Brain Games Ch. 09

Author's Note: I hear that people prefer longer chapters, so I am putting a bit more in each chapter from here on out. Also: all characters in this chapter (and all chapters) are over 18.

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One of Zach's favorite places in the world was the library. And his favorite place in the library was a quiet corner on the lowest level where the library extended out partially over the river. He could sit at a quiet, semi-private desk next to a tall window watching the water flow beneath him. The light brown carpeting had a warmth to it. Because the area was home to massive volumes of public records, it was not a common destination for students looking for books, although Zach was certainly not the only one to enjoy the location for its ambiance.

He sat, breathed, and got to work, the sound of his fingers tapping at his laptop joining the others in nearby desks. Sometimes there was a rustle of paper, sometimes a discreet cough, occasionally a despairing sigh. The perfect sounds of a library.

The despairing sigh came from the next carrel over. It was a distinctly feminine sigh, and Zach could help but tune in.

The woman there was surrounded by paper. She held a pencil. She was doing, or trying to do, math. Zach couldn't see it, and it wouldn't have mattered if he could. Just enough algebra to get by, was his strategy for math.

But he quickly felt that the sigh was not for the math.

It was for a problematic boyfriend. He felt anger, irritation, sadness. All of which were veneers for loneliness. For feeling unwanted.

Zach couldn't tell what the boyfriend had specifically done or not done, but the result was a neglected girl.

He tried to return to his own paper: "James Joyce and the Hero's Journey." He had a few paragraphs, and a lot of notes. It was an utterly obvious topic, he bored himself with his own writing.

His own mind distracted him as well, returning to the momentous events of the day before. By the time he staggered out of Maddy's room, the whole dorm knew about them. Lisa, Maddy's roommate, had not been shy about declaring her shock at the situation, and apparently they had made enough noise to be heard from the common room. Zach blushed with embarrassment.

Jacob, at least, was cheerful. An afternoon of conversation and probably more had gotten things back on track with Ava, and he applauded Zach's hookup with Maddy. "Nice job, Zach! Looks like you made quite an impression!"

Jacob was out late, and when he returned in the wee hours of the night, he returned alone. So, for the first time in a few days, Zach had a deep sleep undisturbed by shenanigans or dreams.

Zach shook it off, trying to return his attention to the paper. A phrase from the Britannica kept tripping him up: "The moral rules by which we might try to govern our lives are constantly at the mercy of accident and chance encounter."

What were his moral rules? He really wanted to know.

Another sigh brought him out of his reverie. He found himself tuning back in.

He saw the dim light of her desire, flickering low. The library was a good place to explore. Why did it always have to be sex? Could he just explore the lines and layers of her energy, feel the beating of her heart and the flickers of lightning as her mind and emotions danced?

But something sharp cut through his attention.

She popped up over the edge of the carrel, straight dark hair, maybe Japanese? "Hey, you mind your own business!"

Zach stuttered. "What?"

"I felt you looking at me."

Zach gaped. "I can't even see you. I'm working on my paper."

"Then I felt you thinking about me. Quit it."

She scooped up her papers, shuffled them into order, and stalked off.

Zach nervously turned back to his paper but found himself even less able to concentrate. How could she know? Did she have training also?

The thought that there might be others like him was a disturbing idea.

Zach closed his laptop and put his head down, suddenly exhausted. You need energy.

The words formed clearly in his mind. Was that his own thought? Was it a message?

Zach let himself soften outwards, tracing his awareness through the threads to people he had connected to: the Japanese girl, had resettled on the other side of this part of the library and returned to moping over her boyfriend. Maddy was having a heart to heart with her roommate. Jacob was struggling with his own paper back in the room. Ava was... Zach couldn't find Ava right now. Diana was out shopping and--wow!--really feeling sexy. Sara had vanished as well. The girl by the fountain was... by the fountain! Hoping for a repeat maybe? The girl on the slope had faded to a bare whisper of presence, Zach felt that connection slipping away. Good to know, they slip away.

Zach realized how prolific his connections had been.

