Mindguard

by Andrei Cherascu

  “You orchestrated everything.”

  “Yes.”

  “Why?”

  “I think you know, Tamisa.”

  “You thought this was the only way…”

  “This is the only way. I can’t very well retire.” He laughed like he had just told a great joke. “The Enforcement Unit will recover from this blow and it will be more powerful than ever. But as powerful as they are, the enforcers do have a weakness. They can’t think. I have to think for them. They’ve become a cult, blindly following me. If I had simply stepped back, they would never have stopped following me. That would have undermined the authority of the new leader, because their love for her would never have been as powerful as their love for me.”

  Though she was fighting to understand, to remain calm and focus on the commander’s words, the most important one eluded her.

  “And if you had died, we would have turned you into a martyr,” she said mechanically.

  Anderson smiled. “The only way to get all of you to stop loving me, was to betray you. I had to break the very rules I created. I had to turn my back on everything I once stood for.”

  “You’ve destroyed your own legacy. You will go down in history as a traitor. They will forget everything you’ve ever accomplished and remember only your crimes.”

  “My legacy is the safety of mankind.”

  “So you just murdered an innocent man.”

  “It seems that Educator Miller was not as innocent as everyone believed. But that really doesn’t matter. What matters is that he was loved and respected. For years, I have worked on distancing myself from the Enforcement Unit. I’ve deliberately made certain moves that could be considered controversial, to turn public opinion against me. Then, I had to make even the enforcers forsake me. I would have done it sooner, but I had to wait for the right time. I had to make sure my successor is ready to take my place.”

  Tamisa knew that she would not be standing there if he weren’t speaking of her.

  “I can’t!”

  “You must! You belong to mankind and your duty is to protect it.”

  “I just had my first mission.”

  “Yes, you are young. That will not be to your disadvantage.”

  “What the hell do you mean? Of course it will.”

  Once again, Anderson smiled. Tamisa realized she had just unwittingly indicated that she was considering leadership.

  “Your young age only ensures that your mind is not burdened with decades of being conditioned to follow mine.”

  “But how could I ever compensate for years of experience?”

  “Because you were born to do this.”

  “You know nothing about me.”

  “I know everything, my dear. I was there when you were born, and I have been with you ever since.”

  Tamisa felt a cold shiver running down her spine. Something strange was happening. She felt as if she had just been transported into a bizarre new world. She sensed that a great mystery would be revealed to her, one of whose existence she had not even been aware until then.

  “The safety of mankind is not something that can be left to chance,” Anderson said. His voice was different. Tamisa had a strange thought: The world’s greatest artist is unveiling his life’s work. It came to her like a cold revelation.

  “Chance is an agent of hazard,” the commander continued. “A few decades ago, I created the Peace Preservation Initiative.”

  “What the hell is that?”

  “It was a highly classified subdivision, operating within the frame of the Enforcement Unit. It was run by our fringe allies, people outside the Unit, who believe in our cause. Only myself and Villo Kantil had knowledge of this division. The Council of Presidents didn’t even know of its existence. This shadow division had one single mission: to create the future High Commander of the enforcers.”

  “Create?” Tamisa asked with a shaky voice.

  “A number of the federation’s most talented genetic architects were involved. They were sent to research facilities on the borders of the IFCO, where government control is limited. Their goal was to genetically produce a person who is perfectly compatible with the requirements of this position, following specific parameters designed by myself. The perfect commander.”

  Tamisa felt sick. “You have genetically produced human beings?” Though biologically possible, cloning humans had been banned in the IFCO, for fear that genetic tampering could lead to further advancements in telepathy. The activity of genetic architects was closely monitored. Any attempt at cloning human beings was punishable by death. Due to the shock of the moment, Tamisa did not fully realize the implications of the commander’s disclosure.

  “Our allied scientists produced a number of children, whom they raised as their own, under controlled surveillance.” Tamisa felt a sudden void forming in her stomach.

  “Your father was one of these men.”

  “No,” she said, slowly shaking her head.

  “The most promising among these children were recruited and rigorously tested…”

  She wanted to throw up. She just continued shaking her head, feeling physically ill, like she was ready to have a seizure. She felt like she was going to fall to the ground, grab her head and just keep repeating ‘no’ over and over again, until madness finally claimed her. Instead, acceptance came with incredible ease. With it, came a clarity of mind that she had never felt before. Important events in her life flashed before her consciousness and she gained a new understanding of them.

  “I am a genetic experiment,” she said with an empty voice. “I am a result.” She thought of her beloved father, only the love was no longer there. It had vanished painlessly, as had her love for Villo. It had been replaced by a feeling of neutral awareness.

  “I am not qualified,” she said calmly.

  Thomas Anderson smiled. “There is no one more qualified, Tamisa. You are the one. There is no single trait of your character that I did not want. There is nothing about you I did not foresee. You are perfect.” The love in his voice was poison. “The Enforcers will accept your passionate and dynamic personality, because they will perceive it as the antithesis of mine. You are the polar opposite of their Traitor Commander, they will instinctively trust you.”

  “They’ll never accept me.”

