Chapter 13: Enemies and Allies
I had expected Tuyen hours ago. The time I spent with Dimitry had been much longer then I had anticipated, but then again everything associated with the gift seemed to get messier then I expected. I felt fear begin to gnaw at my gut as I sat on the couch and waited.
I tried to reach out to her note, but when I called to it nothing happened. I began to panic until it dawned on me I may not be able to call a note that is shielded. To test this I tried to call Dimity's note, and found nothing there but silence as well. Though the macabre thought did occur to me that they could both be dead. This I pushed away as something to difficult to even contemplate.
I think it is a common trait of men that when threatened with uncertainty we tend to overreact, and that the overreaction tends toward the melodramatic hero end of the scale of behaviors. I had an hour or two where I was captured by my own fears, and panic. But as I forced myself not to charge out the door with a machinegun ready to storm the hill of my undefined enemy, I began to calm and think things through.
Tuyen was a grown woman, and hopefully not on Dolkoff's radar yet. I had gained a lot of insight from Dimitry's mind on just how arrogant Dolkoff was, and I wondered if he would even think I could free someone's gift as he could. After all, I didn't believe it of myself until I did it.
I called Tuyen's cell and left a message to call me when she got it, and then settled down on the couch to watch "Equilibrium" for the tenth time. Somewhere in the middle I slipped into dreams of Gun Katta and burning books.
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I woke the next morning sprawled on the couch with the TV still on, and a horrible crick in my neck. I must have been more fatigued then I thought to have passed out like that. I stumbled to the kitchen still rubbing my neck to make some coffee. After banging around for 10 minutes with still no coffee to show for my efforts I decided to go to plan b and head down to the grind after a quick shower.
The hot water and soap helped immensely in returning me to some level of consciousness higher then what I had been operating at, which was somewhere close to reptilian. It was only after I was dressed that I remembered Tuyen, and I picked up my phone to hear the distinctive dial tone pulse meaning I had a message. I called my voice mail and Tuyen's voice purred out.
"Hey Mike, sorry if I worried you, I'm fine. Well I'm better then fine, I can't believe this gift. I have some interesting news too, but it will have to wait until I can see you. Anyway, I'll call you later. Take care."
I erased the message with tremendous flood of relief. It suddenly hit all the way home the amount of danger I had just placed Tuyen in, and a wave of guilt washed over me. What right did I have to include her in this mess? I thought on this as I walked down to the grind, the cool morning air bringing me the rest of the way awake.
Tuyen was a friend, a real friend. She knew the risks, and she took them willingly, with full knowledge of what it meant. I knew I couldn't get through this alone, but I was still hated the idea of involving my friends. I hated the idea of seeing any of them hurt.
The Grind was crowded, but Wendy spotted me in back and waved before pointing me to a table still empty in the corner. I felt like a celebrity as about 5 minutes later she brought me my coffee along with her nice smile.
"Hey Mike, here's your bean."
"Thanks Wendy, how are you this morning?" I said looking into her sparkling eyes.
"Crushed! I got to get back there. I'll try to see you later. Maybe I can swing by the store again around lunch." She winked at me and bit her lip as she walked away.
God she was sexy, but I really needed to get a handle on things with her. If I let this go on too long we were both going to get hurt.
I walked the rest of the way to the store, taking my time and enjoying my coffee. It was starting to get cold when I unlocked the place and went in to get things going for the day. The store was comforting in some way, and I found myself falling into the routine of the day easily.
I talked to my boss later in the morning, and apologized for my inconsistency in operating the store lately. He assured me he understood, and that if I need time off to just get some temporary help to help me run the store for the next few weeks to take the pressure off.
I spent the rest of the morning calling people who had worked for me during busy times before, until I found someone willing to work full time and I arranged for them to come in tomrrow. I wanted the freedom to take care of Dolkoff without worrying about the store for a few weeks. Well, that is assuming I could take care of Dolkoff.
As lunch approach I ordered another pizza, and found myself watching the clock wondering if I would have company to finish it again. I had almost given up hope that Wendy was going to make it for lunch when the bell over the door rang. I stood up behind the counter, a smile spreading on my face. In instinct I reached out for her note and found nothing but silence.
