Chapter 55

Another couple entered the sauna -- Toby and Amy. They'd been keeping an eye on Tina and Alonzo, given Tina's earlier concerns. When Bernice and Randy wandered into the whole Cindy and Beverly thing, they decided that direct intervention was required.

"Mind if we barge in?" Toby asked.

It was clear to Tina that something was up. It was also clear to Randy and Bernice. "Should we stay?" Randy asked. Tina took notice of another indication that Toby was more than he seemed to be...

"I think you should," Toby ventured, "but you can do as you like. We'll be answering some questions that are important to you, though." Randy passed a glance with Bernice and settled back, pulling her against him.

Toby addressed himself to Tina. "I know you have a lot of reservations. We're doing the best we can, but it's not always easy. We would like your input -- but first, we have to ask for your permission to do whatever is necessary to ensure the security of the group. Can we have that?"

Tina frowned. 'This sounds serious... ' "What -- like shoot me?"

"No, nothing like that!" Amy erupted. "It's just that there seem to be more people to protect every day, so we need your cooperation. You're asking questions that we can answer for you, but those answers are going to be surprising -- and, well, very few people know EVERYTHING..."

Tina pursed her lips. "Maybe I shouldn't."

"Maybe you should," Toby insisted. "We don't have much, um, outside governance. Your opinion matters."

"All right," Tina nodded. "You have it."

"I need yours, too, Alonzo -- and yours." He nodded at Randy and Bernice. "You guys in particular know so much already..."

"I'm game." Having seen Toby in action, Alonzo had every confidence in him.

"We've been in for a while," Randy rumbled.

"Yes." Bernice nodded.

"Okay." Toby gathered himself. "The security of the group, officially, has been based on initiations -- we generally collect what amounts to blackmail material on what we would call full members. You two..." he waved at Alonzo and Tina, "really aren't full members -- and Tina isn't at all, but she's kind of probationary. Bernice and Randy really let their hair down too far with you guys, although we had your promise not to tell anyone anything. But promises -- even adding blackmail -- aren't enough for some people. The group's REAL security rests on something else..."

Tina cocked her head. "And that is?"

"Amy and I read minds."

"Yeah, right!" Tina erupted. "I made promises not to tell people THAT? They would think I'm nuts, anyway!" She crossed her arms over her breasts -- and Alonzo's hands. "Prove it!"

Toby locked eyes with Amy and took her hand, then said, "This is what happened to Bernice at the camp."

Tina couldn't move -- but her senses were flooded with sensations and thoughts that she KNEW weren't hers! Hands were on her; Tyrone was touching her, rubbing her pussy and her left breast -- saying things, putting ideas in her head. Otis White put his cock in her hand. She tried to move, but just gave Tyrone more room to work ... Then somehow she was sucking Otis' cock and Tyrone ... Several guys lifted her into the air, maintaining her squat; she seemed to be frozen, unable to move! They dropped her -- on a cock! She was fucking -- or being fucked -- and she was sucking -- and she couldn't seem to do anything about it! Tyrone's voice and his hands on her kept her calm, resigned to what she was doing, even though it was too much, too alien...

Suddenly, she was back. Clutching Alonzo's hands to her, she gasped, "How did you do that?"

"We pulled it from Bernice's mind," Amy replied, "and projected it. We've never done it before, but there seemed to be no better way to get past your skepticism."

"So you CAN... !"

"Yes. It's limited. I only read girls and Amy only reads boys. Together, though..." Toby replied. "Bernice's run-ins with Tyrone were not her fault; Tyrone has a primitive telepathic power. Actually, he has two different things going for him, since his body odor contains pheromones that tend to arouse a certain percentage of girls."

"We discovered the problem when Bernice came to us, bothered by having done things she just didn't understand," Amy related. "We found what amounted to big, dirty footprints in Bernice's mind. Tyrone knows he has a power and he's slowly learning to control it -- but because he was fumbling in the dark, he left a mess, sometimes. It's not new -- it seems like every telepath makes mistakes, initially, including both of us. Otis tended to make it worse by more or less using Tyrone's powers to implant suggestions of his own. We're, well, controlling things, somewhat, by limiting Tyrone's sphere of control -- tuning him to a smaller group of women, I guess you'd call it. But he needed a full-time distraction and Cindy and Beverly were riding roughshod over Anita and the girls in the club -- among a host of others -- and the other cheerleaders were caught in the crossfire, so..."

