Chapter 37

Feeling for Brains

Stephen excitedly filled in our teacher with the details of our great exploits. I just sat back and listened, nodding and laughing. I really was getting worried this whole thing was getting to his head. But we were almost done. It would all be behind us soon. I just needed to hold my tongue until we beat the Girl-Mon and moved onto the tournament. I could do that.

“And then I marched up to that monster freak and threatened her. Told her her days were numbered!”

Lord help me.

“He called her stinky.” I added again. Kenzo raised an eyebrow.

“Dude, that’s not the point! Don’t tell him that…”

The teacher chuckled. “I get the picture. You both have done tremendously in the game. All that’s left is to prepare you for what we gathered them for.”

I leaned forward, excited to be getting into the good stuff. “Fucking finally. Sorry,” I added, unsure how the teacher felt about cussing but he just waved it aside. “We’ve gotta hook up to their minds, right?”

He nodded. “It’s simlar to reading minds but instead you are going to be taking something from them. Well, borrowing. I’m assuming you have convinced them all to trust you?”

Stephen answered first. “Oh hell yeah. They trust me, completely.”

“Then it won’t be a problem at all. As long as you make a show of what you’re doing and tell them to focus on helping, adding their strength to it. You should be able to access their energy pretty simply.”

“But is like what you did with us? We have to go into all their brains? At once?”

He shook his head. “This is different. For you two, I was awakening you, drawing out enough power for you to grab on for yourself. You don’t need nearly as much as that power from them and you don’t need to hand them the keys. You’ll esentialy be taking of the top layer of whatever they have billowing up in their mind. It already wants out, once you reach for it, it will come.”

“That doesn’t seem too difficult. But… near one hundred people…” I said.

“Yes, that will be the issue. I suggest you split the crowd into two sides, each of you taking one whole group. That will make it easier. So, basically all we have to do is get it where your minds can reach out that far. And form a hand.”

Stephen grumbled a bit. “A hand? I thought we were making a weapon, spirit bomb the hell out of her.”

“That’s an option, but I feel like there are more chances for it to fail that way. Instead you should go straight for her weakness.”

“What’s her weakness?” I was almost on the floor from being so on the edge of my seat.

He grinned. “I’ll tell you at the end.”

Stephen groaned. “Why do you gotta keep things secret? Just tell us the whole plan.”

The teacher wagged his finger at him. “It’s more dramatic this way.”

I was with Stephen and rolled my eyes.

“Don’t question me. You two have a lot of training to do. Speaking of.” He clapped his hands together and the rooms contents sunk into the floor.

I tumbled off the now non existent couch. By the time I got up the room was completely bare, and wide open. Empty space. It gave a similar vibe of being in the middle of the ocean, surrounded by nothing on all sides. I was not a fan.

Support creative writers by reading their stories on Royal Road, not stolen versions.

The teacher held his hand out for a second, and then jerked it up. As he did, weird training dummies burst from the ground, surrounding us on both sides. I didn’t have to count to know there were one hundred of them, fifty for each of us.

I walked closer to the nearest dummy, aghast to see there was an exposed human brain on the top of its dome.

“Are these…?” I started to ask.

“Just for show. Not real brains, I promise.”

“They look pretty real to me,” Stephen said, poking one.

“Are you a secret serial killer?” I asked with a grin.

“Mental powers user, therapist, teacher… serial killer. That seems like a bit too many hats for one person, don’t you think?”

“If anyone could do it, it would be you,” I said and he did not argue, just gave me a grin, shaking his head at my silliness.

I flicked one of the brains. “Alright, what do we do with these weird ass things?”

“All of these brains have been given psychic energy in just the same way that all the real brains will be. So, all you have to do is focus, like when doing anything with your abilities, and reach out to them. Let’s try just one to start. You can both use the ones that you so rudely assaulted.”

We laughed and took up positions in front of each of our dummies. I walked around in front of mine. Stephen, weirdly, stayed behind his. He noticed me looking at him funny.

“I… don’t really want to look in its eyes while I do this.”

I died laughing. But when I made eye contact with mine my laughter caught in my throat. It had really big googly eyes, that for some reason were moving, watching everything I did. “Ew, yuck.”

“See! Why is that necessary, teach?”

Kenzo sighed and snapped his fingers. Each of the dummy's eyes glowed and then vanished, leaving no trace that they’d ever been there.

I cocked my head to the side, considering. “I dunno, they are still a little creepy…”

“Enough,” the teacher said, rubbing his brow. “Just reach out to their damn brains.”

Stephen and I shared a grin, relishing in being able to annoy him a bit. I shook my arms and head, getting out the silly, focusing back into the task at hand. I closed my eyes.

“What you want to do now is envision your energy leaving your mind, press it out. Once you get there I think you’ll figure out what is needed next.”

I wrinkled my nose. I would much prefer him to just give me the full directions, why was he like this? But, whatever. I guess it was supposed to help us figure things out on our own or something? I dunno. But okay. Right. Focus.

I calmed my breathing. I felt the power grow behind my eyes. I kept it there until it started seeping out on its own so I pushed it outward, gently. My consciousness got funky, sort of following along with my escaping energy. I was outside my body, looking down at it like I’d just got a Game Over screen.

Alright. I did what he said. Now what? I swiveled my energy around and, there, I saw what he meant. I could sense all of the brains near me. They were dim red lights, glowing in the horizon. Except for the one beside me. Its energy was brighter, more like a flame, it burned and wiggled as if blown by a wind.

I pressed my energy toward it. I didn’t make it that far at all before the dummy's energy seemed to sense mine. The mental wind now blew it toward me, the flames of thought reaching. I extended out and the energies met.

My mind was a blaze with power. It was like when Stephen sent out his energy around me except this wasn’t just warm but burning–pure power. My eyes shot open, burning with a blue flame.

“Terrific you two! Fantastic job!”

I looked over and, sure enough, Stephen had his own eye flames. His goofy smile looked a lot more menacing with all the energy seeping out of him.

“Now, let’s see how many you can gather. I would say, shoot for five at first. No more than that or we could have some problems. Understood?”

We both nodded and went right back to it. I closed my eyes and was able to push my energy out a lot faster. I wasn’t sure if it was because I was getting used to it or because of the rush of energy I now had access to thanks to the dummy. Perhaps both. Either way, we needed more.

I mentally flew to the next dummy. It was just as eager to add its flames. It joined and again my mind and body coursed with energy. I felt my hair standing up, my body breaking out in goosebumps. I added a third, fourth, and fifth brain. By the last I had so much energy that my body lifted from the ground a few inches, my body unable to hold it all so it surrounded me, burning the air, exerting immense pressure.

I opened my eyes. Stephen was there, suspended similarly as me. He wobbled more, but he held it. I could do one more, I knew I could. I bet even with my eyes open.

I expanded my energy, now a huge mass of it. With my eyes open I could see both my vision from my body and from my energy’s point of view. It was extremely disorienting, I had to force back the urge to vomit. I instead chose to focus on what I was doing, reaching out to a sixth brain, its power just as eager to join my mind link.

“Darcy!” The teacher roared, I’d never heard him so serious in all our time of training. “Stop, right this second!”

But it was too late. The sixth brain added its power. At first, I felt great, another influx of power coursed through me… but it didn’t go away, didn’t subside. Instead, it kept building, shaking me at the very center of my mind.

“Stephen, get away from her!”