Chapter 5

Regardless of Phillip's morals, or lack thereof, he was true to his word and showed up that Saturday to commence my training. He explained that there were two types of talents – psychics and telekinetics. Psychics have powerful telepathic and empathic abilities, but have only weak or, mostly, nonexistent telekinetic skills while the telekinetics, like me, could do amazing things to the physical world with our minds but only had rudimentary psychic abilities requiring much more concentration and effort in order to get the effects a psychic would get with just a momentary thought.

With that in mind, over the next several weeks he taught me that controlling a subject's mind was much easier than reading it. That explained the difficulty I was having picking up the thoughts of others. He got me started on some meditation techniques designed to help with the level of focus required to consistently read minds without detection. However, that aspect of training promised to be a long and drawn out process. I would do the meditation on my own time. With Phillip, the attention was on containing my own energies properly and focusing any commands in a tight, undetectable manner directly into the subject's mind.

Since Philip wasn't a telekinetic there wasn't much he could do for me there other than some basic theory. As I had already figured out, telekinesis was very useful in the area of personal combat. The problem was that Telekinetics (usually referred to as TK's) were vulnerable to Psychics. Therefore Telekinetics almost never attempted a raid on other talents without a Psychic along. Usually, they would form up in duos, the Telekinetic providing a shield against physical attack and the psychic keeping any other psychics busy, thereby protecting the Telekinetic from a mental attack – leaving him (or her) free to throw blunt (or sharp) instruments around the area.

Unfortunately, in the world of talents, the Telekinetics hugely outnumber the Psychics so the size of any raiding party was limited by how many Psychics were available.

"Barring the element of surprise, any lone Telekinetic wouldn't last ten seconds against a good Psychic," explained Phil, "but against a Telekinetic/Psychic team, any lone Psychic would quickly be pummeled to death. Teamwork is the key. Success in combat depends on the Telekinetic and the Psychic being able to work together. The more in sync the team is, the more successful they will be."

"Isn't TK good for anything other than violence?" I asked, somewhat dismayed that my primary skill couldn't be put to more productive and less destructive uses.

"You are only limited by your imagination." Phillip grinned, "I've known TK's who used their skills to make money by fixing sporting events – you know, the ball takes a bad bounce, incomplete passes, that sort of thing. Casinos used to be a big money maker but these new slot machines are all digital now. Still, there are some who get pretty good at craps and I even knew of one quick-eyed chap who could manipulate the outcomes on roulette wheels. For the most part though, TK tricks outside of combat are simply done for convenience or entertainment."

"Well, I wasn't really thinking of a way to make money. It's just a little disappointing that all I'm really good for is muscle."

"Hey, that's just in the area of talents vs. talents. When it comes to normal people your telepathic abilities are more than enough to be useful. You can't make changes as quickly or thoroughly as a psychic, but frankly, it's only the rare occasion that calls for quick or drastic action. I certainly hope that you don't harbor any reservations about using your skill in combat though – you may indeed be called upon to do so."

"I don't know. I was a victim of bullying all my life, so I always thought it would feel good to be on the giving end of things. But it just made me feel ... uncomfortable.

Phillip's usually amicable countenance darkened slightly, but only for a moment.

"In all those years of being bullied, didn't anyone stronger ever intervene on your behalf?"

"Yeah ... a few times."

"That's what you would be doing for us. Intervening for the greater good."

"But only once did it involve violence, the other times all it took was talk."

"Yes, but the talk was backed up by a credible threat of violence."

"Right, so what you're saying is that the more power one has, the less likely that actual use of that power should be needed."

"But only if the possessor of that power has demonstrated that he is ready, and more importantly, willing to use his power."

"It just seems ... I don't know ... like there's a better way."

"Well, I'm sure that when the time comes, you will do the right thing." Concluded Phillip in a tone that told me the discussion was over and the day's lesson was to be continued.

I just hoped that when the time came, I would know what the right thing was.

The second week of December found Samantha and I sitting in my family room talking and I was ready to resume project Samantha.

In one sense I already had. As my final exam in 'command and control' I had, under the watchful eye of Phillip, caused Samantha to forget her decision to dress down in my presence. She still remembered the kitchen and what happened, but nothing about her decision. The result was almost immediate. Since I wasn't trying to change anything basic to her personality, but simply returning her attitudes to a previously held state, it didn't require the gradual conversion I had been employing with her other changes. She, more or less, forgot about her decision. Phillip confirmed that major changes in thoughts or beliefs needed to feel natural to the person or they just wouldn't last.

"You can do pretty much anything over the short term and make the person forget," he had told me, "but if you want the change to be permanent you have to make sure there is a logical and gradual progression from the old attitude to the new one. For those of you with limited psychic abilities, the degree of change and the number of aspects that need to be addressed dictate the length of time the conversion will involve."