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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Rodrigo Istalindir" data-source="post: 1867084" data-attributes="member: 2810">Round 2.4 -- Rodrigo Istalindir -- "Mind over Matter"Prague had been a nice place, before the war.  Five years under the Nazis hadn’t broken its body, but fifteen years under the Soviet heel had nearly crushed its spirit.  The city had the gaunt look of a terminally ill patient, and about as bright a future.  That young firebrand from the States’ bold proclamations in Berlin might play well to his constituency, but here they seemed like the hollow promises of a lover slinking out before the dawn.  He’d written a dispatch warning them their President would be dead before year’s end, and then threw it into the fireplace.  They’d never listened to him before.And yet they had reached out to him.  For a decade he’d scanned the classifieds in the [italic]Hospodárske Noviny[/italic] every day.  At first it was a matter of training and professional pride.  Now it was just another habit he was too old to break, like the American cigarettes that cost him an arm and a leg on the black market.  The first day he’d seen the notice, he’d dismissed it as a coincidence.  Families lost pets every day, though only those belonging to Party functionaries would merit a ‘lost and found’ notice.  But the same notice had been there the next day, and the day after.  Today he’d hurried to the newsstand at daybreak, anxious to see if the second part of the signal was there.On page 4 of the classified section, an innocuous advertisement confirmed the contact.  An ad for a refrigerator would indicate a blind drop.  An antique samovar meant ‘run’.  ‘Bicycle’ was code for ‘meet in person’.  FOR SALE:  Red child’s bicycle.  Good condition, some scratches, no rust. 20 rubles.  Call RVB-220 or come to Husova 5, Staré Město, Prague 1.  He knew the phone number would be non-existent, and should anyone trudge halfway across the city for a cheap bicycle, they would find a confused and bike-less homeowner.  But the numbers were significant in other ways.He stopped at a café, bought an overpriced cup of terrible coffee, and pretended to read the newspaper.  ‘220’ signified the time of the meeting, and ‘Staré Město’ meant the Charles Bridge.  During the summer, at two-twenty in the morning the bridge would still be crowded with young miscreants looking for trouble and young lovers with nowhere else to go.  This time of year, the cold wind blowing down the river would make it deserted.  He finished his coffee and returned the cup to the counter.  He threw the newspaper in the trash and left.  With some chagrin he realized he’d have to take a nap this afternoon if he expected to be alert for the meeting.  They never told us, he thought, about how to be spies when we got old.  Probably because they never expected any of us to live past thirty.♦He parked his beat up old car several blocks from the bridge and began walking towards it.  He was early, but he doubted any of the city’s police officers would be out in the cold looking to accost loiterers.  There was a slight chance that this was a setup, that some double-agent in the United States had sold him out to the KGB, and he wanted a chance to observe from a distance before walking out to the middle of the bridge.He found a dark alleyway that looked out on the entrance to the bridge.  The span was only intermittently illuminated.  The city’s power plants should have been replaced before the war, and streetlights were often turned off the save power as well as the bulbs that were in perpetual short supply.  (Picture 1)He huddled in the cold, his eyes wandering from one end of the street to the other, his mind wandering back to the past.  ♦He’d been twenty-three years old when they’d first contacted him.  He had been performing in a small theater downtown, a hole in the wall sandwiched between a rowdy pub and another venue where bored women pretended to disrobe for family men who pretended to still care.‘Anders the Amazing’ had been his stage name, and he’d done three shows every weekend.    The first half of his show was a competent if uninspired selection of traditional magic tricks – sawing a woman in half, pulling a rabbit out of a hat, all of the classics.  In the second half, he performed mentalist feats of he’d devised himself, and the greatest trick of all was that there was no trick.  Precognition and remote viewing were what the OSS agent who recruited him had called it.  