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Authors: Karina L. Fabian

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He felt a point against his back, more of a nudge, and he obeyed, following one of the warriors quietly. He, too, went into the plant, though he didn't marvel at the thought, so intent was he on trying to spot Deryl. Soon, he gave up looking; even if he had seen which way they'd taken him, the corridors twisted and branched so much he quickly lost his sense of direction. In a few minutes that seemed to last forever, they came to a large, leaf-shaped curtain. It folded away as if pushed by a gent
le breeze.

The guards shoved him into the ro
om beyond.

Chapter 4

Deryl awoke to comfort
and an incredible stillness. He couldn't define it, so he lay quietly, eyes closed, feigning sleep and basking in the peacefulness while trying to figure it out.

There was sound, but not the institutional noises of the asylum where he'd lived the last five years of his life, nor those of the hospital where he'd spent a brief week of freedom after his appendectomy. No sounds of rubber soles of nurses' shoes squeaking slightly on the tile, no metallic roll of a cart, none of the occasional moans or outspoken words of patients—only birdsong and a voice raised in wordless acco
mpaniment.

Not vocal
. Psychic.

Deryl sat up, eyes opening
in shock.

A dark-haired man in a green tunic with a red sash regarded him without surprise. He spoke directly to Deryl's mind, not in words per se, but Deryl understood him nonetheless
. I cannot tell you if you are home, but you are safe
, came the message, with a flash of wry humor and a gentle reassurance that then turned to subtle warning.
That is, as long as you mean no thr
eat to us
.

While trying not to be obvious about it, Deryl shielded his thoughts. He didn't know what this healer had learned from him in his drugged state, but until he knew more about these people, the less he told them about his past, the better. He merely reassured the healer that he felt fine and held no evil intent toward him
or anyone.

Nonetheless, the healer rearranged the pillows so he could sit more comfortably, gave him something resembling vegetable soup, and watched as he ate. Deryl sipped slowly, trying not to stare, trying even harder not to let his growing panic show. Where was he? Was any of this
even real?

Real or not, the soup tasted wonderful, and he finished it before he'd realized how hungry he was. The healer took the bowl wit
h a smile.

That's enough for now, or you may regret it later.
The thought entered Deryl's mind with ease.
Someone wishes to see you.
Wait here.

Deryl waited until the odd door folded shut, then let himself feel
his panic.

How had that man communicated with him like that? Quickly, he checked his shields, mental barriers he'd learned to forge over the years and had perfected with Joshua's tutelage over the past month. They were battered and worn down from the horrific weekend during which Dr. Malachai had kept him drugged. He shuddered. Anything could get through
them now.

So why wasn't he being bombarded with the thoughts and feelings of others? Why hadn't they overwhelmed him? Why was he still, w
ell, sane?

Or was he?

He recognized the uniform the man had worn—a warrior-healer, a specialty developed by the Miscria, using Earth's knowledge of triage and army medical techniques. Knowledge she'd taken from his mind by “Calling” Him out of reality and pestering him with questions he was compelled to answer—just one of the reasons he'd been admitted to SK-Mental, and one of the “delusions” that had kept him there for five l
ong years.

I banished her from my mind. Told her I was no longer the Ydrel, the Great Oracle come to save her with my wisdom. So why am I seeing her people?
He threw off the covers, discovering he still wore the jeans and T-shirt Joshua had helped him put on. How long had he been un
conscious?

What did Malachai give me, anyway? I'm hallucinating. Or maybe dreaming? Come, on, Deryl
, wake up!

He shut his eyes tightly, telling himself that when he opened them again, he would see the comforting blue and white walls of his room at the institution. Comforting! Despite himself, he laughed at the thought, but right now, even the padded pink room of the high-intensity ward would comfort him. Anything with straight lines, right angles, and familiar, human, non-psychic people. He fixed the sight, the sounds, the impressions, in his mind, then opened
his eyes.

Gently curved walls of a light greenish brown. A thick mat on the floor that served as a bed. A small chest that, despite its flat top, didn't have a sharp angle anywhere. A leaf-shaped window whose “glass” pane sported translucent veins. No sounds, no psychic buzz of staff and
patients.

“Joshua?” His voice sounded small and plaintive to his ears, and he bit down on his lips to prevent a panicked sob from escaping. Of all the staff at the SK, he trusted Joshua the most. If this was all fake, he'd help Deryl see it. And if it
was real…

If this is real, I have escaped and am on another planet, and Joshua
…Again, he saw himself holding a piece of broken glass to his friend's throat. Then that wrenching. If this was real, where was Joshua? Had he
hurt him?

