Telepath

by Janet Edwards

  I advanced nervously to try to see the path heading down, and spotted it zigzagging to and fro across the slope.

  “The path takes a very long route,” said Eli.

  “If you want to save time, you can just jump,” said Rothan. “You’ll get to the bottom very fast indeed.”

  Eli gulped. “No thanks.”

  “Will you be able to cope going down there on foot, Amber?” asked Adika. “I’m not sure it’s a good idea to have someone carrying you in case they slip.”

  I pictured that and winced.

  “Would you like me to walk down with you, Amber?” asked Forge.

  “That would make me feel a lot safer,” I said. “Do you remember the time I tried cliff climbing at Teen Level beach, and got a massive panic attack when I tried their ‘C’ grade climb?”

  “Of course I remember,” said Forge. “You froze near the top, and I had to go up and rescue you. This is nothing like a cliff climb though. It’s just a steep path, zigzagging downwards. It’s wide enough for me to walk beside you on the slope side all the way. You can’t possibly fall then.”

  “That’s good,” said Eli, “but who’s going to stop me from falling?”

  “I’ve walked along paths like this since I was three years old,” said Rothan.

  The rest of the Strike team hastily straightened up and tried to look fearless, but Lucas laughed. “The Strike team may not be scared of a path used by three-year-olds, but I am. I want Rothan to lurk close by, ready to grab me if I slip. I also claim the right to scream in terror at regular intervals. I have to suffer a few hours of agonized anticipation before that though, so can Rothan put up our tent please?”

  Rothan turned back from the slope, picked an open area of grass, and took off his backpack. I watched, fascinated, as he rapidly took out, unfolded, and locked together sections of tent.

  “Blue group, your job is guard duty and soothing Eli’s nerves,” said Adika. “Red group, get some more tents up and try to sleep. You’ll be on first watch tonight.”

  Blue group fanned out to take up guard positions. Red group started unpacking more tents. Once Rothan had finished putting up the tent for Lucas and me, I went inside and stretched out blissfully on the floor. Lucas came in after me, took off his ear crystal, and brushed my hair aside to steal mine. He turned them pointedly off.

  “Alone at last.”

  “I’d no idea walking could tire you out so much,” I said. It wasn’t just the walking. I wasn’t going to admit it to anyone, but I still found being Outside quite a strain. It wasn’t that it was terrifying me now; it was just so very different from the familiar corridors of the Hive.

  Lucas turned on a lantern and sealed the tent flap. “You should have said that you were getting tired, Amber. We don’t want you getting exhausted on the first day.”

  He took out the small package that was a folded heat sack, and shook it out to full size. “Are you hungry, or shall we rest before eating?”

  “Rest first.”

  I watched him taking off the clumpy boots Rothan had given us, sighed, and struggled back into a sitting position to let my own feet out of prison. I wriggled my toes, took off the bulkier layers of outdoor clothing, and slid into the heat sack. Lucas crawled in after me.

  “That path looks horribly scary,” I said. “I’m a dreadful coward, you know. I gave up surfing after a nasty wipe out. I gave up climbing after that panic attack on the cliff.”

  “Deeply fortunate.” Lucas started talking in speed speech, and I automatically linked to his mind to get the full sentences. “Adika would collapse under the nervous strain of a surfing, cliff-climbing telepath.”

  “You won’t be worried if I cling to Forge on the way down?”

  “I shall probably be clinging to Rothan myself. You won’t get jealous?”

  I laughed. “I’ll try not to get overwhelmed by emotion and shoot both of you. I don’t want Adika arresting me.”

  Lucas grinned. “Adika wouldn’t arrest a telepath for killing a Strike team member or a Tactical Commander. Both are replaceable. A telepath isn’t. You’re above the law, Amber. Untouchable.”

  “Don’t be silly.”