The intelligence agency of the United States had scoured Europe for people with these talents, putting together a special cadre, the Omega group, that they hoped would give them an edge in the impending conflict.   From the first there had been conflict between two groups in the project.   The scientists who had proposed it in the first place believed in the unnatural talents their students seemed to possess, but the agency bureaucracy didn’t, and had agreed to recruit Anders and the rest because they believed that Hitler took it seriously, and were keen to deny him anything he wanted.There had been twenty of them at the start, but only five had remained after tests and exercises had separated those with true talent from the pretenders.  Only Anders had performed consistently enough to be relied upon.He’d spent the early part of the war in England, interrogating prisoners, reading communications intercepts, staring at photos in an attempt to discern what was occurring at some distant battlefield.   More often than not they asked the impossible and were disappointed or angry when he could not provide what they wished.  The program was on the verge of being shut down when the OSS had gotten wind of a Soviet counterpart to the Omega group. Sensing an opportunity, they had smuggled him back into Prague.  They provided him with a cover story to explain his absence, and waited.  It didn’t take long.  Whether it was a Soviet sympathizer who remembered his act or some other event he didn’t know, but within a year he was living the life of a double-agent, reporting the actions of the Soviet Imstreny Otrad, the ‘Mind Squad’.♦Movement on the bridge caught his eye.  A solitary figure walked into the light, pause, and then moved further along the bridge into the shadows.  He waited, and when they were not revealed by the next streetlight down, he realized that they were waiting.He stepped cautiously from the shadows and walked to the bridge.  Their was a bitter wind, and he wished they had picked a warmer location.  He passed through the nearest light, forgetting to close his eyes to protect his night vision.  He nearly walked into his contact before he saw him.“Anders,” said the figure.  It was a statement, not a question.“Yes.  Who are you?”“You know better than to ask that.  You’ve been out in the cold for a long time, Anders.  We appreciate you coming here.”“I’d thought you’d forgotten about me.  I waited for instructions once they shut down the project but I never heard…” Anders trailed off.“Yes.  We thought it best to keep you in place, on the off chance that the Soviets decided to try something like Imstreny Otrad again.  And it looks like they may have.”“Three weeks ago, a scientist key to the Soviet missile program decided to defect while in Berlin.  With our help, he slipped his handlers and was a hundred feet from the West when he stopped dead in his tracks.  He trembled briefly, then fell to the ground dead.”“Three days later, the two agents who arranged the defection died the same way.  No signs of poisons or other biological agents.  One of the agents died during debriefing in a safe house, surrounded by a dozen people.”“No signs of foul play, no medical cause of death that we can determine.  It’s like someone just flipped a switch.”“Why do you think IO might be involved?” Anders asked.“This,” the agent replied, handing Anders a photograph and illuminating it with a small flashlight.Anders looked at the photo.  It was blurry, taken from a distance and blown up to focus on the face of a young man.  With a start, Anders realized who it was.“Alexei?  Alexei Padronov?  I almost didn’t recognize him.  He was still a boy when IO was disbanded.”“Yes, we almost didn’t make the connection.  We showed this photo around where the scientist was killed, and a waitress in a café recognized him.  We think he caused the death of the scientist and both agents.”“How?  Alexei was a distance-viewer.  He had a touch of telekinesis, but only at very close range.”  Anders said.“To the best of our knowledge, he never got closet than a hundred yards to any of the victims.  Could he have acted at that distance?” the agent asked.“No, not unless he’s gotten a thousand times stronger than when I knew him.  But even, there would be signs of trauma.  Damage to the heart, a brain hemorrhage, something.  Touching something by TK is no different than using your hand.  There is still force involved.”“Maybe it’s something new they’ve dreamed up since you left.  In any event, we want you to investigate. Padronov will be performing in Prague this weekend.”