Deryl realized he had wrapped his arms wrapped around himself and was rocking slightly. Was he doing it because, in reality, he wore a straitjacket? Is that what
he wanted?

He shook himself and stood. Barefooted, he walked to the open window. The floor felt smooth and a little soft, like no tile or dead wood could feel. He pulled open the strange window and leaned out, turning his head, wishing for the brick-and-mortar of the stately building of the asylum, with the well-manicured lawns of the courtyard jus
t outside.

Instead, he found himself on the second floor of a building like none he'd ever seen before. It seemed to be covered in a rough bark and decorated with large leaves…unless...were they growing on the walls? Or
were
they the walls? He looked past the grassy field to the tall walls that surrounded the complex a
nd gulped.

He knew those walls: how thick they were, the narrow passages between and inside them, the secret entrances. He knew, too, what defenses lay beyond, and even within the city, if there was one here. The Miscria had designed this keep using her knowledge of Earth battle defenses and medieval fortress con
struction.

He'd spent a year studying medieval architecture and history as well as defense strategies to satisfy her
curiosity.

Can this be true?
He ran his hand on the windowsill—rough on the outside, but smooth indoors, and a little warm. Alive. Real. Yet he could hear Dr. Malachai speaking to him in calm, reasonable tones. “Perhaps it was not the best of ideas to let our young intern try his Neuro Linguistic Programming tricks with you. With his one-size-fits-all-psychoses brand of psychology, he may likely believe that it makes no difference if your Miscria is real, as long as it allows you to…function…in polite society. But we do know better, don't we, Deryl? You'll never be truly sane until you accept this Miscria for the illusion it is. Yet, after a few short weeks with Joshua, your ‘it' has
a gender…”

More than a gender.
He shivered as he regarded the peaceful scene before him.
A city. Inhabitants. Infra
structure—

“Ydrel?”

A voice?

He whirled and gaped at the stern young woman standing at th
e doorway.

Th
e Miscria!

He backed up so fast his elbow slipped on the windowsill. If it was a w
indowsill.

Of course, it's a windowsill
, a voice answered in his mind.
Or are you back to disbelieving I'm real?
When he didn't answer, her exasperation turned to concern, and she spoke to him aloud. “Ydrel. Deryl. It is I, the Miscria. Tasmae, remember? It's all right. You are s
afe here.”

She moved toward him slowly, murmuring gentle reassurances and projecting concern, and he let her take him by the arm and lead him back to the bed. He sat down on the low mattress while she got him a drink—water, clearer and purer than any he'd ever known—then sat down on the floor in front of him. She waited until he'd slowly sipped the ent
ire glass.

“I'm sorry,” he finally said, surprised to find his voice sounded so steady. “I'm a little…disoriented. I'm really here? O
n Kanaan?”

“Yes.” She said, and smiled, though her eyes held worry. He felt her concern in his mind, but he fought the urge to answer in kind
. Not yet.

“How did I
get here?”

She shrugged. “Through the Void, I imagine, though how you managed it is a mystery. The storms in the Void are fierce; none can travel them right now. Perhaps that is why your recovery has taken so long. Or is it because of th
e poison?”

“Probably both,” he bluffed. He had started to feel more sure of himself, at least enough to think more clearly. He still wasn't ready to believe in this world, in this miracle. It was too much to think he'd escaped Malachai's clutches, that he'd found a world where being psychic was as natural as being able to see, where he wouldn't have to constantly guard against the unwanted thoughts and emotions of others. For the most part, anyway; he was still very aware of Tasmae'
s concern.

She watched him in that direct, probing way of hers. He stared back, taking in her features, searching for some clue as to whether or not she was truly real. Her long black hair, in a tight braid that curled around an elaborate headpiece he knew held a sheathed dagger, drank in the light of the room while her eyes, nearly as dark, glowed with intensity. Her alien features didn't quite meet the human standards for lovely—her face too narrow, her eyes too close together—but she had the most amazing cheekbones, and her body was attractive enough by Earth standards; at least, as Joshua had once told him, if you like Xena-body-builder types. He wondered for a moment what this Xena's skin color was; Tasmae was a lovely honey brown. He hadn't been able to capture that in the pencil sketches he'd made after taking Joshua's advice and confronting her in the Ne
therworld.

Do I look as I did in the Netherworld?
she asked telep
athically.

