Majgen Ch. 008

----=(A child named Ukrial)=----

The cosy little cafe was placed in a spring green nature park. The cafe was surrounded by a grass lawn area. Large trees grew naturally at various spots. The lighting was sufficiently bright to give full natural growth to the living greenery of the park. The sky-blue coloured ceiling was approximately three building floors above the park visitors. Most of the recreational areas in mining habitat Drom were based on designs including natural growth.

The borders of the open café were defined by colourful flower beds, broken up by many small paths. These small paths made it possible to enter or leave the café in any direction.

While passing the flower beds to the cafe, Baglian noticed a woman with red hair, and immediately found her attractive. He also noticed a special glint in her eyes, when she saw him. A glint, he had learned to recognise swiftly when women showed it. A little tell-tale sign that her prolonged glance at him was not simply surprise to see a mentarion in person. He pretended not to notice her, while planning how to approach her.

By turning to Majgen, Baglian inconspicuously slowed his travel into the café.

"You will most likely enjoy the iced Mokka Fluffer," Baglian said. He had previously told her she should try one of those.

'He is perfectly aware he already told me this,' Majgen perceived,'He is only repeating it now to give the woman with rose-red hair an opportunity to eye him further. To let her preliminary interest get time to grow to a preliminary attraction.'

Majgen made no sign of this knowledge though. Instead she replied to his remark in a properly humble manner - as appropriate for a student talking to her mentor. Baglian chose an approach to the woman even sooner than Majgen finished her sentence. Majgen disliked being drawn into Baglian's game of seduction, even in this indirect manner.

'He intends to follow through with the seduction this time,' Majgen perceived.

She did not look forward to seeing the full version of his game. During the eight days she had spent with him, she had learned far too much of his scoring-techniques. Even though he had not engaged in serious attempts to reel in opportunities for sex.

Still pretending to not notice the red-haired woman with the light-brown yellow spotted eyes and intricately decorated nails, Baglian chose a path around the seated café guests that would lead them right by her. He walked slowly, a walking speed that could only appear to be a natural pace combined with mentarion dignity. He even passed the woman of interest.

Stopping just after her table, Baglian turned around to look at the woman as if he had almost forgotten something.

"I must say, that is a beautiful blouse you are wearing. Is that genuine tailor design?" he asked the redhead.

"Oh," she replied, looking down at herself a second, pretending she had forgotten what she was wearing, before turning her eyes back to the mentarion, "This old rag? No it's not tailor design."

"That is no rag," Baglian stated, "You do not appear as a woman who would ever wear rags. Although, I am sure, you could make even rags look good." The Femaron made sure not to give the woman time to deny the plausibility of his compliments. Mostly, compliments were more efficient if a woman was denied the chance to rip them apart.

"Is that Minka-wine you are drinking?" he inquired, although he already knew it was.

"Yes. It is."

"But, no bowl of blueberries on the side?" Baglian leaned his head a bit to the side, as if truly wondering why there were no blueberries on the table.

'Femaron Baglian has no particular liking for blueberries, not even with Minka-wine,' Majgen perceived,'He only asked because he read her mind, and saw her regret for not ordering blueberries on the side.' In spite of this knowledge, she kept a straight face.

'It's not hard to imagine how he would react if I ruined his game,' Majgen thought.

"No. I didn't order blueberries, I guess I should have." The Red-head smiled at Baglian in a welcoming manner.

"Would you allow me to rectify that mistake?" Baglian asked returning her smile.

"I couldn't ask such a favour of a man, whose name I don't even know yet."

"Allow me to introduce myself then. I am Femaron Hiro Baglian." Baglian gave the woman a formal mentarion bow. Such formalities were not required when interacting with people who were not mentarion, but non-empathic women were usually impressed by such formal mentarion gestures; Baglian often took advantage of that.

"My name is Lenlen Brork," she said and reached her hand out to him, in a normal non-empathic greeting, "You may call me Lenlen, if you like."

Baglian took her hand.

"You may call me Hiro, if you like." He smiled at Lenlen before he let go of her hand and turned to Majgen.

"Go buy two iced Mokka Fluffers, and don't forget a bowl of blueberries for the enchanting Lenlen, Student Majgen," he instructed.