“He’s a dancer with the Bolshoi, now, isn’t he?”“Yes.  Good cover for an assassin, if you ask me.  The Bolshoi is very popular in the West, and the top dancers visit ballet troupes throughout the world.”The agent handed him an envelope.  “Here’s a ticket to the Saturday night performance.  We don’t need you to make contact with Alexei, just look around and see if any other former IO agents are nearby.  If they are, that will be enough for us to confirm that the Soviets are into the paranormal again.  I’ll contact you next week.”♦The Prague State Opera House was packed.  Anders handed the tuxedoed usher his ticket and followed him down to his seat.  He felt out of place.  He suspected that he was the only person in the audience that wasn’t a Party functionary, absurdly wealthy, or both.  That the arts were out of reach to the common man in the Worker’s Paradise was a clear sign that the country had traded one set of masters for another.The lights dimmed, and the dancers began their performance.  Anders had never had any interest in the ballet, but he was entranced by the grace and athleticism of the dancers.  Different members of the troupe performed, but Anders never saw Alexei or anyone else he remembered from IO.The lights dimmed to rapturous applause, then came back to fully illuminate the venue.   Anders realized that it was the intermission, and he decided to return to the lobby and observe the crowd.The rich and famous graced the lobby, the constant murmur of conversation punctuated by the clinking of champagne glasses and polite laughter.  Anders stood to the back, eyes poring over the crowd.  He was about to give up, ready to report to the agent that there was no sign of IO involvement, when he spotted a woman across the room staring at him.Valentina, the IO agent that had recruited him.  Her presence here couldn’t be a coincidence.  He feigned puzzlement, as if he recognized her but couldn’t place the face.  Then he smiled, and went across the room to greet her.“Valya!  How have you been, my dear,” he gushed.Her expression froze for a split second before being replaced by an enigmatic smile.“Anders.  You look wonderful.  I can’t believe it’s been ten years since I’ve seen you.”“You are as beautiful as always, Valya.  It is good to see you.  When did you move to Prague?”“I didn’t.  I work with the ballet, as a travel coordinator.” Valentina said.Travel coordinator was the title given to the agents of the KGB assigned to prevent embarrassing defections, Anders knew.  “How wonderful for you.  You must get to see so many interesting places.”“And you, Anders?  Are you still performing in that dreadful cabaret?”“No, no, Valya, not anymore.  I’m afraid I have a boring desk job, shuffling papers for the Ministry of Agriculture.”“How sad, Anders. We should have never lost touch.”Anders wondered what she meant by that.  He and Valentina had never been that close.  Her minor paranormal talents had kept her from being more than a handler for the other agents.  This might be an opportunity to insinuate himself into the new program.“Well, Valya, it’s not completely boring.  I still know how to take advantage of my training.  That’s how I got this ticket, as a matter of fact.”She raised her eyebrows in an unspoken question.“I won it in a craps game.  I’d planned on selling it – I never much cared for ballet – but I figured this might be my only chance to see it.”“Really, Anders, cheating at gambling?  You could have been so much more.”The lights dimmed, signaling an end to the intermission.Anders kissed her on the cheek, and stepped back.  “A pleasure, as always.  We mustn’t let another ten years pass, Valya.”“You are so right, Anders.  I’ll be sure to get in touch once this tour is over.”♦Anders returned to his seat.  The second half of the performance was better than the first, and he began to reconsider his preconceptions about the ballet.  Then the lights dimmed again, and a single spotlight illuminated the stage.  It widened slowly, to reveal two immobile figures dressed in black and white.  The curtains parted to reveal a pure white background.  In total silence, the two dancers began to perform.It was unlike anything Anders had ever seen.  They seemed to defy gravity, soaring and tumbling.  (Picture 4 -- Dancers)  One of them must be Alexei, he thought.  As he watched the performance, his initial awe gave way to understanding.  Alexei’s TK had gotten much stronger, he realized.  