He nodded, feeling a lightheadedness that had nothing to do with drugs or hunger. Without quite realizing it, he answered with a telepathic affirm
ation.
Me?

She sent to him images of the Ydrel she had known in the Netherworld and how he looked to her now. They weren't too different—same shoulder-length blond hair, same sky blue eyes over a slightly sharp nose—but his Netherworld image was at once more ethereal and heroic. He wondered if he disappo
inted her.

She cocked her head, considering.
Perhaps it was my lack of skill. I have only been to the Netherworld to communicate with you, and until your suggestion, did not know it could be a place with scenery, objects, a
nd people.

And we're not in the Netherworld now?
he pressed, seeking some way to reconcile what he thought he was experiencing with what he thought should be reality. Perhaps what he'd felt was just her Calling him from cons
ciousness.

He sensed her negation, along with a detailed description of the keep where they'd brought him and what had
happened.

So, he
was
on Kanaan, physically as well as mentally—and he had traveled there by his own psyc
hic power?

She nodded.
And you brough
t another—

“Joshua?” He gasped in surprise. “He's here? He's a
ll right?”

“He's here,” She responded, following his lead in switching to spoken tongue. “Though I cannot if say he's all right. His behavior is
most…odd.”

“Take me to him!” Deryl found his shoes and slipped them on, trying to quiet the thundering of his heart. If anyone could help him figure all this out, it w
as Joshua.

But Tasmae did not move, nor acknowledge his demand.
Why are
you here?

He felt the force of her will against his weary shields, and strengthened them against her, meeting her will with his own stubbornness.
After I s
ee Joshua.

She met his stubbornness with her own. He didn't care. He concentrated on his friend as he walked to the door, hoping to sense his way to him if
necessary.

He had to see Joshua. Somehow he knew that the intern held the key to keeping h
is sanity.

Chapter 5

Joshua lay on a
bed too comfortable for a jail cell and stared at a wall too alien for comfort. Still, he preferred it to getting up and looking out the window. Through it, he had seen a hallway-sized branch that grew out of the side of the building, “blossoming” out into a low-walled platform that looked past the compound walls. In the dusty area below it, human-enough-looking aliens wearing thick, skin-hugging red outfits practiced sword-fighting skills with a seriousness that said it was no SCA get-together. Even now, he heard grunts and the occasional yelp, but no commands, no words at all, not in any language, and that struck Joshua as the most alien thing of all.

I am not going crazy
, he told himself again. Still, the psychiatric part of his mind warned him that if he didn't do something, he might fall into d
epression.

What could he do? Panic? He'd already done that, throwing himself against the leaf-like curtain, which was now as solid as any door back home. He'd pounded on it and shouted until his fists were sore and his throat raw. He didn't know if anyone had noticed, though once he'd calmed down, a warrior had come with food and two pitchers of water. With signs, he told him one was for was
hing only.

What could he do, cry? He'd done that, too, as soon as the warrior had left him alone. It had released his stress, but otherwise don
e no good.

Pray? He'd never prayed so hard in his life, starting with desperate pleas, gradually moving toward familiar prayers he'd learned in years of Catholic religious education—Our Father, Morning Offering, every mystery of the rosary. It had calmed him some, and he had begun to sing some of the prayers, comforting himself with the music, moving on to other hymns, then popular songs. He stopped when he found himself singing one Rique had written for Chipotle. Would he ever see his friends again? And what if he did get back, but too late for their
audition?

He'd reverted back to prayer before finally falling into an exhausted sleep. He didn't know how long he'd slept, but he woke lethargic and depressed and hungry. Food waited for him on the table along with a jug of water and a basin of wash water, but he hesitated to eat or drink. He had put his hands into the wash water and it had frothed like peroxide. Could he trust the food? He checked his watch, idly glanced at the angle of light coming in from the windows. This planet's days were a couple of hours longer than Earth's, he figured. He'd already been missing for twenty-
six hours.

Where was Deryl?
he wondered again. He shivered as he remembered his fiancée arguing with the chief psychiatrist.
What if Sachiko was right and Deryl's meds were too high? What if
he's OD'd?

He was going to throw up thinking about it. He had to do
something.

He could try one thing, ridiculous as it seemed. He shut his eyes and thought as hard as he could:
Deryl? Where are you? Can yo
u hear me?

“You don't have
to shout.”

