Chapter 14 - Unwitting Traitor
Stenn Reslic expected more ‘words’ from his uncle at the end of the class, but when Perrin dismissed them and immediately transmitted away, he was greatly relieved. He decided to leave just as quickly to go to his apartment, get clean, eat a snack and get to the nursery.
At least, that was his intention since he was taking his promise of protecting Llaimos, and teaching him, very seriously. Therefore it was a shock to suddenly find himself down in the aircraft hangar cavern, with no idea how he had got there.
Well, he knew how to get there – he just didn’t remember doing it. Especially in the dark.
It was a further shock when he heard the faint clicks of three weapons being put into ready mode, and furtive movements further off in the darkness. His first thought was to run as the guards weren’t yet in view or he would see the red and green pin-lights on their goggles. Common sense told him he had little chance of not being found. If he ran, he would probably run right into an aircraft. In all ways, the guards had the advantage.
He heard running footsteps receding, moments before the expected challenge.
“Stand still! Don’t move!”
He saw in his side vision, two pinpoint green lights and obeyed, watching as the lights came around to face him.
“Arms out straight to the sides!”
Stenn resignedly obeyed, and felt himself searched for weapons or sabotage devices. His transmitter and bio-monitor were removed, before his arms were grabbed.
“Who was here with you?” one guard demanded.
“I don’t know,” Stenn admitted truthfully.
They didn’t believe him for the question was asked again. He repeated his answer.
“What are you doing here?” was the next question.
They wouldn’t believe him, but again he told the truth. “I don’t know.”
The tiny green lights winked off seconds before a powerful torch was turned on in his face, blinding him.
“What hopper brained game are you playing now, Stenn?” another of the guards blurted.
The miscreant in question recognised the voice of his youngest uncle.
“I don’t know,” Stenn repeated, but this time his voice was unsteady.
He knew the routine from then on, and he suddenly felt quite ill. His father had been very unimpressed with his recent spate of ‘mischief’ when he ‘couldn’t remember’ doing things. This was the twelfth such incident in two months, though his father had only learnt about five of them, but Stenn was becoming quite anxious – thinking he was going mad.
He knew what it looked like – like he was still an irresponsible delinquent. But he wasn’t. He wasn’t trying to be clever, or finding reasons to hang back in his studies.
Maybe he had been irresponsible once, but that was before Tymos and Kryslie had arrived. Now he was trying to prove himself. But if he couldn’t explain his ‘inexplicable’ actions…
His mind flicked through likely scenarios as he was hustled to the cavern beam-in point. They all started with an almighty dressing down from his father who had been tied up in important meetings all week, and would resent such a petty interruption.
After that, the options varied, but always came back to the ones he dreaded – having medics and psychs testing him for instability. It didn’t matter that they had put him up into level delta – they could still neutralise his power – like they had done to Zacary.
It wasn’t his father that he faced across the desk in his father’s office, but his uncle. That was no relief, especially after that afternoon. When Uncle Perrin was deputising for his father, he was an implacable force.
“Why were you in the caverns? You know it is out of bounds unless you were sent on an errand.” Perrin did not waste time on preliminaries.
“Uncle, I don’t know – really,” Stenn pleaded. He squirmed, trying to get free from the guard’s grip.
“You were there,” Perrin stated. “The ground level door was open and Jerrak heard someone running out. Who was with you?”
“I don’t know!” Stenn insisted. “Besides, I know where the door is, but I don’t know the unlock code!”
“You could have transmitted in and opened it from the other side. Is that what you did?” Perrin asked accusingly.
“No! I mean, I don’t know!” Stenn insisted.
Perrin demanded answers to more questions, none of which Stenn could answer, and from his uncle’s face he knew his uncle thought he was avoiding admitting his true reasons.
Finally, with an audible sigh of disgust, Perrin directed, “Take my nephew to an isolation room until his Excellency can speak to him.”
“Uncle Perrin,” Stenn protested, trying to struggle around to face his uncle. “You can’t. I have to be in the nursery…”
“You should have thought of that before you pulled your latest prank.”
