Jake’s Dream Come True
By Billy_Ray77
Chapter Eleven
“Just keep your focus steady when you open your eyes…” Alek was saying when my mother came into our kitchen and interrupted the, so far, futile practice session.
“Pardon me, Alek. I know I promised to stay away and not to disrupt your training but I have to talk to Jake about a phone call I got today. Honestly, Jake! Sleeping in class? I know that sometimes the regular curriculum can be boring to you…”
“It’s not that, mom. I had to see an aura and I can’t do it with my eyes open yet.”
“That’s why you gotta figure this out kid.” Alek declared. “Now you see why you can’t get too comfortable with closing your eyes.”
“I’m not getting comfortable with it. I just don’t see the problem practicing that way.”
“You should be seeing them easy by now – you’ve got to start pushing yourself.”
“I am, you act like I don’t want to figure this out. I’ve never sandbagged at anything in my life. Tell him, Mom. Mom? What’s wrong?”
My mother’s eyes had gone wide. My words startled her out of her stunned silence.
“Did you say you were seeing an aura or you were ‘trying’ to see an aura?”
“Seeing… I’ve been able to for quite a while now.”
“Well he’s not seeing them very well, I can tell you that.” Snorted Alek. My mother’s gaze shifted from me to him.
“Alek, Jake is a telekinetic – I... I thought you knew.”
“Oh for fuck’s sake!” Exclaimed an instantly agitated and visibly frustrated Alek. “That’s just great!” he stood and began pacing around the room while he ranted. “Here I think I’ve discovered someone who could really help us out – the son of one of the most powerful psychics in the world and he’s a fucking TK! Not that you can’t help us out, kid – but TK’s are aren’t what we need. We need more psychics who can stand up to guys like Phil.”
“Uhm, Alek?” said my mother softly. Alek ignored her.
“I’m just wasting all of our fucking time here. You’re a good kid and I can give you the basics but I know shit all about details of combat TK. There are at least a dozen guys… hell your own mother could teach you…”
“Alek, he can see auras.” My mother said matter-of-factly while Alek continued unabated.
“… more about that power than I can. You can still do some pretty… what was that?” He stopped ranting and looked at my mother.
“He can see auras. And he has telekinesis every bit as strong as mine.”
“Yeah.” Alek had a look of amazement on his face. “How can you do that kid?”
“What? I just did what you told me to.”
“Doesn’t matter what I told you, you shouldn’t see auras.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Jake,” interjected my mother, “remember when you were taught the difference between Telekinetics and Psychics? The reason TK’s psychic abilities are so limited is that they can’t see the auras. Manipulating auras is the key to mental connections and being able to see what you’re doing is vital to strong psychic power.”
“I’ve never heard of a TK who could also see auras.” Alek seemed very distant as he mused, “everything we do from here is just theory… Hey kid, take a look at your mom’s aura.”
“What for?”
“That’s just what I want to know,” Mom interjected, “if I’m going to be the basis for an experiment I’d rather know what it was before I agree to it.”
“Relax, Reeny, I’m just trying out a theory that Joe and I used to toss around. Look, we suspected that the linking of auras is really just a very weak form of TK. I’ve been teaching Jake to do it the way I do, identifying a prevalent emotion, matching it and extending my aura out until I make contact. That can take a second or two until the person becomes really proficient. If our theory was right, Jake doesn’t have to do it that way. Are you game to let him try?”
I spoke up before my mother could, “I don’t know Alek, I don’t like the idea of messing with my mom’s brain.”
“I think I know what he’s trying to prove, honey, you won’t need to give any commands, just see if you can connect.”
“She’s right. No commands or mind reading – nothing beyond the empathic anyway. Now call up the sight.”
I took a deep breath, closed my eyes and let it out slowly. Before I had finished exhaling completely the darkness erupted with the fiery glows of our auras.
I turned toward my mother’s auras and saw that curiosity was her strongest aura, which was convenient as that was already my strongest one too. I started extending mine.
“No,” interrupted Alek, “That’s how we’ve been doing it. I want you to try connecting auras from different emotions. Use your TK to manipulate them.”
Releasing her curiosity aura I selected the color I associated with laughter and mirth. It was pretty subdued so I figured it would be a good test. Curiosity was still my strongest aura so I began extending it, then stopped. That was still too close to how I always did it – I was supposed to do it different this time. My aura retracted and I reached out to my mother with my will. I focused on her mirth aura and willed it toward me.
The response was immediate – the aura distended, a tendril broke free and stretched rapidly across the room to me. I picked one of my auras at random and since there were no sparks of mutual attraction to form the link, I simply jammed them together with brute force.
I felt… something… so I pumped as much psychic energy down the link as I could and watched as my mother’s mirth aura swelled.
I heard her giggle. I continued to feed her aura and her giggles turned to peals laughter.
“What’s so funny?” Asked Alek’s voice with a touch of amusement since he could see exactly what was happening.
“I… ha ha… don’t… hee hee… know. Ha ha ha ha ha… I can’t… ha ha ha… stop laughing… ha ha ha ha ha.”