Obediently, Majgen bowed and went to the counter. Baglian had supplied his student with micro-coins, so she could fetch food and drink at his command. Micro-coins were only accepted by few vendors in super-cities, but were a common form of currency in smaller habitats like Drom.

Baglian sat down to entertain and entice Lenlen further, while Majgen was away. Baglian scanned the woman's mind extensively, while making her laugh with clever words and not very subtle - yet very close to honest - compliments. He made sure to never quite reveal that he was reading her mind, but also made sure to never quite imply that he wasn't either.

Making sure not to interrupt Baglian and Lenlen's conversation, Majgen placed Baglian's Fluffer and the blueberry bowl on their table, and moved out of their way. She placed herself at a vacant table less than two metres from them.

'Baglian won't require my attention for quite a while,' Majgen concluded from his emanations, and began reading the minds of nearby park visitors.

Majgen had no desire to listen in on Baglian and Lenlen's conversation, and would absolutely prefer to avoid gaining understanding of Baglian's motives for every single part of it.

'I wish he would let me use thought-techniques for situations like this,' Majgen thought, trivial thinking would have made it easy for her to ignore his emanations.

She had no intentions of doing it without his permission though; her body was covered with sore spots, reminding her not to do that. The bruise on her cheek, currently hidden behind skin coloured make-up, no longer hurt, but Femaron Baglian had given her several newer reminders.

'He does encourage me to scan the minds of people around me though,' Majgen thought, she hoped it would suffice to drown the input from Baglian's emanations.

The man closest to her was envious at Baglian's probable success with the Red-head; Majgen swiftly moved her mental attention from him to another. A woman a bit to Majgen's other side was eating cookies while drinking a coca-based beverage, which Majgen was not familiar with. The taste experiences were tantalising to Majgen. Pretending to be lost in thought, she put her own drink on her table and looked out at the lawn, while focusing on the woman's taste sensations. Baglian had instructed her on ways to appear to not be performing mind scans; Majgen had not previously been suitably educated in this area of the mentarion ways.

Scanning non-empaths was easier than scanning empaths; it was nearly impossible to cause a non-empath discomfort by clumsy entry. Non-empaths didn't have the empathic sensory connections in the brain that empaths did.

Majgen scanned people passing her too, sampling the tops of their minds. She had a strong desire to understand other people. She hoped that if she understood others better, she could understand herself better too.

It was hard for her to refrain from smiling when two children, girls headed for the counter to buy chocolate cakes, passed behind her. They were laughing and talking about chocolate. The one whose mind she scanned was already rejoicing with anticipation of the taste. A few moments later they passed her again to leave the cafe, and Majgen scanned the other one. In spite of Baglian's instructions, she frowned when she sensed the feelings of the second girl.

'Something is wrong,' Majgen thought,'Something is very wrong.'

When the little girl left Majgen's sensing range, which was only about ten metres when scanning non-empaths, Majgen was still not sure what was amiss. The girl looked cheerful, and the top of her mind seemed cheerful too, yet Majgen had a strong impression the girl was not as cheerful as she should have been.

No longer considering whether she appeared inconspicuous or not, Majgen got up and followed the girls. The two children paused to open their chocolate, and Majgen got within scanning range the moment she crossed the boundaries of the café. She didn't really consider asking Baglian's permission to go; the troubled girl was only about ten, and had awoken the protective side of Majgen's personality.

The girls started walking again and Majgen followed at their exact pace, she dove too deeply into the one's mind to notice anything else.

The scenery of the park around the café seemed beautiful to most of its occupants, but Baglian was not interested in the beauty around him, only in the beauty right in front of him. From scanning Lenlen's mind Baglian knew she was a middle-aged woman. A bit younger than him, but old enough to have all the sexual benefits of a mature woman. Occupied with scanning and seducing Lenlen, he didn't notice Majgen had left.

About fifty metres from the café the genuinely happy of the two little girls glanced back and noticed Majgen. The girl stopped in her track and turned to gawk at the mind reader. Absorbed with thinking of chocolate, she had not noticed the mentarions at the cafe. In that effect, this was the first time she ever saw a real life mentarion.

