The Erotic Mind-Control Story Archive

Change of Plans (an Institute story)

by Wrestlr

1. Abominations

Sometimes life’s complicated, and sometimes it’s so simple it works out better than I ever could have planned—and trust me, I’m the master of plans.

Chris moved in after my mom got engaged to his dad. My cousins Jase and Thumper came to visit for the wedding. Those events happened a few months apart, but they’re collectively the reason things went as far as they did. I mean, I sure never planned for things to go that far. Ever since Chris moved in, I was so horned up my nuts nearly overcame my common sense on a daily basis, but Jase and Thumper gave me the final push, and I’m glad they did.

Chris and I went to the same school; we were both eighteen-year-old seniors that spring, with graduation a week away. We were both on the baseball team too, with our last-ever high school game dead ahead. Like most seniors, we had lots of plans for our future, but we knew everything was about to change. No amount of planning can take into account every possible outcome.

I was an only child, used to being on my own a lot and having plenty of privacy before Chris moved in. By the time the wedding rolled around, his dad and my mom had been living together for six months already, even though they weren’t married yet and it was technically a sin. I got used to having Chris around. I couldn’t quite think of him as a brother, but I did think about him a lot. He was good scenery: dark-haired, muscular, gorgeous head to toe—which I knew from practically memorizing his body in the locker room and showers after baseball practice. I had this massive lust-crush on him, though I kept that a secret. Just the sight of him gave me a hard-on sometimes. Fortunately, Chris and I had separate bedrooms, so I still had the privacy to jack off as much as I needed when he got me all boned up.

Jase and Thumper are brothers; their mom and my mom were sisters. Jase and Thumper got leave from the Institute—yes, that Institute—to come for the wedding. They arrived on the day of, a Thursday, which might seem a weird day of the week to get married but it was the anniversary of when my mom and Chris’ dad met, or had their first date, or some romantic crap like that.

My mom changed her plans at the last minute. She and my new dad weren’t planning on a honeymoon, by then they decided on an impromptu weekend honeymoon trip to a casino several hours away, and they invited Jase and Thumper’s parents along—kind of an “adult swim” weekend. See, my mom and her sister had a strained relationship for the last couple of years, partly over that Talents thing, and my mom decided an adults-only weekend would help them renew their family bond, like a mini—“relationship repair” reunion or something. And sure, gambling was technically a sin, but my mom said any winnings would be given to charity, so that made it okay. All the parentals jumped at the idea—of having a weekend away, at least.

Now, my cousins’ folks never seemed like the most demonstrative of parents, but I got the feeling they were kind of nervous being around Jase and Thumper since ... well, since their sons got recruited by the Institute for having some kind of freaky mental power. The polite word might be Talent, but I thought freaky mental power was just as accurate too. I knew for a fact my mom was kind of freaked out about having Talents on her side of the family since my mom’s really religious. Hell, I wasn’t too keen on it myself, because I heard all the things people say about the Institute and Talents. If they’d been anyone other than my cousins, I’d have said hell no to them coming to the wedding, even though saying hell in our house would have gotten me slapped.

I did some research online to find out as much as I could about Talents and the Institute. Most of it was either over-my-head scientific or else pretty scary—nobody seemed to know why Talents had started appearing, but nearly everybody thought they were a bad idea. Sure, some people had plausible, but completely unsupportable, claims that Talents were the result of some designer virus that got loose from a lab, or maybe the natural next step of humans evolving into some more advanced form, or some happy crap like that; but some of the information was wing-nut shit, like this one source that claimed to have proof space aliens had been impregnating Earth women and Talents were their offspring whose job was to prepare the rest of humanity for the invasion of their alien overlords. All the sources that seemed authoritative talked about how Talents were an abomination of God’s will, since only God was supposed to know what lay in a person’s heart and obviously mankind was never intended to be able to read thoughts or start a fire with their minds or anything like that—and praise God that there was a place like the Institute where these abominations could be sent to keep them away from decent, God-fearing normal people.