I then reversed the flow of energy, her aura immediately deflated and her laughter stopped. I broke the connection and opened my eyes to see her panting in recovery while wiping tears from her cheeks.
“Phew! That was intense.” Mom finally said after she caught her breath. “And fast too – there were none of the usual signs of contact – all of a sudden the influence was there, with no indication where it was coming from.”
“I have never seen auras act like that before.” Observed Alek, almost in awe, “You may have something there kid, if only you could do it with your eyes open. I know, I know,” he continued, interrupting my protests, “you’re trying. But since you shouldn’t be seeing auras at all, you may never be able to see them with your eyes open and it’s not your fault. I want to check one more thing. Reeny, bring up your shield, I don’t know if his way can get through one, I know the way I do it can, but my aura never really breaches the shield, the sparks do.”
I called up the sight again and this time there was an oval of shimmering blue haze around her. “That’s really pretty.” I said, then, thinking about how different the auras looked to different people, “What does it look like to you Alek?”
“What are you talking about, Kid?”
“Her shield, how does it look to you? To me it’s a pretty blue film with sparkles of light in it.”
“I can’t see shields, kid.”
My eyes popped open. He and she were staring at me.
“What?”
“We can’t see the shields. They aren’t part of the auras. I don’t know know why you can.”
“I’ve never seen my own, but I saw mom’s just now.”
“I wonder,” said my mother, “if it’s because you’re telekinetic, you’re in tune with that energy and my shield is just a static form of that energy. Can you see anything when I move something telekinetically?”
“I’m not sure, haven’t a chance to try.”
I closed my eyes and called up the sight, “Okay, do it.”
She had dropped her shield and there was no movement of her aura or any blue tendrils, or tendrils of any color. “Are you doing it?”
“Yes, anything at all?”
I opened my eyes, “Sorry, nothing.”
“Let’s try making a connection through the shield,” said Alek.
I made the preparations then extended an aura towards the shimmering blue of my mother’s shield.
It hit the shield and there was a slight resistance, then it slipped through and I jammed it into a random aura.
“Do I pass?” I pulled back and opened my eyes.
“That’s great, kid.”
He looked at his watch, stood and grabbed his coat from the back of his chair.
“I have some people I have to meet. Let me think about this for a while. I’ve got to figure out the best way to utilize your talent.” He patted me on the shoulder and bent to give mom a quick hug. “If this meeting goes well, I’ll have to head straight for Cincinnati. It will be the first time all the leaders have met to form a new council, so it could be a while before I’m back.”
“I wish you’d get a cell phone. It would be nice to be able to contact you if something happens.”
“No way, we’ve lost nearly a dozen group leaders to traced cell phones when one member of their crew was identified. Random pay phones are the only way. You have my email address, I’ll be using libraries to check that at least once a day.”
He turned back to me.
“I want you to play a bit. See what you can do through that link. I’ll call when I’m on my way back.”
He left and I decided to go ahead and play, just as I had been instructed.
I yawned, closing my eyes and calling up the sight. I quickly reestablished the connection just as I had done before, but this time I didn’t sever it before opening my eyes. My mother was just standing up.
“Well,” she said, “I guess I should get dinner started.”
As far as I could tell, the connection was still there. I didn’t do anything with it though.
“Anything I can do to help?” I asked as innocently as I could. Gauging her reaction to see if she could feel me connected.
“Sure, I was thinking of making some steaks, to celebrate your newly discovered ability.” As she talked, she pulled some steaks out of the freezer and put them in the microwave to defrost.
I pushed a tiny bit of energy down the link.
“If you’ll grab the string beans out of the fridge and trim them, I can peel the potatoes. Heh… I must be more excited about your power than I thought – I’m practically giddy.”
Trying hard not grin, I began snapping the ends off the green beans and pushed a little harder.
“Now where did I put that peeler? Hee hee… why is that so… Jake! Ha ha ha ha ha! Stop it!”
Busted! I pulled back on the energy and tried to disconnect our auras with my eyes open by duplicating the same action I had done earlier. I did a quick check with my eyes closed to make sure it had worked – it had.
“That’s not funny, mister. You keep doing that and I’m gonna toss you out that back door right on your little keester.”
“Hey, Alek said to play. I wanted to see if I could hold the connection with my eyes open. And, in case you missed it, I did.”
She smiled broadly.
“That’s right, you did. And you got it on your first try.” She stepped over to me and gave me a hug. “I am very proud of you. But I’m still gonna throw you across the room if you do that again.”
“You wouldn’t really do that, would you?”
“What? Throw you across the room? Damn right I would. You think I’ll hold back because I’m your mother? Okay, I do love you so I wouldn’t let you hit anything sharp, or land hard enough to break anything – just some painful bruising.” She winked and started peeling the potatoes into the sink.
“Are you saying you could manipulate something as heavy as me, that far away?” I resumed snapping the beans – I was curious, but I was hungry too.