  “I’m not being silly,” said Lucas. “It’s in the best interests of our Hive to have a functioning true telepath at all costs. Any aberrations must be tolerated. The slaughter of unit members probably wouldn’t be acceptable on a daily basis, but the occasional one …”

  I lay back, gurgling with laughter, but abruptly sobered up. “It isn’t really funny, is it? However unreasonable I am, everyone has to accept it and humour me. I try not to take advantage of that, but I can’t help it sometimes.”

  “You definitely indulge in some blatant abuse,” said Lucas.

  “I do?” I gave him a worried look.

  He nodded. “Your criminal untidiness shocks the entire unit.”

  I smiled. “My mother forced me to be unspeakably tidy at home, but my natural slovenliness took over on Teen Level, and now I know Hannah will sneak in and clear up after me … You’re right. It’s blatant abuse of my position.”

  “Megan has a theory that your untidiness is a subconscious method of freeing your mind,” said Lucas. “She thinks it’s the reason you can read deeper thought levels than other true telepaths.”

  I stared at him. “She does? What do you think?”

  “I think it’s pure laziness,” said Lucas.

  I giggled. “I suspect you’re right.”

  “I suggest you make a special effort to be tidy during this trip. Especially if we’re going to be sharing this tent on a regular basis. Are we planning to do that?”

  I was startled by the question. I’d been assuming that Lucas would be with me at night. If he wasn’t … I was shocked by the realization of how alone I’d feel without him. “I’d like that. Would you be happy with it?”

  “My options are sharing a tent with Adika or sharing a tent with you,” said Lucas. “I’d definitely prefer sharing with you.”

  There was something oddly anxious about his voice. I finally had the sense to check the deeper levels of his mind, and saw what he was really asking me. Were we just sharing a tent on this trip, or was this the start of something more permanent?

  “If sharing a tent works,” I said, “then I think there might be space for two people in my apartment.”

  We lay there in silence for the next few minutes, smiling foolishly at each other, and then I sniffed the air and frowned. “Can you smell something burning?”

  Lucas put his crystal unit in his ear, and turned it on. “Are you on fire out there?”

  I had my own ear crystal on in time to hear Rothan’s cheerful reply. “We’re doing camp fire cooking. Want some?”

  “No, thank you,” said Lucas. “I’m too young to die.”

  I suddenly felt hungry. “I’ll try some.”

  Lucas groaned. “They’re going to poison your telepath, Adika.”

  “It should be safe,” said Adika. “We tested the first batch on Eli and he’s still alive.”

  Lucas wriggled out of the heat sack, and threw on his clothes to open the tent flap and go out. He returned a moment later, and handed me a warm, strangely shaped object. I bit into it cautiously.

  “It’s a sort of pastryish, breadish thing, with bits of stuff inside it,” I said. “It’s not bad. Try some.”

  Lucas shook his head. “I’m sticking to protein bars. I like my food carefully measured and prepared by reliable machines.”

  “You can’t survive for a week on just protein bars, Lucas,” said Adika, through our ear crystals.

  “Watch me,” said Lucas.

  I munched my way through my pastry thing, and then dozed for a while until Lucas told me it was time to face the nightmare path. I crawled reluctantly out of the heat sack, and got dressed. When I went out of the tent, I found the Strike team packing equipment and throwing earth on the remains of a small fire. Rothan and Adika were standing near the steep slope down, staring o
ut at something. Lucas and I went to join them.

  “What are we looking at?” asked Lucas.

  “Spike 71,” said Rothan. “The big red and black thing sticking way up above the trees. My plan is to set up camp for the night near there.”

  I looked at the tall, pointed object. I was finding it hard to judge distances Outside because of the sheer scale of things, but it seemed a very long way away. “What is it?”

  “I’ve no idea,” said Rothan, “but there are a lot of them dotted around near the Hive, and they make great landmarks for ramblers.”

  “They’re geothermal energy spikes,” said Nicole’s voice.

  “What does that mean?” I asked.

  “I’ve got a ten thousand word, highly technical description here,” said Nicole. “I don’t understand a word of it, but I can read it to you if you like.”

  “Please don’t,” said Lucas.

