The Mutant Mindbender

[Note: This is not a sexy story. It is more like a 1950's pulp science fiction novel]

[Note: This is not a sexy story. It is more like a 1950's pulp science fiction novel]

Chapter 3: Who is Albert Wender?

Chapter 3: Who is Albert Wender?

"He was always a good little boy," said Mrs. Wender.

"Really?" said Croft. Croft, Preston and Agent Waverly were sitting in the household of Albert Wender's parents. Mrs. Wender was a kind looking woman with a thick line of bright red lipstick drawn in a circle all around the edges of her face, from above her eyebrows on her forehead around the sides of her eyes to just below her lips on her chin. She also wore her underwear on the outsides of her pants.

"Yes, he was a good kid, wasn't he, Danber?" said Mrs. Wender.

Mr. Wender, seeming to awaken from a slumber, said, "Yes, yes he was." He was dressed in an old fashioned clown suit, complete with an orange nose and painted eyebrows.

"He has two assaults on his record," said Croft.

"Oh, the charges were dropped on one of those," said Mrs. Wender. "And he was just a kid then."

A chair faced away from all the participants in the conversation. Over the top of it the back of a head could be seen. Croft and the others didn't give it a second glance.

"I see here he was 28 and 31 years old for each arrest," said Croft.

"Barely out of childhood," said Mrs. Wender.

Croft eyed their unusual dress. "Mrs. Wender, have you seen your son recently?"

"Why no," said Mrs. Wender, a frown forming which caused a crease in some of the lipstick that circled her face. "Why do you ask?"

Croft looked at her outerwear and her husband's clown suit. "We'd like to talk to Albert. Do you know where he can be reached?"

The chair facing away from them slowly spun around. The nondescript man was sitting in it. He stared right at them.

Mr. Wender, sitting just a few feet from this occupied chair, said, "No, sorry, we don't know where Albert is."

Croft and Preston exchanged glances. "We know your son left the Exploration Service recently."

The nondescript man leaned forward in his chair. No one noticed.

"Yes, that was a tragedy," said Mrs. Wender. She shook her head. "What terrible negligence."

"Negligence?" said Croft.

"The negligence of his crew," said Mrs. Wender. "If they hadn't been incompetent, they wouldn't have died."

"Really?" said Croft. "Tell me more about this incompetence."

The nondescript man stared sharply at Mrs. Wender.

"Well... I wouldn't know anything about it," said Mrs. Wender.

"Then how would you know it was negligence?" said Croft.

Mrs. Wender paused noticeably for a moment. Then she said, "Albert told us it was, shortly after the accident. Didn't he, Danber?"

"Yes, that's what he told us," said the man in the clown suit dully.

Croft exchanged glances with Preston and Waverly. These people were obviously under mind control. If that was the case, Wender could be here, in this very house! They should search the house-

"Are you sure he's not here?" said Croft.

"I'm not here," said the nondescript man, in a soft, hypnotic voice. "I'm long gone."

No, on second thought, there was no need to search the house, Croft realized. Wender wasn't here. He was long gone. Croft saw Waverly and Preston nod in agreement.

"Yes, I'm sure," said Mrs. Wender. "I would know if Albert was here."

Croft looked befuddled for a moment. Then, he recovered. "Ah... yes... where was I?"

"Asking about Albert," said Mrs. Wender.

"Yes, about Albert." Croft tried to concentrate. What had he been thinking? "So what else did he say to you about the accident?"

"He didn't give any other details," said Mrs. Wender. "He didn't want to talk about it."

"You should be going now," said the nondescript man.

"We should be going now," said Croft. "Thank you for your time."

As they left the home, the nondescript man followed them. When they got outside, Croft turned to Preston and Waverly. "Impressions?"

"Obviously they were under mind control," said Preston.

"Yes," said Preston. "Wender must have been there recently. It's a shame he wasn't there when we visited."

"Yes," said Croft mechanically.

"Perhaps you should take the parents in for an examination," said Agent Waverly.

The nondescript man said something.

"No, I don't think that would be useful," said Croft. "They will probably just be like Greens and the others."

"You're probably right," said Agent Waverly, wondering why he had suggested it.

