Author's note:
Many thanks, once again, to neuroparenthetical, my most amazing editor who relentlessly teases out what I hope is a decent story from the half-baked drivel I send to him.
As always, I've fiddled with it, so any errors left are mine; let's say that they're deliberate attempts to get you to leave comments, if only to complain.
P.S. He even edited this part!!!
*
Having said that -- on with the show.
Caleb 22 - Sue
I sat in my truck, in the driveway, having neither the motivation nor the inclination to go into the house. I hadn't even been bothered to drive into the garage. It seemed that my life was one long series of shitty events. How did that song go? '...every road that takes me, takes me down?'
It had seemed that things were starting to get back to normal - to get better, even. I had Mary back, I had pretty much made up with Maggie, our quartet's various relationships with Dianna were mostly on the up, and I had begun to relax. That had been my mistake. I should never have let my guard down.
The house door opened, and Amanda emerged. She obviously knew there was something wrong because of the bond. She would have felt my mood: the sadness and loss I had felt at losing my best friend. I felt her power wrap me up in love and resisted the urge to quash it. That would only hurt her, and my anger was at myself.
There were so many things that I should and shouldn't have done, but for all my powers, I couldn't change the past -- and I refused to trick everyone else into believing that I'd made better choices than I actually had.
Wearily, I opened the truck door and climbed out. Amanda came over and put her arm around me. She led me inside the house where the other girls were waiting, and I was enveloped in a group hug. Feelings of love washed over me from Mary and Amanda; Jules just held me.
"I'm sorry," she said. "I told you to go."
"It's not your fault," I said to her. "I made the bet and pushed it. I should have known better."
"What happened?" asked Mary. She obviously knew that I felt I had lost Sue as a friend and that I was incredibly upset about that, but not the details.
I shared the memories: everything from my meeting with George to my leaving her dorm room.
We sat; Mary and Amanda were on either side of me and, as usual, Jules curled up on my lap.
"Oh dear," Mary said. "I am so sorry. I know how much she meant to you."
"I just don't understand," I said. "One minute she was screaming like a banshee, then next..."
"You made it too good," said Amanda.
"Wha..." I said, so amazed that I couldn't even formulate a coherent word.
"Sue has liked you for a long time," she explained. "Now, though, she has found herself someone for whom she has developed real feelings. Perhaps she sees a future for them. Your blowjob, I'm guessing, was meant to just 'scratch an itch' to put her feelings for you to bed.
"But then you went and rocked her world like that. I'm guessing she was starting to rethink her choices in life. Give her some time. Things might not be as bad as you think."
"No," I said. "They might be a fuck ton worse. If I have damaged the relationship between her and George..."
"You're doing it again," interrupted Jules. "Taking responsibility for the world's woes. Sue invited you to her bed, and George practically frogmarched you to her. It's not your fault that it was so fucking incredible that you blew her mind. You can't play with a rattlesnake and then complain when you get bit.
"None of what happened is your fault. Yes, it will be sad for you to lose Sue as a friend, but the rest of it isn't on you."
I had no response to that, and contented myself with just planting a kiss on her forehead as she looked up at me. I loved her - loved all of them. I needed to put things into perspective. Sue was -- at least had been -- a friend. The girls who surrounded me, both literally and figuratively, were my family - my life. As long as I had them, I had everything I needed.
I looked up as I heard a truck start just outside. I frowned. By the time I had untangled myself from the girls, it was way too late. My truck was gone. I looked at the empty driveway, and then back at the three girls who stood just beside me. They looked at me, waiting for my reaction, each of their faces a mask of concern as to how I would deal with the latest blow.
I laughed. It was either that or cry, and I decided I didn't really have anything to cry about. I was in love with three of the most beautiful, caring, wonderful girls, and, more importantly, they loved me back.
We went back into the house. As bizarre as it sounds, my truck being stolen had lightened my mood, putting my issues with Sue into an even starker perspective. I called the police and reported my truck stolen. I had to admit to leaving the key in the ignition. Fortunately, I kept my truck key, and my house keys separate. They gave me a report number for the insurance but warned me that the insurance might not pay out since I'd been negligent. For some reason, that made the whole situation even more amusing to me. I guess I had become a little hysterical.
There were no further disasters that evening. I cooked, we ate, and then we sat together for the rest of the night. We didn't even watch television. We just sat and enjoyed each other's company. When I went to bed, Mary came with me and held me, soothing me to sleep.
The next morning, I went for a run. I had assimilated all of the memories that James had given me with regard to martial arts training, and so had reduced my practice sessions to three times per week. The other mornings, I ran. Sometimes the twins ran with me, but it was usually too early for them. Often, I would meet up with them; they still ran, but they started much later.
That morning, however, was a training morning; the run was to keep my mind off of my various woes. James was due at six, so I was back at the house in time to get showered and changed for when he arrived. We sat at the kitchen table with a cup of coffee each.
