Mindguard (20 page)

He didn’t say
that. Instead, he looked worried. If anything could unsettle Villo Kantil, then
it had to be bad.

“What happened?”
Tamisa asked, half afraid to even hear the answer.

“We managed to
track down Ross.” He delivered the wonderful news as if he were reading an
obituary.

“Why is that
bad?”

He let out a
heavy sigh. “This makes no sense to me,” he said. “I tried to contact the
commander but I can’t get through. Martin told me the commander is busy at the
moment and we should just go ahead with the mission as planned. You’ve got full
control.”

“Ok, so… all
right… but where is Ross?”

“Oh, we know his
exact position. Kernis managed to decrypt the Ayers-Ross mission files, so we
know where they’re scheduled to be at all times. Today, they’re on a planet
called Korall, right on the verge of Djago. The objective is to acquire means
of transportation to take them to La Khez, then Ovande, Noriado 2, Ganthic and
finally Carthan. They’ll be spending the night on La Khez and then Noriado 2.
We can intercept them really anywhere we want and at any moment of our choosing.”

“It sounds great
so far,” Tamisa said, confused.

“There’s more,”
Villo answered. The expression on his face told Tamisa that they were getting
to the part that bothered him. “It seems that we were lucky once again. By the
time we seized Ayers-Ross, the team was already on Korall. Because of its
proximity to the Djago Desert, it makes communication very difficult, meaning
Ross will be less suspicious if he doesn’t manage to get through to Kriss
White. That’s a good thing, because so far the old man has been stubborn and
uncooperative. As you know, I spent about a half hour questioning him. There is
no point in wasting more time, because no amount of intimidation or physical
discomfort will make him play along in time for us to use him, of that I am certain.
It’s safer for us if Ross believes that he can’t get through to him because of
their location.”

“White seems
like a tough old son of a bitch. I wish we had him on our side.”

Villo remained
silent. Tamisa was starting to get impatient. She was already worked up about
the media circus, Villo’s hesitation just made her more nervous. 

“Let’s just cut
to the chase. What is it, Villo? Why are you so upset?”

A fleeting smile
crossed his face. “That’s why I love my Tammy,” he said. He sat down on her
bed, staring at the floor. ”The problem is that, even though we basically have
them trapped, the commander gave Kernis the order to activate the neuralfield
scanners.”

“What? Wait a
minute, that can’t be!”

“I can’t explain
it, Tammy,” said a helpless Villo.

“This is… has he
even watched the news?”

Villo said
nothing, for there was nothing to say.

“I mean this
will give them exactly the fuel they need to throw on this little campfire.
This could be a serious problem.”

“Yes, it could.”

“If so far, the
accusations sounded like paranoid ravings this will, in effect, offer the
greatest credibility to our detractors, what the hell is he doing?”

“I don’t know,
Tammy,” Villo said. Those were the most frightening words Tamisa had ever
heard. 

Neuralfield
scanners were highly controversial technology. They worked like genetic
trackers but were far more advanced. Only fifteen years ago the commander had
faced public scrutiny when he had proposed the wide range employment of NF
scanners throughout the IFCO, to aid the Enforcement Unit in its effort of
maintaining peace. They were powerful devices that could instantly recognize a
person’s brainwave patterns if their brainwaves were modified by the use of
neuroinsertions. That would make it possible to locate someone within a few
feet and follow and register their movement on any planet in the federation.

Public uproar
had been immense, with many people vocal about the blatant infringement of
privacy. So far, trackers of genetic markers had been used for the purpose of
finding people suspected of criminal activity, but those had only a mere
fraction of the power and efficiency of neuralfield scanners. The citizens
argued that reading a person’s neural patterns was dangerously close to
telepathy. Once that point had been made, the Council of Presidents was quick
to reject Commander Anderson’s proposal. The use of this technology had been
deemed illegal.

However, in a
controversial move, the Council granted the Enforcers the right to possess the
weapons, but not to use them. The unpopular decision had been rooted in the
fear of another great war and a situation where the enforcers could once again
become humanity’s last line of defense and would need the advantage of such
technology. Using NF scanners for a mission such as this was outrageous. On top
of that, it was completely unnecessary, since they basically had Ross’ team
cornered.

Tamisa couldn’t
understand the commander’s decision, it seemed downright crazy. He was
ostentatiously going against the express orders of the Council. This could turn
out to be one of the few things that could actually jeopardize the very
existence of the enforcers.    

“Give me a link
to Commander Anderson,” Tamisa ordered the holocloud.

