Authors note.
As always my thanks to Neurparenthetical, whose untiring vigilance makes my illegible scribble readable. Any residual errors are left there purposely in order to give you guys something to do.
Enjoy. - and please, whatever you feel about the story feedback is always appreciated. I can't improve if I don't know where I am going wrong.
Caleb 16 - Coming Home
When we pulled up to the house, there was a strange car and a couple of motorcycles in the driveway. Loud music was playing from within. I got out of the car and walked to the door, dreading what I would find inside. Stupidly, I didn't tell the girls to stay in the car - although I suppose that if I had, I would have been even stupider to think that they would have paid me any heed. The front door was unlocked, and we walked right in.
There were five strangers in the living room. Two guys in bikers' leathers could have been brothers. They were over six feet tall and bald, and each of them sported a beard. What little of their skin I could see under all the ink was tanned. They were both sitting on the couch, one on either side of Josh. The one to his right had a gun pressed into Josh's side.
Stranger number three was a small, wiry, mixed-race guy. He seemed to be in charge. He was sitting on one of the easy chairs, drinking a beer, and holding a gun loosely in his other hand. He was directing the action.
Louise was on the floor, her top torn off, her arms being held by a skinny black guy while another man of mixed race was trying to hold her legs down and remove her jeans at the same time. They were around thigh level, and she was kicking up a storm. The guy in the chair was laughing and shouting encouragement to the guys on Louise.
I used my TK to stop the music, and everybody froze - everybody, that is, except Louise. She wrested one leg free and planted a solid kick to the balls of the guy trying to remove her jeans. He yelped in pain and curled up into a ball.
"Hi," I said, "how are we all doing?"
Louise and Josh both looked up at me with strange looks on their faces, although neither spoke.
The guy in the chair swiveled the gun in my direction. "Who the fuck are you?" he snarled at me. I ignored him.
"Everyone on the floor, face down, hands behind your heads," I said, and I imagined all of them obeying me immediately, without question, without any other funny business, and without any hope of doing anything besides breathing until I let them. They complied; they never had a choice.
"Right, the guns," I added. I imagined the miscreants releasing their holds on their weapons. They did so, and I used TK to slide them carefully away - far from everyone, including my girls.
I saw Louise flush, and also got a sense of disappointment from her. Knowing her penchant for being Compelled I wryly made the bet with myself that she was sorry I had not included her in the order.
Amanda was already helping Louise up
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whose aura, was pulsing purple with brown streaks that illustrated her disappointment.
Josh went over to Louise and he threw his arms around her, pulling her to him. I almost did a double take when I saw that his aura had undergone virtually the same transformation that Louise's had. The menagerie of assholes, meanwhile, were all showing broad swathes of yellow, spiked with red and some black. Orange, a color I had seen before but never enough to identify, seemed to indicate confusion. I didn't spare a moment's pity. I did, however, imagine that none of them were able to urinate or defecate. Thankfully, I seemed to have come up with that good idea in time to avoid any unpleasantness.
Louise pulled Josh's face down and kissed him far more passionately than I thought appropriate, given the circumstances. Then I realized that seeing my Compulsion had triggered a fantasy for her. I filed that away for later. A lot had changed since I'd last seen Louise and spoken to her about my powers. I found myself in need of a new training regimen for my Compulsion, and suddenly had some new ideas about who might be involved, and how.
Louise took Josh's hand and led him toward their bedroom. If anything, that was even stranger to me. I would've thought they would've wanted some closure with whomever these intruders were.
It occurred to me that the guns I'd seen and pushed away might not be the only weapons on the thugs, so I redoubled imagining that they were completely paralyzed and helpless, then searched them all. I found another two guns, and a knife on each of them. I secured all of them and pushed them toward the first two guns.
I went over to the guy I had assumed was the leader and decided that since he had broken into my home, it was only fair that I should be allowed to break into his head. Once again, he didn't have a chance. He was a Norm. In mere moments, his entire mind was an open book to me.
His name was Jerome Kraft, and he was the drug dealer who had previously owned the house. He had been broken out of a prison transport bus and had come back to the house to recover the money and papers he had secreted under the decking beneath the hot tub in the yard. Although the FBI had searched the house, they hadn't found his hidey-hole. He knew this because there was evidence in there that would have meant further charges against him - not just for drug offenses, but rape and murder as well.
He had orchestrated his own escape using some members of his old gang, promising them a cut of the million-dollar hoard, and his plan had been to grab it and then high-tail it to the border. When they'd gotten to the house and found Josh and Louise, they just couldn't resist a little R&R before moving on.
I pondered my next move. Involving the local police directly seemed like a mistake. I'd made quick work of five armed thugs without a hint of a struggle, and I didn't much feel like trashing my own house to cover my tracks. My best option was the feds. I sighed audibly and made the call.
"Frank Howe speaking," he said as he answered his phone.
"Agent Howe," I said, "Caleb Stott."
"Mr. Stott," he said, his voice cold. "What can I do for you?"
"Jerome Kraft and four of his buddies are currently eating carpet in my front room. I thought you might like to come and sweep them up."
There was a long silence.
"I'm sorry," he said, "could you repeat that?"
"Jerome Kraft," I said. "The escaped drug dealer, rapist, and murderer, is face down on the floor in my living room. Would you like to come to get him, or should I call nine-one-one?"
"Rapist? Murderer?" he queried. "He was never charged with those crimes."
"I confess I took a peek," I said. "I can show you where to find some evidence of his crimes, along with a chunk of cash too."
"We'll be there in fifteen minutes," he said, his voice jolting like he was running. "Can you hold them until we get there, or do you want us to get local LEOs?"
"They're going nowhere," I said.
We heard the sirens well before the three SUVs screeched to a halt outside the house. Six agents piled out and drew their weapons before approaching.
"Caleb?" Frank shouted.
I had already opened the front door wide. I didn't want them kicking it in.
"In here," I said. "All their weapons are on the table over there." I pointed to where I'd stacked them up. "All the bad guys are on the floor over there." I pointed again. I couldn't resist.
"Tell me what happened," he said.
"Can I show you?" I asked, and he nodded. I shared the memory from when I arrived at the house until I called him.