"I finally got the okay to show you how to create illusions," he said.
I perked up at the news. Our previous sessions had become a little tedious, going over old ground and sparring. It had been over a month since I had first asked him about learning how to create illusions, and I'd already assumed that permission had been denied -- and that they were putting off telling me so for as long as possible.
"In a few moments," he began, "I will share memories of the 'how,' but first there are a few things that you need to know."
James spent some time telling me about the two different types of illusions: planned and immediate. Planned, he explained, were ones that were planned in advance. Jokes were perfunctorily made about clever names. It turned out that they could be prepared well ahead of time, and there were even templates that could be used as a base to construct them. They had a number of advantages over immediate illusions, one being they could be the result of a collaboration of both power-users and non-power-users.
Conversely, immediate illusions were quick and dirty, much easier to spot, and required the user generating them to share in the illusion, as they would be directing the action. The longer immediate illusions went on for, the harder it was for the user maintaining it, as multiple variables piled up. One use case for an immediate illusion would be to hide an action from someone. That would not only require the user to create the illusion, but to split their attention and carry out the action they wanted to hide. I wondered how that kind of multitasking would even work.
James added that not only was using illusions on Norms allowed, it was preferred over using Compulsion, which was still frowned upon without just cause. It was also possible to pull multiple people into an illusion, with the limiting factor being the strength of the user's power. One thing he did remind me was that neither type of illusion would be effective against electronic surveillance such as CCTV.
"That seems like a major handicap," I said.
James nodded. "Oh yeah. The past fifty years or so have been quite the blow for power users generally -- well, if you set aside all morality, that is. I have to assume that a century ago, a powered person could have had the run of Norm society, but for running into a peer."
"Makes you wonder about some of the powered people who lived through the transition," I mused.
James raised an eyebrow. "Now that," he said, "is some very interesting paranoia."
I shook my head. "I'd rather not explode my relationship with a certain someone all over again just yet."
"Fair enough," he said. "Any questions about the broad strokes?"
I didn't know where to start. It kind of all made sense to me, but I wondered how I could possibly divide my attention between an illusion and reality; it would be, almost literally, being in two places at once. The fact that one of the two places wouldn't be real didn't seem to matter much. I hoped that once I had seen the memories, the techniques would become clear.
"Are illusions contemporaneous," I queried, "or can you make time pass at a different rate within them?"
"Planned illusions," he responded, "you have pretty much free rein with. Because you are controlling the narrative, and what they remember, you could pull me into an illusion as an old man, with illusory memories of living a full life. Immediate illusions, it's theoretically possible, but... well, no, I'm not going to stick my neck out again. If anybody could do it, it'll probably end up being you. For the rest of us mere mortals with superpowers, it's so difficult and prone to failure that it's not even worth the attempt.
"Anyway, it's a good question, because it's actually illegal without a warrant to read someone's mind or to Compel them to speak the truth. Sticking someone in a time-dilated or time-compressed illusion can trick them into giving up time-sensitive information without breaking any of those laws. Lots of criminals like to gloat, and if they genuinely believe they've already won, that temptation often becomes irresistible.
"If you drop your shields I'll send you the memories," he said.
I dropped my shields and took the memories. There was a lot to think about. That time, James did not pull me into an illusion. Apparently, my trash talk had gotten to him. I almost felt bad for what I was about to do.
James's shields were pretty much transparent to me by that point. I had managed to find ways through so many times that it had become second nature. I sent a tendril through.
"Breakfast?" I asked, and he grinned.
"That's the only reason I come here these days," he said.
I cooked up pancakes and bacon and put a huge stack of both in the middle of the table.
We had sat down to eat when Louise wandered in. Once again, she was totally naked. James glanced up at her, but it had been a month since their first impromptu encounter, and he had almost gotten used to it. The sight of a naked twenty-year-old did have an effect on him, though.
He looked a little surprised when she sat at the table next to him and helped herself to some of the pancakes.
She turned to him. "Pass the syrup?" she asked.
Wordlessly, he handed her the bottle. She applied herself to her food as if sitting and eating breakfast in the buff was perfectly natural.
When Amanda and Mary walked in, equally naked, James' eyes nearly fell out. Like Louise, they seated themselves at the table and began helping themselves to breakfast, chatting casually with each other after throwing good mornings in our direction.
It was when a naked Jules strolled in that he finally realized, and bugged out of the illusion.
I grinned at him as he stood, red-faced, glaring. I pretended not to notice the lump in the front of his trousers. Obviously, the sight of not one, but four naked teens had affected him, and I couldn't blame him.
"Shall we call that payback for all the times you did it to me?" I asked.
"You know that nobody likes a smartass," he said.
"I have been waiting for that for so long," I said.
