Chapter 9

Author's note: The author is well aware that the origin of the QWERTY keyboard, as presented in this chapter, as well as the claimed greater efficiency of the Dvorak layout, is disputable. As stated before, this story takes place in a fantasy world – so let's just say that in this particular universe it's true and leave it at that.

The next day I was up bright and early to see what Santa brought me. Christmas morning has always been a pretty quiet affair at my house since it was usually just my mother and I. I hadn't expected this Christmas to be any different, except for my new found exuberance for life, but when I came downstairs I found Alek sitting in my living room with my mother. That sort of spoiled the mood for me. I more or less trusted Alek now – since my mother did, but I still didn't like him very much.

"Merry Christmas, kid." He said by way of greeting.

"Is he living here now?" I directed this at my mother

"I told you that school would start today."

"But, mom, it's Christmas."

"It's just another day to those of us in the trenches, kid."

I ignored Alek. "You're back to yourself now, mom, why don't you train me?"

"Because Alek has always been better at it than I am – much better, like Phillip."

"Except I'm not a fucking assassin."

"Right, except he's not a fucking assassin. Look, I haven't used what psychic power I have in over eHetwelve years. I'm out of practice."

Alek stood. "I think I'll go for a walk while you talk to him." He addressed me as he passed on his way to the door. "I'm your best shot, kid. If you want a chance of taking out Phillip, hell, if you want to survive, you need me."

I snorted derisively in response.

My mother gave him an apologetic look as he left.

"You really should be nicer to him, Jake. He's right, you know. You won't find a better mentor."

"I think I was doing just fine with Phillip. Obviously he doesn't know about Alek. Why don't I just keep training with him and turn the tables once I've learned all I can?"

"You were doing great at learning everything he was willing to teach you. But, didn't you ever wonder why he left the direction of your training up to you?"

"Because he promised to teach me whatever I wanted to know? He never refused to teach me anything I asked about."

"Did he ever volunteer anything? Did he ever introduce you to something that you didn't know about – or thought to ask about?"

Parts of the previous night's conversation came back to me.

"You mean like knowing if someone is lying or not?"

"Right, he didn't know of you could do it or not, so he avoided telling you anything blatantly untrue, but he never asked you if you could do it, because if you couldn't he didn't want you knowing about it. He's always been like that. It's how he tries to keep his edge over the talents working with him."

"What makes you think Alek won't pull that same shit?"

"Because Alek needs you. Alek needs both of us. He's not going to take any chances by leaving you ignorant." She looked thoughtful for a moment; "You won't find anyone better at offensive or defensive combat. The only person I ever knew who was as good as him was your father. Alek will make sure you know everything you need to give you your best chance of survival. I can help you with the telekinesis, but Psychics have always taught that side of it."

"But he's such an asshole."

"I admit, he's changed from before, but try to understand how difficult the last decade or so has been for him. He has seen a lot of friends killed. His social skills may be off, but he is the best. Phillip won't be out of the picture either; we have to keep on as though nothing has changed so he won't be suspicious. If he figures out what's really going on he'll have an enforcement team on our necks in a heartbeat – so I hope your acting skills are up to it."

"Won't he notice the changes in you?"

"As long as he thinks you are still going along with the program he'll leave me alone. It's sort of a rule with the talents. If you leave the other guy's friends and family alone it avoids messy altercations in which one or both talents end up dead. So I really do hope your acting is up to snuff. If you don't think you can pull it off, just say the word and we'll disappear right now."

"I think I can do it. What if you monitor him and we can work out some sort of signal to warn me if he is getting suspicious?"

"Won't work, why do you think he hasn't read your mind? We can feel it when someone tries to get into our head. Being able to resist another's control is a matter of experience, level of talent and force of will, so the strongest wins, but even weak talents can sense when someone is in their head."

"But we could still do the same thing by watching his body language."

We discussed how we would try to deceive Phillip as well as how we could clandestinely communicate in his presence. A few semesters previous I had taken a crime and punishment class and done a report on psychic scams (which I was beginning to rethink now) and how the teams communicated with body language and subtle gestures. We had a pretty good plan worked out by the time Alek came back.

"Look, kid," he said as he came through the door and shrugged off his coat, "when I left earlier I said that you needed me, and you do, but the truth is, I need you as well. If you are any where near as good as your dad, with my training, we'll really give 'em hell."

"I hope you aren't planning on stirring up the same shit you and Joe stirred up twelve years ago." My mother cut in before I could say anything. "All that did was get Joe killed. I will not feed my son into that meat grinder."