“I didn’t…”
Perrin sighed. “I know…you don’t remember getting there, never intended to go there,” he summarised severely, making his disapproval apparent. “I appreciate your dedication to protecting Llaimos, but do you really think it wise to be with him if you are doing things unintentionally?”
Perrin used Stenn’s own answers against him.
Stenn stopped struggling and his shoulders slumped. Put like that…
“No,” he admitted dejectedly. “Could you at least tell Jonko or Keleb that I can’t get there?”
Knowing that his friends were tied up elsewhere, Perrin said, more kindly, “Llaimos will be fine for one evening.”
Kryslie tightened her mental shields and paused for a moment before leaving the Conference Room. She could walk out into the anteroom, but she intended to transmit and arrive behind Jonko as Tymos walked to face them. When she had discerned where her friends were positioned, she nodded at Tymos. He began to walk, activating the automatic door, as Kryslie transmitted.
“Tymos!” Jonko exclaimed in surprise. “I wasn’t expecting to see you! I thought I was in trouble.”
“I take it you are pleased to see me,” Tymos grinned. He gave no indication of his sister’s presence, but noted her concentration.
“Of course! Where is Kryslie?”
“Behind you,” Kryslie said clearly.
Jonko spun around and before he could speak again, he found himself caught in an enthusiastic embrace. His mind, full of pleased surprise, suddenly froze when his eyes met Kryslie’s brilliant blue ones. He tried to move, but his body seemed frozen as well. He could still see, and he realised that Tymos and Keleb were moving to the far side of the chamber.
Then his mind seemed to be reviewing his memories, like a flickering reverse rerun of his life. He knew Kryslie was doing something – for the inside of his head felt exceedingly strange. He didn’t try to resist her, because he trusted her, and knew that when she finished, she would explain.
After feeling as if his head was going to explode, he felt that the tight band he could imagine around his Temples – suddenly snapped and the headache was gone.
The rerun of memories went forward to the present.
“What did you do?” Jonko asked. “I know you did something.”
Kryslie grinned faintly. “I removed a whole collection of hypnotic commands – one of which was for you to run to Zacary as soon as you knew we were back.”
“Zacary?” Jonko said incredulously. “How? When? I mean, I know Stenn warned me – but I had met him and he seemed okay.”
“He probably did it at that first meeting,” Kryslie proposed. She sensed Jonko thinking back and finding memories he hadn’t realised he had.
“But why? He didn’t know then that I even knew you. Tobias asked me if I could help a friend of his. So I agreed.”
“It might have been a spur of the moment idea,” Tymos suggested when he came back over. “I suspect that Zacary only worked on younger children before you. The older ones probably wouldn’t have anything to do with him.”
“Why ever not?” Jonko asked.
“A bit of snobbery, I expect,” Kryslie suggested. “Tymoreans aren’t perfect. Zacary was disempowered.”
“Because of what he did to Tymos?” Jonko asked.
“That and other things,” Tymos brushed the details aside. “But I would say that he saw your brown hair, thought you an ignorant yokel, and too juicy a target to pass up.”
Jonko suddenly swore an Earth curse, “Bloody hell! I prattled to him like an imbecile.”
Keleb asked, “Do you think Zacary could have done something like this to Stenn, too?”
“Why? What has he been doing?” Tymos asked.
Keleb mentioned things that he knew about.
“I can’t see Zacary being clever enough to catch him unawares,” Kryslie decided.
Jonko moved his head in a nod of insight. “Senna!”
Tymos made the connection faster than his sister, but only because of comments made by Morov.
“He’s getting the younger girls to come up and kiss him,” Keleb vocalised.
“Yeah, he implied to Stenn that he was going to make out with Senna. Stenn went for him. I saw the scratches and bruises.” Jonko suddenly turned to Keleb. “Are you alright?”
“I had warning, and I didn’t feel comfortable near him,” Keleb murmured. He turned to Kryslie, “What will you do for all the others he is playing mind games with?”
Xyron had come into the anteroom unnoticed, but he asked, “What did you find, Kryslie?”