"You used him," Tina finished.

"Um, I prefer to think that we took two potential problems and used them to neutralize each other, like a chemical reaction," Toby replied. "But I can certainly see how maybe we went too far..."

Amy nudged Toby mentally and presented an issue. Toby said, "Hey, give us a minute -- it looks like we may have overdone it with the guys..." Tina looked up at Alonzo and he looked glazed. Bernice did the same with Randy and detected the same thing. "Guys experience sex differently than girls. I'm used to it, but it was a shock for them -- and Bernice was more or less raped."

"More, rather than less!" Tina erupted.

"Yeah..." Toby agreed. Amy said nothing; she was buffering what was more or less an overload. Alonzo came back first, clutching Tina, but Randy was almost inconsolable, gasping out, "I've been SUCH an asshole!" while cuddling Bernice to him.

"You didn't know, Randy," Toby insisted. "You couldn't. And, really, we couldn't tell you..."

"Well, maybe, but..." Randy shook his head.

"It's okay!" Bernice insisted. "It's over. We're together. You didn't know -- but you gave me a chance, anyway..."

"Yeah, well..." Randy hugged her to him. Bernice was plenty happy with THAT!

"You can't just be judge, jury and executioner like that!" Tina exclaimed, going back to Cindy and Beverly. "Those boys RAPED them!"

"Yes, they did," Toby admitted. "But Tyrone buffered the worst traumatic effects while instilling the lesson..."

"Which was?"

"That they weren't any better than anyone else," Toby replied. "Cindy and Beverly thought that they were entitled -- that the rules existed for other people, but not for them. Their rich families buffered them from the consequences of the things they did. They did a LOT of bad things and they just had no fear of the consequences. That has changed..."

"That kind of thing is for the law to handle!" Tina insisted.

"The law couldn't touch them," Toby protested. "Look what happened when they attacked Anita! Their parents intervened and they got a slap on the wrist when someone else would have been expelled! They didn't even lose their positions as cheerleaders! Nothing short of murder was going to get them into serious trouble -- and that would have been too late for them, as well as their victims! This worked -- and as it turns out, it was a measured response..." Faced with Tina's disbelief, Toby transmitted a gestalt of Cindy -- just to Tina, this time. "This was Cindy."

Tina was amazed! It was like a sewer in there! And yet, it matched Cindy's behavior perfectly! "Omigod! She was really like that? Can you lie?"

"I couldn't fabricate anything that detailed," Toby denied. "Self-centered, selfish, demanding, vindictive, hateful -- she put her so-called friends through hoops daily! And if you weren't a 'friend', you were TOTALLY beneath her notice..."

"Okay, but -- Tyrone?" Tina asked.

"Tyrone isn't as bad as you might think," Amy replied. "And this actually gives him an opportunity to do good, both for himself and for her."

"But he damages people!"

"In our limited experience," Toby replied, "EVERY telepath damages someone before he or she learns to control their powers. It's sad but true -- both of us made mistakes. We've ... limited him -- and what he did for Cindy and Beverly is proof that he has gained some control over his powers -- even if he still doesn't really understand them."

"What ELSE have you done?" Tina asked.

"Well, there's a laundry list, actually. Some of it was before I understood what I had, really. Amy helped with that -- we've been cleaning it up. And there was the rescue of Maddie Reyes' family from her abusive father ... We tried to teach him a lesson, but it turned out that he was a long-time psychopath, so we found a way to get him to reveal himself to the authorities. And there is Julio Vasquez..." Toby sighed. "We could go into it all tonight, but it's late. The point is, no one but the people in this room KNOW what we can do, although I think Damian has suspicions regarding me. But we have a power -- and power corrupts. It wouldn't hurt if we had a second opinion, to help keep us from going to the Dark Side."

"I couldn't stop you," Tina pointed out.

"No, sorry -- maybe it isn't fair, but it's the way it is. We can't GIVE you what we have -- and if we did, it would probably add to the problem," Amy noted. "But we're both trying to do right -- and we'll listen."