When one girl stopped and turned, so did the other - the one Majgen was scanning. The troubled girl had not noticed Majgen and Baglian at the café either, and she too recognised the cut of Majgen's mentarion uniform.

The troubled girl dropped her cookie at the shock of seeing a mind reader.

'No. No. No. No...' the girl thought to herself over and over as feelings of guilt and shame rushed through her.

Majgen had understood what was amiss with the little girl, sooner than the two girls noticed her.

"It's not your fault," Majgen said, and repeated "It's not your fault."

She knelt to be closer to the child's eye-level, and reached out to hold the child gently by her shoulders. Her heart bled with compassion for the little soul in front of her.

"Trust me, I'm a mentarion, I have seen it in your mind, and it's not your fault."

Majgen looked directly into the girls eyes when speaking these words. Water had rushed to the girl's eyes when she saw a mind reader. Majgen's words made the tears break free. Majgen's eyes had been swelling too, as a mentarion she was meant to keep a certain distance, but she couldn't; her own tears ran when the girl's did.

"Please believe me child. It'snot your fault." Majgen's voice was cracking with emotion.

"I..." The girl sobbed. "I didn't mean to," she spurted out, and her sobs became heavy.

Majgen pulled her into a protective hug.

"You did nothing wrong." Majgen rocked the standing child gently in her hug. "It wasn't your fault, and it isn't your fault. Hush child."

Empathically Majgen transmitted her feelings of love and care to the child. She had not learned to mind-sedate, but she knew that for empaths feeling love and care from another person was comforting, and assumed the same would be the case for the non-empathic child.

Upon receiving Majgen's emotions, the child raised her arms and hugged back. The little girl had never been exposed to empathic transmissions before, but she understood the emotions came from the mentarion.

"I thought everyone would hate me," the girl cried into Majgen's shoulders.

"You were wrong," Majgen sobbed back. For some moments they cried together, while the tormented girl's friend gawked at them.

"He is gonna be very angry at me, because you found out," the crying child said.

Majgen had a strong urge to show her own opinion of 'him' to the child.

'She is only ten, Femaron Baglian would never do it, and I am not allowed to perform invasive therapy at all,' Majgen thought,'Femaron Baglian will torture me if I do it.'

For a moment Majgen almost shuddered with fear, but then the child's crying made her forget herself.

'Baglian can do what he wants to me, but he will not try to undo whatever I do for this child now, not if the child is better for it.'

"I want to show you something," Majgen said, "a mentarion thing, something you should know."

Majgen's transmissions of loving emotions had calmed the child. The little girl was still crying, but was able to listen.

"It is important you understand this thing, which I can only show you in a mentarion way," Majgen continued softly, "May I show you?"

The child remained still, but her emotions gave the answer. The reply was affirmative.

'Look.' Majgen opened her mind fully to the child.'See what I see,' Majgen thought, and let the child see, Majgen had the child see, what she had seen in her memories, but Majgen let her see it from her view, not from the child's. Majgen did not know, why she herself knew that she was doing the right thing - she just knew.

"I don't want to see that," the child protested, but her mind cried to understand.

Majgen complied with the child's emotions rather than her words, and kept transmitting her own memory of the child's memory. After a few seconds, the child's sobbing ceased as she finally allowed herself to see what Majgen was showing.

"I see a bad man," the child said, with a voice too adult for her age.

The little girl accepted what she saw, and understanding it was true she started crying again. Majgen withdrew the memory, and once again transmitted only the emotions of love she felt for the child, who wept hard and clung to her.

"He is a bad man," the girl cried with a child's desperation at loosing an illusion.

'I'm sorry child, I had to show you. It was the only way to prevent memories of him from haunting you for the rest of your life,' Majgen thought.

The young mentarion didn't transmit the apology, for having hurt - to heal.

'I'm so sorry.'

Spectator's gathered, keeping a polite distance to the mentarion and the two children, but staring nonetheless. Majgen ignored them, she focused fully on comforting the emotionally wounded child.

