Adventure Contest Entry: Psis Matters

Adventure Contest Entry: ID: 14716

Psis Matters: Part 1

        The sides of Alex’s temples drummed with a dull ache. Not sufficient to hurt or distract, but just enough to make itself known. He pushed the sensation away, chalking it up to fatigue, and continued to focus on his work.
The circuit board sparked with two rapid flashes of light before smoke obscured it. Alex jerked his face away from the magnifying lens mounted to the edge of the table, blinking to clear the ghost-images from his vision. “Damn. I should’ve stopped. What’s the point of being psychic if I won’t trust my own instincts?”
        Using his psychokinetic gift imparted on him a year ago, he lifted a plastic bin from the floor and brought it up to hover beside him. Moving things with his thoughts was far easier to practice than some of his other abilities. Look at something. Picture the target moving where he wanted and then watching it go. Using it had become so instinctive where he had to be careful not to affect things while in public, negating his efforts to keep his powers secret.
        “Where was that extra hyperwave capacitor?” Alex asked the room as he dug through the container. Contents lifted and floated in the air like hummingbirds as he searched, settling back into their place after he realized he had used the last one. “Great. Just great.”
        This meant a trip back to campus and a visit to the experimental electronics lab since he technology for his psionic enhancers wasn’t available at Walmart yet. With a couple of thoughts, he turned off his equipment, put his tools away, and brought his jacket over his outstretched arm as he headed to the door. He finished putting on the garment the old-fashioned way and headed outdoors.
The cool air greeted him like an embrace from an unfavored aunt. It was unseasonably cold for the time of year, but that was life in the north. He could teleport to the laboratory in a few spatial shifts, but after hours tinkering with electronics, stretching his limbs in the night air would do him some good. The idea of his legs elongating like rubber bands swept through his imagination. Fortunately, that isn’t one of the abilities I developed. Useful as it might be at times, that gift didn’t seem appealing at all.
The Franklin Einstein Applied Technologies building sat at the opposite side of the college campus. Alex walked half-way there before an intense wave of emotion washed over him. Terror. Regret. Violation. Fighting the urge to fall to his knees, Alex hobbled over to a convenient bench and sat, scanning the area with his eyes for the source. The power behind of the feelings was strong but they seemed muted, as if they came from a of great distance. If he had been closer to the source, Alex feared he would have been easily overwhelmed by them.
Alex pushed his awareness outside his body for an instant, sending out a pulse of mental energy into what he called the mindscape. All around him, flickering points of light sparkled like stars in the night sky, each one a person. Where there typically had been darkness between the flickers of brilliance, a silver-gray light washed across in a pattern like water spilling over a table. He had seen this before, but never as widespread.
Someone very powerful was dying. Violently. The sensation of life being torn away, drawn out like liquid from a juice-box, tainted the being’s passing. As the last of the energy left its vessel, the container hardened, and the last impression Alex felt was immobility. The strange light dissipated and the empty space between the lights returned.
Slumping back against the cold stone of the bench, Alex ran his hands through his dark hair while trying to settle his nerves. He doubted he would ever know what occurred, but he somehow knew something important had happened.
Yet another strange event to chalk up to the world since the Legion, Morphons, and superheroes arrived. It was frightening to think about, but also exhilarating. Everything seemed so much… bigger now.
“Help me!”
The scream snapped Alex out of his contemplation. Looking in the direction where the sound came from, he spotted a crimson and yellow varsity jacket running along the railroad tracks behind two of the college buildings. Three bright green, glowing masses of light trailed behind, like miniature ribbons of the northern lights.
“That’s not the 10:30 to Bakersfield,” Alex muttered before jetting toward the running figure. Once he reached the cover of darkness provided shadows created by streetlights against the nearby dormitory building, he swapped his jeans and t-shirt for his super-hero costume with a quick teleport from his mind-closet. One of his more unique abilities, Alex could store an item in a portion of his memory and bring it back into the world when needed.
Once in his Starmaster costume, including several pieces of psionic-enhancing equipment he developed, he lifted himself up over the building and overtook the young man racing down the tracks. Recognizing the panicked youth as the center for the varsity basketball team, Alex set down a few feet ahead him and placed a shield dome surrounding the two of them. “Calm down. You’re safe Mr. Trenton.”
The green globs of light struck against the faint blue glow of the shield, causing tendrils of energy to dance across its surface, reminding Alex of an inversed plasma light.
“What the heck’s going on?” Doug Trenton panted. “Who are you? How do you know who I am?”
“Everyone knows you Doug. You scored the winning three-point shot in last week’s game.” Alex grinned with school pride before remembering his mask would be hiding the expression. “You may call me Starmaster.”
Doug moved behind Alex, taking cover from the lightshow on the other side of the psionic barrier. “OK. Whatever. Why are those things after me? They’ve been chasing me ever since I left the gym after practice.”
“I was hoping you could tell me,” Alex replied.
The green lights pulled back from the shield and coalesced into three identical, glowing humanoid outlines. “Starmaster. Identity verified. You are to come with us.”
The ache returned behind Alex’s temples.
(To be continued…)