"Do you think the only thing I've been doing for the last twelve years is hiding? I built an entire network of contacts and safe houses. All those small independent groups that have been fighting the status quo for years – and dying in the effort – are now united. The differences have been ironed out and we are all cooperating." As he spoke, Alek's demeanor shifted from somber and matter-of-fact to an animated passion. "You wouldn't believe it, Reeny. It's everything we always dreamed of." He sobered quickly. "But there are still some of the same old problems."

I was curious, but I was concerned as well. I had figured out last night that this was serious business. But listening to what Alek was saying made me wonder, not only what I was getting into, but with whom.

"I have some questions." I said, getting to my feet to face Alek. "First, what is this network of small groups you're talking about, what 'problems' are still plaguing it and last but definitely not least, what the hell are you trying to do?"

Alek and my mother exchanged a long look.

"I trust your judgment, Reeny."

"It's 'Maureen, ' and don't worry, he's a good kid, you can tell him everything, I know what he'll do."

"Then you better get us a couple of cups of coffee because we are going to be here a while." He then addressed me, "You should probably get comfortable."

I took a seat next to the Christmas tree and he sat opposite me on the sofa. My mother patted me on my shoulder and headed into the kitchen.

"Okay," he said leaning forward, "let's find out what I don't have to tell you."

I filled him in on what Phillip had told me and when I was done he grinned sardonically.

"Well, all that's true as far as it goes. He told you that they try to maintain the 'status quo' in order to protect our secret. Didn't you wonder what he meant?"

"Not really, it made sense when he said it. I assumed he meant that we stay out of things as much as possible."

"That's what he wanted you to think. It's more like," he paused for a few moments, looking thoughtful, "have you ever wondered about the keyboard layout on your computer? You know, why the letters are arranged that way."

"Everyone knows that. What does that have to do with this?"

"Humor me, kid, why is it laid out like that?"

"As I heard it, the early mechanical typewriters would get bound up when the typist went too fast so the keyboard was rearranged to slow things down."

"Have you ever heard of a Dvorak keyboard?"

"I'm a nerd," I chuckled, "of course I have. It's supposed to be more efficient."

"If it's more efficient, why haven't we switched over to using it more than the old Qwerty boards?"

"I don't know, probably the training costs are too much, replacing all the hardware would be a pain in the ass and unless everything went over it would be too hard to try and work with both layouts, like one at home and the other at school or work. We probably could if there was a big enough call for it."

"In other words, it's not worth the time, energy and money it would take to switch everyone over to a new layout. There are bigger problems with computers and such wouldn't you say?"

"Pretty much, I guess."

"What if all the other computer issues were resolved? What if everything computer related was going perfect? Do you think folks might start noticing that their keyboards suck?"

"Probably, people always need something to bitch about."

"So. In that event, it just might be worth all the time, energy and money."

"Yeah, I suppose it would, and I think I see where you are going with this. As long as there are big enough political, social and economic problems people will are less likely to notice weird things happening around them. I don't know, I would think people would still notice someone meddling in world politics."

"It's all in the distractions. Enough stupid or weird shit that happens in the world, the less folks think about the stupid or weird shit the politicians are doing, or even what stupid or weird shit may be happening right in their own neighborhood. Shit, you think that McVeigh dildo thought up bombing a federal building all on his own? Nope, some asshole talent had gone nuts in that area. That idiot talent was taken out pretty quick but a lot of folks were paying attention to things that should have been impossible – most of them in that very same federal building."

"You mean we do things like that?"

"We don't, Phillip and his ilk do. They just love finding paranoid, racist or just plain whacko groups and spinning them up into homicidal fervor. Where the hell do you think terrorist groups come from? And that's just the recent stuff. You wouldn't believe what they've done. Back in the sixties the government was conducting research on ESP, they were getting pretty close to the truth too, so do you know what the Powers Behind the Throne did in order to divert government money and attention away from it? Of course you don't, they started the God damned Vietnam War! It's pretty fucking easy to start a war when you have talents in several different countries working together to make it happen. And it worked too. Most of the money that was supposed to fund the research went to the war and it was relatively easy to manipulate the results with fewer people paying attention. That's just the tip of the iceberg, kid; they do that sort of thing all the time, terrorists, wars, assassinations, serial killers. They control money, policy decisions even who gets allowed to run for office in countries that have elections. In countries that don't, they control the state security. Hell, I would bet that they are behind every single coup that has ever happened. Just think about all those despotic tin pot dictators in those little countries who brutalize their people for years or decades, then one day that situation becomes cause celeb' and our military heads over to free the poor people of lower butt-fuckilvania from their evil ruler. They have dozens of those guys out there just waiting for their turn to be a distraction. And, they do it all so the world stays fucked up, and they stay safe."