  “The spikes house geothermal heat pumps,” said Eli. “They provide heat and power to supplement the Hive’s recycled resources.”

  We all stared at him in disbelief.

  Eli grinned in triumph. “My parents work in Hive Power Resources.”

  When everyone had stopped laughing, the Strike team finished their packing, and Adika lined us up for the descent. “Forge, you’re in the middle taking care of Amber. If she falls off, you’re spending the rest of your life scraping scum filters. Lucas, do you genuinely need help, or were you joking earlier?”

  “I was deadly serious,” said Lucas. “I’m utterly terrified of going down that path.”

  Adika moved forward to where the path started plunging downwards. “Rothan, take care of Lucas. If he falls off, you get to tidy up after Amber for the rest of the trip. That’s probably worse than scraping scum filters.” He paused. “Let’s do this.”

  I did a rapid check of minds. Lucas really was scared. So were a lot of the Strike team. A hand on my arm attracted my attention.

  “Ready?” asked Forge.

  I nodded, and we headed down the path behind Lucas and Rothan. With the solid bulk of Forge between me and the edge, it wasn’t as bad as I’d feared.

  “When there’s heavy rain, water runs down from the table top,” said Rothan. “Watch out for ruts in the path.”

  We progressed slowly and cautiously down the zigzagging path. I hung tightly on to Forge when we reached a point where the path wasn’t just rutted, but part of the edge had been washed away.

  “I envy your head for heights,” I told him. “When I froze on that cliff climb, I was totally rigid with panic, and you had to help move my feet onto the foot holds.”

  “I get scared too sometimes. That’s part of the attraction of things like climbing.”

  I laughed. “Forge, you’re weird.”

  “I’m weird? You’re a telepath, now that’s …”

  “I hate to interrupt the reminiscences,” said Adika, “but remember you’re talking on an open sound link. Amber, you can insult Forge all you like, but he can’t retaliate.”

  “Unfair,” said Forge happily.

  Four more zigzags and the path gradually levelled out. Lucas turned to face me, and gave an exaggerated sigh of relief. “We made it down alive!”

  We’d got spread out during the descent. Rothan waited for the stragglers to catch up before speaking. “We’ll carry on to Spike 71 and camp there for the night. There’s a nice flat area that doesn’t flood, and a spring that’s good drinking water.”

  “You expect me to drink the water out here?” Lucas protested. “It runs along the ground. Things live in it. You wouldn’t drink out of the park lake!”

  Rothan led the way off along the path. “We’ll run the water through purifiers so it’s perfectly safe to drink.”

  “You’re going to have to drink water, Lucas,” said Adika. “We’ve brought some melon juice, but that’s for Amber, not you.”

  I gave up listening to the argument, and reached out with my thoughts as we walked along. Lucas was in clown mode, exaggerating his fastidiousness about what he ate and drank. Dhiren was still a mass of nerves after the horrors of the path down the slope. Kaden was happy about being Outside in daylight, but nervous of the night to come. Eli was enjoying himself despite his periodic complaints.

  Adika was very aware that Rothan knew these conditions far better than he did, and was letting him take on some of the leader role, studying how his new deputy coped with the sudden responsibility. He was planning to push Rothan hard on this trip, because he saw him as his own eventual successor. It was essential Rothan could cope with anything and everything by that distant future time.

  I made a mental note that I should keep an eye on Rothan, and warn Adika if he was overdoing the pressure, then let my thoughts drift out beyond the team. We were leaving behind the mind mass of the Hive, and I could sense the quietness for many cors ahead of us, not that the traditional measuring in standard corridor lengths had much meaning out here.

  I felt an arm take mine, and Lucas guided me as I walked away from the Hive, my mind still searching the surrounding countryside. Somewhere in this alien wilderness, my target was hiding.

  Chapter Thirty-six

  “I thought we’d be almost at the coast by now, but I’ve misjudged just about everything,” said Lucas cheerfully. “I wasn’t allowing for the route along the paths being at least twice the straight line distance. I wasn’t allowing for walking being so tiring and so slow on uneven ground. I definitely wasn’t allowing for us spending a whole day sitting in our tents and watching the rain pour down.”

