Psych Investigation Episodes: Episode 1 (A Young Adult Scifi / Fantasy) (21 page)

Melissa grinned. “That all you got, Big-Shot?”
For some reason, Jack had the notion she was enjoying
this.

A trickle of blood squirted from Jack’s nose.
He wiped it on his sleeve and stood up. He didn’t realize it until
then, but over a hundred people were now cheering and shouting
encouragement to the both of them. Michael seemed to be taking
bets, and Paro was studying the bout like a referee. Psychs were
weird people.

The makeshift arena was actually kind of cool.
All around him, the large glass windows let in bright sunlight, and
he could still see all of Manhattan from where he stood.

Paro held out a hand and motioned for them to
pause. “Jack,” he said. He walked between the two of them with a
massive grin covering his face. “You lose this fight, and you
cooperate with us in full. You win, and Melissa here goes on a date
with you. Oh, and I’ll personally buy you every video game ever
made.”

Melissa didn’t seem bothered by this. She
simply grinned. “I’m okay with that, Paro. But I’ll make it even
more interesting. Land just one punch on me, Jack, and I’ll go on a
date with you, but you still have to beat me if you want Paro’s
reward.”

Jack nodded. “You’re on.”

He wiped his nose once more for good measure
and prepared himself to square off with Melissa again. For a
moment, he almost didn’t hear the voice calling to him in the
background.

“
She’s a Reinforcer, Jack! Keep your
distance and don’t let her get anywhere near you. Mummy loves
you!”

Jack felt like he was going to die of shock. He
turned around, and sure enough, the front-most spectator was his
own mother.

“
Mom! What are you doing
here?”

Paro too, looked as if he had seen a ghost. He
backed away from Jack and Melissa and strolled over to her. “Alana,
when did you—”

She shushed him. “We’ll figure this out after,
Paro. You of all people should know I can’t miss something as fun
as this. It’s almost enough to make me forget how mad I am at you.
Oh, by the way, look at how cute my little boy looks, fighting and
making bets that he can’t possibly win! He reminds me of a younger
you, Paro. Oh, look at him!
Go Jack! Go Jack
!”

Jack watched as Paro shook his head in
disbelief. “Damn Telekinetics,” he muttered.

“
What is
she
doing here?”
Jack asked Melissa.

“
Jack, there’s a lot you still have
to learn. I’m sure this is very shocking to you, and I’ll
understand if you need to wrap your head around this for a bit, but
your Mom—naturally—is like one of us.”

“
That’s not what I meant, Melissa. I
mean what is she doing here without my Dunkaroos? She knows I love
that snack more than anything. If she was gonna drive all the way
over here, she could have at least brought me something good to
eat.”

Melissa tilted back her head and laughed. “Does
anything surprise you, Jack?”

“
Of course stuff does. I had no idea
that Sookie was actually a fairy. I almost passed out when that was
revealed.”

“
I see, so it’s only stupid stuff
that shocks you. Whatever, you’ve had enough of a break. Let’s end
this.”

Before Jack could reply, Melissa dashed at him.
Jack allowed himself another droplet of power, and he fought off
the terrible sensation rising from his stomach. He hurled it at
her, slowing her down but not stopping her completely. He knew she
wasn’t fighting at her best—he’d seen her pound a hole into the
ground. But the deal didn’t say she had to be.

Jack followed up his blast by charging at
Melissa head-on. He collided with her, and the combination of his
Kinetic force and his own charge was enough to knock Melissa to the
ground. Pain exploded in Jack’s body as he made contact. Melissa
was now as rough as iron, even tougher than before. He fell down
along with her.

Lying on the floor, Jack took a moment to
notice that now every single person in the department was watching,
screaming, and yelling out encouragements. He felt like he was at a
rock concert.

Jack got to his feet, but Melissa was quicker.
She kneed him the chest. It felt like being hit with a tire-iron.
He landed on his back with the wind knocked out of him. Before he
could stand, she jumped on top of him, sitting on his chest with
her right hand clutching his throat.

“
Give up?” Her eyes didn’t hold any
menace, just a playful grin and a look of determination.

Jack realized that he would yet again be forced
to resort to that disgusting draw of power. This time, he left the
‘door’ open for a millisecond longer. He almost regretted it, as
even in that tiny bit of time, it felt like he’d never be able to
shut it again. It was risky. Jack knew somehow on an instinctual
level that if he left it open for too long, power would flood into
him until he exploded and wouldn’t be able to stop it.

Jack scrambled around in his mind. He had been
lucky the last few times, but now he was starting to get the hang
of things. It wasn’t easy to locate, but it was becoming easier
each time. It was that trigger, that pathway, the one that sent
things that were near to him farther away. He reached for it
…

Melissa was sent soaring off of him. She landed
on the ceramic floor and rolled across it. After three rolls, she
clutched at the ground and halted, pushing off her arms and
flipping back to her feet.

“
That was way stronger than before,
how did you …?”

Jack followed it up with yet another burst, and
again she was flung backwards and knocked to the floor. But like
the other times, she was quick to get back to her feet, so Jack
sent a third burst her way. And this time, it had no effect.
Melissa didn’t even appear to be fazed by it.

Sarah whispered something into Paro’s ear, and
he nodded.

“
You two!” he shouted. “No more
powerful than what you were using before—that’s an
order.”