“What business do you have with me?” Starmaster asked. “Or with this man?”
Floating in the air like helium balloons caught in a light breeze, the green light comprising the three shapes sparkled in irregular, but cohesive, patterns. “We don’t need him no more.”
Starmaster tilted his head. The campy, hillbilly nature of the response had a far different cadence than their earlier communication. Different, but yet familiar. “Then he is free to leave, unimpeded by you?”
“You’re right. Tell him what he has won, Johnny.” A perfect imitation of a game-show host, even including the cheesy, bright background music.
Doug tugged at the edge of Starmaster’s cape. “Why aren’t they answering any of your questions?”
“You can’t hear them?” Starmaster asked, his perplexed tone hidden by the vocal modulator built into his facemask.
“No. They’re talking to you?” Doug’s disbelief dripped from each word. “What are you, a mind-reader or something.”
“Well…” I am but they aren’t talking to me that way either. No need to confess that when a bigger question lingered. Motioning for Doug to back away, Alex kept his focus on the strange beings before him. “They don’t seem interested in you any further. Get out of here while I keep an eye on them.”
The crunching of feet trampling on loose gravel faded behind Alex as Doug departed. The globs of light held their position with no change to their luminescence.
“You already seem to know my name. What should I call you?” Alex prompted the lights as he mentally triggered the pattern recognition app in his suit’s audio processors.
The flickering of the sporadic lights returned. “Don’t call us. We’ll call you.”
Broadcast pattern identified. Source: EM modulated signal. 99.7% match to dialog from video track of Men in Black 11 between characters—
That’s more than enough. Alex cut of the analysis, recognizing the source material from his pre-teen years. By some means, the light-forms were communicating by sending signals directly to the speakers in the earbuds in his suit. No wonder Doug hadn’t heard anything.
Probing with his mental acuity, Alex sought out the consciousness of the light-forms in the mindscape. Barely perceptible, he located not a pinpoint “star” as he described the minds of most people, but a nebulous mass of energized activity. Either this intelligence was far different than any he had previously encountered, or it was being cloaked by a mind with abilities similar his own. Perhaps it was a projection; an incomplete, temporary imitation of a sentient being.
“You want me to leave with you to go somewhere. I don’t go out on first dates unless I know who’s opening the door for me first.” Alex considered contacting BADGE. He opened a channel to their communication network to see if they had encountered these beings before.
Without any indication of movement, the green lights flooded about Alex’s shield, surrounding the psionic energy field from top to bottom. The plasma storm-bolts returned, erupting from every direction. “There can be only one.” A heavy guitar refrain followed.
The signal strength from his communication link dropped to nothing. Alex scanned for open frequencies, finding all EM channels blocked. OK. They don’t seem to want anyone else involved, but at least they have good taste in source material.
Alex pinged the mindscape. Hundreds of lights flickered within a hundred-yard radius. If this encounter escalated, many innocent people could be hurt.
“Well, if you insist,” he said. “I just call you Emmy since you won’t give me your name. Take me to your leader.”
He could use movie jargon as well as they could.
(to be continued…)

