Telepath (Hive Mind Book 1) (13 page)

I sat under a maple tree, with a
circle of expectant birds around me. I threw a handful of birdseed, and watched
them eagerly fly in pursuit. A moment later, the birds scattered as the Strike
team ran past me and started their third lap of the park. Adika was in the
lead, with twenty figures chasing after him. They were looking a lot less colourful
these days, because Adika had insisted they give up their old Teen Level training
outfits and wear the officially provided clothes instead.

A park of our own had
seemed an indulgence, but it wasn’t. The Strike team needed it for training,
and the rest of us needed it as a place to relax. The last few weeks had given
me a whole new view of not just the park, but the whole Hive. I’d never realized
there were interlevels between the proper levels of the Hive, holding vents,
waste disposal, plumbing, and all the other services. I’d walked along
corridors and never suspected labyrinths of maintenance areas were hidden behind
some of the walls. I’d never even worked out the obvious fact that the park on
one level took up two levels above it to give the extra ceiling height, and one
level below it for tree roots.

I’d been blind, but now
I’d seen all these places. I’d climbed ladders, and crawled through interlevels
and vents, both as a watcher in the minds of the Strike team, and in person.
Adika said it was vital to understand the areas the targets could hide in, and
he was right. Once I’d been there myself, it was much easier to make sense of
the clues I picked up from target minds. When they left the corridors and
entered the bowels of the Hive, visual clues were far less important than
things like the feel of maintenance mesh, or the heat of a nearby lighting
duct.

I got off lightly compared
to the rest of the team. Adika didn’t send me down waste chutes, since those
were both smelly and dangerous. I only did a small fraction of the physical
training they did as well. Adika just wanted me fit enough to run from danger
as a last desperate resort.

Lucas strolled up and
stretched out on the grass by my side. Fran came a few minutes later, and
carefully dusted off a bench before sitting on it. Megan arrived and sat next
to her, but with a significantly large gap between them.

The budding friendship
between Fran and Megan had ended a few days ago. I’d only seen a glimpse of the
crucial argument in Megan’s thoughts. She’d been annoyed by Fran saying
something insulting about Adika.

I didn’t understand Megan’s
feelings about Adika. For that matter, Megan didn’t seem to understand them
either. Megan had over a decade more experience than me. I’d thought that would
help her know precisely what she wanted in life, but instead it seemed to
complicate things. Whenever I saw her thoughts, at least one of the levels
would be agonizing over whether she should give in to her attraction to Adika
or stay loyal to her dead husband.

Adika spotted us as he finished
the third lap of the park, and left his team resting while he came over to sit
on the grass facing me. I could see him glance across at Megan, and her dodge
his gaze. I wondered if there’d been another clash between them. In theory, a
fight between Adika and Megan was none of my business. In reality, it meant I’d
be dragged into an emotional whirlpool the next time I had to read Adika’s mind.

“Team status report,” I
said. “Megan?”

“I’m recruiting a few more
maintenance people. The unit will be operational soon, so we can’t keep calling
in outside staff every time we need minor repairs.”

“Please,” I said. “No more
heavily muscled, black-haired men.”

I was drowned out by
everyone laughing. Everyone except Fran, who gave her usual rigid, artificial
smile.

“You’d prefer them slightly
skinny, with light-brown hair?” Adika asked, with a fake air of innocence.

I blushed. I’d been right
to keep quiet about the Forge issue. My weird fascination with him had vanished
like smoke being sucked into an air vent. I’d no idea what had cured it. I
could only guess it was the result of me reading his mind so much.

Whatever the reason, Forge
was just a member of the Strike team and an old friend now, while Lucas … The fascination
of Lucas’s glittering Carnival mind, which had as many levels as the Hive
itself, could never fade.

Back in Hive Futura, I’d
tried to encourage Lucas into a relationship, but he’d shied away, expecting me
to fall for one of my Strike team. Since then, he’d been watching closely as I failed
to pair off with anyone. As he watched my actions, I’d been watching his
thoughts, an amused bystander in his head as he analyzed the situation and considered
possible tactics and outcomes.