Melissa stuck out her tongue, but she nodded.
“Alright, fine. You hear that, Jack?”

Jack thought he understood. “Yeah, I
heard.”

Jack didn’t mind. If he understood Paro’s
meaning, then it was actually a good thing. Jack didn’t want to
have to reach that deep again. He feared losing control of
himself.

 
Off to his right, he saw a
childish glee in his mother’s eyes. She was screaming louder than
anyone else was while she chanted his name. She looked so
proud.

Jack gritted his teeth as he once again
replenished the small droplet of power. He didn’t know what Michael
was talking about—this wasn’t becoming any less unpleasant.
Although Jack did feel it was slightly different this time. He felt
a bit … weak. It was as if he hadn’t eaten in a while despite not
being hungry. He wasn’t physically exhausted, like the way you get
when you run too much or do too much exercise, but in a way, he
felt drained.

Melissa looked at him as if reading his
thoughts. “You newbie Psychs have no stamina. I can already see it
in your face. You’re going to collapse any minute. Just give up
now, Jack. You’ve already lost.”

“
No way in hell! It’s not over yet.
Come on, I’m ready.”

Melissa approached cautiously this time. By now
she was obviously aware of Jack’s ability to fling her backwards.
Jack reflected on the fight—it appeared she had some way of
resisting what he could do. He wondered if he should try one of the
other things he felt in his mind, but he decided against it.
Somehow, he knew that there were just some strings that he wasn’t
ready to pull on.

With the caution of a boxer, she squared in on
him. She started with jabs that had no chance of making contact,
but slowly she backed him into a corner by a nearby window. Jack
realized that at the rate things were going, he didn’t have the
slightest chance of winning. All he needed was to land one hit,
make contact just once, and then at the very least he could take
the girl of his dreams out on a date.

Melissa faked with her right then sprang off
her left, dashing at Jack. It was at this point he knew he had two
options—dodge and prolong the fight, or risk it all and maybe win
part of the bet.

Surprise was the only thing Jack could see on
Melissa’s face, as he too dashed to meet her assault. With his
remaining power, Jack reached for that familiar feeling, that
trigger, and launched the last of it at Melissa. It didn’t do much,
but she was slowed just enough so that Jack’s fist made contact
with her hard-as-steel face at the same moment she did the same to
him.

Jack’s punch had no effect, but hers knocked
him off his feet. Jack lay there with the wind knocked out of him
and a smile on his face. He had hit her!

It was hard for him to move. He was exhausted.
He tried to get up but to no avail. Melissa walked away and
returned a moment later. She once again took a seat on his chest,
and Jack’s eyes lit up in fear when he saw what was in her
hands.

“
No!” Jack screamed, terror in his
heart. “For God’s sake, Melissa. It’s like the size of a car
antenna.”

Jack closed his eyes and hoped it wouldn’t hurt
too much. To his utter humiliation, the crowd applauded and
laughed.

Chapter 15:
One-Way Ticket
.

“
Look, please try and understand,
Alana. It’s like I’ve been saying—I had no idea he was yours. How
could I possibly know something like that? You should know better
than anyone why we’re supposed to report these things. Tell me,
what if Jack would have killed someone?”

For the first time in the last fifteen minutes,
Paro felt that his point had finally been made, indicative by the
twinge of guilt he saw creep into Alana’s youthful face. The years
had been kind to her. Paro hoped he still looked that young at
forty-five.

Alana had been willing to put off this
discussion yesterday, and Paro owed her the chance to be heard out.
She had spent the last few nights in a room parallel to Jack’s,
where she and Michael had tried to teach him little bits of things
here and there. He was learning slowly, but he was still making
some progress.

“
Jack would never do something like
that, Paro. You’ve only known him for a little over two days, and
even you must already be sure of it.”

They were in the planning room, alone. Paro had
sent everyone on one errand or another, and he was glad to see that
the situation was being diffused. Not long after Jack’s humiliating
defeat, Alana had ripped the planning room door right off the
hinges and sent it hurling at him. She had even brought a basket
full of pots, pans, and other painful objects that he had been
forced to deal with. She was rarely angered, but as Paro so vividly
recalled, when her temper was sparked it was even worse than Paro’s
usual sporadic outbursts. Luckily, she’d only damaged the door and
not the equipment in the room. It was easily repaired.

She hadn’t been willing to let things rest, but
Paro had managed to convince her to at least give him until early
the next morning to work everything out. So, here she
was.

“
I am sure of it. I’m sure that he’d
never willingly hurt another person. But, Alana, this kid didn’t
know what he was doing. Even an environmentalist can step on a bug
and never know it happened. Look, I respect you, more than you will
ever know. I’ll never forget how you yanked me by the ear and took
me away from that Op. team. Not a day goes by that I don’t feel
grateful to be a force for helping people rather than slaughtering
them.”

Paro shuddered as he remembered some of his
older, more violent days. He was only Jack’s age when he started
with the Psych-Operatives. He never knew what it was Alana had seen
in him then, but she beat him to a pulp and dragged him away from
that team. It was years until he was able to properly thank
her.

If Paro wanted, he could bring her up on so
many charges for the last few days alone—let alone for not
reporting her child—that she’d spend years in one of the
facilities. But Paro had never been the “reporting” type. If he
could deal with a situation, then he dealt with it. From the bottom
of his heart, Paro felt that only the truly wicked needed to be
locked away.