"So what have we learned?" said Preston.

"Well, I think if Wender had this skill all along, I think someone would have noticed his Dad wearing a clown suit before now," said Croft.

"So this tends to confirm our working theory that whatever happened to Wender, happened to him on his last mission," said Preston.

"Yes," said Croft. "Let's go have a talk with the Exploration Service, shall we?"

They got into their hovercar, Croft and Preston in the front and Waverly in the back. Waverly moved over so the nondescript man could also get in. He stared intently at the others in the car.

As he drove, Croft said, "I'm Clifford Croft, with the Column."

The others said nothing. The nondescript man looked at Preston.

"I'm Agent Preston, with the Column," said Preston.

"I'm Agent Waverly, with the June Directorate," said Agent Waverly.

The nondescript man looked at Preston. "Croft is in charge because he's one of the Eight."

The nondescript man looked at Croft.

"I'm a top level one agent, one of the best," Croft said.

There was another pause.

"We think he can read and control minds. We're looking for him," said Croft.

Another pause.

"We found him because we spotted him on holorecordings with the victims," said Croft.

Another pause.

"We don't know what we'll do when we find him. We'll probably have to lock him up, at a minimum," said Croft.

There was a longer pause, and Croft blinked. "This isn't the way to the Exploration Service. I've been going in the wrong direction." He grimaced, and made a turn at a corner, heading in another direction. "What were we talking about?"

Waverly shrugged. Preston stared blankly.

"Well, there is one thing we learned from the Wenders," said Croft.

"What?" said Preston.

"Wender said in his report that he had amnesia, that he didn't remember what had happened on his mission," said Croft. "But according to his parents, he told them that his crew's death had been caused by their negligence."

"He knows exactly what happened," said Agent Waverly.

"That's the logical conclusion, yes," said Croft.

"But what could happen to a person to give him the ability to control minds?" Preston asked.

"A good question," said Croft.

The nondescript man sat back in silence.

They reached the ornate headquarters of the Exploration Service, a large building with elaborate fountains in front of them, as well as a quarter scale model of a classic Explorer class vessel. They were small, three or four man ships, but designed to travel long distances in the vastness of space.

Commander Ornat Rentlo had been Albert Wender's superior. He was also one of the officers on the commission investigating the causes of death of Wender's fellow crewmembers.

Introductions were made courteously. Croft was relieved to see that Rentlo was dressed and acting normally, no clown suit, no overblown makeup, no underwear over outer garments. The nondescript man looked around but didn't find a chair available. Waverly decided to stand up and lean against a wall. The nondescript man took his seat.

Croft started the questioning. "We have your written report," said Croft. "But can you tell us in your words what happened?"

Rentlo nodded. "We sent a standard Explorer class vessel to an uncharted section of space. The trip was supposed to take two weeks, and the crew was supposed to spend about a month exploring before returning."

"Those ships must be quick, if they can get out of known space in only two weeks," Croft remarked.

"They are. Explorer class ships are built for speed," said Rentlo. "Most of the entire ship is engines, leaving little space for the crew. That's why we only fit three or four in a ship, and even then it's pretty cramped for them."

"So what happened with this crew?" Croft asked.

"They were two weeks overdue, and we hadn't heard anything from them. We were planning to launch a rescue expedition, when Wender's ship appeared in the main ship lanes. A League light cruiser boarded it, and space marines found Crewman Wender, unconscious. There was no sign of the rest of the crew," said Rentlo.

"And the ship?" Croft asked.

"There were no signs of struggle, or forced entry, or battle," said Rentlo. "The ship's log noted that the ship headed towards the assigned sector on one trajectory, made a few course corrections, and then returned."

"That's it?" said Croft. "There was no record in the ship's log of landings on any other planet?"

"No," said Rentlo.

"No records of sensor blips, maybe intercepts with other ships?"

"No," said Rentlo.

"No unusual stellar phenomena, radiation, or anything unusual?" said Croft.

"No," said Rentlo.

"So if the ship never landed anywhere, what happened to the crew?" said Croft. "How did they even get off the ship, unless they simply stepped out of the airlock?"