An older woman was perusing the stacks nearby, consulting a tablet. He felt out to her: so far all the energies he had experienced had been women around his own age, but this woman might be in her forties. Curious, Zach let himself tune in to her, and immediately felt a dramatic difference in her energy. It was stronger! Much stronger. Zach hadn't expected that.

As he relaxed into pure awareness, he saw the presence of her energy brightly swirling in her body, even though her mind was focused on something extremely dry. Property records or something.

He could only see glimpses of her through the wall of books as she roamed the aisle, checking volumes against her tablet, occasionally hauling one of them off the shelf and ruffling through.

But he could feel that energy swirling with her motion, and it was an easy tweak to send a ripple of pleasure through her. She gave an unconscious sigh and continued with her search. He let the ripple complete its way through her and then sent another. He also sought the edges and folds in the layers of her mind, looking for that place he had found in Diana. Each mind, Zach realized, was potentially quite different. It would take real study to get good at this. A couple of times he thought he found a way to pull her to the now-empty desk ahead of his own, and each time nothing. But he was able to keep the ripples of pleasure, even as he began to turn the dial up on her desire. This was easy: she was already parched with thirst for erotic connection.

He didn't think it was his own doing, but she did bring two heavy books to the carrel in front of him and set them down.

She wore a floral-print dress, bright and light. She was heavy set, but not exactly fat. She had large, heavy breasts filling out the top of her dress, although it was modest, not revealing her cleavage at all. Her waist did not narrow much, but she had a large flare to her hips. She was really a very womanly figure, Zach observed. At least until she sat. He heard her open one of the books and start riffling through the pages.

Zach tuned back into her energies, stoking both desire and pleasure more, feeling warmth spread through her. This moment was one he loved, when he could start to feel her sensations, the bright tingling through her body, the way she began to gently rock against the chair just a little. He heard her breath quicken, even as she stifled all sound.

He wondered what she would look like beneath him, with her legs open and those large breasts moving as he thrust into her. Even as he had this image, he wasn't sure if it was his own or hers. She clamped down on another sound, riffling some pages to cover the sound of her breath. He felt that flare of heat growing stronger.

Something shifted, and Zach suddenly felt like he was watching. Something different was starting to happen.

He felt his own arousal and energy surge with a bright power that felt strange. Powerful, but fierce, dark, relentless. A dark brightness?

His erection was powerful, and he was holding the edge of the desk, his muscles tight.

In the carrel in front of him, he felt the woman in an almost identical posture, gripping the desk, taut, gasping and trying to keep it silent at the same time, quivering, trembling, filled with a craving that went beyond desire for sexual release. She wanted to be completely possessed. And Zach felt himself possessing her, his energies and awareness coursing between them. He felt a brilliant red swirl in his hips, and a fire raging in his core, and a piercing blue beacon from his heart, and a radiant brilliance of white light filling the library from the center of his head. It wasn't light, of course, not photons. It was something else. His own body rumbled and shook. He glanced out the window to see if the waters were diverting, but the world flowed on as usual.

The woman was whimpering lightly, trying to desperately to cover for her sounds. It seemed as if no one else was around, now, however. He had thought there were others, but it was as if he could see everything, as if he was looking down on himself, and her, and the other desks along this side, all empty.

He felt that ineluctable force turning up the desire in her, which seemed inconceivable. Zach could tell that she had her skirt hiked up, her hand between her legs, pressing her hips against the chair, against her hand, thrusting almost wildly.

It was the final blooming of her energy, and something drew Zach back into his body. Watch carefully.

At the first crest of her climax, Zach felt his body take an enormous breath in, as if vacuuming all the oxygen in this part of the building.

Her climax splashed over, but it was entirely with him, and it was contained. He felt a flood of pure golden warmth to every cell of his body, not like a sexual orgasm, but like something entirely different. His whole being expanded with it. He startled to complete presence, utterly in control of his body. He saw every leaf on every tree shining brightly in the sun, every book on every shelf, every grain in the wood of the desk. He saw it all at once, his body absorbing it. He saw Ulysses sitting on his laptop and in an instant, he knew exactly what paper he had to write and what it would look like. It would take him all of ten minutes. Just typing, no further thought required.

He stood and saw the woman, slumped in her chair.