I wasn’t sure I was ready to call Jase or Thumper abominations. I didn’t remember when Jase got recruited, but last year, I’d heard Thumper developed a Talent too and got himself recruited. Man, you just couldn’t hide a family scandal like having both sons turn out to be Talents—my mom nearly disowned her sister over that. I hadn’t seen Jase or Thumper recently, and we were never that close growing up, but I remembered them being decent guys.

I wasn’t sure I had much room to call anyone an abomination either. I figured out a while back that I thought about guys a lot and was probably gay, but I’d never said anything about it to anyone. A lot of the same online sources thought being gay was an abomination too. I wasn’t sure I was ready to call myself a fag—maybe I was just a straight dude who thought about other dudes a lot? Maybe it was just a phase? I already knew I wasn’t nearly as religious as my mom. Anyway, my plan was to be a nice, well-adjusted guy and never let anybody find out about my secret. Not my parents, and definitely not Chris.

The impromptu honeymoon trip meant all four parental units were going be gone all weekend. Jase and Thumper didn’t seem to mind getting left behind with Chris and me. My cousins were just as good-looking as Chris, though in different ways. Having them both around was going to drive me crazy—I was already coming up with excuses for why I’d need to sneak off somewhere private to jack off twice as much as usual!

As soon as I saw Jase and Thumper, I felt an intense attraction and wanted to be friends. They were even better-looking than I remembered. Thumper especially—he had this genuine smile and he was really, really handsome. When he walked up to me in the reception hall after the wedding, I was speechless. He started joking about various relatives, which was about all we had in common. His voice sent a jolt right to my dick. If it hadn’t been for that little lower-case i Institute logo they were required by law to wear on their clothes as a warning for normal folk, and how a lot of the people at the reception avoided them when they saw it, even though they were family, I’d have been crushing on Thumper in a big way. As it was, I decided to be friendly but not let myself get too close, just in case. I had too many secrets of my own, and Thumper was just too big a temptation—or risk—even without that whole freaky read your mind abomination angle.

After the reception, Chris, my cousins, and I changed into everyday shorts and tee-shirts and played around in the driveway, shooting hoops for an hour or so while Jase and Thumper’s parents drove home to pack for the impromptu trip. Chris and I got tasked with entertaining our cousins. The idea was Jase and Thumper would hang out the rest of the day with Chris and me, since I didn’t know my cousins very well and they didn’t know Chris at all; we’d hang out, do dinner on my step-dad’s credit card, maybe catch a movie or something later—kind of a sorry we’re dumping you consolation prize from the parental.

Jase and Thumper were both athletic. Jase was pretty good at basketball shots. Thumper, though, claimed to be a lot better at soccer and, uhm, I sure believed him—because he kinda sucked at shooting hoops, even though he tried hard. Put a bunch of athletes who play team sports together, and they figure out how to be friendly pretty quickly. It’s the camaraderie of being on a team. As we shot baskets, I started to decide Jase and Thumper were okay guys. I talk a lot when I get nervous, so I kept throwing question after question at them, asking what life at the Institute was like, and what being a telepath was like, and did they go around reading people’s minds all the time. They gave me kinda brief answers, not a lot of detail, and chuckling a lot like my curiosity amused them, or maybe they were making fun of me in some way I wasn’t understanding? I started to wonder if they thought I was being the nosy brat younger cousin, even though I was only a year younger than Thumper.

By late afternoon, my parents and theirs were long gone. I snuck up to my room and locked the door for some privacy, planning on a quick jack-off session. My room overlooked the back yard and I could see Jase and Thumper walking around by the pool out back. I liked watching them together; they seemed like a great team. I liked the way Jase as the older brother seemed to always be looking out for Thumper—nothing intrusive or controlling, just letting Thumper do his thing, casually making sure Thumper always knew Jase had his back. And Thumper always seemed to make sure Jase never got too bored, the way Thumper was always joking and looking for mischief, stirring things up, stuff like that. That relationship seemed to me what having a brother was all about. I guessed that I missed out on a lot, being an only child. It was probably too late for my step-brother Chris and me to develop that kind of closeness, since we’d both be going off to different colleges in a few months. Besides, Chris would probably kill me if he knew I secretly liked that fag shit we were always making snarky jokes about.