He was using it to extend his leaps and to steady his balance, and to enhance the performance of his partner as well. Anders’ train of thought was broken by thunderous applause.  He looked at the stage in time to see the curtains close on Alexei and the other dancer.He could do it, he thought.  If he’s strong enough to move two grown men, he could probably exert enough force to kill at a distance.  The doctors investigating the assassinations must have missed something.  It wouldn’t take much to cause an aneurism.  ♦Anders was awakened by the cold press of steel under his chin.  His heart pounding, he opened his eyes and tried to shout, but a strong hand clapped down over his mouth before he could make a sound.  The face of a stranger leaned close, eyes dispassionate, almost reptilian.  Anders felt a gentle tug at his neck, and realized that the intruder had cut his throat.  He had a brief moment to marvel that it hadn’t hurt at all before the darkness claimed him.♦Anders jerked upright, gasping.  His hands went to his neck, feeling for the gaping wound he knew must be there.  Feeling nothing, he turned on the light next to the bed.  The white sheets spread out before him were unsullied with blood.It had been a long time since he’d had a precognitive flash this strong.  Typically, the strength and clarity of the visions were proportional to how far in the future the events occurred.  His killer might be in the house even now.  Anders turned off the light and climbed quietly out of bed.  He hoped no one had noticed the light go on and off.  He gathered the clothes he’d left on the chair and entered the hallway.  Moving quickly, he went down the back staircase to the kitchen.  Senses heightened by fear, he heard the knob on the front door jiggle as someone worked the lock.He tip-toed to the door leading from the kitchen to the back yard.  He turned the key slowly, and eased the door open.  He dashed across the yard and into the darkness beyond.♦Anders sat in a café in Wenceslas Square across from the Jalta Hotel, face hidden by a newspaper.  The hotel was the best in the city, and he knew the Bolshoi performers would rate the best accommodations.  Valentina’s job would require her to stay here too.There was no hidden message in the paper.  Anders needed to get in touch with the agent, persuade him to arrange for extraction.  He wondered if the attempt on his life meant that the operation was blown, or if it was just Valentina acting on her own initiative, suspicious at his convenient presence at the ballet.Valentina appeared at the entrance to the hotel.  He saw her stop to talk to the doorman, than head off on foot across the square.  Anders smelled fresh bread. Odd, he thought.  This café was too small to have a bakery.He tasted fruit, although he’d had nothing to eat since the day before.He smiled.  The excitement was honing his precognitive senses, and he knew where she was headed.  He waited a few moments to make sure she wasn’t being watched, then hailed a taxi.  “The Party Market” he told the driver.The Party Market was a weekly spectacle.  Open only to members of the Party, it was the place where the wives and servants of the powerful shopped for the fresh foods denied the rest of the city.  She must be meeting someone, he thought.He had the driver drop him a block from the entrance.  Relaxing, he let his re-awakened sense reach out.  He closed his eyes, and saw the guard at the side entrance shout as a small girl spilled cocoa on his uniform.  The guard turned away to grab a rag to wipe off his uniform.Anders opened his eyes and moved towards the side entrance.  Ahead of him, he saw the small girl being dragged along by her nanny.  The girl tried to pull away, and her arm flew backwards, splattering brown fluid all over the hapless guard.  Timing it perfectly, Anders stepped through the doorway while the guard reached for the cloth.Anders moved through the market, picking a spot where he could watch the bakery unobtrusively.  He didn’t have to wait for long.  Valya appeared from the crowd, moving nonchalantly towards a large display of freshly baked breads and pastries.   (Picture 3 - Bread).Here, he though, her contact will meet her here.Watching out of the corner of his eye, Anders saw a man pick up one of the loaves of bread and inhale deeply.  He put the loaf down, picked up another, and moved to the cashier.  Valya, stepping in behind the man, picked up the discarded loaf.  Anders could see where the crust had been broken.  She moved to the cashier, and Anders noticed that the other agent had already left.  Valya paid for her bread, then headed for the main entrance.  