“The commander’s
channel is unavailable,” the computer responded. 

“Give me Martin
Anderson, then!”

“The channel is
unavailable.”

“Damn it! Give
me the coordinates to the commander’s exact location!”

“Unavailable.
The commander is not on the premises.”

“And Martin?”

“Not on the
premises.”

“This is crazy! Villo?”
When Tamisa looked at Villo she had the expression of a scared child seeking
reassurance from a parent. Unfortunately, she found Villo looking back at her
with the same exact expression.

“They are both
unreachable? Now? Right before we’re about to leave on this mission? It’s
almost like they fled or something.”

“Whatever it is,
Tammy, we have specific orders and we have to go ahead with them.”

“But -”

“Tammy!” Villo’s
voice was categorical. “The commander’s actions are baffling, I can see that as
well as you can. The two qualities that define an enforcer more than anything
else are trust and willpower. Your mind wants to panic but you won’t because
you are an
Enforcer
. You are one of us. And the beating heart of the
enforcers is Thomas Anderson. He always has been and I hope he always will be.
He trusted you with this mission, you are the Field Unit Commander. You’re the
one who needs to show the most faith in him right now. You owe him that and I
think we all do. You can’t let the team see that you question his judgment,
even for a second. It would be bad for morale, it would be bad for the team
and, ultimately, when the situation is resolved, it will be bad for you and
your future with us. Have faith, Tammy!”

“Do you trust
him with your life?”

“My life is
nothing, I trust him with it entirely. If the commander decides that he must
sacrifice it for the good of humanity, then I humbly offer it to him to do as
he sees fit.”

Tamisa felt her
heart at the same time break and beam with and pride. “You trust him that
much?”

“Do you trust
me
?”

She hugged him
tightly, her most beloved friend. “I don’t trust anyone
but
you,” she
said.

“Then have
faith! Whatever he does, it’s the right thing. He has never been wrong.”

“Never?”

Villo’s eyes
spoke volumes. Tamisa took a deep breath, as if preparing to dive into the
deepest waters.

“Then we should
go,” she said, “we’re set to leave in three hours.”

Enforcing
Injustice!

Slogan used by an
anonymous group of activists who oppose the political influence of the
Enforcement Unit. Text usually found spray-painted next to a drawing of
Commander Thomas Liam Anderson on the walls of abandoned buildings.

“Are you all
right?” Isabel asked. Her body was tense, as if she feared Sheldon might
collapse at any moment and she would have to catch him. He was as white as a
sheet and his eyes were sunken into their sockets. He looked like he had lost a
ton of weight in just a few seconds.

“Yes,” he answered
and simply walked past the two women, paying no attention to either of them.
Sophie turned to Isabel and got worried when she saw the look of concern on the
elderly mindguard’s face.

A few minutes
later they were in front of the small Christian church that Mac had chosen as
their meeting point. Ray Manner was sitting on the steps. He told them that Mac
was inside and would join them shortly. Sophie was surprised when Jason Elden
also entered the house of worship. She knew that Mac was a practicing Christian,
but she had no idea that Elden was also. It made sense now why Mac seemed
closer to him than to the other bodyguards under his command. The bond between
the two had always seemed to be more than friendship.

“We found a
decent ship,” Manner said. ”Seems in pretty good shape and it should get us to
where we’re going. What the hell happened to Sheldon?”

They all turned
and stared at the mindguard, who looked like he had contacted some strange
disease and was going through all the symptoms in just a few minutes. He turned
around and walked away from them, clearly in no mood to be the center of
attention. Just then, Mac stepped out of the church.

“All right, off
we go, then. Sophie, remember what I said, you need to stop at any time you
tell me.”

●

They boarded the
small spacecraft that looked a lot worse for wear than it really was. The
flight was not completely unpleasant, but also not comfortable. As they
distanced themselves from Korall, it seemed like everyone’s general mood
worsened by the minute, most notably Isabel’s, who had to change from her
colorful garment into the same dark combat uniform everyone else was wearing.

“If we get
attacked, they usually go after the mindguards first,” Ross explained. “That’s
why I’d rather have everyone looking the same, make it harder for them to
distinguish their primary targets.”

Other than that,
there was very little talk for the duration of the trip. When someone did speak
it was usually in mono-syllabic groans.

“Well, according
to the machine we’re in the desert,” announced Simon Bayles, who was piloting
the vessel. Sophie felt relieved at the realization that she didn’t feel any
different. But that was just superstitious thinking. They were in a spacecraft
in the vacuum of space, not on a planet where their brains would be exposed to
that mindfield, or whatever it was called. There was no reason to feel anything
yet and she knew it. What was she expecting to happen? A huge holosign
signaling ‘You’re in trouble now’?