Thumper stripped his shirt off. My mind went, like, Holy crap!—Thumper had a great chest and abs, and I could tell he worked out often. I watched them wander around the yard for a few minutes, and I wondered what they were talking about and if it had to anything to do with that upcoming assignment Jase had mentioned earlier. I decided I didn’t much care right then because just looking at them was sensory overload enough. I was about ready to drop my shorts and rub one out when Chris knocked and hollered through my door that he was going swimming and to come get him if his girlfriend called. I yelled back that I was not his fucking voice mail service and he should take his phone with him if he was that worried about missing her call. Saying fucking in our house felt scandalous—I’d have never risked it if my mom had been home to hear me!

Five minutes and a satisfying masturbatory orgasm later, I decided that watching Chris and my cousins out back by the pool was too much temptation to pass up. I changed into my swim trunks and hauled my ass downstairs and out to the pool. By then, Jase and Thumper’d disappeared somewhere, but Chris was there.

While we were messing around in the pool, I decided to do something radical and dared Chris to lose his shorts. Of course I knew he wouldn’t do it, but I was always teasing him about stuff like that. Have I mentioned that Chris was gorgeous? Chris said no way to losing his shorts, I decided to take advantage of the parental absence and up the stakes; I pulled mine off under the water and threw them at him. He caught them and laughed and said swimming naked was fag shit and told me to put my shorts back on. I said, like, Why? We had a privacy fence so the neighbors couldn’t see—and anyway, it was still afternoon on a Thursday and most of them weren’t even home from work yet. So I swam at Chris and grabbed at his swimsuit, but he sidestepped away from me. He was laughing, like, Dude, that’s fag shit, what’s wrong with you. He wasn’t really calling me a fag—fag shit was just a general-purpose insult everyone on the team threw around when we were teasing each other. He was completely clueless about me liking guys. Chris kept grinning and shaking his head like he couldn’t believe what a freak I was being, so I knew we were cool. He still had my trunks in his hand, and he threw them over by the back door so I wouldn’t be able to get them without hauling my bare ass out of the pool where somebody really might see, and they landed—splat!—right at Thumper’s feet.

Thumper and Jase were coming back outside from wherever they’d gotten off to. I was stunned and so was Chris, and we both just froze and stared at them. I finally worked up the balls to call to them, “Hey, guys! Jump in and let’s have some fun!” I was felt awkward being naked, but I didn’t know what else to do other than try to joke it off.

My cousins grinned and started taking their shoes off. What they did next surprised the heck out of me, and I think Chris nearly died of shock. Jase and Thumper slipped off their shorts like being naked was the most natural thing in the world, and then they ran and jumped into the pool with us. I was, like, What the fuck? But I decided they’d seen my swimsuit hit the ground so they knew I was naked and they probably thought it was no big deal. I decided I should play it cool and not act all freaked out about it.

We goofed around for a while, playing a little two-on-two keep-away with a ball, which was really just an excuse to splash and dunk each other, and shit like that. Chris laughed and pushed away whatever naked body came too close to him, making a big deal out of saying something like, None of that fag shit, you hear? A couple of times I’d play like I was trying to grab Thumper’s ass under the water or I’d reach over and scratch at Jase’s hairy chest and make a comment about all that fur. Chris always shook his head and laughed something about all the fag shit going on in the pool, but we all knew he was just joking. Seriously, though, Jase had a lot of hair on his chest already, a lot more than Thumper with his little patch between his pecs or me with just a few hairs—I think smooth-chested Chris was a little jealous. I know I was. I was fascinated by the wiriness of Jase’s chest hair, and Jase didn’t seem to mind, and it was tricky not to spring a boner each time I copped a feel.

