Mind Over Mind (17 page)

Ydrel looked at his intern friend as if he should be the one committed, but did as he was told. “I don’t see how this will help,” he said doubtfully.

“Maybe it won’t, but unless you’ve got a better idea, try it my way a minute, all right? Remember when Talia and Kris were trapped in the blizzard and Talia’s empathy got out of her control? We’re going to try a little ground and center just like Kris taught her. So, I want you to imagine your power like an anchor, or maybe a drill, with a strong line tying it back to you. Go ahead. Let me know when you’ve got it.”

He waited, and finally Ydrel muttered, “Maybe...OK.”

“Good. That’s your ground. You can use it to pull energy to steady you when you’re buffeted by outside forces. Ready? Now plunge it into the ground.” As he waited, he folded his hands behind his head and crossed his legs, trying to look as if they’d just decided to hang out and watch the clouds. Otherwise, he kept his silence, trusting in Ydrel’s imagination to help him accomplish the task.

After a long moment, he heard his friend say, in a somewhat surprised voice. “Wow. OK. What’s next?”

“Well, it seems to me you’ve picked up a lot of useless energy. See, we all give and receive energy from each other—everybody and everything, even plants and water and rocks. To plants and rocks and such, energy is just energy; they take in what they can use and pass the rest on. Humans, though, because we’re sentient, emotional creatures, tend to translate energy into positive or negative: positive, and you feel happy and stable; negative, and you may feel initially stoked, but then irritated or nervous.”

“So being in love is positive energy?”

“Oh, yeah. But do me a favor and keep that little gem of information to yourself. Sachiko wants to play things cool, and I don’t want to scare her off.”

“I don’t remember this in any of those books.”

“Oh, it’s not. It’s in some pop psych book I read, I don’t remember offhand which, but it’s still useful information. It works for me when I’ve had a rough day or I have to deal with someone I don’t like. Back to you. You are full of negative energy; you’re shaking with it. It’s no wonder you’re having trouble keeping things coherent. So we’ve got to get rid of that energy so you can focus and load up on the good stuff. Make sense? You still with me?”

“Yeah, yeah, just…let’s hurry.” Ydrel’s voice was strained and his breathing was starting to accelerate again. “So how do I get rid of it?”

“You’ve got your ground. Shunt it through there. What I do is imagine all that nervous energy flowing out my fingertips, like a river, washing out upon the ground—”

“But it’s not ‘nervous energy!’ It’s all these thoughts and feelings and—and they’re not mine and they keep coming in. How do I deal with that?”

Joshua sat up and turned to face his prone friend. Ydrel lay stiffly on the ground, his hands at his sides, fingers slightly dug into the grass. Despite the muggy heat, he was barely sweating. Joshua wiped the sweat off his own face while he thought. This wasn’t the first time he’d played into someone’s fantasy, but it was certainly the most sustained and the most complex. “Ydrel, I’m not psychic, and I don’t know anyone who is, or even if there are any reputable books on the subject. I’m playing this by ear, and you’re going to have to help me. One thing I do know, anything getting through your shields is obviously bombarding its way in, and you’re so tensed up that nothing’s getting out. You’re so uptight, you’re not even sweating. You look like rigor mortis has set in.

“It’s like a dam in a flood, does that make sense? If you don’t release some of the water, the pressure builds and the dam breaks, so you release it in a controlled way. So, if you relax, let all those thoughts and emotions and energy flow through you, even if more come in, you’ll still relieve some of the pressure. Make sense? OK. Start with a couple of breaths. Good. Remember your ground; you’re not going adrift. Let your body get heavy. Feel the muscles get warm. Feel your pores open up. Each invading thought, each outside feeling is like a bead of sweat. Let them out, feel them seeping out your pores. Feel the tension leave through your grounding line, pulling the energy, the outside thoughts with it…”

He continued this way for a few minutes, guiding him through relaxation, watching as Ydrel’s muscles loosened and went slack. Sweat began to bead up, then trickle down his face and dampened his blond hair. Gradually, his trembling eased and his breathing slowed.

When he spoke, his voice was closer to its normal timbre. “It’s better. I can still feel all these thoughts coming in, but they’re just sort of…passing through. It’s kind of a crawly feeling.”

“Well, you look more relaxed. Shake yourself out a little. Make yourself more comfortable. That’s it. Think you can concentrate now?”

“I think so. For the moment, anyway.” Ydrel put his hands behind his head, pillowing it, and bent one knee up.

