Socket 3 - The Legend of Socket Greeny (2 page)

“HOOO! What a grip!” He shook his head like a
wet dog. Pain was better than nothing at all. “But tell me
something, won-wonderboy? How am I going to kill your girlfriend if
I’m in here—” He covered his mouth with both hands. Held his
breath. “Don’t tell me…”

I only blinked, but it was enough. He saw
more of the vision than I thought. He was fucking with me.

“Are you joking? You’re here to tell me…” He
was bouncing again. “That I’m going to… escape?” He sang the last
word like a little girl, the last syllable squeaky.
“
ESCAPE?”

I didn’t budge, move or think. I wouldn’t
give him the satisfaction of seeing the details, wouldn’t let him
see more of the vision that revealed him wearing street clothes and
smiling at the sun. I didn’t want him to see that no one paid
attention to the curious man until they got near him and his
dangerous mind; how he projected a mere thought to tear a little
girl from her parents. How he shoved her into traffic. Tires
screeched. Someone screamed.

“Tell me, how do I do it?” he asked. “Oh,
please. Tell me.”

“It won’t happen, Pike.”

“You saw it, huh? Show me, right? Show me how
it happens.” He clapped his hands. “Please, pretty
p-p-pleeeeeeease. I got to know, I just got to know.”

I stood. The chair collapsed into the floor.
“I’ll alert the Commander of what I’ve seen. I promise, you’ll not
escape.”

“Yes, but you could tell me just one thing?”
He looked around the ceiling, again, entertaining the
possibilities. “Do you know about
wheeeen
it might happen? I
mean, I’m not saying it
wiiiiill
, but just in case. You
know, I need to clear my calendar.”

“Be advised.” I projected the vision to the
minders. Mo nodded.
Received.

“Do I kill you, wonderboy? When I get out, do
I kill you? That’s not too much to ask, is it?”

“As long as I live, you will not walk
free.”

“Perhaps you should ask good master Pivot
about that.” He cocked his head. “Or is he still AWOL?”

Pivot. The greatest Paladin to ever live. My
personal mentor. One that could see the future. One that
disappeared over a year ago. I could still sense his presence, some
days it was stronger than others. He was always around. I could
feel him watching. I never thought much about the fact that he
never showed himself, just secure that he hadn’t disappeared
entirely.

“Good old papa Pivot doesn’t talk much these
days, would you say?” Pike said. “Tell me, what’s it like to be
abandoned by someone you love? I’ll bet it stings, like maybe it
was your fault.” He leaned forward and sniffed. “Maybe it’s, you
know… you.”

“He’s around.”

“He is?” He looked in both directions. “Is he
in the room right now? This second? Like an imaginary friend?” His
laughter was high-pitched and much too loud. Cut right through me.
“Poor wonderboy. All alone in the world. That’s why he comes to see
good ole Pike, he does. Lonely.” He tipped his head back to the
minders. “That’s why he’s here boys.”

“You’re broken, Pike. You deserve worse.”

“Do you trust him, wonderboy? Do you trust
papa Pivot?”

“He’s the reason you’re here.”

“Yes, well all good things come to a
screeching halt, they say. Just ask your vision, wonderboy.” His
tongue pushed through a smile. “Listen, you come to old Pike when
you have your next vision.” He dipped his head, let me glimpse the
white eyeballs behind the black glasses. “I’m here to help,
wonderboy.”

He said it sincerely. He was a master of
keeping an opponent off-balance. Nothing he said could be
trusted.

The color faded from the walls. The images of
the minders shrank. Pike melted into the floor. “Be sure to call my
secretary,” he said, his voice fading. “She can squeeze you
in...”

I left the dark room, more disturbed than
ever.

I sat cross-legged in a field of manicured
turf, breathing rhythmically in meditation. It had been weeks since
the vision of Pike’s escape and, still, it was with me. Most
visions faded with time, but this one remained in full detail. Like
a siren that refused to stop. I noticed my thoughts about it and
returned to the present moment, listening to the birds sing.