As the ship
reached the desired level of hyperspace stability, and could pass through the
Muench-Henriksen gateway, Sophie was completely unaware of how suddenly and
violently her mood was about to change.

●

The thick clouds
on La Khez made landing the spacecraft very difficult. There was poor
visibility, the radars didn’t work very well and they were approaching a
mountainous region at dangerous velocity. For a brief moment, the team seemed
worried, but Bayles skillfully steered the vessel towards a plateau and landed
it safely. The last part of the ride felt to Sophie like a rapid descent on a
shabby rollercoaster whose parts were falling off.

“Smooth landing,
Bayles. Don’t quit your day-job!” Manner said.

“You could have
piloted the ship yourself, if you weren’t too dumb to understand the commands.”

The second they
set foot outside the ship, their brains were exposed to the physical field
created by the telepathic activity. For Sophie, it all happened so quickly that
she didn’t have the time to adjust. She had but a fraction of a second to
notice that everyone was staring at her like they were expecting something to
happen. Then she felt overcome by a painful pressure stemming from somewhere
behind her eye sockets. It was as if an immense weight had been placed on her
brain and that weight was now pushing against her tear ducts.

She fell to her
knees and started crying. It was the strangest feeling. She didn’t even have
the strength to be ashamed, as the unmanageable sobbing was rapidly draining
all her energy. For some strange reason, the word ‘mindache’ popped into her
head, though she didn’t think that term actually existed. She was overcome by a
horrible headache and an uncontrollable urge to cry, like she was experiencing
an acute episode of severe depression. She felt like the whole planet was
closing up on her, like everything around her was trying to get inside her
head. The sky was made of lead and the ground was hot coal, forcing poisonous
smoke through her every orifice, and tearing new ones where it found none.

She rocked back
and forward, desperately weeping.  She was angry at her team for just
standing there, looking at her like this was some sort of a performance. Not a
single one of them made the slightest gesture to comfort her or help her. 
Damn you all, what the hell are you doing? Help me!
 She didn’t
have the power to utter a single word.
Damn you Sheldon, you were supposed
to protect me!

She felt like
she was just experiencing the worst possible day of her life condensed into one
single moment. And they were all just looking at her like they were waiting for
her to shrivel up and die. Later, she found out that they were actually just
waiting for the initial shock to pass.

“You had to get
it out of your system,” Ross said. “That was your mind trying to fight off the planet’s
neuraltranscendence field.”  

She was still
breathing heavily and her eyes were bloodshot from all the tears. “I… I would
have never expected this… it’s…”

“Yeah, it’s very
traumatic. That’s why we put so much emphasis on training and preparation. Truth
is, scientist still don’t really understand how this physical field works. They
don’t know the exact ways in which it interacts with an individual’s brain.
They just know it’s caused by the specific thought timbres of telepaths and
that it increases in power with the number of telepaths on a certain planet, as
well as the frequency of mind-to-mind communication.”

“Yeah, but
still… this…”

“I know,” said
Ross, “you have to go through it to really understand.”

“Does everyone… I
mean… do people usually break down like this?” Though she still felt exhausted,
enough time had passed for her to conjure up the energy to at least feel
embarrassed.

“Well, the
mind’s initial reaction to exposure is usually pretty turbulent, but it varies
from case to case. I’ve seen few that were as severe as yours. But don’t feel
bad, it all depends on a person’s psychological structure. Maybe you’re more
sensitive. And, after all, this is the Djago Desert. Neuraltranscendence fields
don’t get much more intense than this. Anyway, we need to bunk here overnight,
we have no choice. You need your rest and so do Isabel and Sheldon. The next
two planets in our path, Ovando and Ganthic, are even more dangerous. But we’re
staying right here. We’ve scanned this plateau and there’s not a soul around
for miles.”

Sophie just
nodded, for she felt she didn’t have the strength to do anything else. Ross
gave the order to set up the tents. 

●

“Ma’am, sorry to
disturb you but we need to talk.”

Dieter Muench
was the first person to come see her since they left Old Earth. The ship had
landed on Noradio 2 a few hours before team Ayers-Ross was schedule to arrive.
She had spent the entire duration of the journey in the holochamber, trying to
establish contact with the Andersons. Once the ship entered the Djago Desert,
she lost connection to the cloud and spent the rest of the time in quiet
solitude, trying to make sense of the situation.