Finally Chris jumped out to go piss, and when he did, Thumper hauled himself up on the side of the pool and sat there, dangling his feet in the water, just sitting there naked like he didn’t care who saw. Jase climbed out too and flopped down on one of the sunloungers beside the pool. I thought my brain was going to melt down from the strain of trying to memorize every square inch of Thumper’s body, then Jase’s, without being caught looking. So of course, I started asking a hundred more questions about Talents and the Institute, just to have an excuse to look at them. I even asked them if they thought I might have a Talent too, since what I read online suggested that freaky mental powers might be hereditary. But Thumper just shook his head and said no, he’d already scanned us when he met us and not to take it personally because for a telepath scanning the minds of everyone around is as natural as breathing, and scanning isn’t the same as reading thoughts—just like recognizing people around him isn’t the same as fucking them. That made me shut my mouth real quickly and I must have blushed deep red because Thumper and Jase both laughed, and Jase said to me, “Tony, dude, the look on your face!” Thumper apologized for embarrassing me, but he didn’t stop grinning like there was some sort of joke there I wasn’t understanding. I didn’t mind them teasing me a little because it gave me another excuse to look at them. I was busy comparing and committing every detail of their bodies to memory for later jack-off use: which one of them was a little more muscular, were they hung the same length because they’re brothers or was one a little longer than the other, or hung a little thicker, and which of them would I want to kiss and touch first?

Eventually I had to get out of the water, and I started making myself think about my upcoming final exams so my dick would go down. I wasn’t going to climb out of the pool with a bone. Thumper got up and put on his shorts; he went and got my swim trunks and tossed them close to the edge of the pool where I could reach them, without me even asking him to, so I decided, Talent or no Talent, maybe Thumper was still the nice guy I remembered after all. Jase seemed cool too.

That evening, after dinner, somebody decided we should go to a nightclub. I don’t know whether Jase or Thumper came up with the idea, but they both seemed enthusiastic about it. They only had a few days of leave from the Institute, and they wanted to get out and mingle with what Thumper called real people and Jase called Normals, as if he forgot Chris and I were exactly that. Besides, when they headed back to the Institute, Jase had some big end-of-training evaluation coming up, so super-secret he couldn’t talk about it, but he implied it meant he and Thumper would be split up and wouldn’t be seeing much of each other anymore. I could tell they were both bummed about that. Anyway, Chris was all for going out too, even if it was Thursday and a school night, and since the parentals had left, there was no one to stop him. Next thing I knew, I’d gotten myself talked into coming along too—though to be honest, they didn’t have to try too hard to convince me.

So a little after nine o’clock, we were all piled into Chris’ car and on our way. Jase had found out about some new club somehow, probably online or something, and he got to ride shotgun so he could navigate and give Chris directions. Which was fine by me—Chris always drove like a maniac, so I was probably safer in the back seat anyway.

The place looked like some old warehouse from outside, but we could tell immediately it was a hotspot. There was no parking for, like, five blocks, and even that far away the thumpa-thumpa music felt like an earth tremor. Expensive cars everywhere. From what I could tell by the people going in and out as we walked up, the club attracted a twenty-something crowd that was effortlessly hip and upscale. I started to worry; I’d never been to a place like this, or any nightclub, or even anything except church socials and school dances before. This club looked like the big league, and I was definitely worried I wouldn’t fit in. At eighteen, Chris and I—hell, even Thumper at nineteen as well—were too young to be in a place like this, and my fake ID wasn’t going to be good enough to pass inspection by that intimidating behemoth of a bouncer working the door.

I said this maybe wasn’t a good idea and we should go somewhere else. Jase just smiled and said not to worry. Chris slugged me on the shoulder and told me I should relax and let Jase do the talking, on account of Chris was thought the club looked cool and was betting even I could hook up in a place like this. Ha-ha, very funny. I rubbed the spot where Chris punched me. Before I could open my mouth again, Jase marched up the bouncer and presented his ID for inspection.

The bouncer took one look at Jase and his eyes widened and he started shaking his head, saying “yer kind” was going to have to go somewhere else.

Our kind? Oh, right—the lower-case i Institute logo Jase and Thumper were required to wear on their clothes. This club probably had one of those no Talents allowed policies to “protect” their patrons. I wasn’t sure why most places bothered; Talents were so rare, most people never met one. Jase and Thumper were probably the first two Talents to show up at this club’s door ... well, ever.