Suddenly realising his student was no longer behind him, Baglian strained his empathic senses for any trace of her emanations, with no success. He rose, and scouted in all directions, not bothering to excuse himself to the attractive Lenlen. He noticed several people staring in one direction, following their gaze Baglian spotted the black of Majgen's rank 10 uniform against the green of grass.

Baglian started walking to his student, he kept a dignified pace, although he was prepared to break into a run if the need should arise. When he had covered half the distance, he could see why his student was kneeling.

'She is hugging a child, both of them appear to be crying,' Baglian noted, he also saw a woman running towards Majgen and the child.

"Ukrial," the woman yelled.

Baglian assumed it was the child's name. He increased his speed to be close before the woman reached his student. Silently, Baglian cursed at himself for not having noticed his student sneaking off.

The woman stopped a bit less than two metres from Majgen and the child. Baglian was within hearing range, when the breathless woman talked.

"Ukrial, come to mummy. Sweetheart, come to mummy."

In response to those words, the child hugged Majgen, and kept her back to her mother. Majgen's back was to Baglian, she could sense him, but she wasn't paying heed to his presence at all. Holding onto the child, Majgen lifted her face to look directly at Ukrial's mother.

"You knew," Majgen stated. The child had known her mother knew, hence Majgen knew too.

Baglian was astounded by the undertone of hate in Majgen's voice and the fury in her emanations.

'Haven't seen this side of my student before,' Baglian thought, while the child's mother tried to reason with Majgen.

"That's my daughter, let go of my daughter," the woman said, unable to put command into her voice.

'There is something very feeble about the way that woman speaks,' Baglian noted.

The Femaron came close enough to look into Majgen's mind, and ignored the mother a moment, to scan the top of Majgen's mind. He caught on to the basic scenario from his student's mind.

'Sexually molested child. The father did it, the mother knew,' Baglian clinically listed to himself. Unlike Majgen, he was able to keep a professional distance.

"Petro!" the mother screamed in panic, when she saw the Femaron, "Petro come here!"

The rank 10 student uniform colours, which Majgen wore, had seemed absurd to the woman. Tenth ranked mentarion uniforms was something worn by mentarion children, not young adults. The mother had instilled false hopes in herself, had made herself believe that maybe the young woman was not a mentarion. Seeing a man wearing the ghastly Femaron-uniform shattered the mothers false hopes.

"Petro." Her voice cracked hard this time, what came out sounded more like a shriek than a name.

Keeping her hands on the child's shoulders, Majgen rose to her feet but allowed the child to hang on to her legs. Three adults were running towards them from the direction the mother kept glancing towards, the angry mentarion student furiously eyed the runners.

"Control your rage, Student Majgen," Baglian ordered, while retrieving a communicator from an inner sleeve, wrist pocket.

"Salt three-hundred solar twenty call GED Drom," Baglian spoke to the communicator, in one sweep voice-activating the device and instructing it to call law enforcement authorities, while he moved it to his ear.

"GED here, how may I help." a female voice said, to his ear.

"Track my identity and location through this communicator," Baglian ordered tonelessly, "This is a mentarion report of a past crime. I request GED units to arrest two suspects, who are present, at my current location."

The three runners arrived out of breath. Two of them rushed to Ukrial's friend, and lifted her up. Their relief to find their own child safe and sound was evident. The third adult was Ukrial's father; he stopped one metre short of Majgen. He panted heavily, while viewing what he considered a horrifying sight - two mentarions with his ten year old daughter.

"Step back, Sir," Baglian ordered in a firm, commanding tone, while keeping the communicator at his ear.

"Gimme..my...daughter," the man counter-ordered between gasps for air.

"Step away from my student and the child, or I will sedate you, Sir." Baglian made sure to express himself very specifically while instructing the suspect, to make the situation more clear to the GED on his communication line.

"Ukrial...come...to...daddy," the man gasped on, ignoring Baglian.

Instead of obeying her father, the child took a harder hold on Majgen's legs. Majgen's understanding of the girl's memories had taught the little girl that she owed no allegiance to that man.

"Last warning, Sir," Baglian stated.

The finality in the Femaron's voice and words convinced the man to back away some paces, but the man continued calling to his daughter.

"Ukrial Sweetheart...it's me...Daddy."