“Good. Now let’s work on your shields. Remember what Aahz said about ley lines in
Myth Adventures
? Use your abilities to sense around you. See if you can find a ley line around here.”

“How?”

“Well, what’d Aahz say? Sort of, focus without focusing. I know.” He lay back down so he could look at the sky. A few billowy white clouds graced the field of blue. “You ever look for shapes in the clouds? It helps sometimes to not look at them too hard, just let your mind and imagination take you where it will. Try that.”

It was only a moment before Ydrel nearly shouted. “That’s amazing! It’s right there!” He pointed to a spot to the right. “It practically goes over the building! And there’s another one over there, like toward New York. How come I never noticed them before?”

“Never looked, I’ll bet. Now what you need to do is tap the line. And no, I don’t know for certain how. Imagine another ground line. Um, reach out with a psychic hand. But be careful. You don’t know how much energy you’re dealing with. Once you figure that out, start putting it into your shields. Tell me about your shields. What are they like?”

“Malachai helped me with them when I first got here, only he made me meditate and hypnotized me.” Ydrel shuddered. “They’re like big stone walls around my mind. They block out everything, but there are windows I can open when I need to. That was the theory, anyway. Even on good days, it doesn’t work that well, but at least enough that I can cope.” Again, he shuddered and gasped. “Joshua, I need to do something fast.”

“Tell you what. Start with the walls. Translate the energy into stone. E=mc
²
, right? Then, we’ll try some other things—different materials, multiple walls. You’re the military strategist; use that knowledge to your advantage for a change.” Joshua glanced at his watch. “Ydrel, I’m sorry to do this, but I have to meet Drs. Malachai and Sellars in fifteen minutes. You want to stay here and work on your shields?”

“Yeah. I don’t think I can do this if I’m too close to people, especially McDougal. You don’t have to tell Malachai I’m out here, do you? He kept me cooped up in my room all day yesterday. He’s trying to get me to use my powers for him, like some trained dog. He’s going to be mad I slipped my leash.”

“He probably knows already. The orderlies have seen you since you came out this morning and when I came out here, Sachiko was about to let Edith know. If it’s any consolation, we’ve been out here nearly half an hour and no one’s run you off yet. And, if I can, I’ll go talk to this McDougal before I see the doctors. If he’s off his meds, they need to know.”

“Malachai knows,” Ydrel snapped. “Why do you think he moved him next to me?”

“Right. Sorry. But if I talk to him, let him know I know...If others are noticing, he has to do something, right? Really, he’s not going to risk his reputation or the institute’s to punish you, is he?”

“I suppose not,” Ydrel grumbled doubtfully.

“Just stay here. Take in energy. Build your shields. Shunt out the negative stuff. I’ll catch you as soon as my afternoon appointments are over and we’ll make dinner and figure out some improvements, promise.” Again, he glanced at his watch. “I have got to go. I don’t know why Malachai called this special meeting but I’ve already been warned not to be late with him.”

_*

Ydrel watched his intern friend sprint across the compound with a pang of jealousy.
Must be nice to have your biggest worry be whether or not you’re on time to a meeting. That, and figuring out how to apply your favorite novels to a so-called “real” psychic.

He knew he wasn’t being fair; Joshua’s ideas had actually helped. He could feel the thoughts and feelings of others coursing through him, passing through his ground rather than bombarding his mind with images. It made him feel antsy, like he’d been given too many amphetamines or had too much adrenaline in his body, but at least he wasn’t being overwhelmed. Nonetheless, he needed to rebuild his barriers and soon.

He looked again for the ley line. There it was, a wispy none-too-straight line where the air was a shade darker than the surrounding sky. He realized now he’d noticed it before, but passed it off as an optical illusion. What an idiot he was.

Just like with the books,
he grumbled.
All the time I spent fruitlessly searching the school’s nonfiction sections and I should have just boned up on my fantasy!
He felt the temptation to berate himself, and forced it down. He knew where that would lead. Instead, he gazed up at the ley line until he could feel it as well as see it. Then he closed his eyes and imagined reaching up to it, gently—

“Wake up, Stephens!” The harsh voice broke Ydrel’s concentration. It was Paulie, the orderly, and he was mad. “Get up. Dr. Malachai wants you back in your room.”

“Joshua said I could hang out here a while longer.” The words were out of Ydrel’s mouth before he could stop them. The proximity of Paulie and the strength of his anger were threatening the last of Ydrel’s already badly eroded barriers. Now, contempt was added to the offense.

