The Elders (Mind Dimensions #4)(50)

“I’ll go ready the plane,” George says. “Kate, please go through the safety procedures as you wait for the others.” Without waiting for her reply, he walks off toward Pandora.

Kate clears her throat and fishes a pill bottle out of her pocket.

“Are you kidding me?” I stare at her. “I have to take an Ambien again?”

“It’s standard procedure for now,” she says. “Once the Elders say you don’t need it, I won’t do it.”

“But Frederick trusts me. He wouldn’t have authorized all this if he didn’t.”

“He didn’t say anything about safety to me, which means I have to stick to the standard protocol,” Kate says.

“Fine. At least let me meet the rest of the team,” I say.

We wait in tense silence until the others arrive.

“Is this everyone?” I ask, looking over the four new arrivals—three dudes and one woman. They look vaguely familiar. I think I saw each one of them in the Victoria Sutra room as statues.

“Darren, this is James, John, Eleanor, and Richard,” Kate says. “Now take your pill.”

“What?” I ask, trying to keep my incredulity out of my voice. “You’re telling me this mighty team consists of just the seven of you?” As I say this, I study them.

James looks like a hard man, his fierce expression heightened by a cleft lip scar.

John is just as big as James and Stephen, only he somehow looks less healthy, probably due to the bags under his eyes.

Richard is the scariest of them all, though he’s the least muscular. I think it’s his bearing, coupled with leathery skin and an intense stare, that creates this effect.

Eleanor has more in common with the guys than with Kate. She’s more muscular than me, and I’m not exactly a wimp, even if I currently feel like one in comparison.

If this team were a circus troupe, John would be the sick lion, Stephen and James would be a polar bear and a grizzly bear, Eleanor an elephant, Kate a panther, and Richard a scorpion.

“Who’s the seventh?” Richard asks with a sneer. “You wouldn’t be talking about George, by chance?”

“Well, yeah. I thought he was the leader,” I say.

“He’s a politician, a glorified bureaucrat,” Richard says. “We don’t work for him.”

“Sorry, I stand corrected,” I say. “I’m sure you guys are awesome and all that.”

“If by ‘all that’ you mean that the six of us have never failed a mission,” Richard says, “then yeah, we’re awesome.”

“Enough chatter.” Kate demonstratively takes a pill out of the bottle. “Can you now take the f*cking pill? Or should I make you?”

“I’d listen to her,” James says, smiling. “You wouldn’t enjoy it if she made you swallow.”

Ignoring the merriment James’s comment created, I take the pill, trying my best not to choke on it. Before Kate can ask, I open my mouth to show that I did as I was supposed to.

“Such a good boy.” Eleanor’s voice is deep, matching her physique to a T. “You’ve trained him well, Kate.”

I just walk onto the plane and take the seat I slept in earlier.

I hear the others come in but pay no attention to them.

This time around, I’m determined to fight off the effects of the Ambien by exercising mind over matter. I have free will, don’t I? I should decide whether I sleep.

“You really part Leacher, kid?” asks one of the dudes. James, I think.

“Part Reader, yes,” I say.

“What’s it like to Leach—I mean Read—someone’s thoughts?” maybe-James asks.

I yawn and say, “It’s like living as them for the duration of the Read. You’re your target, like in a super-realistic virtual reality that on top of sight and sound also has taste, smell, and touch.”

“Must be trippy,” the guy says.

“It’s pretty awesome.” I yawn again.

I don’t hear his next question because my mind goes blank—again.





Chapter 15





I wake up with a jolt and attempt to move, but find myself restrained for some reason. Did someone tie me up again?

As my eyes adjust to the light, I realize my vision is somewhat restricted too. However, I can see, which means I’m not wearing a bag over my head. How crazy would it be if my second trip to see my Enlightened grandparents once again had all the comforts terrorists enjoy on their way to a secret prison?

The world whooshes past me so fast that, for a moment, I wonder whether the plane is plummeting toward earth. In that case, the fact that I’m tied up doesn’t matter.

A shot of adrenaline clears the remaining sleepiness from my brain.

The good news is that I’m not plummeting from the sky while inside a metal coffin.

The bad news is that I’m inside a metal (with too much plastic) coffin that’s rocketing forward.

The restraints binding me are actually seat belts crisscrossed around my chest. Some kind of visor with tinted glass is restricting my vision. Judging by the person sitting next to me in the driver’s seat, I’m wearing a helmet.

All this adds up to me sitting in a car, or a car-like rocket, that’s moving faster than my still-groggy brain believes a car can go.