Joshua yelped and sat up. At the door stood Deryl, his long blond hair a little disheveled, his blue eyes a little wild, but otherwise healthy and whole. Joshua froze, torn between the desire to hug his friend in relief and the urge to throttle him for getting him into
this mess.

“Oh, thank God!” Deryl exclaimed. “You need
a shave!”

Joshua blinked. Then he laughed, short barks that grew into whooping gales until he hunched over, clutching
his side.

“Joshua?”

“A shave?” Joshua managed to burst out. The psychologist part of him warned that he was bordering on hysteria, but he didn't care. It felt so good to laugh! “Thank God I need
a shave?”

A smile quirked Deryl's lips, but he spoke earnestly. “You don't understand. When I woke up, here, I thought—I thought I'd really go
ne crazy—”

“Yeah? Join
the club!”

“Well… they said your behavior has been kind of
erratic…”

Suddenly, Joshua realized they'd kept him under surveillance. Somehow, that made it funnier. He fell back against his sleeping pallet, rolling. Soon Deryl was lau
ghing too.

“'We come in peace' didn't work!” Joshua
sputtered.

“You're so scruffy! I never would have hallucinated you with two day's growth
of beard!”

“I'd have never hallucinated being a prisoner in a mandrake on
steroids!”

“A what
on
what
?”

Then neither could talk for their
laughter.

Finally, Joshua sat up, still chuckling, and wiped his eyes with the heel of his hand. “Whew! Deryl, I am so glad to see you. Now, let's go h
ome, man.”


We can't.”

The words bathed Joshua in ice water. The panic came back. “What do you mean, ‘W
e can't'?”

Deryl took a deep breath to calm the last of his giggles. “Joshua, I'm not even sure how we got here. Tasmae—Josh, she's here! She's real!—she said that no one can teleport right now. There are ‘storms.' I don't know, maybe you'd call them ‘anomalies in the space-time continuum'? I think the only reason we got here was because she was Calling me when I was trying t
o escape—”

The urge to throttle his friend returned with a vengeance. “Deryl, I want to
go
home
!”

“Yes. Okay. I know. Josh, I'm so sorry. I never meant to drag you into this. I just—I freaked. Malachai drugged me. He was going to convince my aunt and uncle that I was beyond help and I don't know what and…” He took a deep breath. “I'm sorry. I'll talk to Tasmae. I'll figure out what I did and how to get you home. I
promise.”

“Yeah, all right.” It was the best Deryl could do at the moment, and Joshua knew it. He leaned back against the wall—it gave slightly, as if thinly cushioned—and shut his eyes. He felt weary again, but a better weariness than the malaise of earlier. However, the headache that had been dogging him since yesterday made itself known in force. With one hand, he rubbed his temples. “So, what do we do in the
meantime?”

“Well, Tasmae's convinced you're
harmless—”

“'Mostly harmless.'” Joshua smirked, but fought back another bout of
laughter.

“What?”

“Never mind.” He hadn't lent Deryl a copy of
Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
yet. In the story, a researcher for the guide spent fifteen years studying Earth before changing its entry from “Harmless” to “Mostly Harmle
ss.” “So?”

“So we're guests now. I'm going to take the room next
to yours—”

“This isn'
t a cell?”

Deryl rolled his eyes, and it again struck Joshua how he and Tasmae both had that expression. “I'll have to be your interpreter until some of the others learn English. Tasmae, of course, already knows it
from me.”

“Could've fooled me. She never sai
d a word.”

Deryl shrugged. “This isn't an actual town. It's sort of a keep—a fallback if one of the nearby cities gets overrun by the Barins—that's the
ir enemy—”

“We're in a
war zone?”

“No. Calm down. The Barins—didn't I tell you this at SK-Mental?—they're from another planet, and for whatever reason, they only attack in waves with a long time—months, even years—in between. The Kanaan call it the Season of War. This is the Season of Preparation, so they're here checking the defenses, doing military exercises, and making sure the keep is ready just in case. Anyway, the point is, there aren't very many people here right now. They're only using the out
er areas.”

“The part that's a plant? We're really inside
a plant?”

Deryl's face split into a grin. “Cool, huh? No wonder I had such a tough time explaining mortar to them. Would you try to make a daisy chain with cement? Look, we've kind of put a wrinkle in their plans, so I think we need to just lay low and follow Tasmae's lead. There are mostly warriors here, with some support staff, and some of them are having problems believing I'm the Ydrel. And nobody knows what to think of you. Hey, you don't look
so good.”

