Chapter 2
Monica had decided she wanted to prolong her time with the relic, so she was rearranging Mason's memories one more time. She was in his mind, sitting at the computer and thinking of the best change she could make.
She could just make him forget about the relic and put his family's memories back, but that would probably put an end to Mason staying over in her dorm room every night. That was no good...
She opted for a different solution. She found the files labeled "Mom", "Dad", "Jenny" and "Family" and moved them onto a flash drive. If Mason's family didn't remember him they wouldn't miss him every night, and if Mason didn't remember his family he'd never have a reason to return the relic. Monica figured she'd return Mason and his family back to normal at the end of the semester, when she'd become more proficient in the use of the relic.
She made a few changes to the "Monica" and "Mysterious Relic" file so Mason wouldn't question the new status quo, and she summoned a door to leave Mason's mind. She found herself in her dorm room, next to Mason's sleeping form. She now knew she didn't need to use the relic while he was asleep, but she figured it was the best to use it clandestinely where possible.
* * *
The next morning, Mason woke her with a kiss.
"How's my sleeping beauty been?" he said, a tender look in his eyes.
"Uh, fine?" she said groggily, rubbing the sleep from her eyes.
"Let's get ready. I want to hear what you've learned about the relic so far." Mason said excitedly.
Monica decided to test whether her changes had taken effect. "Mason, tell me what you know about the relic?"
"Do you really need a recap of the past few days?" Mason said.
"Could you humor me?"
Mason thought the request was a strange one, but said, "Well, you told me you found it the other day. I obviously didn't believe you, so you proved it works by removing my knowledge of dogs and Frankenstein. I was impressed, so I volunteered to let you keep testing it on me."
"Hmm, sounds about right," Monica said. "Alright, lets get some breakfast, and I can tell you what I've learned."
They went to the dining hall, and Monica and Mason both went to the cereal line.
"Don't you usually go for pancakes?" Monica asked curiously.
"I guess I'm not really feeling pancakes today," Mason said.
That surprised Monica. Mason had loved pancakes for as long as Monica had known him. Maybe this was an unexpected result of her changes to Mason's memories?
They both got their food, and sat at their usual (as of two days ago) table. They ate in silence for a bit, before Mason spoke.
"So, are you going to tell me, or are you just going to keep me in suspense?"
"Okay, I'll tell you've what I've learned." Monica said. She filled him in about the additional properties she had learned about the relic. She finished by saying, "Also, I believe I've tracked down somebody who might know something about the relic. There's a Prof. Miller who teaches at this college, and might know something about it." She looked to see if that name sparked any recognition in Mason.
Mason just replied, "So, are you going to talk to this Prof. Miller?"
Monica smiled. "No, I'm pretty busy today. I figured you could go talk to him. Show him some pictures and see if he knows anything about it." She was lying, of course. This was her lightest day in terms of classes, but the thought of an unknowing reunion between father and son amused her.
"Alright, I can do that."
* * *
Monica and Mason split up after breakfast. Mason went to talk to the professor, while Monica went to the lab section of her Organic Chemistry class.
Her task that day involved some basic thin layer chromatography in order to identify an unknown molecule. The teacher had forced them to work in pairs, and Monica found herself in a group with Susan Acevedo.
"Oh, great," Susan said in disgust. "Why'd I have to get yoked to you of all people?"
"Look, I don't like it any more than you." Monica tried to keep her voice even and civil. "Let's just do this as quickly as possibly, so we can get over this unpleasantness."
Monica and Susan had shared the same classes for the last two years and had learned to hate each other in that time. Their relationship had started as a friendly rivalry, but the constant attempts to one up each other and prove academic dominance had worn the "friendly" aspect down to near nonexistence.
They both knew what they needed to do, so they worked in near silence. In short order they prepared the TLC plates, and they sat in silence waiting for them to develop. Monica knew it would be a while before it finished, so she took to watching the people around her. All of them were still setting up their TLC plates. With all of them distracted, she guessed that nobody would notice if she tried the relic on Susan...
She pulled out the stone relic, and before Susan could react she touched it to her head.
Susan's mind room looked like a patchwork microcosm of the college campus. Each corner was reminiscent of a different part of the college: The stadium, the biochem building, the library and the dining hall. Monica walked to the library portion, and started looking through the books, trying to find a book title that interested her.
After a minute or two of browsing, she found a slim book called "Secrets." That sounded promising. She pulled the book down off of the shelf, and began flipping through it. Most of the secrets were pretty boring to Monica, since she didn't have context for them. However, she eventually found one that made the whole search worth it. It read:
"I am working as a stripper at Nitro Club to pay my way through college. My stage name is Crystal. None of my classmates know."
Monica could hardly believe her luck. She didn't know how yet, but she was sure she could use this against Susan. She wondered if there were any other juicy secrets in there, so she read on. Eventually, she came across a passage that caused her heart to sink:
"I had sex with Aaron while he was still dating Monica."
Aaron had been Monica's first college boyfriend, and she had been devastated when he had broken up with her out of the blue. With this news, Monica knew it wasn't out of the blue after all. Whatever good will Monica had remaining towards Susan, it was gone now. She wanted revenge, and with the relic she was in a great position to get it.
She searched through the library and found a thick book titled "Education." She opened it up and found where seventh grade started. She began ripping pages out of the book a dozen at a time. When she was done, there was a mess of pages on the floor before her.
"She won't be needing anything past sixth grade for her new life," Monica said half to herself.
Monica looked through the other books in the library and found a few that needed to be thinned out as well. "Vocabulary", "Science", and "Literature" in particular took a big hit. She made some slight modifications to the "Monica" book, and she gathered up all the ripped out pages into her arms, and walked into the center of the space. She knew from summoning the doors and the flash drives that she had a certain amount of influence inside a person's mind, but she had never tested the limits.
Monica imagined a giant stripper pole on the field, and one appeared. Apparently, there wasn't much of a limit at all. She put a dozen bottles of vodka in the dining hall, and she emptied the biochem building and filled it with trashy magazines and a television. When she was done, Susan's mindscape was almost unrecognizable. Satisfied with her work, she decided it was time to leave.
* * *
Monica found herself sitting next to Susan holding the relic and large stack of papers. She looked around, and as expected it seemed like everyone else was so wrapped up in their experiments that they hadn't noticed this odd occurrence. Susan looked dazed, and when her awareness returned it was clear that she was not the girl she used to be. Her bright, intelligent eyes now had a vapid dullness to them, and she now carried herself less like a confident straight-A student and more like a sensual trollop.
