Trifecta (94 page)

Michelle had been growing ever more alarmed as she listened. 
She didn't think she really had psychic ability, but from what this professor was
telling her, she was in grave danger.  "I have to admit, I believe he has strange
powers.  What should I do?"

"If he weakens you or hurts you, he may simply erase
any psychic power you possess.  Unusual human abilities seem to flourish in certain
circumstances.  They aren't turned on by will power alone.  Psychic powers are manifested
in periods of extreme need, during periods of great stress.  Omar may bring your
powers out to his own detriment, if he pushes you too hard.  On the other hand,
he might just cause them to disappear."

"So I would be worthless to him.  But you're supposing
I have something I've never even experienced."

"You've never had premonitions that came true?  Never
knew when someone was going to call you?  Never avoided a disaster because you felt
uneasy?"

She nodded rather dubiously.  "Those things happen
to everyone."

"That's called precognition.  Think of something recent,"
Vincent urged.

"Oh, I did know when Omar's witches were after Heather. 
I knew they would kill her if I didn't do something right away."

"And you knew better than to get involved with Omar,"
Vincent said nodding.  "Think of something different about you. Maybe when
you were a little girl."

Michelle was silent for a moment and then her face lit
up. "It's almost a family joke.  They said I was attracted mysteriously to
hurt animals.  I did seem to find a lot of injured and abandoned little dogs and
cats.  Rabbits.  Once a bat.  Rats and mice.  I insisted on keeping them.  My parents
said I healed them.  But that was long ago."

"Okay.  Let's just suppose you have the psychic ability
of precognition and also the gift of healing.  That may be what attracted Omar."

This man was enhancing her anxiety about Nakamura.  She
got up and went to the telephone.  "I'm worried about a friend..."

Vincent listened to her side of the telephone conversation,
but couldn't see her face, as she was turned away from him.  She was talking to
someone named Tom.  Vincent saw her react violently, as though she had received
a physical blow.  She cried out 'No,' once, then she was quiet for a time.

"Try to keep him there.  I don't think he should drive...Oh...the
car's wrecked?  He can't talk?...resting.  Okay.  Thank's, Tom.  I'll come over
now.  Take him back to his hotel."

Michelle walked woodenly over to a chair and sat down. 
"His car exploded."

Vincent nodded.  "You have to believe very strongly,
right now, that you have the powers."

Michelle shook her head.  "I have to drive over. 
Get Nakamura."

She seemed agitated and Vincent didn't want her panicking. 
She had to be calm.  "No.  You'll be leading Omar directly to your friend. 
You should stay away from him.  I think Omar will start another attack very ..."

Suddenly all the light bulbs in Michelle's apartment started
exploding, one after another, like tiny bombs.  First the bulb in a lamp by the
couch, near where Vincent was sitting exploded.  Then each bulb in a small chandelier
in the dining room.  The apartment became darker as each bulb exploded with the
popping sound of a small bomb.  The kitchen fixture erupted loudly and crashed
to the floor.  Each pop and explosion was distinct and separate.  Smoke drifted
from the bulbs and glass covered the floor. 

When the glass splinters sprayed around the room, tiny
sharp projectiles hit Vincent and Michelle.  Michelle let out a shrill scream and
ran to the center of the living room. 

A whirlwind seemed to blow through the whole apartment,
toppling books off of shelves, knocking chairs over, sending small objects flying
around the room.

Everything stopped.  The whole apartment was completely
dark, which made it even scarier.  Only a diffused illumination came in from the
windows to the balcony.

Vincent was badly hit on the right side of his face and
arm from the exploded lamp bulb near where he had been sitting.

"Are you all right?" Michelle asked.  She was
shaking out her hair, which was covered with tiny glass splinters.  She had been
closer to the dining room and the tiny bulbs in the chandelier had sprayed the fragile
glass all over her, but she didn't have any serious cuts.

Vincent nodded.  "We were lucky.  But we have to get
out of here.  Right now.  He's started his attack." 

