Psych Investigation Episodes: Episode 1 (A Young Adult Scifi / Fantasy) (14 page)

Despite all of Andy’s terror and sorrow, his
grief and his misery, his nightmare and his pain, up until now,
there had still been a glimmer of hope. Even with the unbearable
torment and realization that he had utterly and completely ruined
the hopes and dreams of an entire lineage, there had been one
small, almost unrecognizable escape from despair. In the farthest
reaches of his mind, Andy knew that due to the nature of his crimes
he wouldn’t be suspected. After all, he killed without laying a
finger on his victims. If he wanted to, he could simply start over
and never hear of his atrocities again.

Now that was gone, and all that remained inside
of Andy was misery. So, there
were
people who could track
these powers? If he’d had even a morsel of suspicion, he never
would have gone through with any of it. He could have called the
police, or he could have reached out for help. Ruin and Requiem had
told him he was unique, but now he knew otherwise.

I’m done. I’ll be executed, my mother
shamed, my life snatched away from me. Do I even deserve any
better?

“
I know what you’re thinking,
Darling, and it’s not because I’m a Telepath,” Requiem said. Ruin
simply nodded.

She walked over to him in the corner of the
dark bomb shelter. Gravel crunched underfoot as she crouched down
in front of him. With her red hair and her fierce eyes, her beauty
somehow managed to overshadow her madness.

“
Do not lose hope. There is no going
back, but we can still move forward. We have broken no laws because
we are the law
. I’ve seen this ‘Harris-boy’. Once we have
him, nothing will stop us. I think you can help us. You claimed to
know him.”

Andy shook his head. “You might as well
forget about Jack. Even if Jack is
like
us, he’ll never
be
us. In fact, he’ll never be like anyone. Sometimes I
wonder if he’s even human.”

Ruin rubbed under his chin. “I noticed
something was off about him as well,” he said. “Andy, tell us
everything you know about Jack Harris, starting with your
relationship. Are you two friends?”

“
Kind of,” Andy said. “It’s very
difficult to say. Jack seems to think we are, but I mostly avoid
him. He’s one of the few people abused at school more than I am,
and he reaches out to me—not for help or pity or anything, I think
he just doesn’t like seeing me alone. He has this friend of his,
umm … Adam. So despite it all, he always has someone to talk with.
I mostly keep to myself, and I think he feels bad for
me.”

Ruin nodded. “Interesting. You say he is abused
at school?”

Andy shook his head just thinking about it.
“You have no idea. It’s a miracle he hasn’t gone on a rampage,
abilities or otherwise. What that kid’s gone through makes my life
seem like heaven by comparison. I don’t even know where to start
with Jack.”

Requiem and Ruin slid over two metal chairs,
which scratched against the gravel floor.

“
Well, tell us what you can,”
Requiem said.

“
I live about two miles from him, so
we’ve gone to the same school since about the third
grade. Since then, I’ve seen some of the worst things humanity
can offer brought upon him. If it was just being beaten up or spat
on, or even shut inside of a locker for a few hours, he’d be no
different from me. But with him, they took it beyond
that.”

Andy inhaled. “In the early sixth grade, he
found an abandoned baby rabbit outside the schoolyard. For weeks,
he nursed the thing and brought it with him to school. The teachers
didn’t seem to mind, which was weird. I guess they thought it was
cute.”

“
He carried it with him for almost
two months, caring for it, playing with it. When bullies would come
near him he’d hide it, and they’d threaten to beat him if he didn’t
give it to them. Let’s just say he got quite a few beatings. But
one day, as a ‘joke,’ this kid Jeremy Sanders gets hold of some rat
poison. He breaks into Jack’s locker, replaces the food, and within
a day the little thing dies.”

Requiem stood from her chair and picked it up,
tossing it into the corner. The chair crashed against the wall and
landed on the floor with a thud.

“
Those bastards!
How dare
they?”

Andy was confused. So now Requiem was a
compassionate person? Insane people made no sense.

Noting his confusion, Ruin spoke, “Andy, we
already consider Jack to be our brother. The rabbit was his
thing.
If he wanted it to live, then damnit it
lives
. That is our way. It was his choice, and it was
violated by trash like this Jeremy. But please, continue, what
happened next?”

Andy tried to ignore the remark and continued.
“Well, it didn’t take long for Jack to find out who did it. It was
also the first time I’d ever seen him angry about something.
Normally, he just ignored the torture, but this time, he went up to
this Jeremy kid, who mind you, was quite a bit larger than
Jack.”

 “
So anyway, Jack knocked this
guy to the floor with one hit. I’ve never seen that kind of power
from anyone. Oh man, you should have seen the surprise on this
kid’s face when little old Jack sent him to the ground. Jack jumped
on top of him, right? And he made like he was going to punch him
again. I remember because he pulled back his fist like he was ready
to go all out on this guy.”

Ruin laughed. “And you say he can’t be made to
see our side of things?”

“
Wait, Ruin, there’s more. Just when
Jack was about to start pounding this kid into oblivion, the kid
started screaming, ‘Wait, please! Don’t hurt me. I’m sorry,
please!’ And then Jack just … stopped. He didn’t even think about
it. The moment Jack heard his voice he just stopped, got off the
kid, and told him he forgave him.”

Andy continued, “You see? This is why he’ll
never join us. He’s not like other people.”