The commander
and his brother had been missing for twenty-four hours and they had made no
attempt to communicate with anyone. Every single enforcer she came in contact
with was visibly worried. This had never happened before in the unit’s history.
In her heart, Tamisa knew that the brothers’ disappearance had everything to do
with this mission.
Her
mission.

“Ma’am?”

She had given
express orders to be left alone, but she was aware that Muench would not be
asking to speak with her if it weren’t important. 

“What is it?”

“Ross is
scheduled to arrive on this planet in a few hours. We will intercept his team
shortly after that.  You haven’t yet set foot on the planet, ma’am.”

Tamisa
appreciated the respect. Prior to being declared Field Unit Commander everyone
had either called her Tamisa or Tammy, now she was
ma’am
. Only Villo
continued to call her Tammy, even in front of the others. It bothered her, but
she was too busy with the events surrounding the mission to confront him about
it.  

“I know, I’ve
been working,” she said.

“You need time
to adapt to the planet’s neuraltranscendence field.”

Since she had
technically never been to a desert planet before, protocol required her to
interact with the planet’s NT field at least three hours before the start of
the mission. The brain needed time to adapt. The nanobots that served as
mindguards had already been injected into her bloodstream but pre-exposure to
the neural field was necessary before the mission could begin. The rule had
been established by Prime Timekeeper Cor Wanners, after the formation of the
Enforcement Unit.

“I grew up on
Aanadya, Mr. Muench. It’s a border planet that’s as dangerous as anything you’d
find in the desert.  I think I’m well-equipped to deal with the nuisance
of a NT field.”

“With the utmost
respect madam, Aanadya is a
border
planet. I’m sure it has a
considerable field in comparison with a place like Terra Antiqua, but desert
planets are something entirely different. I respectfully advise that you follow
protocol. Akio has also had his first exposure and he is in pretty bad shape.”

“Understood,
I’ll do it right away.”

●

When Tamisa
stepped outside the small spacecraft she found Villo and Winston Calladan
stretching their legs. Akio was with them, and he was as shaken up as Muench
had said. He was pale and his forehead was drenched in sweat. Everyone turned
to look at Tamisa as she disembarked. They were obviously curious to see her
reaction.

She felt a
sudden rush of adrenaline, like panic attack. A terrible headache developed
behind her eye sockets and her heartbeat hastened. Her condition got worse by
the second. She felt like she just wanted to start crying.

She didn’t.

Taking a few
deep breaths she used the mental conditioning techniques that Villo had taught
her, to calm herself down. She thought about that personal place every enforcer
had to choose, the one corner of the universe that belonged solely to them.
They should make it their life’s mission to always return to that place. Their
ultimate destination. A beacon of light in the darkness of their dangerous
assignments. More than just a physical place, it was supposed to be a refuge
for their minds. Tamisa remembered the serenity with which Villo always
meditated on the rock that oversaw the Mediterranean Sea. To him, it was the
most important place in the world. A home for his soul.  She had a
different one.

At first, she
had encountered difficulties trying to pick out a place of her own.

“There is just
none I can think of,” she always said, when Villo criticized her inability to
choose a mental anchor. 

“You are angry
and restless,” he had said to her once. It was a short while after she started
training with him privately. “Your heart is restless and your mind follows its
lead. You just never stopped running away, even after all this time.”

“So what the
hell makes you think I’m running
from
something and not
towards
something?!” she snapped.

Villo puffed.
“Jeez Tammy, sometimes your head is as thick as it is pretty. Motion is good,
running is good. Hell, I teach
speed
if nothing else. A fast body, a
body that is always on the move, can never be harmed. A dynamic mind is so much
more valuable than a static one.”

“Then why are
you lecturing me about running?”

“Because, Tammy,
running is only effective if you have full control over when to
stop.”   

He had been
right as always. Full control; that was the most important thing in the world.
It had been difficult back then to find a place where her mind could ‘stop’,
but it was not difficult anymore. Now she had a place of her own. It was
her bed, the bed in which she had first made love to Villo. That was the most
important place in the world. It was not only a place of rest for her body, but
for her mind as well. It was a universe all of its own. Their shared
universe.  It was the place to which she always wanted to return.

Now, on this
alien planet, exposed to a traumatic neural transcendence field for the first
time in her life, Tamisa thought of her bed… and it helped. 

It all happened
so quickly. The process of calming down was strenuous, but in the end she
succeeded. The pain receded, her body stopped shaking. The murmured voices grew
silent. She was in full control. Her colleagues were staring at her in
amazement.