A Loner Mentalist Pt. 09

"But...but I thought..."

Jack kissed her forehead, noting that he was leaving tiny traces of his blood as he did so. "Because you got it wrong, the skeleton man got it wrong, too, and he spared us! You saved our lives, Mia. If he hadn't read your mind and learned of the list, we'd both be dead by now. You couldn't have stopped him from reading your mind, but you screwed him over by turning his advantage into his defeat."

"But...I didn't mean to."

"That makes you all the more badass, then. Fucking over a mentalist who's holding all the cards without even meaning to do it? Awesome!"

She looked into his eyes and rubbed his hands holding her face. "I'm so sorry about your mother. I..."

"I know. Thank you." He let go of her and bent over to pick up his laptop.

"Are...are you going to be ok?"

Jack turned the laptop on and entered his password. "I doubt if I'll ever be ok. My mother was mind raped into slitting her throat right in front of me and I tasted her blood as I watched the light go out of her eyes." His eyes lost focus as he waited for the system to boot up. "I suppose that there's something deeply dysfunctional about me remaining so functional this night." He bit on his lower lip and noticed Mia wince. He could feel a tiny trickle of warm liquid go down his chin.Oh, right! My face is fucked up. "How bad is my face?"

She tried to put on a brave smile, but he could see in her eyes that she definitely didn't mean it when she said, "It's not so bad."

"Don't worry! I don't feel any pain and we'll find a pro to fix me up." He started Skype and called George.

The auburn-haired, multi-chinned hacker's face quickly popped up on the screen. His mouth dropped. "Boss! What happened to your face?"

"Never mind that! New orders! There are cops staking out your place right now!"

"They're feds," George said, nodding. "I can tell, cause they got pigtail antennas on their cars."

"Who they are doesn't matter. They're there to sit on you until the big bad comes to get you in the early morning. You need to do something for me before that happens."

"Anything, Boss, but am I not allowed to escape?"

Jack sighed. "I need you to do this for me first. That's an order! Besides, let's face it! You're too fat to give anyone the slip. Is all that blubber you're carrying going to silence the heavy stomps of your feet and make you move as quietly as a cat?"

"Well, I can-"

"Shut up and listen! There was a call made tonight. A cellphone call from my mother's house. It was started...I don't know, about half an hour after sundown, or a little later than that. It was about an hour ago, ok? It lasted about...uh, two and a half, say, three minutes. I need you to find out everything there is to know about that call! Get me all the info about the caller and the called, and put a fucking tracer on both, if you can. You got that?"

"A call that lasted two, or three, minutes and happened an hour, or an hour and a half ago? That's not much to go on. Do you know which cellphone carrier was involved?"

Jack shot him a murderous glare. "George, my fucking town was evacuated today. The call I want you to trace was probably the only call made here tonight, so it shouldn't be too hard to figure it out. Get it done! Call me as soon as you get any info!"

"Will do, Boss!"

Jack turned the laptop off and slammed it shut. He licked out at an itch on his lip and tasted blood. "Is there a mirror in this place?"

"I don't know," Mia said.

"Never mind," he said and picked up his bags to leave.

"Where are you going?"

Jack stopped at the door. "I'm going to kill the mercenaries and then I'm going to take care of my mom...and then I guess I'll find a competent surgeon to put my face back together. I'm winging all this, you know." He winked at her, noting that made his vision blurry in that eye, and walked off down the hall. She rushed after him. The bags fell out of his left hand and he glared at them until he saw his thumb was still dislocated. His whole hand was swelling up, from the wrist down. He held it up. "Maybe I'll have this fixed first."

Mia picked up the dropped bags and he led the way out, recalling the route from memories of being carried in. Once out on the factory grounds, Jack led them to the main production hall. All the mercenaries were there. Their eyes were liquid pools of panic behind their masks. Jack nodded at the closest and held up his injured hand. "You! Fix my dislocated thumb!" The mercenary walked over and gingerly clasped his fingers around Jack's hand. "Quit fucking around! I can't feel pain. Just do it right and do it quickly!"

The mercenary nodded and grasped Jack's hand with both of his. After a crush and a tug Jack felt through every tendon in his left arm, the mercenary nodded. "You'll need a splint to keep it from slipping out again."

