Chapter 11

Saint Francis, Catholic Girls School

Counting Olivia’s class of thirty fifteen year olds, there were a little over two hundred fifty students ranging in ages from twelve to eighteen at Saint Francis. It turned out that Saint Francis had really changed since June had attended it. Where the old school had been rural, just outside the city limits, this school was deep in the woods, miles away from anything. There was a strict visitation rule in place at this school, and holidays were strictly regulated too, but there was never a complaint from any of the students or parents for that matter. The parents that did make arrangements to visit during the year were all impressed with the changes that had come over their former problem child. None noticed anything unusual to report.

The normal gestation period of a human fetus is 40 to 42 weeks or approximately 10 months. Checking we found that the, let’s call it the Agency, was taking the fully matured child after 280 days like clockwork. They could calculate everything so precisely because it was done in-vetro. They didn’t have to wait to discover they had conceived, it was a sure thing.

Saint Francis being a year round boarding school, Kate and Whitney were already carrying another child. Olivia was beginning to just show and she was not allowed to leave the school grounds with June, her legal guardian, any more. In fact the school imposed it’s strict visiting rules on June and Ann. Rules which were in the contract June had signed with the school. Nobody was particularly worried because Olivia’s link to the Hive was still strong.

Olivia meanwhile had tested the other girls and herself and found that everybody at the school refused to believe they were pregnant. Though we could make Olivia face the fact she was carrying a child now in our lunch time debriefings on the link, as soon as we dropped the link she reverted to her default state of, I’m not pregnant and I don’t look like a blimp. Olivia’s unflattering description of Kate and Whitney weeks ago.

Robbie and the Builders were still working on some way to get us onto the third floor, so far without any success. The Agency, when it came out of it’s third floor hideaway, were always in their cloaks which made our video and audio worthless. Whatever the material that the school was made of effectively blocked all our snooping efforts. Attempts to quietly drill holes in it failed to even scratch it, the diamond drill just slid off it, and the laser didn’t even heat it up. Even the Builders were impressed with the material, which said a lot.

Since we were in AE3 we informed RE and the Organization of Assassins of this new development, He thought it sounded a lot like they were just using a good hypnotist to control the girls. At first we all laughed at his suggestion. After all we use hypnosis all the time, especially in the Fairy Tale Treatments. He argued that there is a big difference between that and true hypnosis. In our case all the Girls wanted to be hypnotized, in fact loved to be hypnotized and cooperated.

RE said that originally their organization used the methods developed by Franz Mesmer back in the last part of the 18th Century, and refined in the early part of the 19th Century before the practice fell into disfavor with the legitimate medical community. The German physician, who had an obsessive interest in astronomy, astrology, and the occult, theorized that there is a natural energetic transference of energies that occurred between all animated and inanimate objects. A transference of energies he called animal magnetism. Sometime later others referred to his technique of inducing a hypnotic trance as Mesmerism.

RE claimed that true Mesmerism is not voluntary. True Masters of the Art possessed a natural abundance of natural animal magnetism that they can use to induce a deep trance in others any time they want. Since the Art depends on being born with a natural abundance of animal magnetism most Western doctors dropped it in favor of simple hypnotism which any competent medical practitioner could become competent with after a little study. Mesmerism became one of those Eastern Mystic Arts that were discouraged and it’s practitioners actively attacked as charlatans and frauds by the illegitimate Western medical community.

“So you believe that we’re dealing with Mesmerism here RE.” I questioned.

“Using Oscans Razor, that the simplest answer is usually the best. Then yes. Your Girls are being Mesmerized.” He answered.

“But wouldn’t they know it. I mean we all know that Harry is hypnotizing us, and what we do while we’re hypnotized.” Ann stated with conviction in her voice.

“Well technically you remember what I want you to remember Ann. There’s this somnambulistic aspect of hypnosis that I have never been real big on. Some people are naturally somnambulistic. They can go so deep you can have them forget they were even hypnotized.” I hedged.

“Can you do that Harry?” Ann asked.

“I guess I could Ann, but where would the fun be in that. I wanted you all to remember how good it felt. I didn’t want any of you to forget what was done to you, or forgive the ones that took advantage of you. I just wanted all of you to come to terms with it.” I laughed.

“That’s the difference Ann. You know what he does! You want it! He wants it! Mesmerism on the other hand depends on the person doing it to use his natural animal magnetism to overwhelm your defenses. There’s no consent involved.” RE explained.

“Can you do it?” Harry wanted to know.

“No, I can’t, but Sensei could.” He answered mater of factly.

So at that time C Pod, Cherry, China, Crystal, Cheryl, and Clara where given a new job. Find out if there was such a thing as Mesmerism.

