“His name is Mr. Fluffybutt,” I told him, somewhat sheepishly. “A man was just going to throw him away, before I rescued him!”
“That man is a big dummy!” Theodore stated with firm conviction.
I nodded in total agreement.
“You can feel it, can’t you?” he asked me, keeping his hands safely behind his back. I could tell he was making an effort to seem as non-threatening as possible and, despite my knowing this, it was working remarkably well!
“I felt it as soon as he came in,” I confessed. “I had to dig him out of the bottom of a box.”
“Sounds like you have a bit of psychometry to your gift,” Theodore explained, with a slight air of admiration.
“Psychometry?” I asked. I was being bombarded with a lot of words I had never heard before!
“It means you get psychic impressions from touching objects,” Earl explained, looking pleased with himself.
“Oh, right,” I shrugged. “I think it comes from the… other thing I can do…”
“Oh! That must mean that you’re Jane!” Theodore proclaimed, looking absolutely delighted!
“You’ve… heard about me?” I asked, starting to freak out a little more.
“Dear, you’re famous around here!” Theodore admitted, smiling. “Oh, but in a good way!” he assured.
I glared at Earl who seemed remarkably bad at keeping secrets, considering who he worked for. Earl just shrugged like he wasn’t the least bit concerned.
“I wouldn’t worry about it, if I were you,” came the voice of a tall, skinny, man with sandy blonde hair. He looked to be in his early thirties and wore a comfortable-looking t-shirt and jeans. He had his hands in his front pockets, looking about as casual as possible. He was soon joined by a man that was either his doppelganger or his identical twin. They even wore matching outfits!
“Jane, this is Bill, and this is Ted,” Earl explained. “They’re identical twins and the best remote-viewers we have!”
“I’m Bill, he’s Ted,” the man that had stepped up behind the first man explained.
“You’re lying,” Theodore and I stated at the same time, earning surprised looks all around.
“I didn’t know you were an empath!” Theodore practically giggled.
“I’m not, I don’t think…” I refuted. “I learned a long time ago how to… read people…” I felt a hot flush of shame and anger as I confessed this. Theodore must have picked up on this as his face grew sympathetic.
“We all do what we must to survive,” Theodore assuaged, sounding solemn, like he understood exactly how I had learned this little trick that had nothing to do with psychic powers. I could see why he made a good shrink!
“Okay, you got us!” the twins laughed in unison, which is creepier than it sounds…
“Anyway,” one of the twins, Bill, I think, said, “I wouldn’t worry about being famous down here.”
“Yeah, we can’t really talk, openly, about what we do except down here,” the other twin, Ted, admitted.
“So, news of a hot new star that’s blowing everybody away tends to create a lot of buzz,” Bill smirked.
“Especially when they do a better job at a mission than you did!” Ted admitted, looking sheepish.
“You mean, you got the mission of finding the missing soldier before I did?” I asked, trying to keep up between the two of them.
“Yeah, but we sort of blew it,” Bill confessed around a sigh.
“We knew he was in the desert somewhere, but we couldn’t get anything more specific!” Ted groused.
“Then we heard that you led the retrieval team right to the camp!” Bill enthused.
“It wasn’t so much me,” I confessed, turning solemn with the memory. “The soldier had an idea of where he was, so I just repeated back what he told me…”
“That is still some highly impressive work!” came the silky-smooth voice of a lovely Latino man with milk-chocolate skin and a thin, black, mustache. He was dressed in a suit that fit him better than Earl’s and looked much more expensive! He was a little on the short side, for a man, and was barely taller than I was. He gave a little bow that I think was supposed to impress me, but sort of repelled me. People bowing was a strange thing for me back then. I’ve gotten more used to it as I’ve gotten older, as more cultures prefer bowing to shaking hands, but seeing it for the first time, I didn’t know what to make of it!
“Please allow me to introduce myself,” the man practically sang. “I’m a man of wealth and taste! People usually call me Mr. Baggs, but you may call me Monet!”
“Hello…” I mumbled, somehow turned off by what he was doing. Something struck me as odd or hostile about him, but I couldn’t put my finger on it.
“I know you would love to see my huge, sprawling, mansion, on my expansive estate! I’d be happy to give you a tour! Just say the word and I am yours!” the man continued in his silky-smooth voice.
“I’d really rather not,” I told him bluntly. His voice was like chocolate to the ears, but there was just something… wrong about him that I still couldn’t explain.
“I’m sorry,” he rebuked, sounding incredulous, “but it almost sounded like you were refusing me!”
“I am!” I told him coldly, giving him an icy stare. “I don’t want to see whatever mansion or estate or whatever you have! I don’t want to be left alone in the same room as you!”
Monet’s eyes went wide and he gave a small gasp as the twins snickered behind me.
I rounded on them and demanded, “What’s so funny?”
“I think you might be the first woman to ever refuse Mr. Baggs,” Theodore explained, with a small smile.
“Monet Baggs is a Mesmer,” Earl explained. “He’s a strong broadcaster and can convince anyone he talks to that he is telling the complete truth and is utterly trustworthy. He’s one of our best field agents.”
“I think I’m in love!” Monet crooned! “We must go on a date together! I’ll take you to the most beautiful beaches! Nothing will be too good for you! You’ll have the finest things money can buy!”
“No,” I glared at Monet, hoping to be as blunt as possible in an effort to deter him from this insane quest he’d chosen for himself.
It was at this point that Theodore actually giggled as he told me, “Welcome to Project Aesop, Jane! I think you’re going to fit in just fine!”
And you know what? Theodore was right! For the first time in my life, I didn’t feel like the biggest freak in the room! Mind you, I still felt like a freak, but among these people, that didn’t seem so bad! My freakishness was the fresh-cracked pepper to my perfectly seared steak, rather than the sprouts that ruin a perfectly good bacon sandwich!
A girl could get used to this…
Call Me Jane Page 19