Vincent painfully pulled a splinter out of his right cheek
as Michelle led him toward the sliding glass doors to the patio so she could see
his injuries better.

"You're lucky you didn't get glass in your eyes,"
Michelle commented.  She was picking glass out of his sparse hair.  He had several
cuts on his arm and scalp.  There was a bad one on his ear lobe, which was dripping
blood which appeared black in the dim light.

"Let's go in the bathroom and take care of that,"
Michelle said.  She started hurrying toward the bathroom.

"No," Vincent yelled urgently.

Michelle turned around. 

"Don't turn on any lights.  They might explode too."

"Right.  Where's Lucifer?"  She looked around
but couldn't see the tiny white cat anywhere.  She finally heard him in the bedroom,
meowing mournfully.  She would have to crawl under the bed in the dark and get him.

"Leave the cat," Vincent said.

"I can't." 

Vincent nodded and muttered, No, a healer couldn't leave
an animal. 

Michelle heard Vincent follow her as she walked into the
dark bedroom, crunching on glass splinters, and inched under the bed.  Of course
Lucifer was being difficult and backing away from her.  He looked an unearthly luminous
white in the darkness and she finally grabbed him.  She heard Vincent muttering
about the fact that Omar seemed to have abilities over electrical phenomena.  Lightening
and electrical appliances.

Michelle started backing out from under the bed.  "He
must have been using those skills on the buildings I manage.  We had power outages. 
Elevators, air-conditioners and lights malfunctioned.  All at once.  Smoke detectors
went off.  Security systems were suddenly screeching, going crazy for no reason. 
Real disasters.  One man was almost killed."

"How long did it last?"

"A couple of days."  Michelle was standing up
with the struggling cat.  "Then everything went back to normal."  She
was stroking the cat, calming it as they went back into the living room.  The whole
apartment was almost entirely black except in there.

"His power is limited.  He can't control something
like that for very long."

Michelle smiled when she noticed they were both
whispering, as though they could be overheard.  She went to the front door and
opened it.  It was on a spring which would close it automatically, but the
bright light from the hallway was a relief, even though her apartment looked
like a disaster area.  The force of the flying glass and the wind had knocked
books and figurines off of shelves like there had been a major earthquake. 
When she saw the extent of the damage she was surprised that neither she nor
Vincent had been more badly injured.

"Get the things you need.  We have to leave,"
Vincent urged.

She was still shivering from the shock of the exploding
lights and was quiet for a time.  Finally she let the door close and went to the
closet in her hallway.  She came out with a flashlight.  She held it far away from
herself, cringing as she turned it on, trying to shield the cat with her arm.  It
did not explode.  There was glass shimmering all over the carpet where she focused
the light.  Even the glass monitor on her computer had burst, spewing its guts over
the computer table. 

"I think I will do whatever he wants."  She was
speaking slowly as she started gathering the clothes that she had prepared for work. 
"I can't let my friends get hurt."

"Wrong attitude, Michelle," Vincent said.  "You
have to fight him.  You have to believe in yourself."  He was wishing he had
the time to hypnotize her and strengthen that belief.  But they were going to have
to start their own attack soon or Omar would take all initiative away from them. 

"Think Michelle, what's he going to do now?"

"Oh," Michelle straightened up with the clothes
over her arm.  "He uses the heating ducts.  The heat almost never goes on here
in Hawaii.  That's how my things got moved." 

It was almost uncanny.  She could see it in her mind,
Omar sending his army of giant insects down through the ducts.  It could have
been gruesome and horrifying, but it was just a picture she was seeing in her
mind objectively.  Then she remembered that the apartment above hers was
empty.  She suddenly knew that was why he had killed the woman living there. 
He wanted that apartment empty.  The fact was there in her mind, sudden and
incontrovertible, but she didn't know why.  She aimed her flashlight up at the
ceiling, where the heating vent was located.  Gas was pouring out of the duct
like thick smoke.  It was already covering the ceiling like a thick oily cloud
that was reaching down towards them. 