“Simple hypnosis, very low key or you would have noticed it. I expect that he may have used the same trigger words and actions on everyone he has affected like those children seen doing unsanctioned things.”
“A course of anti-hypnotic sleep conditioning should counter that,” Xyron considered. “I will arrange it for all the students. You know the triggers?”
Kryslie nodded.
“We treated Zacary as a matter of routine when he returned,” Xyron commented.
“If Kellex had him for long enough, he might have been resistant?” Tymos suggested.
“Or the commands might have been reimplanted telepathically,” Kryslie proposed.
“Or we have missed something,” Tymos added.
“Well, I am glad you fixed me,” Jonko said with emphasis. “Could he do it again?”
“Less likely now that you are alert to him, and if I may advise – don’t accept sweets from strangers,” Kryslie forced a wry grin.
“He drugged me?” Jonko realised.
“Yup!” Kryslie agreed.
“Who put him up to it?”
“Our first bet is that odorous Kellex,” Tymos told him. “Perhaps you should have killed him when you had the chance.”
“Anyway, Jon, you are okay to go. Just don’t mention to anyone that we are back, okay?”
Kryslie seemed to want to hurry their friends out. Tymos gave her a quizzical look, but then he notice Perrin Reslic waiting patiently near the door.
“Yeah, we’ll see you later. I’ll send Morov for you,” Tymos added.
“Won’t you be visiting your brother?” Keleb asked.
“He knows we are back. He’s fine,” Tymos assured him. “Besides, Stenn will be with him.”
Jonko and Keleb left the room, and only then did Perrin Reslic approach.
“Actually, my nephew won’t be able to attend your brother this evening. My brother wishes for you to examine Stenn on his behalf, Princess Kryslie.”
From the use of her title, Kryslie knew the request was official. She would be acting in the President Governor’s name.
“Certainly, Lord Perrin. Where will I find him?”
“Isolation room 11. You will be allowed in.”
Mentally, Tymos muttered, “Uh-Oh.”
“May I ask why isolation was deemed necessary?” Kryslie asked.
Perrin explained, and added, “I sincerely hope that his problem is as easy to solve as young Jonko’s.”
“Yes,” she agreed.
Stenn hadn’t stopped pacing the eight steps wide by eight steps long isolation room since he had been placed there. For one thing, it felt too quiet – like they had done something to suck all the ambient sound from the room. Even when he kicked the table or chair in his excess of frustration and disgust, the sound was muted.
For another thing, if he sat still, he’d start thinking about the inevitable interview with his father, and all of the invidious scenarios he’d already thought of. The time he had spent in the white painted room already seemed like hours, though it hadn’t got dark yet so it wasn’t that late. Still, his stomach was growling. He had intended to eat something right after his class. Without his wrist chronometer, he could not judge the time, so he went to the window to see what he could of the activities outside.
When he heard a faint sound behind him, he went rigid. The feeling of power in the room had suddenly increased, in the way it did when his father came near. He turned, slowly, reluctantly – bracing himself for the expected lecture.
But it wasn’t his father.
“Kryslie? What…”
“Sit down,” Kryslie directed, pointing to the bed. As he obeyed, she pulled the chair closer.
“When did you get back? Why are you here?” Stenn babbled. He was both relieved and confused.
“We have been back nearly a week,” Kryslie told him, and saw him nod as if just now comprehending something.
“You are the reason why my father has been so busy,” Stenn said.
“Yes, and why he is currently too busy to deal with petty nuisances like you,” Kryslie admitted, and then grinned faintly at Stenn’s involuntary flush.
“Are you here to censure me in his stead,” Stenn challenged.
Kryslie jerked in surprise. “No. Why would you think that?”
Stenn stared at her. “Why? Because you have the same aura of power about you that my father does, and if you excuse my presumption, you feel angry.”
It was Kryslie’s turn to flush. “I am not angry with you, and although I am here at your father’s request, it is not to give you a lecture.”
“What then?”
“I will get to that,” Kryslie promised. “But first, tell me why you have been behaving like a juvenile idiot? It’s not like you.”