Jase didn’t even blink. He told the bouncer to check his ID again because everything was in order and there was no reason to turn us away. Jase looked at us and winked, then back at the bouncer. Was he doing something to the bouncer’s head? Telepaths were supposed to be insidious ...

The bouncer looked at Jase, then at the rest of us. He harrumphed and waved us toward the door, already turning his attention to the people behind us. I was still wondering what changed his mind when Chris swept me into the club too.

Inside, Chris’ eyes lit up. “Holy shit!—Look at this place!” The place was dark but at the same time blazing with dancing-swirling accent lights in brilliant colors. The thumpa-thumpa music was turning my brains to mush—how could people hear themselves think in a place like this? I sure couldn’t. Or maybe people came to a place like this to not think for a while? Damn, ten seconds inside the door and I was already over-thinking this!

And the people in this club?—they all seemed to be gorgeous twenty-something guys and girls, a little older than us, and all decked out in cool clothes and expensive haircuts and bodies built from devoted gym time. Chris was agog at all the girls in sexy dresses walking by in clumps of threes or fives, while the shirtless bartender-guys practically made my jaw drop before I remembered to play it cool and pretend I was scoping out the chicks too.

I was overwhelmed by it all. Jase led us to a tiny open space between bodies at the bar. An absolutely gorgeous shirtless blond bartender, wearing black pants and a cheesy little Hi, My Name Is nametag stuck to his left pec, slid in front of Jase and leaned forward. Jase hollered something at him, and the bartender nodded. Me, I just tried not to stare at the bartender’s bare chest. Sean—his nametag announced that his name was Sean.

Sean didn’t seem to care that a couple of us probably looked under age; he grabbed bottles from the rack behind him and, seconds later, he had set us up with a round of shots. Chris elbowed me playfully with a big grin and snatched one of the glasses. Jase shouted what was probably a toast as he hoisted his, but all I heard was thumpa-thumpa music—for all I knew, the toast was probably Here’s to permanent hearing loss or something.

I wasn’t sure what I expected to happen when we got there, but it hadn’t involved us getting drunk. This was totally off-script. But that didn’t stop me from tossing my head back and swallowing the mouthful of strong alcohol quickly. Dude, I scolded myself, relax, stop worrying, and have some fun. Which sounded so exactly like something Thumper would say, it was like he really was saying it inside my head.

Which was when—holy fuck!—the alcohol burn hit my brain. Crap!—and people actually paid for this shit? I made a face and hoped it wasn’t obvious that I had, like, nearly zero experience with hard liquor. Chris and Thumper made faces too, which reassured me and made Jase grin even bigger.

After another round of shots that convinced me this booze was liquid hell, somebody pushed a beer bottle into my hand. Beer was familiar—I could handle a beer or two—and it was cold which helped calm my throat. After that, everything turned out kind of cool. Chris went off to scope some chicks and try to hook up. Jase and Thumper and I hung out, and somehow we ended up on the dance floor, even though I dance like a lame donkey, so I guess maybe the alcohol got to me more than I knew. We were just dancing, not really with each other, but I never let them get too far away—because I’d rather be caught dancing with my cousins than dancing by myself. Nothing says can’t get laid loser more than dancing alone. And while maybe I was still a virgin sexually, I did not want anyone to think I was a loser. Being labeled a loser might be even worse than being a Talent.

At some point, I found myself by the bar with another beer in my hand. Jase and Thumper were nowhere to be seen. Okay, I could do this—I could hang out and act cool. I plastered a big grin on my face like I was happy and not drunk at all, though maybe I was a little drunk, and spent the next several minutes watching the crowd. Yeah, my plan was working. Until my bladder decided it couldn’t wait any longer. Time to find the restroom.

I’d kinda figured out where the restrooms were by watching the crowd. After all, there’s only one place girls go in groups. Guys heading in the same directly mostly went singly, though I saw a couple of them in pairs or groups—those were probably going to the restroom to do drugs or something, which made me think this bar probably wasn’t that different from high school, only with more booze, more cologne, and louder music.