“Oh, are we taking orders from the intern instead of the head of this institution?” he sneered, and Ydrel felt him resisting the urge to kick him. “Get up. Move.”

I don’t have to see the line. I can find it by feel. I’ve got my ground. I can do this.
Nonetheless, he trembled with apprehension as he followed the orderly back to his room.

CHAPTER 20

Joshua paused at Dr. Malachai’s office door and took a deep breath to ease some of his own apprehension. He’d managed to stop by Mr. McDougal’s room, and it had only taken a couple of minutes to see that if he was taking his medication, it wasn’t working. Then, when he’d taken the chance and asked him about it outright, the client had lied through his teeth. Malachai wasn’t stupid. He had to at least suspect. So why move him now? And why next door to the most sensitive person in the ward? And how could Joshua bring this up without sounding as paranoid as Ydrel?

Play it by ear,
he told himself as he knocked and entered.
You don’t even know what this meeting is about. Maybe he’s going to explain all this. Yeah, right.

His doubts were justified as soon as he saw Edith’s face—disappointed, and a little sad. Dr. Malachai’s expression was neutral but stern, and there was a hint of a glint in his eyes. Together, the two spelled trouble to Joshua, but he refused to jump to conclusions. “Good afternoon, sir. Edith.”

“Sit down, Mr. Lawson,” Dr. Malachai indicated a seat near Edith. He did not take his usual spot behind the big desk, but rather perched himself casually on its edge, arms crossed. He stared at Joshua expectantly, as if waiting for him to say something.

Since Joshua had no idea what this was about, there was no way he was going to make the first move. Instead, he met and kept the senior psychiatrist’s gaze and waited. In his peripheral vision, he saw Edith look from one to the other. He felt a little bad for excluding her, but he was not about to look her way. It might look like he was asking her for help, and he wouldn’t give Malachai that satisfaction. He waited. The moment stretched.

Finally, Malachai broke the silence. “We wanted to discuss some concerns about your internship, specifically in regards to Ydrel Stephens.”

“Yes, sir.” He kept his tone and body language carefully neutral.
You’ll have to give me more to go on than that if you want any admissions out of me. Of course, I haven’t got anything to confess, really.

“You’ve been spending a significant proportion of your day with him, and some weekend time, I’m told, acquiring educational and reading materials?”

“Yes, sir. Per my discussions with you and Dr. Sellars…” Joshua mirrored Malachai’s formal words and tone.
If you want to be maddening, I can be maddening. At least until you tell me what this is really about.

“And what is your assessment of the relationship you’re developing with our young client?”

“Could you be more specific, sir?”

Whether in exasperation or simply to break the growing tension in the room, Edith spoke. “Dr. Malachai is concerned you’re feeling pressured to devote too much time to working with Ydrel. No one is criticizing your work with other clients,” she added quickly. “Far from it; I’ve had nothing but the best reports. But you are putting in a lot of extra hours, and there’s concern that you may be feeling the strain.”

“Have I given any indication that I—” Suddenly, something clicked in his mind. He turned to Malachai with a sardonic smile. “Caught my little speech to Ydrel, did you?”

The psychiatrist looked away as if embarrassed. “I overheard some of it while passing in the hallway,” he said.

So that’s what you look like when you lie.
Joshua filed the look on Malachai’s face into his memory. He’d been very careful to keep an eye on the door while he was talking to Ydrel. The only way anyone could have heard the conversation unseen was to have snuck up and listened from the wall beside the doorway. Even then, he knew he had not spoken loud enough to be heard in the hallway. A sensitive microphone might have picked it up, however, which would also explain why Dr. Malachai waited until Monday to bring this up instead of hauling him in immediately afterward. Aloud, he said, “I’m sorry you had to hear that, sir. Mother’s Speech Number Three is really only meant for its immediate recipient.”

“Mother’s Speech what?” Edith laughed.

Joshua turned toward her with a smile; in his peripheral vision, he could see Malachai trying to cover his own confusion. Clearly, Joshua’s answer had caught him flat-footed. Joshua’s smile broadened and he hoped they would think it had to do with his explanation. “You know how your mom always had the same themes she used on you over and over when she was mad? Well, when I was thirteen, I numbered them. Mother’s Speech Number Three was, basically, ‘I’m doing all this extra work because I love you, but if you really don’t care, fine, throw your life away and I’ll find something more productive to do with mine.’ She used it a lot when I was surly and didn’t want to do my assignments, so when Ydrel turned that attitude on me...” He shrugged expressively.