“Of course.” She stopped and turned to face me. “You don’t think you could? But you threw those football players around the bathroom.”
“Yeah, up close it’s easy. But I just got them started, after that it was all momentum. I couldn’t have softened their landings – it wasn’t my fault that none of them were killed.” I remembered Eddie piling face first into the row of sinks. “Man, hitting those sinks must have been a real bitch.” I had stopped snapping beans. “I feel like I over did it.”
Mom came over and embraced me.
“You did what you had to do, honey. The way those boys were… drunk, angry, do you really think they would have held back on you if you hadn’t had your power? Shit,” she snorted, “they almost killed you just having fun when they were sober.” She released the hug, but kept hold of my shoulders and looked me in the eye. “This isn’t an A-Team rerun. In the real world, when someone points a gun at you and pulls the trigger, you die.”
She guided me into a chair, sitting down to face me.
“I’m glad you have a conscience, I really am. It means you’re not an asshole with your ability and that you aren’t likely to become one. But I don’t want it to make you hesitate when your life or someone else’s is on the line. When the time comes for you to do what you have to do – I want you give it everything you got. Can you do that?”
She was right. I may have gone a little overboard with Dan and the meth-heads, but with Thad and the jocks... well if I hadn’t taken care of those guys quickly, one of them might have gotten it into his head to hurt Sam. It may have been a little too much there as well, but in a situation like that, better too much than not enough. I had done the right thing. And, now I was involved in real serious life and death stuff. I had to be able to hurt people, hell, to kill someone, without hesitation. If I fucked this up I could die, mom could die or maybe even Samantha. A cold knot formed in my stomach at that thought.
There was a difference between picking on somebody in the cafeteria and fighting for your life on a battlefield. I hadn’t been picking on Dan in the cafeteria, hell, he’d been picking on me and it wasn’t even as though I had brought that on myself – although that was something I used to do all the time. So from now on I just wouldn’t antagonize the bullies. I had nothing to prove now. Besides, with my new found ability I might have the answer I was looking for before.
But when it came down to the serious shit…
“I… I think I can… have you ever killed anyone, mom?”
Her eyes cast downward. “Yes.” She said softly, “several times. And I hate it. But I did it without stopping to worry about how I would feel about it later. That’s why I’m still here. That’s why you have to be able to do it too.” She looked back up at me, fierceness in her eyes. “I’m not asking you to like killing. I’m telling you to survive – for me. I’ve already lost your father. I can’t lose you too, Jake. So you have to be able to hit an enemy with everything you have and for as long as it takes. If you let up for even an instant before it’s done… I’ve seen too many fall that way. So promise me. Promise me that when it comes down to you or the other guy – or girl, you’ll tear them apart without mercy. Because that’s the only way you come out the other side alive.”
I sat stunned. This was quite a far cry from the ‘good boys don’t hit girls’ speech I had gotten from this very same woman when I was seven. I had never seen my mother like this before.
There was more at stake here than my life, there was what my death would mean to those around me. Certainly my mother would be devastated, but what would it do to Samantha? Who would protect her the way I could? I had to survive. My mother was right, in order to do that, I had to be able to do whatever it took to ensure that survival.
She reached over and grabbed my hand firmly, her eyes steely and resolute.
“Jake, promise me.”
“I promise, mom. I swear it.”
“Good.” She waited a beat before continuing. “Now, it sounds like I as wrong when I told Alek that your telekinesis was every bit as strong as mine, so let’s see what you can do.”
She stood, beckoning me to do the same and pulled all the chairs away from the table.
“Try and lift the table with just your muscles, no TK.”
I grabbed the end of the table and lifted. My working out had made big changes but I still couldn’t get the whole thing in the air, it was too awkward.
“Now add your TK.”
Still holding the table, I easily willed it into the air.
“Good, now set it down, take a few steps back and try it again.”
I did that and raised it with no problem. We continued to repeat the process and I noticed that by the time I was halfway through the dining room, about fifteen feet away, it required much more concentration and somewhere around twenty or twenty-five feet I couldn’t get it off the ground.
Mom put a hand on my shoulder and with no apparent concentration or effort, the table rose into the air and hung there.
“I suppose the old adage about multitasking is true.” She said matter-of-factly.
“What’s that?”
The table slowly settled onto the floor.
“It means you’re not doing any one thing very well. You have both psychic and telekinetic abilities, but neither is as strong as those of us who can only do one or the other.”
On impulse I reached out and tried to grab one of the potatoes off the counter on the far side of the table. It rose gracefully, with hardly any effort from me, and floated gently to my hand.
“Hmm… It appears that you’re not limited simply by distance,” mom observed, “but by the weight of the object manipulated as well. If I were so far away that I couldn’t lift the table, which, by the way, would be about fifty feet, I couldn’t move that potato either.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means we are going to have to do some experimentation and a whole lot of practice so you will know your limitations when push comes to shove.”
She plucked the potato from my hand.
“But, right now, I’m starving. I’ll get this little guy and his brothers in the pot and you get back to those beans.”