“You’re wrong,” Stenn said bleakly. “Though I haven’t been acting like one intentionally since you came, I used to.”
“Tell me what has been happening,” Kryslie suggested. “Just between you and me. From your point of view – honestly. I have heard some things, but I need to hear from your perspective.”
Kryslie sensed Stenn’s reluctance to admit that he thought he was going mad. “This is just between us,” she repeated.
“For now!” Stenn contested. “If my father asks about this, you would have to tell him.”
“What I might have to report to him, may very well be something totally unlike what you are thinking. Really, I have a reason for my questions, but I cannot explain yet.”
With extreme diffidence, Stenn began to tell her of the odd things he had noticed himself doing. There were a lot more such events than Perrin had learnt about. Kryslie noted the oddity that he never mentioned Zacary. Odd because people had seen the two of them talking, amicably they assumed, on quite a few occasions.
When Stenn finished, after saying, “I don’t recall intending to do any of that stuff,” he asked, “You believe me, don’t you?”
“Tym and I haven’t told you to stay away from Llaimos have we?”
“Uncle Perrin stuck me here! He implied I might have harmed Llaimos, if I was doing things unintentionally.”
“Hmm,” Kryslie mused. “Well, Llaimos is fine. He knows we are back, and he has the advantage of being kept in rooms completely shielded from stray thoughts.”
A look of understanding changed Stenn’s face from worried to hopeful. Then it fell into abstraction. “Do you think I am acting like Sacul did? Or hearing voices like Zacary?”
“Are you?” Krys asked neutrally.
“Voices? I don’t think so. Certainly nothing like when you tried mind-talk on me.”
Kryslie accepted that and began to comment. “Your uncle spoke to Governor Xyron about you and Jonko.” She paused, giving Stenn a chance to react. He scowled.
“What? Because I sounded off at him?”
“No, because you ran off during class…again…without permission or explanation, and were less than attentive afterwards,” Kryslie corrected him.
“I didn’t run off. Jonko did,” Stenn insisted. He honestly did not recall his own wandering.
“Actually, Stenn, you did. Keleb saw both of you go off…and…he saw Zacary walking off.”
“Zacary? That cretin? I wouldn’t go near him with a twenty foot stave,” Stenn blurted.
“That is what I thought. Jonko told Perrin he needed to be sick, but Keleb sensed he had intended to say something else, then changed it to that.”
“Do you think Zacary is behind this? But how?”
“It seems likely, but I haven’t approached him yet. Tym and I have reasons for not wanting it known that we are back, so Zacary will wait a bit. What I found with Jon, when I approached him, was an implanted series of hypnotic commands. And fortunately we were in a shielded area, for one of those commands was to go and tell Zacary as soon as he learnt we were back.”
“Is that what you think he did to me?”
Kryslie nodded. “I sensed the same compulsion when you first saw me.”
“How? I would ever let that cretin get the better of me,” Stenn insisted.
“Normally, I would agree, but Zacary figured your weak spot. Jon mentioned you had a go at him about Senna.”
Kryslie felt his surge of anger.
“She’s thirteen! He told me how good she was at kissing,” Stenn exploded. “The perverted cretin has been seen kissing a lot of the young girls. He’s eighteen!”
That revelation about the girls, Kryslie filed away for later thought.
“What do you remember about that fight?” Kryslie asked carefully.
“I warned him off my sister, gave him a pummelling, and I didn’t care if I split his healing wounds…”
“Did you make up afterwards?”
“No damn way!”
“He didn’t offer you a peppermint?”
“No, why would he?”
“Jon recalled Zacary giving him one, and feeling weird afterwards.”
“No. No peppermint, but he did try to squirt me with something,” Stenn recalled suddenly.
“Ah,” Kryslie said without explanation. She had seen a brief recollection of the device in his mind.
“What?” Stenn demanded, tired of all the cryptic remarks.
“Lay down will you? I want to try something.”
