Bright Star Page 3

  Then he changed.

  His skin warmed visibly to a healthy toffee glow. His hair, dry and kinky, waved softly over his eyes. His narrow shoulders widened, his slender body strengthened, packets of flesh filled in the hollows of his bones. With a brush of his hand over his face, his strong jaw was wiped clean of stubble and his dull black eyes changed to a sherry brown. His nose was a perfect line with flared nostrils over broad lips. Rush was sure he wasn’t a handsome fellow anyway. Still, people stared at him when he went around in his natural skin. Even without his unusual Talents, he could tell they were watching him. They still did, though less so with his diminished appearance. Rush would never be comfortable with that. People were smarter than even they knew. Most of them could sense there was something different within him, even if they couldn’t pinpoint what.

  He waved a hand and it was as if a shallow wave of dim rippled across the room. Wherever the ripple touched seemed to bend, shatter, and reshape. The white walls stretched and darkened into a shadowed slate gray. The floor shifted and opened until the carpet melted away to reveal smooth rock. The bed lowered, curved, shimmered in a cerulean blue. Eggplant and emerald colored pillows and coverlets covered the soft rise invitingly. A depression in the center of the slate deepened until it became a hot pool of scented water bubbling over dark blue tile. In the center of the pool was a long burning flame that seemed to touch the water and yet continue to burn. Similar flames attached themselves to the ceiling and walls to give the room a warm aura. Deep blue, iridescent boxes spilled soft music into the air. The ceiling dripped low and bowed into the worn stone of a subterranean cavern. This was his luxury, his heaven. A palace buried in caverns. He smiled wryly to himself: his dream home. All he needed was a dream girl. But he knew, even as she made her way to him, that Elizabeth was already dead.

  Effortlessly, he snapped his fingers and a banquet appeared before him. Damn, he was always hungry, especially when he thought of her.

  “How did you do that?” The voice, surprising like a beam of sunlight in dilated pupils, sliced through Rush’s chest. The bones in his shoulders ached, then his collarbone and sternum. His ribs squeezed around his heart. His throat closed over and he began gulping for air and clutching at his windpipe. The muscles convulsed on the left side of his face, closing his eye then straining him so that his head began to shake. His body continued to collapse around his organs. He felt the seizing in his bladder as he struggled. He fell hard on his back.

  Jackson’s eyes, driven wide by the sight of his brother’s act, grew tight as he went over to Rush and placed a hand over his chest. A cool charge went through to Rush’s heart. For a moment, his body seemed to expand again, enough so that he could concentrate on the words flowing from Jackson’s mouth.

  “First you focus on your heart and lungs. Think of them being transparent, thin, so much so that air and light can pass through them.” Rush followed the instruction and felt the constriction inside him begin to subside.

  “Now,” Jackson continued, “breathe and do the same for your mind. Imagine it empty, clear, porous. It may sound strange but try to picture fruit. A series of all the fruits you know, one after the other.”

  Again, Rush followed Jackson’s queues. Strawberries. Apples. Grapes. Bananas. Easy. Oranges. He found the discomfort had almost completely subsided. Mangos. Tangerines. Peaches. Almost. Pineapples. Raspberries.

  “All better?” Jackson inquired with a quizzical brow.

  Rush nodded and looked away. That is when he remembered the Shift. The faint scent of musk on the air enhanced the exotic nature of his creation and served to remind him that this atmosphere was quite man-made, and probably beyond anything his brother had seen created so easily. He was caught—again—and his heart constricted—again. He was now going to have to convince Jackson that what he was witnessing was not real… again. Wearily, Rush sank down onto the side of the very normal and non-Shifted bed. He rested his elbows on his knees and waited.

  “How did you do it?” Jackson asked without attempting to hide his awe. He tapped Rush excitedly on the shoulder to gain his attention.

  “How did you know what was happening to me just then?” Rush countered instead of answering. He needed time to think.