Even in the dark she could see the gas was green.  Her
mind warned, Poison.  She felt surprise that she didn't smell anything, just before
she passed out.

S
uzanne pranced slowly down the hallway toward
the guard, wearing a very brief halter and shorts.  It was her job to distract him. 
She had to lure him from his post long enough for Omar and Samson to take the bodies
out of the apartment in the hallway he was guarding. 

His eyes felt like spectral hands drifting over her body,
touching thighs, breasts and hips; skipping her face altogether.

Suzanne had believed her role would be difficult or impossible
to perform, but suddenly she was an actress, swinging her hips and tossing her head. 
Her directions were to appear slutty and wanton, and although part of her enjoyed
the vulgar and alien role, another deeper part was appalled.  She stumbled, and
when she awkwardly righted herself and resumed the sexy strut, she thought with
confusion that she had been stumbling, even falling, a lot recently.

The keys to the vacant apartment in the hallway above were
in her pocket.  She was supposed to keep the guard busy there.  She took the keys
out of her pocket, a difficult maneuver because the shorts were so tight, and dangled
them in front of the guard's nose.  He was seated, so she leaned over seductively
so he could get a good look down her halter top.  She mentioned the vacant apartment,
breathing warmly in his ear, in which she noticed disgusting, gross tufts of brown
hair stiffly sprouting.  He followed her eagerly into the elevator.

Suzanne almost had a panic attack when the elevator doors
slid shut and she got a closer look at the man.  He was hairy, heavy, at least forty
years old and already panting lecherously.  Dark brown hairs were also sprouting
from his nose.  She felt disgust when she looked into small, bloodshot and predatory
brown eyes.  She wondered what in the world she was doing.  Wasn't she a college
student with a wonderful career ahead of her?  Didn't she have a straight A average
all through high school and college?  It seemed like a distant memory, but the fleeting
thought almost had her in tears for the briefest possible moment.

She stumbled again when she got to the door of the vacant
apartment.  It was either fear or she was losing control of her body.  It worried
her momentarily, but she no longer had the capacity to keep one train of thought
going long enough to figure out what was happening.

"Slow down there, big boy," Suzanne said playfully,
as she shut the door of the vacant apartment.  It was the place where a woman had
been brutally murdered just a few days ago, but Suzanne didn't know that.

The guard was looking her over like she was something deliciously
edible.  He started to reach for her as she was closing the door, so close she could
feel his hot breath and his hands upon her shoulders.  She flinched away and then
giggled, like she was playing a game.  His attention was sickening.  She thought
she might throw up right here and now, and decided to  make sure she hit him.

"I'm so thirsty," Suzanne commented, smiling
at the old lecher.  He backed off, not wanting to ruin his good fortune by moving
in too lustily.

"Lets see what there is to drink," Suzanne suggested,
quickly moving toward the kitchen and out of the proximity of his clutches, deciding
this roll-playing was way above and beyond the call of duty.  She wondered just
how long she would have to keep this old guy busy.  Omar said he would let her know
when it was safe to release him.

"You are so pretty..."  The man was attempting
to touch her hair as she opened the refrigerator.

"Uh...thank you."  Suzanne peered in and saw
some soft drinks.  She took out two.  "Why don't you go in the living room
and sit down.  I'll put these drinks in glasses."`

The man reluctantly left the kitchen.  There was a low
counter that opened into the living room and Suzanne could see him obediently lowering
himself down on the sofa.  He looked like a great bear, a Neanderthal, not very
tall but thick in every aspect.  A repellent primitive throwback to reasoning man. 
She took ice out of the freezer and found glasses.

Suzanne checked her watch and noted that only five minutes
had gone by, but she also noticed it was way past the appointed time for her to
take the herbal potion Omar had mixed especially for her.  It was a combination
of ginkgo-gotu kola, ginseng, licorice, passion flower, St John's Wort, chamomile,
catnip and some other things she couldn't remember.  Suzanne knew it made her sleepy,
so she took the brown plastic packet and emptied it into the drink she was fixing
for the security guard. 