The headache had him full in its grip. “Caffeine deprivation, probably. Dehydration. Hunger. Stress. What I wouldn't give f
or a D.C.”

“No Diet Cokes here, I'm afraid, but let's see what we can do about
the rest.”

Joshua didn't even bother to argue or nod, just stood—slowly, as the vise around his head tightened at the change in altitude—and fol
lowed him.

The door, which resembled a violet petal but had proved sturdy enough when he'd been banging his fists against it, folded up and out of the way, and they passed through to the smooth light brown corridors that he vaguely remembered going through two days before. Deryl walked with complete confidence, and Joshua followed. After the third turn, however, his curiosity got the better of him. “Do you know where we'
re going?”

“O
bviously.”

“And you've been awake and ab
out for…?”

“An hour or so.” The corridors forked, and Deryl took the
left one.

“So how do
you know?”

“Tasmae. I guess you could say she, uh, ‘flashed' into my mind a map of the outpost.” Deryl looked at his friend thoughtfully. “Well, not a map, exactly. Everybody here communicates telepathically. I think you've figured that much out, right? So she didn't tell me or even show me—she shared her understanding of the
outpost.”

“So you know everything she knows
about it?”

“Everything she wanted to share with me. Psychic communication is like verbal communication; when you communicate telepathically, you can usually share just what you want the other person to know. Does that make a
ny sense?”

“No. But maybe it will when my head stops pounding. In the meantime, we ought to come up with a name for telepathic talk. It's awfully awkward saying ‘psychic communication' or ‘communicating telepathically.' And let's not even get into Tasmae ‘flash
ing' you.”

Deryl snorted. “You can't be too sick, if you can make puns. Not illness sick, anyway. A
ny ideas?”

“Ask me after the local equivalent of ibuprofen kicks in.” Joshu
a groaned.

“Hang on, we're almo
st there.”

They passed through another, sturdier door. At first, Joshua thought Deryl must have made a wrong turn and ended up in a dormitory. It held none of the usual things he associated with an infirmary—no equipment, no charts hanging on the beds, not even privacy curtains. Just two men in green tunics and slacks sitting beside one bed, leaning in concentration over the leg of a young woman dressed in the same thick, skin-tight red outfit that passed for uniforms here. Sweat beaded on her pale face, and when one healer shifted slightly, Joshua saw why. A huge gash cut through her calf so that a meaty flap of skin and muscle hung loosely. The sight of it, combined with his headache, brought bile to his throat, and he quickly sat down on the nearest bed with his head in his hands, trying not to gag. He felt the bed give slightly as Deryl sat b
eside him.

Then he felt…something. He couldn't define it, but it teased at him through the pain of his headache, and he tried to concentrate on it instead. It was almost sound, almost touch, and it suggested comfort, like a soft pillow and low peaceful music did whenever he was sick with the flu. But just like when his mother turned the music too low, he strained to make out wh
at it was.

Deryl nudged him, and he looked up, moving his head as little as possible. The young woman was standing, balanced by the men in green as she put weight on her leg. She hesitated a moment, then nodded, smiling. They released her and she stood on her own, turning to give each one a quick hug. As she strode out of the room, Joshua took a good hard look at her leg. Where her flesh had been cleaved in two, there was now only a slightly pink area on her lovely skin. His ja
w dropped.

Deryl
snickered.

“Oh? Can
you
do that?” Joshua snapped at h
is friend.

“No, bu
t he can.”

Joshua turned just in time to see a pair of hands move toward his face, and the sensation he'd only vaguely felt earlier flooded his awareness. If what he had sensed before had been quiet music, this was like standing in front of the speakers at a major concert. He could feel the power of the healer, beating in time with his heart, his very cells joining in the harmony. His headache washed away
in glory.

A momentary prickling in the back of his skull, and as suddenly as it had engulfed him, the sensation of power vanished. He swayed in it
s absence.

“Whoa.”

Deryl and the healer steadied him. “Are you okay?” De
ryl asked.

“Yeah. Great. What a rush. Can we do it again?” He felt giddy and
unfocused.

The healer laughed. “You are very sensitive to healing power. You are a healer in your wor
ld, then?”

“No way, not like that!” But then he stopped, considering. His mother's friend, a local Reiki master, insisted Joshua had power and had invited him to train with her. He recalled, too, just how deeply he'd gotten inside Deryl's head when circumstances had driven the psychic client into catatonia. “Well, maybe. I can't say
for sure.”

BOOK: Mind Over Psyche
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