It looked like she might have pissed herself. She was dripping into the carpet, and there was a broad, spreading stain of wetness. She wasn't moving.

Suddenly afraid, Zach leapt around the desk and felt for a pulse. He felt something, faint, fluttering, and with the rest of his senses, he knew she was not actually dead -- or at least, not her body. She was not there, something beyond sleep.

Swiftly, efficiently, Zach tossed his things in his backpack, and navigated out of the library.

* * *

Zach went straight to the dorm. Maddy and her roommate had sorted things out, he could tell, and were just chit-chatting.

He knocked on her door. Lisa answered, her eyes widening a little when she saw him.

"Maddy," she said, turning away.

"We need to talk," Zach said. "Let's go for a walk."

As soon as they were alone, he said: "I might have just killed someone."

"What???"

He explained everything, including the Japanese girl who had somehow been onto him, as well as the sense that something different had happened.

He also confessed that he felt extraordinary, like he had superpowers.

"You do have superpowers," Maddy said. "That's the point."

"I mean, like, different now."

"I think it's some kind of drug," Maddy said. "The kind of thing that the brain itself manufactures. I don't remember all the language. Dopamine? Serotonin? Endorphins? Neuro... somethings?"

"Maybe, but I feel I could lift a car."

"Well," she answered, "you do look about as good as I've ever seen you. I think your teeth might even be a little straighter."

"What's wrong with my teeth?"

Maddy laughed. "Come on, you didn't kill anyone, let's go check on her."

Back in the library, the wet spot was real, but the woman was gone.

"Damn, Zach. You made her squirt!"

"I don't think that's real. That's just porn right?"

"No, it's real. Maybe porn fakes it, but they fake it because it's real. I've never done it, but... it's real."

The two heavy books of property records were still on the desk. The chair had been wiped dry.

"Well, she recovered then," Zach said. Relief flooded him.

"Sssssshhhhhh."

Of all people, it was the Japanese girl again.

She was short, thin, childlike, and yet there was something much older in her eyes.

She whispered to Zach: "Don't you think you have created enough disturbance today?" Her expression was fierce, and disapproving.

"Uh, sorry," he said.

"You should be. So rude!" She held up her hand to forestall any further conversation and waved it in a curious way. Then turned her back to them.

Maddy stifled a giggle.

They turned to leave, but before they got to the stairs a strange expression crossed Maddy's face.

"Wait up, Zach. Be our bee."

Zach leaned against the painted cinderblocks of the main building until Maddy returned. "Yup," she said. "I noticed it out of the corner of my eye, but it didn't process. The wet spot is gone. That girl... she did something magic."

Zach looked skeptical.

"You said she was onto you, right? Things are seriously getting weird around here," Maddy said. "It's like suddenly this is Buffy, but college. Are you a vampire? Or a slayer?"

Zach faked a laugh.

* * *

It was another day of beautiful spring weather. Small pale clouds drifted lazily overhead, and sunlight brought all the beauty out of the planted flower beds around the library. Maddy pulled Zach to a wooden bench and kissed him, deeply. She straddled him, holding his face in her hands.

Zach had entwined feelings: on the one hand he had an enormous awareness of every living thing, a hyper-focused awareness of the world in every particular, all singing to his senses. On the other hand, he had a deep well of anxiety, a fear of what was going on that he couldn't shake. Maddy's kiss was a beautiful distraction, and he felt the wild flow of her arousal. It would be nothing to join it to his and to explode right here on the bench. He held himself back and eventually, although very worked up, Maddy disengaged and tumbled herself next to him.

"This is amazing, Zach! Just amazing! I am pinching myself."

"I think you are more excited than I am," he observed.

"Why shouldn't I be? I get all the benefit and none of the responsibility!"

"That's fair," he said. "Although I don't know about all the benefit."

"So," she said, changing the subject. "Lisa and I talked all morning. She's a bit conservative you know, right? And she really tried not to lecture me, although I can't say she succeeded. But she doesn't want us having any more sex in her dorm room."

"Ok," Zach said. "It's her room too."

"Actually, it's my room, too, and I can do what I want."

"So..."

"So I agreed to all her terms, feigning reluctance and anger."

