Tales of the Red Panda: The Mind Master (8 page)

Mike Larsen stomped through the corridors of the Don Jail as
fast as his feet could carry his ample form. Larsen was a thick-necked,
red-faced prison guard and made no apologies for it, or for much else. The Don
was nobody’s idea of a palace, but Larsen was king of this particular castle.
Not in the warden’s office maybe, not before a review board, but among the
hundreds of toughs, sharpsters, gangsters and would-be master criminals that
called the Don home, Mike Larsen and his guards were the law. But not today.

Today there was a strange energy throughout the entire
building. You could feel it in the yard, where most of the jail’s population
whiled away another day of captivity. You could feel it in the dining hall and
in the lockdown cages. It was a strange, quiet energy, a dreadful note of
preparation – full of hostility, yet based in fear. An aggressive sort of
hush that a pack of jackals might settle into when they sensed the presence of
a tiger.

Mike Larsen could feel it too, and it made his job more
difficult. He had no idea if the inmates had somehow sensed the Don’s most important
guests, or if the prison grapevine had outdone itself again, but the silent
dread that hung over the five hundred men housed within the walls of the jail
made this anything but a typical day. Which made it that much more difficult to
pretend that it was.

Larsen’s boots rang out in heavy, clumsy peals as he closed
in on the isolation wing. Here, prisoners were kept away from the general
throng – sometimes for their own safety, sometimes for that of the
assorted cutthroats and murderers that might try their luck against the worst
of the worst. And it was here, on this day of all days, that his most important
guests were holding court.

Larsen fumbled with the keys on his belt. The coiled terror
of the prisoners throughout the building, the eerie pretense of calm they
exuded… it was all more than a little unsettling, even for Larsen, who had
spent more days inside than most of his charges and feared not one of them. He
slid the steel door of the isolation wing open and slipped inside. The corridor
beyond was silent as the grave, and nearly as dark. Only two light bulbs burned
down the length of the hallway. The rest still hung in place but had clearly
been twisted from above, to bathe the corridor in shadows. Larsen cursed a
little to himself. He wished his guests would remember that not everyone could
climb walls.

Larsen turned to lock the door behind him. When he turned
back he nearly jumped out of his skin, finding himself face to face with a head
that seemed to float in mid air. A wide, upside-down Cheshire Cat grin spread
across the floating face as it pushed forward slightly into the light. Of
course it was the Flying Squirrel, keeping silent vigil, hanging from the
ceiling. The fact that Mike Larsen had been expecting her made it no less
disconcerting.

“You’re not supposed to be in here, Mike,” she purred.

“Don’t start with me, Squirrel,” Larsen puffed, his cheeks
growing more crimson by the second.

“I’m startin’ nothin’, Peaches,” the girl said, as she
dropped from the ceiling and spun in mid-air to land silently on the balls of
her feet, cat-like. “That was the friendly warning part of our program. The
Boss don’t like to be disturbed.” She drew herself up to her full height,
nearly a foot shorter than the burly guard. Larsen had the good sense to be intimidated
anyway.

“What’s he doing in there?” Larsen puffed. “It’s been over
an hour.”

“Questioning the suspects, Mike. Just like we promised.”

“Still? These guys have been grilled by every mug with a
shield in the city limits. They’ve had suits come down from Ottawa, the Crown
Prosecutor practically lives here–”

“Yeah, yeah. They’re the most popular girls in school. I get
it.”

Mike Larsen looked anxiously towards the cells at the end of
the hall. He licked his lips, just once, without meaning to. The Flying
Squirrel cocked her head just a little, and gave him a smile that made him
think twice about trying to get past her.

“He’s gotta finish,” Larsen sputtered. “You two gotta go.
Warden’s orders.”

“Why would the Warden give us the boot?” her eyes narrowed.

“Because he’s got O’Mally and a room full of his boys in his
office and he’s running out of stalls. The Chief has some new theory.”

The Squirrel snorted. “Theory? From O’Mally that’s a fancy
word for random guesswork. The Red Panda’s using hypnosis, Mike. If there’s
anything to learn, he’ll be the one that learns it.”

“And that’s why the Warden’s been standing on his head to
keep the guards from the Empire Bank job from being transferred ‘till you two
bothered to show up,” Larsen fumed. “He’s run through every piece of red tape
that’s in the book and a few that aren’t, all to hang on to them. He did it
because he knows you’ve got the best shot to bring this one home, and he knows
that outside of this place, you two don’t have any friends in official places.”