Stenn complied, without fuss, stretching out on the neatly made bed. He was intensely curious, but he held his tongue, when Kryslie began to move her hand over him, an inch above his clothes, and going from his feet to his head. He could see the look of concentration on her face as if she was looking at him, yet looking into him. He noticed with amazement that the shape of her eyes had changed.
Kryslie adjusted her eyes and invoked the ‘energy’ sight – and seeing Stenn only as a glowing energy form. Then, instead of looking at the whole shape, she concentrated on one small section at a time. Her perception that all was normal continued until her hand reached the level of Stenn’s neck, and then a shiver went through her. She concentrated more intensely, and discerned the faintest trace of a greenish aura at that point. She continued to move her hand over his head, and found it normal.
She normalised her eyes, sat back and considered.
“You found something?” Stenn asked.
“Possibly.” She didn’t sound certain. “I will have to bring Tym here.”
“Am I sick or something?” Stenn demanded.
“No, horribly healthy,” Kryslie assured him. She decided it was time she explained things to her friend. “I think that a peppermint that Zacary gave Jon was drugged to make him susceptible to hypnosis, and be purposed to find out things and report back. It was easy for me to counter. Xyron is arranging some sleep conditioning for those who are likely to be vulnerable.”
“That might as well be everyone. Zacary has been getting around.”
“True, but he has been under observation, and he has mostly spoken to students or lower servants.”
Stenn snorted. “He hasn’t changed. He is still picking on those weaker than him.”
“Except you,” Kryslie pointed out.
“And Jonko,” Stenn added.
“Well, that’s true, but if you remember when we first got here, he assumed we were yokels because our hair was brown then?”
“I did warn Jonko about him – maybe I was too late?”
Kryslie shrugged. “Keleb didn’t trust him.”
Stenn grinned faintly. “Good for him. So I was a target and you think what? He wanted to get at me for his own reasons, or whoever got at him wanted to get at me?”
“That’s it. I’m not sure. If Zacary identified you to the person controlling him, that person might have expected you to have access to more classified stuff.”
“Zacary would love to get me in trouble,” Stenn admitted. “It probably didn’t take much to encourage him to go for me.”
“That is another point,” Kryslie agreed.
“So, can you help me?” Stenn asked.
“Oh, yes,” she assured him. “But I want you to stay here for a bit – until after I have examined Zacary. Will you be a good boy?”
Stenn growled. “I am not a …”
He found his mouth covered when Kryslie leant forward and unexpectedly kissed him. He was too stunned to react when she also embraced him, and he found his mind and body could no longer move.
“What did you…” he began to ask as soon as he was able to talk. Kryslie put a finger to his lips to silence him.
“I apologise for taking advantage of you, and truly, I’d like to try that again when we both can enjoy it. However, I had a reason. What did you notice while I was twitching memories in your head?”
“Twitching? Excellent description – I saw my life pass in front of my eyes.”
“Not all of it,” Kryslie assured him. “Just a few months worth. Think back to that episode with Zacary about Senna.”
Stenn did, and he was recalling other things, other conversations with Zacary, and the things he had been told to do. “Can you assure my father I have not degenerated to a complete idiot?”
“At the very least. Now, tell me something. Some of those places that you visited, I never knew of until just now – so I doubt that Zacary could have known either. Do you think any of that might be known of and spoken of by people in the Peace Corps?”
“Some things – like the report archive,” Stenn considered. “I have two brothers in the Corps, who would know all of that, but they wouldn’t have spoken of it. I know because – well – because of my father. I have had to do errands for him recently. What has that to do with things?”
“I am not sure. I need to talk to Tym and to Father.”
“Then why the seduction act?”
Kryslie blushed. “Something told me that if the compulsions were set deep enough, I might not be able to remove them. I had to trick your brain, before anything realised what I was up to. Getting it thinking on certain primal functions, meant I could get so deep that what I did was deeper than any compulsion. You should be immune from hypnosis now.”
“But?” Stenn sensed the doubt.
“I will know more after I have studied Zacary,” was all Kryslie would say. She gave Stenn an encouraging grin, and left him to his thoughts. Not all of which were depressing.