  “It happens.” Jackson offered with a quick shrug. “Permanent Shift. Usually when you expend too much energy on any one specific Shift. You know, Parameters of Shift 101. What you’ve done here is amazing, record-breaking in the time that you accomplished it. It would have taken me days to do it. And, after I was done, I never would have been able to put it back.” Jackson swept his arm toward the room that had subtly returned to its original condition.

  “No,” Rush mumbled absently. “This is an easy Shift.” Then, as he considered Jackson’s words, he asked, “Why fruit?”

  “Fruit is mundane. It’s the first and easiest way to train children on how to manage Perma-Shift. Something about the listing that focuses your cognitive skills and forces your Energy to center there instead of in manifestation, if that makes any sense to you. And…” Jackson paused. He measured his next words very carefully. “And they’re healthy.”

  “Healthy?” Rush was empirically incredulous.

  “Yes, healthy,” Jackson assured him. “It’s one of the weird phenomena of Shift. Thinking about healthy things has a significantly healthy impact on your body, including when you are in the throes of Perma-Shift.”

  “That’s ridiculous. Why doesn’t it work for heart attacks?”

  “Sometimes it does,” was Jackson’s bashful answer.

  Rush merely considered the information then nodded. He was still unsure, but chose to pursue another topic. “How did you get in?” He looked back at the door that still bore a trace of the glossy black word that should have planted the suggestion in Jackson’s head that he did not want to enter the room. He should have been plagued with sadness, loneliness, insecurity, disconsolate grief. He should have been inured with the feelings of despair just by nearing the door. The further away from it he stood, the less he would feel the suggestion. Jackson had braved it anyway.

  *

  Jackson walked over to the dusty chess set and began to study the pieces. He picked up the queen, still impressed with her heaviness. The pieces were made of solid pewter. The queen was the heaviest, the most ornate. He put her down gingerly but didn’t take his eyes off her. “I would like to say that I was able to identify the suggestion from my years of training, but I didn’t. In fact, the suggestion was so strong I was shaking even while I reached for the door, but I needed to talk to you.”

  Jackson turned to see Rush raise his eyebrows. Jackson assumed this was an indication of shock and incredulity. Though his brother looked slightly different, his lack of expression was the same. “You wanted to talk to me enough to plow through a very, very, very nasty suggestion?”

  Jackson shrugged again, remembering a feeling of intense misery descending on him at the thought of going to his brother for advice. He’d started to sweat and felt bile pooling in his mouth. He also remembered the feeling that Rush was the only one in the world who could help him. When he weighed both emotions, his need to seek Rush out overrode the suggestion, the High Energy Shift used to create it. Jackson knew his brother would tell him the right thing to do.

  The fact that he sought guidance from his brother more than anyone else probably had a lot to do with the fact that Rush was older by nearly five years. Boys usually looked up to their older brothers and wanted to emulate them, didn’t they?

  When they were little, Rush had always steered Jackson away from trouble. He taught him from an early age not to lord his extraordinary abilities over others. It was Rush who had urged Jackson to protect smaller kids, to cooperate with the incessant battery of tests to which the Service subjected Jackson. It was Rush who told Jackson constantly that their parents loved him, and that they understood and respected his unique gifts, though Jackson had never, even as a boy, completely believed it.

  Rus
h warned him that he needed to comprehend the difference between asserting and aggressing. In all things, Rush had never failed him. He had been an unwavering and unmoving guiding star for Jackson through subtlety and nuance when necessary or relentless, persistent emotionally dealt discipline when necessary. Even despite his Talent. Amazing to Jackson, he didn’t know why, but his Talent had never had an impact on Rush. He had always considered Rush to be his teacher, and Jackson had never, not once in his life, considered using his power on him. Deep down, Jackson had known in the way only a soul can know, that his Energy could not affect… could never conquer Rush. It was only at this moment, this very moment that he knew why. Rush had power of his own.

  “Well,” Rush prompted.

  “Well what?”

  “What did you want?” Rush asked patiently.

  “I don’t remember,” Jackson admitted, sure that before Rush asked him the question, he had known. He ran a hand over his bristly dark blond hair and changed the subject. “You should be trained.”

