panic when she noticed most used plastic chits. Was her information outdated? Did they no longer use physical currency? She let her breath out in a whoosh as several people paid using the same kind of flat, green bills she clutched.
Using the ticket machines wasn’t much different than queuing up for meals on the station. In a smooth movement, she slipped in line at one of them. So far, so good, Leila thought, waiting for her turn. She tapped on the touch screen with her dull fingers. It registered her choices without any problems. Thank goodness they didn't use more sophisticated identity metrics--there was something to be said for a primitive planet.
A rumble underfoot was either seismic activity or a train coming. Leila glanced around her, but no one seemed to pay it any attention, so she turned her attention back to the ticket machine, wondering which denomination of bill it would accept.
Leila chose one and slid it in the receptacle. It spit the money back at her, beeping its annoyance. She tried another one and the same thing happened. Her hands shook as she rifled through the money looking for the largest number bill she had as the machine kept beeping. She took a deep breath and attempted to pay again. The bill was sucked into the machine and spat out.
She slammed her hand against the screen. Tannar had swiped these bills from her Uncle's office and swore they were authentic. It wasn't much, but Leila had counted on it being enough to live on until she got settled and found some sort of job. If none of the filched money were any good, she had to seriously rethink her options.
“You okay, honey?”
Leila nearly jumped out of her hide at the voice behind her.
“Here, let me try something." The woman smiled. There were the overly flat teeth and the round pupils. Was that how Leila looked now?
She took the money the machine had rejected. “It doesn't like wrinkled bills." She flattened the currency against the leg of her jeans. A long gray braid lay flat down the center of her back, nearly to her hips. It was hard to tell the ages here, but Leila thought she was certainly older than both her parents. She seemed pretty spry, despite the silvered hair and sun-damaged skin. “Now try.”
Leila fed the bill back in the slot. Her ticket dropped out along with some flat, round coins. “Thank you.”
It was impossible not to stare.
“You're not from around here, are you?” the woman said.
Leila blinked back a moment's panic and the urge to flex her covered claws. You have no idea, she thought. Well, it was always best to stick close to the truth. “No. I'm taking some time off between high school and college. Traveling." She was proud of her command of simple 21st century American English. Her voice didn't even shake.
The woman nodded as they walked toward the turnstiles. “I hitched across the country when I was probably your age." She looked Leila over with narrowed eyes.
Leila resisted the urge to check her camoufl
age. If she wasn't going to pass, better that she discover it now.
She stuck out her hand. “Georgie Ryder.”
Leila took the woman's hand in a ritual she had seen and practiced hundreds of times, a ripple of fear moving beneath her skin. This was the moment her disguise would hold or fail. She watched Georgie Ryder's expression carefully for clues, but it wasn't as easy reading emotion in these unfamiliar faces. Even after months of studying holos, she found their body language, too, was stilted. The nostril filters made it impossible to check scent markers, but she wasn't sure she could handle the olfactory assault without them. And even if she could, there was no way to know if her interpretation of Human scents and pheromones would be accurate. Leila had to rely on the imperfect vehicle of the spoken word and though she'd scored top of her class in Earth dialects, it was much easier in the lab or in the stupid simulations her teachers set up. “Leila Estrano.”
The woman's skin was cooler than she expected, but less smooth. Her hands had callouses that were almost as thick as Leila's own.
Georgie nodded. “I like a young person with working hands.”
Leila looked towards the turnstiles, fingering her ticket. “Well, thanks for your help.”
“Always glad to be there for a fellow traveler,” Georgie said.
Leila jerked to a stop and searched the woman's face again. Could she know. Her expression seemed simply open and friendly, even if the words carried a mocking overtone. Or was Leila just projecting her father's tired sarcasm on everything around her.
“Oh, hang on a minute.” Georgie rifled through her pockets. “If you need anything, call me,” she said, handing over a small card.
Georgie Ryder. Managing Editor. The Morning Star. By the time Leila deciphered the confusing letters. the woman was gone.
* * *
Holo simulations of Manhattan were nothing like walking through it. The sheer amount of life exhilarated Leila's damped-down senses. Roadways carved straight gullies through cliffs of buildings lining both sides of the streets. Internal combustion vehicles traveled in tight clots from automated traffic controller to controller in a frenzy of color and sound. It was far more efficient to walk, even with the smog, but the rolling cavalcade made Leila think of servomotors and relays in some complex machine.