"Then make me one," Jack impatiently said. The mercenary nodded and scurried off to grab a med kit.

"Now," Jack called out over the assembled men, "raise a hand if you're truly sorry my mother was murdered tonight!" One mercenary at the back raised his hand. Jack barked out a bitter laugh. "Oh, this'll be fun! Why are you sorry?"

The mercenary at the back said, "I wanted to fuck her in the ass first."

Jack nodded the whole time the first mercenary improvised a splint for his thumb.

"Jack," Mia said in a small voice. "Are you ok?"

Jack kept nodding. When the mercenary finished making the splint, he said, "No. No, I am definitely not ok. But, hey, at least I found me a gravedigger." He pointed at the wannabe-sodomist mercenary in the back. "You there! Your name is Buttfucker from now on! Get over here!" Buttfucker squeezed past his colleagues and stood behind Jack and Mia. Mia looked up at the burly mercenary with unease. "Now, which one of you sidewinders handed the thin man the knife he used to kill my mother?"

Another masked mercenary stepped forward. "I did."

Jack cocked his head. "Is that a replacement knife in your sheath?"

"No, it's the same one."

Jack let out a bitter giggle and shook his head. "Take out that knife and start cutting yourself. Make the cuts at least an inch deep." The mercenary took out his knife, his eyes wild with fear, and screamed as he stabbed himself in the side. "Who gave you permission to make a single sound, jackass?" The mercenary paused, his eyes full of fear and pain. "Do it silently, capiche?" The man nodded and stabbed himself in the thigh. "And when you start to feel faint, or if anyone tries to interfere, slit your throat the way my mother did." The mercenary nodded again and stabbed himself in the forearm.

Jack stepped forward. "Raise your hand if you've never raped a woman!"

None of the mercenaries did.

"Raise your hand if you've never murdered anyone in cold blood!"

Two mercenaries in the back raised their hands. Jack pointed at them. "Assistant gravediggers! Step forward!" The two assistant gravediggers walked over to stand behind Buttfucker.

"The rest of you, stand in a circle!" The mercenaries quickly formed a circle. "Good! Now, face left!" The mercenaries turned to their left, still standing in a circle. "Take out your guns and press them against the back of the head of the man in front of you. Press them where they will make a kill shot." The mercenaries began trembling as they drew their sidearms.

"Jack," Mia said, "what are you doing?"

"What does it look like I'm doing? I'm taking out the trash."

"Are...are you sure about this?"

"What? Do you think I could use them as my own, personal army?" Mia nodded. "Fat fucking chance of that. I'm the son of a Naval officer. I fight with honor! This is just trash to be taken out." He addressed the mercenaries again. "When I give the order, you will start to count to ten. You will become more and more synchronized with each number you count, until, as you say ten, you will all fire. If any of you are alive after that, for any reason, put your gun in your mouth and shoot until you are dead."

Jack saw the spreading stains on the men's crotches and under their armpits. He smiled and tasted blood again. "Cock your guns!" The mercenaries cocked their sidearms with shaking hands. Some needed both hands to do it. "And begin counting!"

"One," they said in many voices.

"Pick up my bags and lead us to a car," Jack said to Buttfucker and his assistants. They hurried to comply.

"Two," the mercenaries said, in fewer voices.

Jack and his party walked out of the hall while the mercenaries inside it became more and more synchronized with each number they counted aloud. "Drive us to my mother's house," Jack ordered Buttfucker.

Buttfucker nodded and got in the driver's seat. The assistants loaded the bags in the trunk. Jack shook his head as a momentary weakness struck him. His mother's pale face sprung up in his mind's eye. Her eyes were silently begging him, but he couldn't figure out for what. As he grimaced, he tasted fresh blood. His limbs exploded into action. He dashed across the factory yard before anyone could even react. He burst through the door and yelled, "Stop! All of you, stop!"

The men all cried in wordless relief. Some shook with emotion. "Holster your weapons," Jack ordered. "Just...go to the proper authorities and confess all your crimes. Get punished for them." He pointed at the one that was bleeding all over the floor. "And bind his wounds first!" He turned around and walked back to the car.

"Get out," he ordered Buttfucker and the assistant gravediggers. "Go to the proper authorities and confess all your crimes. Get punished for them." The men looked at one another in confusion. "Go!" They scurried off.