Six kids sat cross-legged in front of me on
firm, round pillows. Their eyes were closed and hands gently folded
in front of their bellies. They tried to ignore the pain in their
knees, sitting like concrete figures, holding steady, their breath
coming and going. But they heard the birds. Dawn was near.

Sitting was almost over.

Their minds were in various states, some
open, some scattered. The girls – Madeline, Aleshia and Grace –
were mostly calm, but the boys were somewhere else. Joseph was
dreaming, Dylan half-asleep and then there was Ben hating
everything. His eyelids were cracked open, watching me.

They could leave the Garrison any time they
wanted. But if they stayed, they had to commit to the daily
schedule and that included food and a warm, dry place to sleep and
a tropical forest. But there was also meditation practice, physical
training and emotional therapy. The price for all these pleasures
was but a gift itself:
Understanding
. I wanted to show them
what they already possessed: essential wonder and unlimited
freedom.

“I want you to return to this moment.” I
unfolded my legs, let the aches fade from my knees. “Allow the
moment to be present. Allow space for your entire experience,
whether it’s excitement, resistance, love or hate. Allow space for
whatever is in this very moment and be with it. Recognize thoughts
about it. Notice if you want it to be different.”

The dewy grass slid between my toes. I
stepped quietly behind them, gently straightening their sagging
backs.

“Just notice what you think and return to
your bodily sensations. Allow the present moment to unfold.”

Excitement vibrated around them. The best
part of meditation was the end. They listened, remained sitting and
present, but there was more exuberance than usual. Even Ben was
grinning. They all cracked open their eyes, looking behind me.

The trees were far away, their canopies dense
and dark. But even so, I could see the bright colored grimmets
crawling along the branches, scurrying to get away without being
seen. The little dragony creatures – no bigger than hummingbirds –
were probably hovering behind me making faces or holding their
tails up behind my head like horns to make the kids laugh. My
frustration shot like sparks, rustling the leaves like a rogue gust
of wind.

Grimmets
.

They were psychic titans, each one of them
with more mental strength than the entire human population. They
defeated the duplicates, the entire population, several months ago
without any hint of resurrection. I was the conduit for their
power, for I understood. I saw life clearly.
The One Who Sees
Clearly,
they called me. Through me, the grimmets called to all
duplicated life forms on the planet, instructed them to deactivate
and they did.

And now the grimmets were bored. And when the
kids were around, they were insufferable.

“Socket?” Ben asked. “Ummm…”

Sigh
.
“Dismissed.”

They jumped and ran, pulling at each other as
they raced for the opposite end of the oval, grassy field. I let
loose an ear-splitting whistle. They turned while running. I
pointed at the meditation cushions tumbled in disarray. They
fought, laughing along the way, and swept up the cushions to put
them away. Every part of the schedule was their responsibility.

Ben fell down and rubbed his numb leg.
Feeling came back slowly to his calf, and when it did, pins and
needles tortured his nerves. “Why do we have to sit so damn
long?”

No one gave Ben much of a chance. His father
died when he was little and his mother was addicted to prescription
drugs and mood-altering gear, anything that would make her feel
good, escape the emptiness inside, until she mixed too many pills
and never woke up. Ben landed in a children’s home, like the rest
of them, only he ran away. He was resistant, a fighter, but I saw
something in him. And he trusted what I saw. That’s all I
asked.

When the pain ebbed, he hobbled after the
others. They were already leaping onto the jetter discs nestled in
the grass at the opposite end of the field that hovered off the
ground once their feet locked in place. They scooped up sticks that
were curved at the ends and flew across the field, the jetters
tilting a few inches off the ground, responding to their thoughts
for direction and speed.

The tagghet field was in the middle of the
Preserve, a tropical jungle carved out of the mountain and
protected from the elements by an invisible forcefield overhead. It
was like a 5.2 square mile conservatory and the kids’ very own
playground. A place I thought of as home.