Tina pursed her lips. "So what DO you do to add to the group's security?"

"We implant and inhibition not to discuss it with outsiders," Toby replied. "We always get permission first, now, but I guess it wasn't always like that. Even so, there are slip-ups -- like tonight."

Tina pursed her lips. "So before, when you asked me to cooperate, you placed a block." She couldn't find it in her head... "I don't like that."

"I didn't, either," Amy replied, "but even blackmail couldn't keep SOMEONE from going to the authorities on no notice and destroying a couple of dozen lives."

"Blackmail?"

"Members agree to be ... compromised ... for the good of the group. We set it up as a process that could be followed if something happened and we were not around," Toby replied. "Actually, some of the members ARE members because they were compromised before..."

"They agree to this..." Tina eyed them dubiously.

"Yes. Voluntarily, if they want to be full members," Toby replied. "I can't think of anyone who is a member who doesn't think the benefits outweigh the risks."

Tina sighed. "There's a lot to take in."

"Several hours' worth," Toby agreed. "Tonight isn't the night. But we'll do it..."

"Obviously, you're going to have to do something to keep us from talking..." Tina mused.

"I don't want to know," Alonzo erupted. "If Tina wants to do this, that's fine -- but I can't pass judgment, and this stuff makes my head hurt."

"We can fix it so you don't remember -- or only remember when one of us brings it up," Amy offered.

"I'll take that," Alonzo agreed.

Amy turned to Randy. "Randy... ?"

"We know too much already," Randy waved it off. "Now we know a little more about why and how, but if you think of the stuff I've seen, driving that van ... I'm cool."

"You guys saved my life," Bernice declared. "You kept me from going crazy, anyway, and rescued me from being a street hooker ... I'm in."

Tina turned to Alonzo. "Alonzo..."

"You can talk to me about it if you need to -- but I've been to a bunch of the group's parties and I really don't want to know if I made someone do something they didn't want to." He turned his attention to Toby. "About 'M'..."

"All totally voluntary. You did her a world of good, in fact," Toby assured him.

"Okay."

Tina was charmed that Alonzo's conscience bothered him. "Tell me?"

"'M' is a nickname, obviously," Toby related. "The older women in the club tend to go by their first initial at parties. 'M' was very shy -- and a victim of abuse by her husband. Alonzo was very gentle and romantic with her and I think it was good for both of them. I KNOW it was for her."

"She's Maddie's mother, then," Alonzo made the connection.

"Yes," Toby agreed. Backing off a bit, he said, "We may have ruined your evening, but it seemed like these things were coming out on their own -- and maybe hurting Alonzo, who doesn't deserve it."

Tina looked up and over her shoulder at Alonzo. "I think it will be all right. I think I've had enough heat, though..."

"The Jacuzzi is that way," Toby grinned, pointing. "And there are rooms all over the place."

"So you guys just have sex anywhere?" Tina asked.

"Yeah, it's kind of wide open," Toby replied. "The old place was small, and most of us have seen each other. We just had some mattresses and stuff and part of the whole deal for new members in particular was doing it in plain sight. That's why that wild stuff at the diner happened, more or less. Damian and Alyssa are old news and Mac and Donna started out at a party..."

"So now there is plenty of privacy..." Tina began.

"But tradition is to let it all hang out," Toby finished.

"Well, I might like that -- after the first time," Tina murmured. "Do you mind getting wild?" she asked Alonzo.

"I've done it -- but it isn't very romantic," Alonzo muttered.

"Well, sometimes we don't want to be romantic -- but this time..." She snuggled back against him.

"For sure!" Alonzo agreed.

"Why don't you take a nice shower together and find a room, then?" Amy suggested.

"Good plan," Alonzo agreed. "Come..." He got up, displacing Tina and forcing her to stand, took her hand and led her out.

"So..." Amy looked at Toby, "Is she going to be trouble?"

"No -- at least, not for history, I don't think. New projects..." Tina would take convincing regarding the Bitch, no doubt.

"Well, maybe we shouldn't do it."

"She's almost as bad as Fernando, though, isn't she?" Toby mused.