Requiem’s lip pulled back, distorting what was
normally a beautiful face. Her eyes, too, seemed crossed, and her
tongue lolled out the side of her mouth like a hungry
animal.

“
Oh, I want him so badly. I need to
be alone for some time, my sweets. I can barely contain myself, and
I don’t wish to hurt my two dear brothers. This Jack Harris, he
will … he
must
be mine. I will have him slaughter his
family. No, better, I shall make him kill
children!
I need
to be alone. You two, get out of here—now!”

A chill went down Andy’s spine as understanding
dawned on him.
She’s excited by the thought of destroying
innocence? It seems the greater the innocence, the higher the
pleasure. Who is she?

If asked, most would say there are three types
of people in this world—the sane, the mad, and those who know they
are mad. But seeing Requiem, Andy came to realize there was a
fourth.

Those who know they are mad and loving
it.

Cemmera Wilson, Division Captain and team
leader of Op. team four-H, smiled as she felt the excitement
grow.

“
Give me the analysis,
Santos.”

Santos looked towards the ground and appeared
to be deep in focus. He was a fat, weird-looking fellow with
mushroom-shaped hair and large cheekbones, but none of that
mattered to Cemmera. Santos could be as fat and ugly as he wanted,
as long as he did his job properly.

“
It’s the two we’re looking for, no
doubt about it. They’re both Teleys and they’re both scared out
their wits. They have a feeling we’re closing in on them, and
they’re about to lose it.”

“
Do they sense you?” she
asked.

“
Not at all. They’re amateurs,
untrained.”

Cemmera nodded. This was good.

They were crouched out of sight and huddled
behind a filthy stretch of wall that lined a storage facility in
Midtown Manhattan. All five were bundled in bulletproof T.A.C
jackets, Comm radios, 9mm. firearms, and non-constrictive helmet
gear.

As usual, Manhattan roared with activity. Cars
sped to and from work, restaurants, and a few other less
respectable places. Positioned over a sewer grate, the stench
annoyed Cemmera, but she pushed it from her mind and focused on the
entry point.

“
Can everyone here make the jump?
It’s only a two-story window.” Cemmera beamed with approval as one
by one, her team-members nodded. It was only about a fifteen foot
jump to the window, and her team was well-trained. Even a Telepath
could make the jump with proper training.

Cemmera motioned with her hands, and in one
fluid motion, the team bolted upright from their crouch and
followed Cemmera. She sprinted from behind the dusty wall towards
the left end of the complex. The second-story window was low enough
to the ground that the wall behind them hid them from any
onlookers.

With a grunt, Cemmera kicked off the ground and
leapt, grabbing hold of the base of the window. Concentrating,
she focused on the chemical structure of the glass. As a
Manipulator with almost two decades of practice, the chemical
composition of glass could be manipulated as easily as a piece of
bread in a toaster.

Silently, the glass faded away into sand, and
she entered the building. One by one, her team members leaped,
grabbing a hold and pulling themselves in behind her. Once inside,
Cemmera signaled weapons-free, and the men removed their guns from
their holsters.

“
Santos, location,” she
said.

Santos looked down again—it was his gesture of
gathering Intel. It was different for every Telepath, but they all
had some noticeable quirk when they were concentrating. “Just down
the hall and to the left. They have ah, let me see here now. Any
deeper and they’ll feel the probe.”

A small drop of sweat fell from his forehead as
he concentrated. “Okay, they have weapons. They’re carrying Colt
M1s and sufficient ammo to take down a small army.”

Cemmera nodded. “Alright, we’ll put our
Kinetics up front and our Brute in the middle.”

Neil Witherson, her team’s sole Reinforcer,
grunted at the derogatory term. More than anything else,
Reinforcers hated to be called a ‘Brute’. Cemmera knew he wouldn’t
voice any protest during a mission, but he’d approach her about it
later, for sure.

Cemmera rubbed her gloved hands together. “On
three we go.”

One
.

Here it was. This was the reason most joined
the Op. department. She knew she was not alone in feeling the rush,
the excitement fill her belly—the giddy feeling of pleasure and
empowerment she’d come to live for.

Two.

She licked her lips, with her fingers held
tightly on the trigger of her weapon. Not that she would ever use
it—very few did. It was less powerful than what she was capable of
by herself.

Three.

This was it, her favorite part—watching her
plan come to fruition. On cue, Neil balled his left hand into a
fist and then slammed it into the door. With a tremendous crash,
the door exploded off its hinges and flew into the room, startling
the two frightened men huddled in the corner.

As Cemmera expected, they reached for their
firearms. They were Telepaths, widely accepted as the weakest
fighters among Psychs. Before they could raise their weapons
halfway into a shooting position, the guns were ripped from their
fingers and sent soaring across the room and into the hands of her
Kinetics.

Cemmera smiled. She only loved two things in
this world—the thrill of the hunt and the men she hunted
with.

The two targets looked at each other in
confusion before raising their hands into the air and dropping to
their knees.

“
We surrender!” one cried. “Don’t
shoot!” begged the other.

Cemmera shrugged. “Okay, I had the last few
kills, so who wants this one?” Cemmera’s men filled her with pride
as each member of her team raised their hands like school children
with an answer to their teacher’s question. They were such good
boys.

“
Alright, you seem kind of agitated,
Neil, so go ahead and smash ‘em until their skulls look like
jelly.”