Whisper (Whisper #1)(52)
Ward shakes his head. “She’s not ready to talk without me covering her words.”
I’ve only been training for two days, so he’s right. The idea of him leaving fills me with anxiety.
Straightening his white lab coat, Manning says, “I can hardly expect her to feel safe enough to share if you’re in the room.”
“And you won’t be safe at all if I’m not,” Ward shoots back.
I flinch, knowing he speaks true.
“What about the Karoel?” I say as a compromise — and a reminder. To myself as well as them. “As long as we stay in here, it’ll keep me aware enough not to consciously push power into my words.”
Manning’s eyebrows lift, and I’d say he was agreeing with me if he didn’t look so puzzled. But it’s Ward I’m focused on, waiting to see what he says.
He cocks his head to the side and asks, “You’re confident the Karoel will be enough to stop you?”
“Considering it’s a pain in the backside to Speak around, yeah,” I answer truthfully. “It’s much easier to talk normally in here than it is to use my ability.”
With his hands tightening around the book and socks, Ward gives a brusque nod. “Dr. Manning is experienced enough to take care of himself if you do slip up, since despite what you say —” he raises the objects in his hands “— you can work around the restrictions of the Karoel easily enough. So be very careful not to power your words with intent.”
Manning still appears bewildered, but then his face pales as he peers at the walls and understanding hits him — a delayed recognition of my Creator ability and exactly how dangerous I am without the power-dampening black mineral surrounding us.
“Just to clarify,” I say, “I’m not allowed to accidentally turn my therapist into an otter?”
Ward doesn’t respond, not verbally, though that strange light does enter his eyes again. It’s there for only a fraction of a second before his lips tighten and a muscle ticks in his jaw. He leaves the room without another word.
“So, Jane, how are you feeling?” Manning asks me, drawing my attention to him.
How are you feeling? Four words that he used to ask me every morning, four words that I never answered. Now, in the safety of the Karoel room, I can actually reply. Not that I know how to respond. How am I feeling? The truth is impossible to articulate.
“Fine, thank you,” I say, as if I’m speaking politely to a stranger — which I guess I am. “And you?”
His beady black eyes narrow slightly. “Perhaps we should sit.”
After standing for hours with Ward, I’m happy for the reprieve as I fold my legs under me and sit cross-legged on the ground.
Manning looks down at me, one dark eyebrow raised. “I thought perhaps you might like to produce chairs.”
My first reaction is to feel embarrassed for missing his implication, but I rally and say, “You heard Ward. I have to be careful with my intent. Unless you want to risk becoming the chair, then I suggest you make do with what we have.”
I don’t know why I’m so flippant with him. Perhaps it’s because I spent years in his presence and he never once shared that there were other people like me — and that he was one of them. Protocol or not, as my therapist, he should have realized how much I needed to know.
Lowering himself to the floor, Manning says, “You seem agitated.”
“You don’t say.”
“Would you like to talk about it?”
A therapist’s perfect opening line: Would you like to talk about it?
No, Dr. Manning. I would not.
“You know what I’d like to talk about?” I say, instead, but I don’t wait for him to ask. “I’d like to talk about Lengard.”
His expression sincere, Manning invites, “What would you like to know, Jane?”
And just like that, the floodgates open. Questions I haven’t been game to ask Ward, questions I haven’t had the opportunity to ask anyone else. But with Manning in front of me, one of the original Genesis-generation Speakers, I take full advantage of everything he’s willing to share. And that turns out to be a surprising amount.
I learn that to survive down in this underground bunker, everything needed comes from Speakers with mental abilities similar to telekinesis — like my Creator ability but with much stricter limitations. They are able to summon food, clothes, money, whatever, from a storage bunker located topside and deliver it to Lengard as required.
I learn that when new potential Speakers are discovered, a team is sent out to bring them here so they can learn how to control their power. They each spend time in a cell as a “test subject,” just as I did, but the initiation process — which Cami already described for me — only lasts a short time, unlike in my case. As soon as they reveal their Speaking ability, they are moved into the dorms so they can commit themselves to the program.
I learn that their training is mostly covered by the Genesis Speakers, the ones who aren’t out scouting for new teenagers. Those older-generation Speakers — many of whom comprised my bevy of floating evaluators before Ward came along — are tasked with teaching the Exodus recruits control, just like Ward is attempting to teach me.
I learn that they’re training — we’re training — so that when the time comes for the government to announce our existence to the world, the military can call on us to use our abilities for everything from international political negotiations, to conflict resolution, to encouraging peace during times of war.