Mia stepped out of the car and put a hand on his shoulder to give him a supportive squeeze. "What changed your mind?"

"The look in my mother's eyes as she...never mind. Fuck 'em! Fuck all of them!"

"You're sure you don't want to use them for an army?"

He paused to think about her suggestion. "Yes. It doesn't make any sense to keep them around. The thin man and his helpers know who each and every one of these men are. They can track them by mundane means. Assembling a private army would be the equivalent of broadcasting my location and intentions at every moment. Besides, the bad guys can always assemble an even bigger army, or mobilize the actual fucking Army. My best weapon is anonymity."

Mia nodded, accepting his explanation. "You know..."

"My second best weapon will be my telekinetic girlfriend." Mia's eyes went as wide as saucers. "If she's still up for it." Mia nodded vigorously. "Andif I manage to pull it off." Mia let out a wordless scream of joy and hugged him tightly. Jack grunted at the force of her grasp. "And if she gets me to a surgeon who can reassemble my face for me before I bleed to death."

Mia let go of him. "Sorry! Sorry! Of course!" She opened the passenger side door and helped him settle into the shotgun seat. Then she ran around the car, got behind the wheel and gunned it out of there. When Jack pointed, she turned the car towards the city. Aside from having more options for medical care in the city, the town was still evacuated.

As their car vanished into the distance, the mercenaries began to slowly venture out of the hall. Inside the car, Jack's laptop beeped to indicate an incoming Skype call. Jack reached into the back seat and retrieved it. He opened up the laptop and answered George's call.

"Hey, Boss! I've IDed one of the phones. It's the cellphone of Walter Skinner, an assistant director of the FBI. I'm sending you the man's information right now."

Jack grinned as a pleasant shudder went through his body. He finally had a name to go after.

"The phone that made the call is a burner, no name attached. I am following which towers the phones are connected to. Skinner is in D.C. and the burner was at your local airport before it got switched off, so I'm guessing the owner is on a plane right now."

"Good work, George. Thank you. I'm sorry you're going to get arrested soon."

George looked confused and sad at the same time. "Do I have to, Boss? I've got an escape plan in place since ages ago. I'm dying to try it out."

Jack sighed. "What's your escape plan?"

"I installed a remote control system on my mom's old car and I've got a dummy behind the wheel. I'll drive the car through the closed garage door and gun it towards the interstate. While the pigs chase after it, I just walk away in the other direction."

Jack grunted. "Well, that's a...that's a good plan, actually. You got all your affairs in order? Cleaned up after yourself?"

"Yes, Boss."

"Then go for it! Escape! I'll send you the info on how we meet and where. Just head towards the east coast once you're out of the city."

"Will do, Boss!"

"Good luck!" Jack ended the call and turned the laptop off.

At the hospital, Jack was disturbed by the fact that everyone's mind was available to him for manipulation. The realization that anyone's surgeon could be "persuaded" to make a fatal error during an operation, or that the clinical pharmacist could "slip a decimal point" and inflict a fatal overdose to a patient would have been nightmarish for him on any other night. As it was, he simply roused the best plastic surgeon that was on call that night and had the man do his best work on his face.

After cleaning Jack's face up, the surgeon discovered it wasn't ruined. It had just looked like it might have been because it had been caked with blood. And it had hurt horribly, too. "There's some swelling," the surgeon pronounced, "and we'll need to put a stitch to this cut above your right eyebrow...but I expect you'll look exactly like your charming, old self in a few days."

Jack glumly snorted at the woman's words, but made no comment. He spent the procedure fully awake, his power blocking all the pain coming from his face. His thumb and ankles were also checked out and given a very positive prognosis. He was given a proper splint to wear for another ten days to fully heal.

Mia and he retired to a large mansion in the residential part of the city, not too far from Jack's house, and Jack convinced the family to let them stay the night, without informing anyone.

Mia cuddled up to him and soon fell into an exhausted sleep. He remained lying on his back. The image of his mother dying kept haunting him as he stared up at the ceiling with unseeing eyes. He fell into a strange daze, half awake and half asleep, and the dawn greeted him like that.

When Mia woke up, he was stirred from his stupor. "Are you going to do it?" she asked him.