Edith was torn between shock and amusement. “You used
guilt
?”

“It worked a lot better on him than it ever did on me.”

“And this is your idea of sound psychology?” Dr. Malachai cut in disapprovingly.

Joshua answered, his voice completely deadpan. “I was told not to practice psychology without a chaperone, sir.”

 “I see. Well, that clears things up, and I’m relieved to know things are indeed well between you and young Ydrel. If there’s nothing else.” Dr. Malachai pushed himself off his desk.

“Actually, sir, there is something. I happened to meet Mr. McDougal, who’s in the room next to Ydrel’s. He’s bi-polar, I understand?”

“Yes. We moved him to the basic care ward over the weekend.”

Here goes. In for a penny
. “Sir, he’s not taking his medication. He was pinging—agitated, having a tremulous hold on his emotions—so I asked him how his medication was helping and he lied about taking it. Frankly, I doubt he’s been taking it for a while.”

“Indeed. And this is your conclusions based on, perhaps, two minutes’ evaluation?” Although his voice and expression were neutral as always, there was a spark of menace in the senior psychiatrist’s eyes.

Joshua refused to be intimidated. “I am very good at spotting liars, sir.”

“Be that as it may, Joshua, Mr. McDougal has been my client for several months. I believe I am a bit better qualified to judge his state of mind. However,” he added magnanimously, “I shall take your comments under consideration when I see him this afternoon. That will be all, Joshua; I believe Dr. Hoffman expects you. He seems quite impressed with your peculiar talents. Edith, if you’d remain a moment.”

Dismissed, Joshua left alone and headed down the hall. When he came to the junction, instead of heading toward the common rooms, he started up the patients’ hall.

“Hey. Where are you going?” Sachiko intercepted him as he passed the nurses’ station. “Dr. Hoffman was asking after you. I told him you were with Dr. Malachai and—oh, oh. What happened?”

“There’s a manic-depressive in the room next to Ydrel’s.”

She sighed. “I know. I don’t like it, either, but as long as he’s on medication—”

“He isn’t.” Joshua started again down the hall. She slipped around the desk to follow.

“What do you mean he isn’t? How do you know—”

A howl of rage and the crash of furniture interrupted her question and together, they dashed to the source of the sound.

“Meddling little prick! Dare tell me what to do! I’ll teach you!”

They found McDougal in his room, shouting obscenities and swinging a chair at a figure lying curled in the fetal position on the floor. Ydrel. Joshua dashed in to grab at the chair before McDougal could land another blow on the boy’s back; McDougal swung backward and it hit Joshua across the side of the head. He saw stars, but somehow managed to grip the chair and wrench it free. Sachiko flew in after, and in a few deft moves, had the raving client on the floor, his arm twisted and her knee positioned so that any move would cause great pain. It didn’t stop him from doing his best to dislodge her or from his mad ranting. “Get off me, yellow bitch! Interfering nigger! You have no right to tell me what to do! I’ll be fine once I remove this poison from my sight!
Let me go!”
He surged upward, nearly succeeding in throwing her off. He howled with pain and fury.

“Josh! Get Monique—tell her I need—!” McDougal twisted furiously, trying to get out from her grip. What she needed was drowned out in his roaring profanities.

Not that it mattered. “I’m not leaving you alone!” Josh replied. He didn’t add that he was still dizzy and didn’t think he could get up anytime soon. He settled for throwing himself on McDougal’s legs.

“I’m here!” Monique shoved past Joshua, a syringe in her hand. Joshua did his best to immobilize the wild client’s legs. He kicked sharply, catching him under the jaw, but he held on, trying to use his weight to pin him down. He could hear, almost from a distance, McDougal’s yells and Sachiko’s harried directions.

McDougal’s screech told Joshua the meds found the right recipient’s arm, but he continued to lean until a couple of orderlies bearing restraints took over. He didn’t bother to stand up—he still felt a little dizzy from that kick—but turned around to check on Ydrel.

The boy still lay curled up in the fetal position, his arms crossed about his waist, his torso jerking spasmodically, his eyes tightly shut. Joshua shook his shoulder and spoke his name. He didn’t respond. He shook a little harder. “Ydrel!”