The lighting was still dim, but the men’s restroom was a little quieter than the club, which was a welcome relief. I headed for the urinals. On my way, I noticed under the partition that one of the stalls had several feet in it—three guys, judging from the shoes. They must be getting high, I thought. Something seemed off about that, especially the way one guy in black pants seemed to be on his knees in front of the second dude, while the third stood alongside them. I kept seeing little red and yellowy-gold flickers, like the light show from the club was visible even in here, which seemed weird because I couldn’t see any windows or anything. But before I could worry about that, I heard somebody moan—and not just any moan, a sex-moan—and my eyes went back to the feet under the stall wall. I thought, Are they ..., then the overriding thought in my head was, Nah—they’re not having sex, definitely not having sex, no need to pay any attention.

I emptied my bladder, flushed, and headed to the sink to wash my hands. That’s when that stall door opened and, in the mirror, I watched the three men file out.

Jase was smoothing down the front of his shirt. Sean the bartender staggered out, still shirtless, his black pants still open; he looked kind of dazed as he buttoned and zipped, like he still wasn’t sure what he’d just done or why. And finally Thumper, still pulling his shirt back on.

All I could think was, Sean’s gonna need a new nametag—that one’s looking kind of ragged.

Thumper winked kinda smugly at me. That’s when I realized, clear as day, complete with a mental image of Sean on his knees sucking Thumper’s cock while Jase jerked off and then pulled Sean’s head over to his hard-on, they really had been having sex in that stall! Holy crap! I yanked my head around the other way as they left the restroom.

All I could think was, Fuck!—My cousins’re into guys too? This was definitely going to take some time to process!

I’m not sure how we got home. I just remember Chris and me in the back seat with Chris trying to tell me all about this blowjob he got in the back of the club from some hot chick who liked his body and all his baseball-toned muscles; he was really shit-faced drunk and kept starting his tale over from the beginning, again and again. I saw Jase and Thumper swap this smug look, like they knew something about Chris’ blowjob story that they weren’t telling. Then we were stumbling into the house, all of us laughing, and Chris was really drunk and practically falling all over the place. Chris wanted to keep drinking all night, even though he was probably ten minutes away from passing out and it was way into the a.m. and we had school in just a few hours, but Jase convinced us that getting some sleep was the better option because we still had the weekend ahead of us once Chris and I got back from school. Sounded good to me. I was ready to crash and wasn’t about to argue.

In my bedroom, I stripped only down to my boxer shorts. I usually slept naked, but I didn’t want to make Thumper uncomfortable seeing me parading around my room nude. Sure, we’d been naked in the pool earlier, but that was with me underwater from the waist down, where it wasn’t as in-your-face. Here in my bedroom was a completely different situation.

Jase and Thumper were too tired and drunk to drive all the way back to their house, so they were going to stay over at our place. Jase was be sleeping on the fold-out couch downstairs, and Thumper was going to sack out on an air mattress I had in my room for when friends occasionally slept over. “You sure you’re gonna be okay on the air mattress?” I asked him. We could have shared my bed, but that wasn’t part of the plan. I wasn’t comfortable with that; having him beside me all night would have been too much temptation—and what if I sprang a boner? No, if he didn’t want to sleep on the air mattress, he could sleep on the couch in the living room with Jase instead.

“It’s fine,” he said. “I’ve slept on worse.” He grinned at me, and I grinned back even though I didn’t have a clue what he meant. Thumper stopped at his underwear too, so I must have made the right decision about staying in my boxers. He had a really nice body, which I couldn’t help noticing, and I won’t have minded seeing him nude again. I hadn’t planned on Thumper staying over, but this offered possibilities. Maybe I could find a way to get another good look at his tackle tomorrow when he took a shower?

I crawled into my bed, and Thumper stretched out on the air mattress on the floor. I looked over the edge of my bed and thought at him—Can you hear me, can you hear me?—just to see if he was listening in on my thoughts, but he didn’t react. He seemed to be settling down to sleep instead. He lay on his back with his hands behind his head, eyes closed, the sheet pulled up to his nipples.