"Feigning..."

"I want you to fix it with her, Zach. It will be a good challenge for your superpowers."

"What? I don't think that's a good idea. And what about me being a good guy? And what about..."

Maddy waved her hand in front of him. "Zach, she's already been brainwashed by a church. We can liberate her from the cult that already has control of her."

"Ahhh... That sounds like a rationalization..."

Maddy leaned back. "Maybe, but it's a damned good one, if I don't say so myself."

"Anyway," Zach said, "I think it's too subtle for me. I have basically a couple of dials I can turn... unless... he's running the show, and I really don't like it when that happens. If that's what is happening."

"Good enough for now, Zach. Clearly, we need practice. Want to practice?"

"Actually, let me write my paper first. I got a kind of a vision of it, and I want to write it out before I lose it. But yeah, let's try some practice tonight."

* * *

"What's it going to be?" Maddy asked when they met up again later.

The paper had gone fairly easily. Not quite as brilliant as it had seemed when he had the first insight, but it seemed a creditable and creative approach to boringly obvious topic.

Jacob had finally finished the paper he had been agonizing over as well and was planning a celebration with Ava.

"Remember the girl by the fountain," Zach asked.

"Of course! Jesus! How could I forget?"

"She was into you," Zach said.

"Yeah, even I could tell that," Maddy said.

"And she was out by the fountain today, hoping she might see you again."

"Damn, Zach, why didn't you tell me?"

"Other things on my mind, I guess."

"So, now what?"

"She is on her way to Downlo to meet some friends."

"How do you know that?"

"Once I have made a connection, I can kind of tap it, at least for a while. It's limited, I can't read thoughts directly, but I get feelings. Sometimes I can get sensations, sometimes not, it's definitely not consistent. And it seems to fade. That girl I told you about from the lawn? She was like super into me for a day, but as soon as she forgot about me the connection drained away to nearly nothing."

"You know this is blowing my mind."

"Anyway, let's go have pizza tonight."

Maddy give him two thumbs up.

* * *

Montgomery Street separated the campus from the rest of town, and was lined with stores, bars, restaurants. On a Friday or Saturday, it was basically a free-for-all party, if the weather wasn't terrible. But on a Sunday, it was a bit more restrained.

Downlo was a pizza pub. It could be hard to find a table after seven or eight, but Maddy and Zach arrived early enough to grab a seat in the back. As they threaded their way to the table, Maddy nudged Zach, indicating with her chin.

A slender girl, on the tall side, long light-brown hair dyed lavender at the ends, sat with three others. It was two guys, two girls, but it didn't seem like any kind of dates were going on. Just friends.

"It's way too noisy in here," Zach said. "I don't mean people talking, but just too many people, too crowded in. I can't separate one from the other. It's like trying to pick out a specific wave in a pool with a thousand people thrashing about."

"It's not a thousand people. A hundred tops, probably less."

"You see what I mean, though, right?"

"Yeah, well, try harder. Maybe if we were closer? We could ask someone to switch seats with us?"

"I don't know."

"Well, let's get some pizza anyway," Maddy said. "And beer."

The drinking age was 21, but Downlo was famous for not looking too closely at fake ids. When you first bought your fake id from the hustlers in the graphics design program, they had a price list:

Fool law enforcement: $5,000

Get served at bars: $500

Get into clubs: $300

Get into Downlo: $150

The pepperoni pizza was decent, and a pitcher of ale was affordable. Zach still didn't care for the place. The scent of baking pizzas only partially hid the smell of stale beer and worse, and he didn't like how obnoxious people got when they were drunk.

He also didn't care much for beer, but he ordered one.

As he sipped it, he realized that alcohol had an interesting dampening effect. If he tuned into the churning energies, he found it to be more manageable after half a beer. He relayed this revelation to Maddy.

"Do it, Zach! See if you can bring her over."

Maddy optimistically went looking for an empty chair to pull up.

With the harsh edge of all the energies mellowed, Zach was able to start to disentangle the tumult. It was only when he realized he already had a connection to the girl that he found it. If he had been trying to connect to someone random, it might have been beyond his abilities, but now he found her.