  “I’m an adult. They don’t train adults.”

  “They don’t train adults because they get everybody when they’re kids. We live in the nation’s capital, not because our parents loved it here, but because they’ve been studying and training me since before I could walk. It’s amazing you have this kind of Talent and have managed to fly under the radar. Energy has a way of making itself known to the Service. They have satellites, Rush, that pick up traces of High Energy. They can identify Talent from outer space. You have to be tested. You have to be protected. You have to be trained, Rush.”

  “No, Jackson, I don’t have to be, and I won’t be.” His words were final. Jackson wouldn’t argue. At least not then. “I can tell this isn’t going to work. You and your desire to do what you think is the right thing to do… No, you won’t be able to leave well enough alone. For that reason, I have to do something I don’t want to do.” Rush ran a hand over his face. “I’m sorry, Jackson.”

  *

  “Hey, man, I must have just zoned out. I didn’t realize what time it was. You mind if I cut out early and we play some tomorrow? I gotta figure out what’s going on at the center.” Jackson pulled off the wireless virtual reality gloves. He briefly checked his score on the gaming console and handed the gloves to Rush.

  “No problem, Jack.” Rush, now transformed back into the sullen introvert, answered with a nearly believable smile. “Tell Ronald I said hi.” The gloves were warm to the touch. The Shift had been precise, instantaneous, and perfect. He slid them into the console drawer.

  When Jackson walked out of his room, Rush sighed and closed his eyes. That was the seventh time in as many months he had removed the knowledge of his unique Talent from his brother’s memory. Seven Shifts in seven months, Rush tried to cheat destiny. Too frequently, this Talent he had been careful to hide since adolescence, seemed to want to bare itself to his brother… maybe to more than just his brother.

  He did it even though he knew it was useless. Rush had always known that he could not cheat destiny.

  *

  When Jackson Rush swiped his badge at the west lobby of the Service, he waved at the older woman in uniform behind the desk. The pleasant looking woman graced him with a huge smile. Her smooth skin was the color of fresh garlic and her eyes looked like half moons as she grinned. Her salt and pepper hair was very short and bristly. She was tall, definitely taller than he was, and plump. She wore starched navy pants and a button-down with yellow chevrons on the sleeve that looked like it could have represented any security company in the country, but of course, her uniform was not only bulletproof but also psychic-proof. All of Melita’s Talent was based in self preservation. She couldn’t do anything to anyone else, but they couldn’t do anything to her either, including get past her. Great for security in the only place on the planet where everyone commanded High Energy of a sort.

  Jackson walked through a sensor that looked strikingly like an airport security pass-through, then started down a hall. The floor was old terrazzo but gleaming clean. The walls were a governmental off-white and only interrupted by doors and windows with metal blinds blocking the view inside. He took an elevator then, down sixteen floors. Stepping out, he passed through another security booth nodding at a young, skinny man he’d never met before.

  “You’re new?” he asked with a smile, putting his hand out.

  “Yes, Mr. Rush, sir.”

  “Jackson.”

  “Oh I don’t know—”

  “Nahh, it’s cool. I give you permission to call me Jackson. What’s your name?”

  “Banks.”

  “Nice to meet you, Banks. You had to have done really well to be on this detail.”

  “Yes, sir, um… Jackson.”

  “And what’s your…”

  The young man put his hands out waist high with his palms facing downward. A bronze light, a dark brown flame almost, seemed to leap out of his palms and form a wall in front of his body. He raised his hands higher, and up the force field went. Jackson stepped closer and put a finger into the High Energy barrier. A faint buzz let him know how strong the Energy was.

  “That hurts,” he said with a slow smile.

  “Well,” Banks toed the tile at his feet, “It does for other people, y’understand. I wouldn’t expect…”

  “And you shouldn’t. Really, I could feel how strong and controlled the field was.”

  The younger man beamed at that. “I have to tell you, sir. It’s amazing meeting you. Amazing. We had like a whole chapter on you.”