Three days ago, my Tactical
Commander had decided the probability of success, with its projected benefits,
now justified taking risks. He’d been blatantly chasing me since then, and I’d
been teasing him a little in revenge for his reluctance in Hive Futura.

Lucas, of course, had
worked out exactly what I was doing, why I was doing it, and that his target
had every intention of being caught in the end. He also knew that I was busily
reading his thoughts and plans, and was constantly picturing wicked images to
tease me in return.

Lucas grinned hugely in
response to Adika’s remark. “I hope she does.”

Megan made a choking noise
and hastily started talking again. I risked one glance at Lucas’s dark eyes,
saw he was laughing at me, and pointedly turned my face away from him to concentrate
on Megan.

“I’ve got the candidates
standing by for when you have time to interview them, Amber.”

“I’ve been wondering about
something,” I said cautiously. “Normal accommodation levels have decorations
and wall paintings, but our unit walls are all plain white. Would it be
possible for us to have a resident mural painter to brighten the place up?”

Megan nodded. “Law
Enforcement has its own mural painters, the same way it has its own cleaners, electricians,
and other general staff. We can easily get one assigned to us. Would you prefer
paintings of people, or flowers, or …”

“Actually, I really liked
the paintings done by someone on Teen Level,” I said. “Her name is Sofia. She’s
just come out of Lottery as a Level 1 Mural Painter.”

Adika had been gazing across
at the resting Strike team, but now he turned to stare at me. He obviously knew
that Matias was pining for a girlfriend called Sofia. I was relieved when he
didn’t say anything.

Megan frowned and tapped
at her dataview. “Sofia’s clearly an incredibly talented artist to be rated Level
1, but she isn’t allocated to Law Enforcement.”

I gave a heavy sigh of
disappointment. “Is there such a big difference in the imprints that it’s impossible
for her to work here?”

“No, it’s purely a security
issue,” said Megan. “I could get Sofia’s personality profile checked to see if
she’s suitable for transfer to Law Enforcement. That might involve extra tests
on discretion and …”

I smiled. “Please ask Sofia
if she’d like to be considered for a transfer.”

If Sofia agreed and was
approved for a transfer, then she and Matias could be happy together here. The
other member of the Strike team who was pining for an old girlfriend was Forge,
but I couldn’t work out how to fit a Level 9 Media Presenter into a Telepath
Unit.

I dismissed that thought
for now, and turned to Lucas.

“Tactical team is fully operational,”
he said, “and in continual data exchange with Tactical teams in the other Telepath
Units. We’re shadowing Keith’s team on the suspect area around 600/2600, and
getting their full data feeds about it. They want to hand that area to us as
soon as the rest of our unit is operational. Keith has said there’s nothing
wrong there, and it would take a massacre before he’d admit to making a mistake.”

Megan made that choking noise
again. Even though the deeper levels of her mind felt Keith’s negligence had
led to her husband’s death, she still wasn’t comfortable hearing a telepath
openly criticized.

“We’ve been suffering some
glitches in getting our research information,” continued Lucas, “but we’ve built
up profiles on a large number of areas with low level suspicious signs. We’ve
already discovered about thirty where the guilty party is obvious, and referred
them on to be dealt with by borderline telepaths or nosy patrols. Others are on
the list to be checked when our unit is operational. We’ve also got one area that’s
just plain peculiar. The area 500/5000 shopping area on Level 1 is being
plagued by ducks.”

We all stared at him. Area
500/5000 was the centre point of the Hive. On any level, the 500/5000 shopping
area was the biggest and fanciest. The one on Level 1 was the finest shopping
area in the entire Hive. I’d promised my mother we’d go shopping there one day,
but so far I’d been much too busy.

Everyone had the same
question in their thoughts. Adika gave in and asked it. “Ducks? Real ducks?”

Lucas shook his head.
“Pictures of ducks, fancy golden ducks, keep appearing on walls. A practical
joker must be sticking them up, but nobody has caught him in the act yet. It’s
hardly threatening. In fact, people are finding the duck plague so amusing that
the shops have started ordering matching toy ducks to sell themselves.”