  It was our sixth day Outside, and the Strike team were busy with the morning routine of breaking camp. Rothan packed a final section of tent into his backpack, and looked round to check nothing had been left behind.

  “I warned you to expect rain, Lucas.”

  Lucas laughed. “I know you did. I just naively thought the clouds would run out of water after a couple of hours. I was more worried about the Truesun being a strain on Amber, but we haven’t seen it for more than five minutes. Well, I am now an older, wiser, and much wetter man.”

  “Everyone ready to move?” asked Adika.

  We formed up in marching order.

  “You’ll find the path rather muddy after yesterday’s rain,” said Rothan.

  The path turned out to be extremely muddy. We squelched along it for several minutes, and I sensed other minds approaching. “Ramblers ahead, coming our way,” I warned. “About ten of them.”

  When the ramblers reached us, they paused for a chat. The Western Coastal Way was one of the main ramblers’ routes between the Hive and the coast, so we’d got used to this sort of encounter by now.

  “The stream ahead has flooded,” said a woman. “The bridge itself is fine, but you’ll find the water about ankle deep on the path before you reach it. Once you’re over the bridge and headed uphill, you’ll be fine through to the quarry.”

  “Thanks,” said Adika.

  The other party were looking us over with interest. One of the men turned to Rothan. “You’ve got a lot of new recruits with you.”

  Every group we met noticed our matching, brand new equipment, compared it to Rothan’s well-worn jacket and boots, and instantly identified him as the experienced leader of a mob of clueless greenies.

  Rothan smiled. “I’ve just come out of Lottery as an Outside maintenance worker. I’ve talked some of my new work colleagues into trying out camping.”

  “Don’t let yesterday’s rain put you off,” said another man.

  “We won’t,” said Forge.

  “I didn’t mind the rain,” said Lucas. “It was getting down the slope from table top that terrified me.”

  The experienced ones laughed. “You’ll soon get used to that.”

  We exchanged waves, moved on, and soon reached the flooding they’d mentioned. As a cosseted telepath, I didn’t have to worry about getting my feet wet. Adika picked me up to carry me across, and I automatically closed my eyes to concentrate on doin
g a proper mental sweep of the area.

  Adika had warned me not to neglect the area behind us, so I checked that first. I sensed the group of ramblers we’d just met, and another group much further away. Far beyond them was the distant hum of the Hive.

  There were several more sets of ramblers ahead of us, and what I thought must be the minds of the sea farm staff in the far distance. To the east was …

  “I may have a target,” I said.

  The Strike team instantly drew their weapons and gathered round me.

  “Relax. The target’s a very long way east.” I pointed. “It’s hard to judge distance, but he’s at least a hundred cors away. That’s too far for me to get much detail, so I can’t be sure it’s Elden, but the mind is definitely human, male, and looks unusual.”

  “How many minds are there in that area?” asked Lucas.

  “Just the one man.” I concentrated on that elusive speck of thought.

  “One person alone out here is suspicious to start with,” said Rothan. “Ramblers always travel in groups when they’re this far from the Hive.”

  “A hundred cors away,” muttered Adika. “Are you serious, Amber? You’re really detecting minds that far away?”

  “It’s very quiet out here, so my range is much further than inside the Hive. I think I’m already sensing the sea farm ahead of us.”

  “That’s incredible,” said Lucas.

  “The sea farm is like a tiny smudge of minds,” I said. “The Hive is far behind us now, but much louder and quite unmistakable.”

  Rothan and Adika started checking maps on their dataviews. “There’s a major path to the east of us that runs from the Hive to the sea farm,” said Rothan.

  Lucas peered over his shoulder at the map. “That’s the Ocean Path. It’s the shortest route between the Hive and the coast, but I assumed Elden would avoid it. He wouldn’t want to risk swimming offshore to meet an aircraft anywhere near our sea farm and fishing fleet.”