The Squirrel pursed her lips and said nothing. She knew it
was true. She and the Boss were outlaws. They had their small army of agents
and informants, but few men involved in the system seemed to be able to see
that they were trying to help. If Chief O’Mally ever got wise that Warden
Pembrooke and his men co-operated with them from time to time, Pembrooke could
easily find himself inside one of his own cages. She held Larsen’s gaze for a
moment, then turned her own eyes down to the end of the hall.

For a moment, they both stood in silence.

“Is he on the eighth?” Larsen said at last.

“What?” she hissed, slightly annoyed.

“The eighth? The last guard?”

There was a small pause.

“Not exactly,” she said at last.

“The seventh?” Larsen asked hopefully.

She turned to him with a wry expression, and smacked her
lips a little, just once.

“He still with the first one, isn’t he?” Larsen deadpanned.

“Yep.” She smiled ruefully.

“It never takes this long,” Larsen said in frustration.
“Haven’t you been curious?”

“Curious?” the Flying Squirrel sputtered. “I’ve been going
bananas. But he told me to keep watch, so I’m keepin’ watch.”

“Look, kid,” Larsen said, opening the door behind him, “this
is just a courtesy call. The Chief is coming in, so you gotta get out. The
Warden’ll stall him as long as he can, but for all I know he’s on his way right
now.”

The steel door clanged behind Larsen and he was gone.

Kit turned back to the hallway. She sighed – at least
it was an excuse to see what the heck was going on. She padded silently down
the darkened hallway to the cell at the very end. The small window in the door
was just slightly too high for her to peer through comfortably, but he had left
the door ajar.

She opened the cell door as quietly as she could. The scene
she found was not at all what she expected. The young man who had so recently
been a guard at the Empire Bank was lying peacefully on his bunk, apparently
asleep. The Red Panda was sitting on the edge of the cot, seemingly exhausted,
his head in his hand.

He looked up when he heard Kit’s gasp. His face was ashen
and there was sweat upon his brow. The Flying Squirrel struggled to regain her
composure.

“Closing time, Boss,” she said. “How’re we doin’ in here?”

“Well, he’s no longer catatonic,” the Red Panda smiled
weakly. “So we’re fine. How are you?”

“Are you ever gonna explain yourself,” the Flying Squirrel
asked at last, “or are you waitin’ to see if I burst?”

The pair of masked heroes had slipped out of the Don Jail
just moments ahead of a large delegation of bright young men in crisp blue
uniforms. The route through the maze of prison corridors was well known to both
of them, though not another soul living could have told you how they seemed to
get in and out as they pleased.

A short distance from the Don was a derelict garage at the
end of a seldom-used laneway. The building had all the appearance of having
been abandoned by its owners like so many other businesses that had collapsed
under the weight of hard times. Those who passed the boarded windows and rusted
doors every day would have been surprised indeed to learn that the garage was,
in fact, the property of a holding company that was, in turn, owned by one of
the city’s wealthiest men. What Fenwick Industries wanted with such a property
one could only imagine, though few would have guessed August Fenwick himself to
be aware of the building’s existence.

At that very moment within the dimly lit garage, a bright
red domino mask was removed and the mystery man known as the Red Panda assumed
his own mask – that of Fenwick himself. He hurriedly stowed his mask and
gauntlets in one of the many secret compartments in the rear of his limousine
as he waited for his partner to change. The Don Jail was hardly centrally
located, and there was a dearth of buildings to swing down from; there had been
a need for a secure location for their car and equipment when they paid a call.
Today being a rare daylight visit, the need for secrecy had been even greater.
It was fair to say that a limousine in this neighborhood would attract even
more attention than the thundering black roadster the press had dubbed “The
Pandamobile.”

Kit Baxter watched her mentor as he ran his hand across his
brow. She couldn’t quite tell if he was still exhausted or just trying very
hard not to look as she pulled her chauffeur uniform on over her catsuit. There
was nothing to see, of course, but she still always watched to see if he’d
sneak a peek. She didn’t know whether to feel flattered or insulted that he
never did.

She opened the front door and slid in quickly, stowing her
cowl, goggles and belt as she did. As the engine roared to life, the
dilapidated-looking main doors of the garage swung open of their own accord,
and the limousine rolled quickly down the laneway.