Megan laughed. “I must go
shopping over there and buy one.”

Adika came next. “Strike
team’s basic training is nearly complete,” he said. “I’ve got two or three team
members who aren’t up to Chase team fitness yet. They’re working hard, so it’s just
a temporary issue. In two days’ time, we’ll be ready to move from training to limited
operational status, checking simple suspect areas. A week of that, and we
should be ready to go fully operational and handle emergency runs too.”

Those words gave me a
shiver of nerves. I knew everyone was impressed by my abilities as a telepath,
I could read that in their minds, but so far I’d only done training exercises.
I’d no idea how I’d cope with reading a genuine wild bee, or even if I’d be
able to recognize one. I’d lived for eighteen years as an ordinary girl. I
still felt like an ordinary girl. Could I really do what the Hive needed? If I couldn’t,
people might die. If I couldn’t, what happened to Olivia and York might happen
to me.

I forced that thought away,
and faced Fran. She immediately burst into resentful speech.

“I object to that snide
remark from Lucas about glitches in getting research information. Liaison has
complied fully and promptly with every request for data.”

Lucas sighed. “You’ve been
refusing to accept calls from me for the last two days, Fran. Claiming you’ve
complied with every request for data may be technically true, but since you’re
blocking me from making the requests in the first place …”

Fran gave him a look of
open disgust. “I merely suggested you route all data requests through your
deputy, Emili. A necessary measure due to your offensive attitude.”

“Yes, you made that suggestion,”
said Lucas, “though frankly it sounded more like an order to me. As I told you
at the time, we can’t work like that.”

“What’s been going on
here?” asked Adika sharply.

Lucas sighed again. “During
emergency runs, the Liaison team have to evacuate bystanders without creating
panic. My team threw a few practice scenarios at them, situations like a
dangerous target heading through a medical area, so they could come up with appropriate
responses. They did well, inventing some very creative cover stories. I made a
light-hearted joke about them being excellent liars. It was meant as a
compliment, but Fran was annoyed.”

I checked Lucas’s thoughts
for extra details. His memory showed Fran had been much more than annoyed,
startling him with an explosion of anger.

I tried to smooth things over.
“Fran, I think you misunderstood Lucas’s joke. He was genuinely impressed by
your team’s response to the practice scenarios.”

“It was more than this one
incident,” said Fran. “Lucas’s entire attitude is frivolous and completely inappropriate.
I refuse to work with him until he becomes more professional.”

“I agree that Lucas can be
frivolous,” said Adika, “but you can’t blankly refuse to work with him. I’ve
just said that Strike team are only two days away from checking genuine suspect
areas. Lucas will be the one calling our tactics. At any moment, he may need Liaison
to supply extra information, co-ordinate outside assistance, or organize evacuations.”

“He’ll have to get Emili
to make those requests,” said Fran.

Adika’s face changed from irritation
to outright fury with startling speed. “You’re seriously suggesting that Emili
has to repeat every order from Lucas before you’ll action it? During genuine operational
runs? Even the simplest check run can turn unexpectedly nasty, and we’ll be
responding to full emergencies soon. I’m not having your sulking causing delays
that endanger my men’s lives.”

Fran glared at him. “I’m
not sulking, I just insist on …”

I stood up and interrupted
her. “I’ve had enough of this, Fran. I’m in notional charge of this unit, with
two deputies who do the actual work. Megan is in charge of everyday running of
the unit. Lucas is Tactical Commander in charge of unit operations. That means Lucas
is your boss, Fran. You have to follow his orders.”

Fran stood up too. “Oh
yes, we all have to grovel and obey Lucas because he’s sleeping with you. I
don’t know how he can bear to touch a freak like you, let alone …”

“Shut up!” Megan screamed
the words at her.

Everyone was standing now,
and there was a strange, shocked silence. Even Fran didn’t seem to believe what
she’d just said, but there could be no denying or forgetting those words. There
was only one thing I could do now. The thing I should have done when I first
read Fran’s mind. I forced myself to speak and did it.