I walked to the edge of the field, where the
trees met the turf, where a silver android awaited. His long
plum-colored overcoat hung to his ankles. Colors flashed across his
featureless faceplate, a bright red eyelight following the kids
across the tagghet field. He held out a breakfast bar and a bottle
of water.

“How was your morning meditation?” he
asked.

I chewed the breakfast bar and observed the
kids weaving expertly around each other. “Aleshia is ready to begin
sitting every morning. I’d like to keep the others sitting twice a
week, at least for another month.”

“You should be aware that Grace is stealing
food from the others.”

Of course, Grace was stealing. I knew her
memories, experienced them when we sat. Like the others, she was
considered
damaged.
She ran from her memories, distracting
herself with thoughts and desires and fears. Most normal people did
that sort of thing, but no one could blame Grace. Her foster
parents did unconscionable things to her. Mostly it was beatings,
but some were sexual, the sorts of things that destroyed people,
left gaping emotional holes that could never be filled.

But Grace was resilient. She had a lot of
work to do. I wouldn’t recommend meditation for a person like that,
especially not that young. But she was different. All these kids
were different. They didn’t just endure; they were highly evolved,
possessing an innate, genetic disposition for learning and
transformation. I know, because I hand-picked them.

After the duplicates were defeated, the
Paladin Nation needed direction. I launched the Orphan program.
Ironic, I suppose, that the whole existence of the Paladins was to
defeat an enemy that were like orphans. Duplicates had no maternal
parents, considered themselves free and independent of the
psychological problems that hampered humans. But the duplicates
were programs, no matter how efficient they were, they could not
be,
could not transform and grow. Unlike the duplicates, the
children could rise above their handicap.

I wanted to reach out to the human race,
integrate the Paladin Nation into society, help people understand
themselves. Understanding wasn’t just a right of the Paladins, it
was a human right. So why not start with society’s most
underprivileged. That didn’t mean people would want the
understanding we offered. Many people possessed a lot of
psychological difficulties. Could they overcome them? We couldn’t
make them. So I selected the ones I sensed would.

“I would like Grace to join group therapy on
Wednesday,” I said. “I don’t want to separate her from her peers,
though. She needs additional support from some like-minded children
with similar experiences. Empathy will go a long way for her. I’ll
be leading the group session. I also want to schedule Ben for
individual counseling.” I took a swallow of water. “I’ll be leading
that, too.”

“But you are not approved to counsel the
children, Master Socket.”

They were on the other side of the field, but
Ben spun around and looked at us, as if to make sure we were still
there.

“He needs trust, Spindle. He trusts me.”

“Do you have a suggestion on how to get
permission?”

“Don’t call it counseling. Just schedule him
to chat with me for an hour. Let’s start a week from now, on
Friday.”

“But you are leaving that morning.”

The trip. I conveniently forgot. One of those
things I was told I would be doing. All Paladins must make at least
one trip through the intergalactic wormhole network. For the
experience, I guess. My work was here, right now. I didn’t need to
see what sort of research was being done on planet Krypton or what
alternative fuel was being mined from an asteroid
.

Sorry, I’m busy
, I wanted to say. But
I already knew the Commander’s answer.
No, you’re not.

Sunlight had crossed the sky, stretching long
shadows over the field. Some of the grimmets emerged from hiding,
fluttering over the kids, swarming so thickly they nearly buried
them. Aleshia bounced the discus-shaped tag off the ground and the
grimmets chased after it, then mauled Joseph when he snagged it
with the magnetic curved end of his stick.

A red grimmet was in the trees behind me.
Rudder
. I could
see
all around me with my mind, feel
the negative space between objects and
know
the essential
spirit of all things, building an image of what things
looked
like in my mind. But I didn’t need all that to see
Rudder, he was different. I felt him, like a part of me that moved
separately in the world. We had bonded when he brought me back from
death and a part of me stayed with him. And part of him with me. He
dropped onto my shoulder and wrapped his whip-like tail around my
neck, purring.

[I told them not to do it,]
he thought
to me.
[I knew you’d be angry.]