He nodded. "Unless you've come to your senses."

She smiled. "Oh, I'm ready, babe."

"I might not be able to undo it. You might come out wrong on the other end."

She kissed his forehead and looked him dead in the eye. "I'm yours, Jack. No one ever cared for me before you came along. Not really. Whatever you do to me, I'll be fine with it."

Jack considered her earnest words and then nodded. "Sit in the comfy chair, then." He pointed at the chaise-lounge across the room. She jumped out of bed and went over to it. "Make yourself comfortable." She nodded and settled in. "Take off your choker and close your eyes."

When she removed her mental protection, Jack slid into her mind. He verified her earnest desire to be telekinetic and built upon it, asking for her permission to lock away certain portions of her memory. He got it and proceeded to create a thick curtain in her mind, dividing her will and identity from the things he covered with the curtain. He covered up not only the memories she had made in the last decade, but also her procedural memories. He made all the skills and experiences she had gained in the past ten years go away behind the curtain.

With each swish of the curtain, more and more of her mind was taken away from her. With each move of the heavy, impenetrable curtain, she became more childlike. Key aspects of her personality vanished as the experiences they had been built upon were covered up. Her self-loathing and guilt were gone once the memories of her first foster parents were hidden away. Her understanding of the world, of social mores and norms, and the skills she needed to manipulate people vanished. With so many parts of her hidden behind a heavy curtain, she regressed into a small child. Empty. Open. Vulnerable. Trusting.

Jack noted that he'd normally be struck with a lot of empathy for the innocent creature in his grasp. The events of last night had put a heavy blanket over his emotions, too, so he prepared his barrage of horror with clinical detachment.

He placed the memory of being raped by her father into her mind and waited to see what would happen as she processed it. She felt distraught, but that was it. Her mind wasn't breaking the way the Nazis had done it in the camps. He imagined a more horrible scenario, replete with the mother finding out and ignoring it, and the society at large being utterly unhelpful. He put it in her mind and made her process it. The result was just misery. A burning, consuming misery and lots of meaningless pain.

Jack started to feel angry and frustrated, but he dismissed those emotions with ease. After the experiences of last night, a tiny hiccup wasn't worth getting upset over. He was now calibrated to a higher standard of misery. He nearly made a visible reaction as he realized that was the problem with converting Mia into a telekinetic. Her life experience was too terrible for this to have the desired effect. He reached deep into Mia's mind and tried to feel how big its pain storage facilities were. He got an image of a huge underground vault, much bigger than Smaug's cave.

I'm gonna need a bigger boat.

He quickly reproached himself for his glib thoughts. This was not the time for such behavior and he was better than that.But I'm not good enough to break her mind into such pieces that it would bee able to reshape physical reality at a whim. Not after all this misery had already worked on it. He erased the memories of abuse he had instilled into her mind.She'll be so disappointed, but I tried and it just couldn't be done.

Before he gave up and lifted the curtain to restore her personality and memories, he had a thought. The Nazis had worked on scared little girls after they had already put them through the trauma of wearing stars in public, getting herded into ghettos and concentration camps and all the misery those brought about. Too much trauma shouldn't be what prevented telekinesis. It should be a facilitator to the transformation.

He reached behind the heavy curtain and retrieved the terrible memory of her parents dying in the car crash, right in front of her eyes. It was the single most definitive moment of her life and the emotional impact it had on her was immense. Her mind was like a bonsai tree with one half cut off. Just as all the possibilities the tree had had with the other limb still attached were gone forever, so was her mind forever broken by that night. That memory and those emotions were at the root of her whole personality and they touched and colored every one of her subsequent experiences. The difference between innocent, child-like Mia and the Mia that emerged after the memory was restored was like the difference between the Caribbean and Antarctica.

This is the key. I have to use the existing pain to make the new one work.

He covered the memory with the curtain again, but left the emotional impact uncovered. Now Mia's whole being trembled within as it was in the grips of suffering from an unknown terror. He instilled the memories of parental sexual abuse into her mind and watched them flourish into a horrible, gruesome tableau of misery. Mia's entire being and its true concept of self hung in the balance as she struggled to process this new horror. Jack withdrew the curtain from the way the rest of her adoptive family made her feel after they told her she had been adopted in the first place.