Anders waited several minutes, absent-mindedly perusing the merchandise while he tried to figure out why Valya would be acting as if she were an agent in hostile territory.Not Valya, he realized.  The other agent.  She couldn’t meet the other agent directly.  With a sinking feeling, he realized they had been compromised by a mole.  The other agent must have alerted IO that Anders had been reactivated.That means the agent who contacted me is probably already dead, he thought, and there’s no one who can help me.Feeling the first stirrings of panic, Anders made his way from the market.  He couldn’t go back to his house, and that meant he couldn’t get his car and try to get out of the city.  His only choice was to get to the American consulate, try to use his talents to sneak past the police and plead for asylum.He hailed another taxi, and gave him an address a few blocks from the embassy.  Riding in silence, he tried to relax, hoping another flash would show him the correct path.Getting nothing, he looked out the window and realized they were heading away from the embassy, back towards the Jalta Hotel.“Driver, you’re going…” he started, and then stopped when he saw the drivers eyes in the rearview mirror.  The same eyes he’d seen in his vision the night before.“Just relax, traitor.  I’m under strict orders not to kill you.  Yet.  But I can hurt you if necessary.”The taxi pulled up to the curb on a side street near the hotel.  The driver got out, making sure Anders saw the gun under his coat.  He opened the door, and pulled Anders from the back seat.  Keeping a firm grip on his arm, he steered him to the entrance, across the lobby, and to the elevators.Anders was desperate.  If they got him alone, they’d kill him for sure.  But his talent failed him; no visions of doom or salvation flashed before his eyes.The elevator opened, and Anders was ushered inside.  The scent of lilacs filled his nose, and he noticed that there were small flower-filled vases on the walls of the lift.  The assassin pushed the button for the penthouse suite, and the elevator rose silently.Reaching the top, the doors opened, and Anders was escorted past several guards into the penthouse.  Despite the fear that threatened to overwhelm him, he couldn’t help but be awed by the decadence that surrounded him.  Gold filigree graced every fixture, and expensive oil paintings adorned the walls. Persian carpets covered the fine wood floors, and across the room, butterflies flitted about a glass enclosure that doubled as a window looking out across Wenceslas Square.  It must be heated, he thought, and laughed inwardly that he could be appalled at such extravagance when faced with his own demise.He noticed two large wingback chairs set in front of the butterfly cage.  The one on the left was occupied, a man’s arm visible as it reached out and picked a porcelain teacup from the end table. “Welcome, Anders.  It has been far too long.  And allow me to congratulate you.  Going undetected all this time is quite an accomplishment.  “A pity those in the IO with some telepathic skills were always unable to read the thoughts of those with our unique talents.   It would have saved so much effort.”“Alexei,”  Anders started to speak, and then stopped.  Pleading for his life was pointless.  They wanted him dead, otherwise they wouldn’t have dispatched a killer to his home.  This little play must be Alexei’s way of toying with him before he had him killed.“Good, Anders.  No begging.  I’m glad to see you still have some dignity.  Please, sit with me a moment.  If you would be so kind as to answer a couple of questions, I can promise you a painless death.”Anders sat in the second chair, eyes focused on the butterflies.  “Tea?  No?  Very well, suit yourself.  It is quite good, though.  Not the dishwater you’re used to, I expect.”“So, Anders.  I have but two questions for you.  First, were there any others in the original IO cadre who were in the pay of the enemies of the Rodina?”“Not that I know of.  They wouldn’t have told me if there were, and I never had reason to suspect otherwise.”  Anders said.“Yes, I expected as much.  Still, one has to ask.  A man will do most anything to save his life, and there was always the chance you knew something.”“My second question.  How did the Americans come to suspect that IO had been revived?”“You were too good, Alexei.  You left no trace, no indications as to why those men just dropped dead.  One unexplainable death might be ascribed to bad luck, but three?  Your pride in your new skills gave you away.”