Chapter 41
“We don’t need to send him out anywhere,” the Indian’s voice said over my head. “He’s able to enter an unwary mind and read their thoughts.”
“What’s his range?”
I froze. That voice belonged to the man I hated. I peered between my lids, and saw through a slice of windows, blue sky and not much else. The air smelled dry and hot. A faint breeze stirred over my head.
“He’s awake,” he said and pried my eyes open. I tried to punch him, he pushed my arms down without any effort. I tried to yell for help and my voice made only a squeak.
“Danny. Or is it, Daniel?” The Colonel came over to block my view.
“You bastard. Why don’t you die?” I spat.
“Why don’t you get up and kill me, boy? He smiled. “Oh, too bad. You’re a cripple now. Aren’t going anywhere, are you?”
I lunged for him and the red man easily kept me from the Colonel’s face.
“Feel a little peckish, Dantan?” He grinned. “We have you on a mild dose of an experimental drug called tetradex. Made from the puffer fish. It paralyzes the muscles so every movement is like lifting a car. Except for breathing, it doesn’t affect that like curare. Of course, you won’t be going anywhere on your own without legs or a wheelchair.”
“Where are we? Who is the shit head who shot his own dog?” I snarled. I cast my thoughts out and before I could even blink, he had me tight in his net. I couldn’t even squirm. “You’re like me!” I gasped.
“No, I’m not. I’m trained as a shaman. I can latch onto spirit and hold it, I can’t read your mind,” he said. “My name is Sam Kolachi, I’m Shoshone.”
“You work for the NSA?”
“I work for whoever pays me. Colonel Pierce is only one of my employers.”
“Where are we?”
“Just over the border in Mexico,” he answered carelessly. “On a ranch, 100 miles from anywhere. No dogs, cats or birds around.”
“Doesn’t matter how far away I am,” I said. “I can still reach one.”
“No, you can’t. Not as long as I have you bound by my witchcraft,” Kolachi said. “I hold your spirit in my web. Until I release you or break the web, you can do nothing.”
I tried again, splitting myself into a dozen spears, the most I’d ever attempted. Like an arrow, I flew through the distance only to hit a barrier of glass and bounce off. I fell stunned and I looked up at his face. I felt as if a ton of books had landed on my chest, I could barely lift my ribs to breathe. He waited until I could speak. “What are you going to do to me? What do you want from me? How are you going to make me work for you?”
“Danny, with one little needle, I can make you a complete quadriplegic. I can blind you, deafen you and leave you only your voice, but you’d still be able to travel in your head, still tell us what we want to know. I can go after your father and your girlfriend, your friends and the agents. Everyone you love.”
I screamed in defiance, futility, and despair. “I’ll kill myself first chance I get!” I promised. “They already think I’m dead!”
“We won’t let you, Danny. Now, tell me. Is there anyone else that can do what you can do?”
“I’ve never found anyone else, except my uncle and he’s dead.” I said. Not that I’d looked. The only one who even came close was Felice.
“Your first task is to search the world for others like you,” he said. “Then, the Colonel wants you to reach these people. He’s looking for something called the Orion Project.”
“Right now?”
“You have somewhere else to go?”
“I’m hungry. I need the restroom.”
“You’re wearing adult diapers. You can eat when you’ve worked.”
“What time is it?” There wasn’t a clock in the room, just the bed I was on, two chairs and the window. A fan overhead. No TV, phone, or even electrical outlets. The walls were rough white plaster – adobe.
“11 AM.”
“What day?”
“Wednesday.”
“Wed – Wednesday after Thanksgiving?” Holy crap, I’d lost nearly a week.
“December 2, Danny. You should have seen the furor over your unfortunate cremation incident. Your funeral was…impressive. The Presidential Medal of Honor. Care to tell us how you did that?”
“You’ll both rot in hell for what you did to my father and Felice,” I said wearily. “How do I search if you’ve blocked me?”
“I’ll go with you, point you in certain directions where there are rumors.”
I felt him pick me up in his head and I was able to fly as he hitchhiked on my back. It wasn’t like when Felice came with me, he couldn’t reach inside my thoughts, more like he held my head in his hands and pointed me like a gun. Distance meant nothing until we reached halfway across the world, touching lightly on the minds of wolf, bear, snow owl and snow leopard. I sensed surprise, and he felt it too, pointed me at the glowing beacon of blue light I found in the darkness of the city. A bright spark that was stunted somehow yet he could hear me.
“Hello, Keegan,” I said to the mind that resonated almost like mine. The images were in Russian, and although I didn’t understand the words, I could the pictures. Yet, this mind was infantile, developmentally delayed. Great portions of it were devoid of function, retarded and unable to compete in the everyday world. I couldn’t access it, or see through his eyes or hear, he was just too badly brain-damaged. Left him, and continued on. Could reach no further, was stopped by distance, and the vast expanse of the Siberian plains.
Came back to the bedroom to find hours had passed. I was exhausted. My chest hurt, my jaws ached and I had a migraine. No one was in the room with me. I slipped into my own thoughts and searched for Felice to see if I could sneak a thought to her. Slammed into a brick wall and my head burst into flames. Thought I was burning to ash. Cried out. Begged for relief, and he was there in the flames laughing at me. Slowly, the fires died, popped out and I looked down at myself to see perfectly normal skin, not blackened flesh.
“Care to try again, Dantan? The thing about pain in your mind is that you feel it exquisitely but it does no physical damage to your body. So I can do it endlessly, until your mind breaks.
“We know brainwashing didn’t work on you so this is what’s left. You can make it easier on yourself by cooperating. Now, let’s try the other side of the continent. When I’m satisfied, we’ll stop.”
“Then I can eat?”
“No. For your foolish attempt to contact who ever, you’ll forgo lunch and dinner.”
He made me search until midnight. By then, I was so exhausted I was barely coherent. I think I soiled and wet myself. I couldn’t feel it but from the smell, I was pretty sure of it. My stomach hurt so bad I wanted to throw up, but there wasn’t anything in it to throw up. He left me lying in my own filth and in minutes, I cried myself into a fitful sleep.