I rolled over and pulled the little pamphlet from its hiding place under my other pillow. I’d picked it up for free last week when I went with my mom to the religious bookstore downtown. The title was How to Protect Yourself from Psychic Assault, and it talked about how God’s order didn’t include unnatural “gifts” like telepathy and how, if you ever thought there was a Talent around, you were supposed to be ready to protect yourself from them—it used words like assault and invasion and mind rape when it talked about what telepaths did to normal God-fearing people. It seemed real informative and authoritative too.

I hadn’t felt like I needed to protect myself from Thumper earlier at the wedding, but now I was still a little drunk, Thumper was nearly naked, I’d learned Thumper liked guys too, and we were about to go to sleep alone in the same room. I decided I had better be safe than sorry.

The pamphlet wasn’t that long. I’d read it several times before Thumper’s visit, and I skimmed through it again quickly. Thumper didn’t seem like what the author said telepaths were like—he seemed like an ordinary guy. But I figured the author had to know what he was talking about or else he’d have never been able to get the pamphlet published. Besides, the author said telepaths often use their Talents secretly to try to win a person’s trust, which is even more insidious since the person doesn’t realize what’s happening before the telepaths mind-assault him and leave him a drooling mess. I wondered if that was what my cousins did to Sean the bartender at the club—the covert part, anyway, though leaving Sean a just had sex in the restroom mess didn’t seem nearly as bad as the drooling mess the pamphlet author talked about. The only way to know for sure about Sean would be to ask my cousins, and I wasn’t about to do that. No, I decided I’d better protect myself.

I was feeling drowsy. Time for sleep. I tucked the pamphlet away. “G’night,” I whispered, and reached over to turn off the bedside lamp.

“Night,” Thumper mumbled back.

At the end of the pamphlet, the author had talked about things God-fearing people can do to protect themselves from psychic assault. I figured it couldn’t hurt to try them out, just in case Thumper was fooling me and everybody else with his nice-guy routine. I definitely didn’t want to be left a drooling mess if he mind-assaulted me in the middle of the night.

What you had to do, the author said, was to picture your mind around you as an impregnable fortress where you were safe from all harm. Okay, I could do that. I imagined myself in a safe place, which looked like my bedroom, which I guess made sense since this was my personal space in our house. I was standing in it naked, because I usually slept naked and that’s how I always liked pictured myself in my head for sleep-related things, naked the way God made me. Then picture your will as a glowing pot, burning bright with the power of God’s grace. Take the glowing will from the pot and use it to paint the inside of your impregnable fortress walls, so God’s will and your will shine together to block all the outside dark influences of sin and corruption like telepathy. Okay, I could do that too. I imagined myself scooping out handfuls of the glowing yellow-white stuff from the pot and slinging it at the walls, where it splattered like paint and covered the walls with bright shining color. Heh, this was fun! I did the part of the room that represented the front of my mind easy enough, but I had a little trouble conceptualizing the sides and back as clearly—plus, by then I was getting sleepy, and imagining felt a lot like dreaming. In my head I surveyed the walls coated with the glowing will. Yeah, that looked like a damn fine job, if I did say so myself.

I turned to Jase, standing naked beside me, and asked him, Could you break through that? No way, right?

Little flecks of blue and purple light flickered around the edges and planes of his body. He looked at the walls and said, Nope, I’d never be able to get through that—you did a damn fine job blocking us out. Which made me grin with pride.

Thumper stood naked on the other side of me, glowing faintly in red and gold. He looked around me at Jase and said, Remember that first time with me? I tried making a wall too.

Jase just chuckled. I figured there was a long story there, but neither of them enlightened me. More brother history stuff, probably.

I pushed back the drowsiness. I had something important to ask them first. You’re not gonna mind-assault me, are you? Don’t want to be a drooling mess.

No one’s assaulting anyone. Now let’s get some sleep, one or both of them told me, and they put their arms around my shoulders, and pulled me down onto my bed in that safe mental fortress, and curled themselves around me like the easy companionship of puppies.

As sleep tugged me down, I thought happily, Is this what having a real brother is like?

Could be, one of them answered, as I settled my head against his strong, protective chest and slept.