Fear raced through me and I slammed the curtains down around my mind, my heart racing. She appeared around the pile of furniture in the center of the store. It was Dimitry's sister. Her black hair hung straight down across her white blouse. She walked slowly, but without fear directly toward me. I found myself drawn to her eyes, for they blazed with such hatred, such pure vengeance that I had to stop myself from taking a step back. It was a strange contrast to see such hatred contained in such a lovely face.
Why did these people hate me so? I had not come into there world and attacked them. I found it hard to comprehend that my mere existence so threatened them that they were willing to destroy their own family in the attempt to destroy me.
She stopped five feet from the counter, her green eyes burning into me. As I opened my mouth to speak her first wave of thought hit me. It was like a tsunami of thought coming off her and breaking against my mind. Wave after wave of sound poured from her and almost through a haze I saw her lips curled back in a snarl of rage.
I fought to regain my equilibrium, and to hold my defenses together. I could feel the emotion in those thoughts even through my defenses. They were pure rage, pain, and loss. My defenses were weakening under her attack. I had not been prepared for the sheer ferocity of her attack.
I reached deep into my reserves then and pulled a tight ball of sound into my mind with the single thought "stop". I poured energy into it barely holding my shield up as I did so. At last I threw it at her with all the force I could muster. It spun across the plane of my mind like a blue ball of singing electricity.
It struck her and punched through her shield like an armor piercing bullet. I saw her stagger in front of me as the thought poured through her. Her assault faltered and stuttered to a stop, and I felt my curtain quickly settle and repair in the sudden silence. Instead of pressing my attack I held up my hands palm out to her.
"Wait, hold on!" I shouted at her.
Her lip curled back again and she trembled in front of me. I knew my thought was already beginning to wear off, but she did not resume her attack.
"Why should I wait! I do not wait on vermin to cross the road in front of me, I shall not wait for you." She was almost panting now from rage, and I could almost feel the tension in her .
"I am not your enemy, please let's talk." I pleaded with her.
"Not my enemy!" she screamed. "You killed my brother and I shall have your blood!"
The thoughts that hit me then were of such intensity that I felt small rips in my defenses at several places at once. I struggled to hold, to form a thought to throw at her, to defend myself but her assault was overwhelming. I staggered back tripping over the stool behind the counter and crashing into the small desk there. A look of triumph was on her face as her energies smashed into me.
Some small part of my mind thought how ironic it was that I was about to be defeated by a woman who thought I had killed her brother when I had helped him. With that thought a single image rose to the surface of my brain. It was of Dimitry grasping my hand with that small smile of his on his face. It was an image of our beginning friendship, of the beginnings of respect, and his first tenuous steps back toward trust.
Then, once again my instincts stepped in and took over for me. Until now I had tried projecting single thoughts, or emotions in my balls of thought. Now, I took that memory like a photograph, and placed it into a ball of energy. It was like a time capsule, but this photo also contained a snapshot of what I was feeling at that moment.
As my curtain began to tear asunder from that terrible onslaught I threw it at her with every bit of panic and desire to survive I contained. I disappeared into her like the last, cutting through her defenses and vanishing into the column of her sound in the plane of my mind.
Her attack faltered for only a moment before I saw her eyes blaze again, and her jaw clench.
"Liar!" she screamed and her thought pounded into my failing defenses again. In desperation I began to fling every image that came to mind at her one after the other. A image of her brother bleeding on my couch and my concern for him. The image and feelings I had after I had tried to heal his mind. The image of us sitting and talking yesterday morning.
As each thought struck her the attacks from her slowed. She was shaking her head now, and I continued to fire more thought photos at her. The image of Dimity and I eating Mac and cheese and talking. Dimity raging against his father in despair and hatred. Me handing Dimity the role of money and the suitcase after he was cleaned up.
With that last image her assault faltered and stopped and she began to shake as she stood facing me. Her whole body trembling like a dry leaf the moment before the wind strips it from it's branch. She continued to shake her head, as she tried to back away.
She stumbled and fell to the floor as tears began to trace down her golden face. I stumbled out from behind the counter and knelt on the floor a few feet away from her. I was trembling from adrenaline and fatigue.
"He is alive. I swear it, he was alive when we parted ways yesterday morning. Your father tried to kill him for failing to kill me. I just tired to help him."