“Answer me this, in return.  How did you do it?  I saw your performance.  Your TK has gotten incredibly strong.  I can see you are capable of reaching much further than we ever suspected was possible.  But how did you kill them without leaving some trauma?  There wasn’t even any internal bleeding.”“Anders, Anders.  If only you had thought more about your gifts.  You always saw them as separate functions, crude replacements for physical skills.  If you wanted something dead, all you could think to do would be to crush it like an insect.”Alexei pointed towards the butterfly cage.  Anders’ eyes followed, and he saw a brilliant butterfly, its wingspan six inches across, freeze in mid-flight.  (Picture 2- Butterflies)  It hung there for a split second, then collapse in upon itself as if crushed by an invisible fist.  The ruined creature fell to the ground.“But if you use your remote viewing to spot the perfect place to strike, Anders, you can replace brute force with finesse.”In the cage, all of the remaining butterflies fell to the bottom without warning.  There was no sign of damage to their frail wings and delicate bodies.  An uneducated observer would have sworn that some invisible gas had filled the chamber and killed them.“The human body is so fragile, so balanced.  The tiniest nudge, say to the valves of the heart, at just the right moment, and the body collapses like a house of cards.”“Now, Anders, our little demonstration is over.  I’m afraid you won’t be able to experience my little trick personally, as I’m sure your TK skills are still sufficient to protect you.  But I doubt they are sufficient to stop a bullet to the brain.”“Please, enjoy a last cup of tea.  It is really quite exquisite.”Alexei placed his cup on the saucer sitting on the table and stood.  “Gregory, please see to it that my old friend enjoys his tea, and then kill him.”Alexei leaned over the back of Anders’ chair, looking over his head at the dead butterflies.“No last words, Anders?  Very well.  I bid you farewell.  Come, Valya, I wish to visit the museum before we leave for London.  I hear Sir Alec is going to be in attendance.  It’s not every day one gets to perform for the Prime Minister.”“Let me get my coat, Alexei.  I’ll meet you at the elevator.”  Valya replied.“Don’t dawdle, dear.  Gregory has work to do.”Anders jumped as Gregory approached, but the killer only filled the second teacup and handed it to him.  Anders inhaled, the aroma of the expensive brew, and tried to calm himself.  Behind him, he heard the door to the penthouse close as Alexei and Valya left.The smell of tea was replaced by the smell of lilacs. Anders willed himself to relax, extending his paranormal senses outwards.  He saw the hallway outside, saw the elevator doors open, saw his former colleagues enter the small enclosure, saw them press the button that would take them to the lobby.  “Hurry up and drink your tea.”Gregory’s voice was faint and distant.  Anders watched the elevator doors close.  Reaching out with his mind, he pushed the ‘Elevator Stop’ button and held it down.  He saw Alexei press the ‘Start’ button to no avail and then begin pounding on the doors.  Valya looked terrified.Anders shifted his sight upwards, towards the cables that held the elevator suspended in the shaft.  His TK wasn’t nearly strong enough to break the cables.  He looked closer, and realized that the thick metal cords were actually composed of smaller, braided cables.Focusing even closer, he could see the individual wire strands, so thin, so fragile.  Reaching out with his mind, he drew an imaginary blade across the cables, the razor thin edge of telekinetic force slicing through the metal fibers.  He felt the sudden release as the cables severed, and he shifted his vision to watch the elevator car plummet to the earth.   The car hung in midair, not moving. Anders began to panic, then realized there must be a failsafe measure in case the cables snapped.  He looked again, and saw the tension lever that had released when the cables snapped.  He seized the lever with his mind, vertigo nearly overwhelming him as his point of view followed the doomed car earthward.  “Ok, that’s it.  If you don’t want your last drink, that’s your problem.”  Gregory’s voice snapped him back to the penthouse.The assassin stepped around the chair, gun drawn.  He worked the action on the automatic pistol, and smiled at Anders.Anders smiled back, and stopped Gregory’s heart.He’d always been a fast learner.</blockquote>

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