  “They already have. From the moment you graduated your first year at the academy, when your potential became clear, I started making it seem like I was favoring you. I intervened on your behalf when some of the instructors wanted to eliminate you from the program because of your quick temper. Rumors started spreading that you were offering sexual favors to the commander. They grew louder when I gave you command of your first mission. But then, when it became clear that you were sleeping with Villo, another rumor started spreading: that I had tried to sleep with you, but you had turned me down. So now I was trying to punish you by sabotaging your mission. I refused to give you all of the information invoking ‘exclusive classification’. I ordered you to use neuralfield scanners. I suddenly disappeared when you wanted to speak with me. I was trying to confuse you, to make sure that you fail. And then, the final blow: I ordered Villo to desert you, to go after Ross himself, just to undermine your authority.”

  Tamisa’s soul felt soiled, like her mind had felt when the factory worker and Sheldon Ayers had tried to seize it. “You… you sent Villo to his death…”

  “Villo’s main concern was the safety of mankind. His own life was not his priority.”

  “Why Villo?”

  “Because you loved him.”

  “He made me love him,” she screamed.

  “Your passion was always your strength, Tamisa. Villo helped you shape it into what we need. With this strength you will now lead the world’s greatest army.”

  Tamisa was crying. For the first time, she did not care that someone else could see her tears.

  “I knew that losing Villo would ignite that fire I’ve started inside you. I knew that you would hunt down those res
ponsible for his death, that you wouldn’t give up until you got your revenge. I only hoped that you would win. Judging by the fact that you are standing in front of me now, I think it’s safe to say that you’ve won.”

  In Tamisa’s mind, Anderson’s words entwined with her own: ‘One of us has to lose!’ - once spoken with great conviction.

  “At this very moment,” Anderson continued, “a story is spreading among the enforcers, traveling from one soldier to the next. It is the story of how you overcame the odds. The deck was stacked against you from the start. You’ve been betrayed by your commander and by your lover. You’ve been abandoned, beaten, hurt and manipulated. You’ve been crushed. In spite of it all, you survived. Not only that: you’ve won. I know my men; they are my children. I know how they think and I know how they feel. Before the day is over, Gracian Moss will ask to speak with you. He will tell you that he has spoken to the Coucil of Presidents, and that the decision was made to elect a new leader before my impending trial, to ensure that everything will proceed lawfully. He will suggest you and everyone else will agree. They will choose you because I have made you my enemy. Your command will revitalize the Enforcement Unit. It will mean safety for the human race for centuries to come.

  Defiance took over - the last remnant of her former self. “I won’t do it,” she said with her remaining hate.

  “You have to,” he gently answered. “The world is in your care now. I know you will take good care of it, because I know you.”

  Nothing else needed to be said. Tamisa turned around and headed for the exit. She did not say goodbye. She did not tell him how much she hated him, nor how much she loved him. She did not tell him that she understood. She left the room without looking back, leaving behind only her silence like a burden she wished to cast upon him. She knew that if she turned around she would see him smiling, and she couldn’t bear that.

  When the final set of doors closed behind her, she let out a big sigh. No one would ever ask her what she had discussed with Thomas Anderson. She believed that with all her heart. No one would ever know.

  One of the guards took a step toward her. “We’ve received a message while you were inside,” he said. “Interim Commander Moss asked to speak with you privately.”

  Chapter 40

  There are some who believe only what they can see. To deceive their minds, you must merely trick their eyes.

  Kinsey Ayers, A New History of Old Earth

  The two travelers stopped at the top of the hill to admire the landscape. It was every bit as beautiful as they had been told. A world born from joyous memories and unrestrained imagination.

  “It’s even more wonderful than I expected,” the girl said.

  The giant looked at her and was glad to see her smiling. “I guess there are uglier places you could call home.”

  “I’m afraid,” she confessed. “I’m scared of how it will feel.”

  “I am too… a little,” the giant admitted. That made her feel a bit better.

  “How do you think it will feel, Mac?”

  “Like a mother’s womb,” he joked.

  The girl was not amused. “I’m serious,” she said.

  “I don’t know, Sophie, I’m just tryin’ to cheer you up a little. Otherwise, you’ll instantly depress the hell out of the entire Opus Caine.”

  They remained serious for a few seconds and then suddenly burst out with a hearty laughter. It was the result of accumulated stress and fatigue rather than amusement, but they still felt guilty. They laughed teary-eyed for a few minutes, before abandoning themselves to tears of sadness.

  They both missed Sheldon. They couldn’t believe he was no longer with them. His death left a void that seemed to run as deeply as the very fabric of the universe.

  Even though she hadn’t known him for long, Sophie felt that she had lost a good friend. When the enforcer woman attacked them in the cave, Sophie froze in place, not knowing what to do. Even Mac was hesitant. He had dealt with the incredible speed of these soldiers before and it had almost gotten him killed. He didn’t want to risk Sophie’s life. Only Sheldon knew exactly what had to be done. Sheldon always knew.