“And what did you find out Cherry.” I asked a week latter when we had our weekly updates meeting. Still nothing had come of watching Saint Francis, and we were afraid to use anything that could be considered hostile to investigate it. We now knew, through the use of passive receivers, that the underground part of the school extended out maybe two thousand yards from the school itself. Most of it like the spokes on a wheel. Then the rim connecting it all together like a wagon wheel.

“First I think that China needs to update the Hive and our other partners on what we’re done to contain the situation.” Cherry informed us all.

“What do you mean, “to contain the situation”.” Ann wanted to know.

“Hey, when this started we wanted to find out what was happening to a few girls. Now we have an entire underground city to deal with. This complex has to be regarded as a hostile force. Think of this! What if it’s really a space ship...” Pandemonium broke out in the meeting and on the link.

“A space ship ... what kind of space ship?” Everybody wanted to know.

“Your thinking like back in the old days. All space ships have to look like a Bob. They don’t! We’ve proven they don’t! Turn on a shield and you have a space ship.” Cherry paused to let that sink in.

“Let me take it from here Cherry,” China started off. “We started researching what was here before the school. I admit we thought we would find old mine shafts or something we could use to explore the city, or whatever it is under the school. Imagine our surprise when a thirty year old National Geographic map showed a mountain. A very large mountain I might add. Me and the Pod started thinking. What if we wanted to hide our ship. After all you had just set up PFEDAMS, the prison planet, so we started thinking. That’s what they did. They scooped up the mountain and then reburied their ship and built the school on top of it.” She paused and looked at all our still shocked faces.

“Now ask yourselves, what happens if we spook them, or go in guns blazing.” She asked.

“They ... they ... they’d turn on their shield ... and ... and ... leave.” Ann finally got out. It’s a hard ideal to get your brain around. After all we were the only ones with shields right. Well apparently not anymore.

“That’s what we thought too, so we asked the Builders and Robbie how to stop them from leaving...” I interrupted.

“But nothing can penetrate a shield.” I started.

“But You Can Disrupt A Shield Before It’s Established.” China said, using her hands to make gestures around each word. “No shield, no ship, no fast getaway.” She finished.

“We had Bob to fabricate an automatic disrupter and planted it at the school. They won’t be going anywhere now.” Cherry added.

“Now let me start laying out what we’ve learned about Mesmerism.” Crystal started. Another one of C Pod heard from. “I’ve set up a few visual aids to help me explain Mesmerism, so lets get started.

They started off their presentation with a movie clip from the comedy version of the James Bond movie Casino Royal where the Villain Orson Welles does his magic act.

“That’s how we imagine Mesmerism to be Master. So far every woman we’ve shown this to almost has an orgasm, every male hated it and expressed feelings of inadequacy after watching it. The women want a strong dominant male, the men reacting to a rival male.” Crystal paused, and Cheryl took over.

“But what if it’s more? There have always been the Jung archetype of the Superman. A being that is the next step above man. What if it’s an evolutionary improvement. What if that animal magnetism is that missing extra factor to having Homo Superior.” Cheryl hypothesized.

“So you think Mesmerism is real and this Agency has it.” I asked.

“Yes, and having studied the alterations to the DNA they are making we think they are trying to make a true slave race...” Cheryl continued.

“A slave race?” Ann questioned.

“Our experts and the Builders agree that those targeted genes in the fetuses are related to what our scientist have identified as related to strong ESP. This Agency is making them recessive. In fact trying to remove them.” China added.

“Why would they want a slave race if they can do what your saying they can Cherry,” I questioned.

“Maybe where they come from everybody has this power Harry.” She laughed.

That made sense. We didn’t know what the Agency is, but it has become time to find out. So with counter measures in place we went to visit Olivia.

Upon arriving at the school’s door we knocked and were finally met by one of the teachers and taken to the Head Mistress since we didn’t have an appointment. Shortly thereafter Olivia showed up. Her baby bump was a noticeable bump now. When she walked through the door I shot the Head Mistress and Ann shot the Teacher escorting Olivia with sleep darts. We didn’t know if they were part of this or not, but we wanted them neutralized. At least the Agency couldn’t use them against us if they were asleep.

Next we proceeded to the hallway elevator arrangement to the third floor. We were hopping to get their attention without causing a panic. Maybe we could reason this thing out, whatever it was, like reasonable men, ha, ha. Thirty minutes later nothing had happened so I knocked. After working over the photos of the hall and questioning Olivia we knew where the cameras had to be. I took a package out and placed it under were we knew the elevator was. It had a blinking red LED and large LED countdown timer. Pressing the button the timer started counting down from 60. At thirty a loud speaker activated and announced that they would talk to us. We were told to return to the Head Mistress’s office and wait. I turned off the device and went back. Since we had not been contacted I assumed everything was ok with the Girls.