She worried it might not make him sleepy enough, or work
fast enough.  She hated giving him two doses, which was all she had, but Omar would
understand and replace them, she hoped, as she dumped in the second packet.

Omar had explained that the herbs enhanced mental and psychic
perception, so that she could learn to do the rituals necessary to become his High
Priestess quickly, but she was wondering now if it really had that effect.  She
always had those strange doubtful feeling right before she took another dose. Omar
had her on the herbs around the clock now so those puzzling querying feelings hadn't
bothered her recently. 

Suzanne smiled when she thought of Omar.  She would do
anything for him.  He was the most wonderful, wisest and most handsome man in the
world.  Suzanne felt like she was in a wonderful dreamland when she was with him. 
He had promised her everything her heart could desire, and had actually given her
a large ruby ring.  She glanced at the bright red facets, which threw a rainbow
of colors on the kitchen walls.  She hated disobeying him and forgoing the herbs,
but she just could not stomach that old guy pawing her.

The old guy was looking at his watch and complaining that
he had to get back to work as Suzanne gave him the drink.  She reassured him that
after they had some refreshments they could really relax.  Lie down and relax. 
His eyes brightened and he gave her a disgusting smile.

Suzanne sat in a chair across from the couch and watched
him  down the doctored potion greedily, not even tasting the herbs, which were actually
quite bitter, in his rush to get his hands on her.

Suzanne chattered inanely, with growing trepidation, as
the man set down his empty glass, but she found that she was starting to remember
things she had somehow forgotten.  Things that had once been important to her; like
getting her degree in abnormal psychology, like the boyfriend she had back at school,
like her kind psychology professor, Vincent Middleton, who had generously taken
her on this vacation.

Suzanne was puzzling over the priorities of her life and
just where Omar fit into her carefully planned future, when the security guard suddenly
interrupted her, blurting out, "I feel very strange."

The man placed his hand on his forehead, "Feeling
woozy-sick."

Suzanne was shocked at how fast the man had responded to
the benign natural herbs.  She knew they just made you sleepy for a little while,
then you got happy and euphoric.  "I'm sure you'll be fine in a moment.  There's
lots of caffeine in those soft drinks."

"No.  It's different."  The man was gagging,
holding his head.  Then he fell over sideways on the couch.

Suzanne approached him warily.  This might be a ploy to
get her down on the sofa with him.  He would win in any wrestling match they might
have, outweighing her by at least a hundred pounds, and being much stronger as a
male anyway.  She cautiously waited about three minutes, but the man did not move
and she finally, tentatively, touched his forehead.  He didn't seem hot or anything. 
He didn't look like he'd had a heart attack or was in any pain.  He appeared to
be sleeping very profoundly, snoring softly through his open mouth.

Suzanne felt great relief that the man was knocked out,
but she wondered what kind of herbs could be powerful enough to conk a man of his
size out that fast.  The way he had keeled over was frightening.  Whatever Omar
had been giving her was much more powerful than she had believed.  It was disturbing.

She sat anxiously, waiting for the man to wake up or for
Omar to call.  An hour went by.  She glanced at her watch every minute or so.  Finally
she got sleepy, too, and curled up in the chair, drowsing off.  She awakened several
times, hiccuping, but went back to sleep quickly each time.  It was the first natural
sleep she'd had in days.

Now she was in serious and dangerous drug withdrawal. 
Suzanne had been given larger and larger doses of a powerful tranquilizer, which
was laced with cocaine for the euphoric feeling.  Heavy drug abusers, whether using
cocaine, tranquilizers, alcohol or heroin, whose bodies become dependent on those
drugs to function, often have seizures, a cardiac arrest, or die when the body is
abruptly withdrawn from their narcotic.  Many go through a severe psychotic episode,
or states of agitation during drug withdrawal, if their body is physiologically
strong enough to manage to stay alive, because the brain is another organ which
becomes dependent on the drug.

Suzanne began having petit mal seizures, her whole body
shaking with involuntary tremors every few minutes.  Since she was asleep she didn't
know she was in grave danger.