  Mac pulled Sophie into his all-encompassing embrace and she quietly wept in his arms for a few more minutes. He was also devastated at the loss of his best friend and the guilt of knowing that Sheldon would still be alive if he hadn’t dragged him into this. But, in a strange way, he also felt with certainty that things could not have happened any differently.

  Unconsciously, he clutched the crucifix suspended from his neck. He didn’t know how to feel about sharing his mind with an entire race of people. Did God not create all human beings in His image? Were they not all equal in the eyes of the Lord? Then why did it feel so wrong?

  Perhaps his faith was simply not strong enough to erase decades of being conditioned to think that all telepathy was evil, that it was dangerous. After all, he had dedicated his life to protecting people’s minds from intrusion. He had fought to guard the very intimacy of their thoughts. And now, his own would belong to everyone else, and theirs to him. It was against everything he had stood for in his life. Then he remembered that it was a life he no longer had. There was no longer a place for him in that world. Sheldon had told him that, and he was right as always.

  “He knew he was dying,” Mac whispered to Sophie, hoping to comfort her. “He chose to give his death meaning.”

  “I know,” she said, but she didn’t sound relieved.

  Sheldon had sent two final messages before the woman’s sharp, dart-like spikes punctured his brain, killing him instantly. The first was a message to Sophie and Mac. Mac had no idea how Sheldon had managed to break the Weixman Barrier, but now he would never find out. Sheldon’s message could not have been clearer if it had been delivered by a voice: ‘Sophie, Mac - the woman will leave. Let her go. After she has left, pick up her weapon. The second the generator is recharged and you can dial out, shoot at the cave ceiling and then leave immediately. The cave will collapse. Nobody will look for you. You will be dead to the world.’

  A fraction of a second after his mind had thought its final thought, Sheldon Ayers was dead. But in that fraction of a second, he had time to get inside the woman’s head, so gently she had not even known he was there. He took Mac and Sophie with him. They witnessed how he replaced the truth with his fantasy.

  In her mind, Sophie and Mac were dead, crushed under tons of rock. She had to flee to save her own life. In reality, she gently lowered the weapon and simply walked out of the cave, to her vehicle. She drove back to her team, while an entirely different reality played out in her head. After she left, Sophie and Mac took another look at Sheldon. Even in death he looked alert, as if his extraordinary mind continued to function beyond the death of the body.

  “Goodbye, my friend,” Mac said. Sophie whispered ‘thank you’. Then, Mac did exactly what Sheldon had said. He generated the Muench-Henriksen gateway, fired a few shots at the cave ceiling and quickly followed Sophie through to the other side, to the only place in the universe where they would be safe.

  With the village now in sight, Mac started feeling more and more confident that they would be all right. At first, he was worried that the girl might not adapt, but he had the impression that she was as tough on the inside as he was on the outside. After resting for a few minutes, he took the girl’s hand. They started towards the village, where a new life awaited.

  A New Life

  When you say the word ‘God’ you are referring to a being which brings things into existence. Instead, you should be assigning the term to existence itself.

  Kinsey Ayers, A New History of Old Earth

  Tamisa’s first order as the new High Commander of the world’s greatest army surprised everyone. She demanded to be taken to the former home of Sheldon Ayers. Everything had happened so quickly she did not even have time to fully realize that she was now the most powerful person in the man-inhabited universe.

  Throughout the entire inauguration ce
remony, even as she was taking her oath in front of the Council of Presidents, all she could think of was Sheldon Ayers. She wasn’t sure why she felt such a pressing need to see his home or what answers she expected to find there, but she felt that the only way to exorcize the demon that was the dead mindguard was to fully immerse herself in his life.

  “Commander Faber, would you perhaps like to participate in the initial briefing session first?” Gracian Moss suggested.

  “No, Sheldon first!”

  The man looked at her in a strange way, but he promptly followed her order. Anderson had been right. Their loyalty to her bordered on fanaticism. They truly were all merely extensions of her own mind. Instruments of her will. She felt the enormous responsibility pressing on her conscience, threatening to overwhelm her.

  She wanted to isolate herself in Sheldon Ayers’ environment. She wanted to surround herself with everything that had meant Sheldon’s life, the life she had ended. Curiously, she did not feel the same burning desire when it came to Isabel Mensah, Sophie Gaumont or Maclaine Ross.

  She kept telling herself that it had been self defense. Who knows what Ayers would have done, had he managed to take control of her mind. She had merely protected her own life, and more importantly, the success of her mission. In spite of that, Sheldon Ayers’ name commanded great respect and questions would surely arise regarding his death.

  In the aftermath of Horatio Miller’s assassination and Thomas Liam Anderson’s upcoming trial, the world did not look very favorably upon the enforcers. She was left with a great burden. It would take all her strength and determination to regain the prestige once held by the Enforcement Unit. The first thing she wanted to do was form a council of veteran enforcers as advisors to the High Commander. This way, she was giving the enforcers their own voice, encouraging individual thought without discouraging loyalty. It was something Thomas Anderson had never done. Only his own brother served as somewhat of an advisor, and in the eyes of the enforcers, he had disregarded even his brother’s council in the end.