Still no response. Joshua pried open an eyelid, the one that wasn’t blackened from the attack. His eyes, staring ahead yet focused on someplace deeply inward, didn’t even react to the change of light. With a sinking feeling of expectation, he sat the young man up. Like one of those dolls that closes its eyes when it’s laid down and opens them when upright, Ydrel’s eyelids snapped open, his eyes still unresponsive. He began to rock.

“Oh, my God, what happened?” Edith appeared at the doorway, accompanied by Malachai. She hurried through the door and knelt before the rocking boy, speaking softly and examining him.

“We heard yelling, and found Mr. McDougal wailing away at Ydrel with a chair.” Joshua tried to stand, but sat down on the floor again quickly as an unexpected wave of dizziness swept over him. “Whoa!”

“Stay still. Your forehead is bleeding,” Malachai said distractedly as he pushed past him to where orderlies were finishing putting the restraints on the raving client. With a tap on Sachiko’s shoulder, he dispatched her to look to Joshua.

The restraints and sedatives were stopping McDougal from struggling physically, but he continued to yell and rant. “You!” he exclaimed when he saw the psychiatrist. “This is your fault! You promised no interference! I should kill them—all of them. No interference! I’ll see to it they’re dead and it’ll be on your head! Your fault!” His ranting dissolved into indistinct murmurs and howls as the sedative finally took effect.

Sachiko, meanwhile, had given Joshua gauze to press against the gash in his head while she checked the T-shaped bruise along one side of his face. “How many fingers am I holding up?” she asked. Behind them, McDougal struggled to consciousness long enough to yell a few obscenities, and Malachai instructed them to take him to the advanced care ward. Edith continued to talk to the rocking Ydrel.

“Three, but they’re blurry with this eye,” Joshua answered, closing first the right eye, then the left. “Don’t worry. I’ll be fine in a minute. But I don’t think he got like that from missing only one day of his meds,” he added loudly as the orderlies dragged McDougal out of the room and Dr. Malachai joined Edith, standing behind her. Dr. Hoffman walked in at that moment and knelt next to her.

Malachai ignored the intern. “Well, Edith?” he asked softly.

“He’s driven himself into a catatonic state.”

Hoffman sighed. “Great. The last time, he was like this for two weeks. We never did figure out what triggered his recovery. Remember, Sachiko?” he said to the nurse, who was applying a bandage to Joshua’s forehead. “You’d just started working here when it happened.”

“It was my first day, in fact. What was Ydrel even doing in here?”

“Probably trying to convince McDougal to take his medication,” grumbled Joshua. His head was starting to pound in time with his pulse, and he could feel his temper going. He rested his head gingerly in his hands, fingers seeking the pressure points that might help alleviate the pain.

“The important thing,” Malachai interjected, “is what we should do about Ydrel’s current state.”

Edith’s eyes were bright with unshed tears, but her voice was calm and professional. “Lorazepam?”

Dr. Malachai grimaced slightly. “I’d rather not. He reacts so unpredictably to chemical treatments.”

“We could just let him be,” Hoffman suggested. “He snapped out of it himself last time.”

“Let me work with him.”

All eyes turned to Joshua. Hoffman laughed shortly. “Work with what, exactly?”

Despite the aching behind his eyes, Joshua forced himself to meet the gazes of each psychiatrist as he spoke. “This is classic NLP. I find his rhythm, use it to get to wherever he is, then I lead him out.” He looked directly at Dr. Malachai. “I’ve done it before; ask my dad.”

“I don’t need to; I’ve read the case study. I am not the proponent of Neuro Linguistic Programming that your father is.”

“I understand that, sir, but what have you got to lose?”

Now everyone looked at the senior psychiatrist, waiting, hoping. He frowned slightly, never taking his eyes off Joshua. Joshua kept his own gaze steady. Finally, Edith spoke. “Randall, let him try.”

“All right, then, but you’ll do this under observation and with recording equipment running. And I want commentary.”

“No can do, sir. If I break rhythm to comment, I’ll have to start over again.”

“Indeed. You’ll debrief later, then. Edith, will you see to the arrangements? I think the Small Room is available.”

“I’ll make a few cancellations and meet you there in a few minutes,” Hoffman said. “I want to see this.”

“It could take a couple of hours,” Joshua warned.

“I’ll bring some reading.”

“I’ll get you some.”

“Joshua, are you up to this right now?” Edith asked as she rose. A couple of orderlies had been waiting at the door and came in with a wheelchair and started to load Ydrel into it.