Psis Matters: Part 3

        The Emmys took position around Starmaster, one directly ahead of him and the other two flanking him on either side. Following the lead of the one’s motion Starmaster psycho-kinetically lifted himself into the air and above the buildings and over the canopy of trees surrounding the campus. They flew in the evening air for several miles to the northwest.
        Starmaster checked his signal strength. He had an extremely weak connection. Should I try to call for reinforcements? Deciding to keep the option open, he kept radio silence. The Emmys hadn’t done anything overtly threatening. Yet.
        Approaching a small grove of trees, the Emmy ahead of him descended beneath the branches full of leaves.
        “Are we there already?” Starmaster searched the surrounding area for mental presences. There was unusual activity below him, like weak filaments of a spiderweb being carried off in a wind, but uncomplex, non-sentient. He sought out conscious, human minds specifically. Finding none on the mindscape within what he equated to a mile in the real world, he settled into an arc to follow into the wooded area. The other two glowing beings followed him without reaction to his question.
        Engaging his night vision function of his mask, Starmaster surveyed the interior of the glade. The bright glow of the creature, which grew more intense in the new visual mode, ahead of him reached ground level and continued to descend. It seemed to be leading Starmaster into the wide opening of a sinkhole, a common feature in the state. Varying in sizes, these holes were natural formations caused by underground water movements.
        “Did Timmy fall down here, Emmy?” Starmaster kidded as he engaged a high-powered LED embedded in the star symbol on his costume. Roots and vines clung to the walls of the pit, a brown tapestry of interwoven plant material. Patches of green light shone up from the bottom of the sinkhole, wavering and distorted as if reflecting from a pool of water.
        Turning a full 360° as he lowered further down, he spotted a rope ladder dangling alongside of him. He moved closer to inspect it, noting it wasn’t made from cheap twine or household materials. He reached out a hand and tugged at the sturdy rigging. Strong nylon fibers and aluminum slats confirmed the ladder was professional climbing gear.  Someone else has been down here. Not too long ago either.
        His curiosity continued to grow as he closed on the bottom of the sinkhole, finding plastic coolers and a portable table with specimen containers laid out upon it, some filled but many more unopened. A brand label of AE had been printed on the plastic packaging protecting the scientific materials. Recognizing the name as a recent scholarship donor to the college, Starmaster searched for further labeling or identifiers for who might be responsible for their presence in this remote pit.
        “Did you bring me here to show me litter?” Starmaster queried the room, mostly speaking aloud out of an irrational need for sound while more than six-feet underground. “There are some foul people out there, but you should have gone to AE. It looks like their people left this here. Why come to me?”
        A few feet away, the only Emmy who led the way down into the sinkhole hovered above the water.
        Casting a faint green pallor on the walls and shallow water covering the floor, except for where Starmaster’s light was directed, the being lowered closer to the murky liquid. “Pull yourself together, man”
        “Ok,” Starmaster replied, still scanning the room. He recognized the dialog from some campy sitcom. “That doesn’t make much sense. Let’s try this again. Why did you bring me here?”
        “Don’t go into the water. You don’t know what’s in there!” Deep cello chords reverberated after the quote from Jaws 2040.
        Starmaster lifted a few inches higher, glad he had kept levitating rather than landing. “Is there something in the water?”
        “Affirmative,” A sci-fi robotic dog’s voice responded.
        His attention drawn beneath the floating Emmy, Starmaster lowered the beam of the light emitting from his chest. The murky water didn’t reveal its secrets easily. A thick sediment or plant material seemed suspended in the liquid. Weaving his light around the pool, the light glinted from something small and metallic. Using his telekinesis, Starmaster lifted at the object. A tiny clip connected to a lanyard floated into the air.