  Jackson gave a faint nod of his head. He’d heard this before and was glad that no such course had existed when he was in training. Jackson proceeded through the double doors behind Banks. He took a right then entered the room to his immediate left.

  There was a tall, almost sickly slim man in a white lab coat, a pale blue button-down and khakis in the room. “What is it, Ronald?” Jackson skipped a greeting.

  The other man with pale yellow hair narrowed his light green eyes. “Tell your brother I said hi.”

  “Damn, Randall, sorry.” If Jackson didn’t know any better, he’d figure that a suggestion was causing him to call his co-worker by the wrong name. “What’s—” Jackson didn’t finish the question. For the first time he realized that the metal blinds covering the giant window dividing this room from the next were pulled up. He took a step back as a pair of huge, hot black eyes stared at him intently.

  “Why is he in holding?” Jackson snapped at Randall.

  “He got the rock and went ape shit.”

  “Nice,” Jackson scowled. “Leave it to you to put it in clinical terms.” He turned back to the window and looked in at the man who seemed to be staring directly at him, venom glazing his eyes. It was a man he had considered a friend, Thaddeus Okwenuba.

  “Well, I could get into the details, but as I recall, you’re not much interested in those.”

  “Sometimes,” Jackson conceded with a shrug as he continued to watch Thad, who seemed to be watching him back. He shouldn’t have been able to see Jackson through the glass. Jackson was quite sure that he could, though. High Energy sight was just one of Thaddeus’ Talents.

  “We need you to get the rock.” There was almost a play of a smile across Randall’s thin lips.

  Of course they needed Jackson to get the rock. Thad wasn’t even dangerous without it. He wasn’t typically dangerous with it either, but that was only after an initial release of stored High Energy. An astonishingly violent release.

  “Wasn’t it in containment?”

  “Yeah,” Randall answered. “It’s not now.”

  Jackson gritted his teeth then demanded, “Did you ask him for it?”

  “Um, no.” Randall responded with derision.

  “You can reason with him, you know.”

  “Um, no.” Randall repeated. “What I know is that you can’t reason with him, at least not yet.” Before Jackson could interject, he went on to explain, “Sure you can reason with him
and everything’s fine once he releases that initial bout of aggression. He hasn’t done that yet. He was about to do that. Don’t know how he even made it all the way here.”

  That was indeed a feat.

  What amazed everyone at the Service was that Thaddeus couldn’t seem to access his High Energy at all without the pebble. There had been no other cases, truly, where High Energy could only be tapped by use of an inanimate object. There had been plenty of cases where Shifters used inanimate objects—prisms, pools of water, seeds, even other people—as a focal point to enhance their Talents. Some naturally occurring objects had been found to have special properties that helped in that aspect. Yet hematite had not been established as one of those materials. There was absolutely nothing special about it. Nothing at all. That’s why it and its owner had been transferred into Dr. Sandoval’s care. The lab had tested it with every method they could and found nothing out of the ordinary. Heat, cold, elemental interactions, impact testing, microscopes and particle beams. Later in life, Thad, a Doctor of Physics in his own right, had even recommended half the tests. He had been as eager as anyone to discover the power the rock held over him. They’d even given it the ultimate test. They’d given it to the Precocial—Jackson had stopped just short of sleeping with the damn thing under his pillow—but nothing happened. The rock was nothing more than a piece of hematite that fit easily into the palm. Not even a subsonic hum. Still, without it, Thad—an untried teenager at the time—professed to be unable to use his Talent. So they tested him.

  Mental and physical stress trials represented the mission for the R&D division of the Service. They were structured to test all of the known types of Talent manifestations. Pyrokinesis, telekinesis, clairvoyance, regeneration, replication, the list went on and on. Parameters of Shift 101. They had a thousand tests to evaluate the 223 categorized Talents. These tests had shown no High Energy in the man without it. It didn’t make any sense, because the one thing they all knew for sure was that Thad was a dangerous man with the object and he was not even 50% assured to be able to control the strength of the Energy.