They drove in silence for a minute or more, until Kit Baxter
could stand it no longer.

“Well?” she said at last.

She heard a sigh from the back seat. “It was like nothing
I’ve ever encountered before,” he said. “It was a minefield.”

She pursed her lips. “I don’t understand. What was like a minefield?”

“That man’s mind was.” His voice was grave. “You were right
to think that it sounded ridiculous: eight guards, each with an utterly
identical alibi. No one would invent such an absurdity for themselves.”

“So… what then?” she said. “Wait… are you sayin’ that
someone else invented it
for
them?
That they’re not lyin’ at all?”

“No, those men aren’t lying,” Fenwick said, the colour
beginning to return to his face. “Each of them is relating the events
surrounding the robbery of the Empire Bank just exactly as he remembers it.
That’s why they’ve been so resistant to interrogation. They’re trying to
co-operate; they’re trying to tell the police everything they know.”

“But everything they know is a lie!” Kit said, slapping the
wheel with grudging respect for their adversary. “Man, that is slick!”

“Yes and no,” he said. “Yes and no.”

“I see what you’re sayin’. If somebody could work that kinda
trick, all they’d have to do is come up with eight
different
sets of memories and no one ever would have been the wiser.”

“Yes.” His fist clenched involuntarily. “I was blinded by
that. I thought it was a blunder. I thought perhaps they’d been in a hurry,
perhaps they hadn’t expected to encounter more than one guard. It can take time
to properly suggest an alternate set of memories, even to cover a short span of
time.”

“What’re we talkin’ about here?” Kit said, her brow
furrowed. “Hypnosis?”

“Yes,” he nodded. “And no simple mesmerism either. That was
my mistake. I assumed whomever was playing a hypnotic game, that I was better
at it than they were. I was wrong, and it almost cost that man his life, or his
sanity.”

“Boss?” she said. “It’s tough to keep the car on the road
when I have to make with the Socratic method. What happened in that cell?”

“It was a trap, Kit. As soon as I pressed the spell to help
the guard recover his true memories, his mind started to collapse around me.”

“Collapse?”

“Basic life functions shutting down, consciousness
splintering… shattering… I could feel his mind slipping away. The information
that we needed was there for the taking, had I been content to let him die in
the process. It took everything I had to bring him back, to repair the damage.
But at the first attempt to reach back into his memory it all began again, and
in a completely different way. I don’t quite know how to explain myself…”

“I think I’m getting’ the picture,” she said. “It was a
booby-trap.”

“Yes,” he said quietly. “Yes. And I’ll tell you what else.
Those false memories weren’t merely created through suggestion, they were
implanted
if you will. Overwritten,
through mind-to-mind contact.”

“Which means what?” she said with a shake of her head.

“It means that whoever did this was a true master of the
mind.”

There was a moment of silence while they both digested this.
In the end it was Kit who spoke first.

“Boss, let me ask you this…,” she began.

He looked up and caught her eye in the rear-view mirror.

“This booby-trap… is there any chance that it could have
hurt you?” Her brow was furrowed slightly and her jaw was set. He could see that
she was on to something.

“No,” he replied, “there was no real danger to my mind.”

“And you say the real memories were there… you could have
got them.”

“Yes, if I hadn’t bothered trying to save him, I could
probably have retrieved them, given time.”

“And since you had eight guinea pigs there to play with,
it’s fair to say that you’d have gotten the skinny sooner or later, if you
didn’t mind killing a few of them in the process?”

“I’m sure,” he said sternly.

“Then whoever did this must have known that you’d never do
that,” she said with certainty.

He thought for a moment and nodded. “You’re right, Kit. It
is the only thing that makes sense. Someone this skilled in mental disciplines
could easily have implanted unique memories in each of these men. But in failing
to do so, he drew attention to himself–”

“–and left a trail of breadcrumbs only you could
follow,” she smiled.

“And then took it away in dramatic fashion,” he reminded
her.

“There is that.”

“He’s taunting me, isn’t he?” Fenwick said, arching an eyebrow.

“And how does that usually work out for people?” she purred.

“I can only pray that you’re right, Kit.” His eyes focused
on the road ahead with steely resolve. “If this fiend proves to be too much for
us, I can’t imagine who else could possibly stand in his way.”