Rentlo paused before answering. "We simply don't know. A few weeks later we sent a followup ship on the same trajectory as Crewman Wender's ship. It returned a few days ago without reporting anything unusual."

"And what of Wender himself?" Croft asked.

"Aside from his amnesia, he was perfectly healthy. No sign of any trauma or drugs in his system. He remembered going out... and then he remembers coming back."

"Did he seem odd, or changed?" Croft asked.

Rentlo paused. "No, not changed."

"That's funny," said Croft.

"Why funny?" Rentlo asked.

"Well, if I came back from a mission with a gap in my memory and my fellow crewmembers all gone, I would be a bit concerned. And if I resigned from the service all of a sudden, I would expect people to ask questions."

"We did ask him questions," Rentlo frowned. "He didn't tell us anything useful."

"Please let us be the judge of that," said Croft. "What exactly did he say when you asked him what happened?"

"He didn't remember. Like I said, he remembered going out... and then he remembers coming back," Rentlo dully repeated.

"But he didn't say anything about how his fellow crew disappeared?" said Croft.

"No," said Rentlo. He paused again, "But he was an able commander. I doubt whatever happened was his fault."

"What an odd thing to say," said Croft.

"Why?" Rentlo asked.

"Well, how can you say it wasn't his fault when you don't know what happened?" Croft asked.

"He was a very able member of our service," said Rentlo.

"Commander," said Agent Waverly. "You called him commander. But he wasn't the commander of the mission. It was a Lieutenant Fuller, was it not?"

"Ah, yes, that's correct," said Rentlo.

The nondescript man said something.

"I misspoke; it was just a slip of the tongue." said Rentlo.

"Yes," said Croft. "I can see it that you misspoke, that it was just a slip of the tongue," he repeated.

The nondescript man looked keenly at Croft.

"I can see there's nothing further to learn here," said Croft. He got up, and then blinked. There had actually been some more questions he had wanted to ask, but it probably would have been a waste of time to ask them.

A waste of time? How could he know that?

Croft looked around the room. He saw Rentlo, Preston, and Waverly. Croft had another thought.

"Would you mind if we-" he stopped, in insentience.

Rentlo looked inquiringly at him.

"...got a transcript of the report?" Croft asked, changing his sentence in midspeech.

"We've already transmitted that to you, haven't we?" said Rentlo, looking confused.

"Yes, so we have, my mistake, sorry," said Croft.

They left and entered the hovercar. This time Waverly lay on the floor in the back while the nondescript man sat in the backseat with his feet on Waverly's chest. Neither Croft, Preston, or Waverly thought anything unusual about it.

"What were you really going to ask Rentlo?" the nondescript man asked.

"For permission to examine Wender's ship," said Croft, in a dull monotone.

"You don't need to examine Wender's ship," said the nondescript man. "There's nothing to be learned there."

"There's nothing to be learned there," Croft repeated.

A few minutes later Croft stopped the hovercar at a street corner. The back door opened, and then closed. Waverly sat up in the back seat. Croft resumed driving. He pressed the accelerator.

"So, impressions, anyone?" Croft asked.

"Something must have happened on that mission," said Preston. "An entire crew simply doesn't disappear." He noticed that Croft seemed to be driving fast.

"Something happened to change him," said Croft. "At this point, I don't think there's much else to investigate on this end."

"What do we do next?" Waverly asked.

"I'll have to put my mind on it," said Croft. Croft gunned the car as they came to an intersection, where a holographic stop light was shining.

"Hey, slow down," said Preston.

"Why?" Croft asked, still accelerating.

"Croft!" Waverly yelled.

Preston attempted to reach for Croft, but it was too late.

A car appeared ahead of them. Croft, still wondering what was going on, slammed into the rear of the car, sending both his and the target car spinning into the intersection. The car kept spinning until it slammed into a wall of a nearby building.

Croft blacked out for a moment. When he awoke, he saw Preston looking over him.

"Croft? Croft?"

Chapter 4: The Search Continues

Chapter 4: The Search Continues

"My shoulder still hurts me," Croft groaned, slowly rotating it.

It was the following day. Preston, Croft, and Agent Waverly were sitting in an office in Column HQ.

"We were very lucky that a sore shoulder was the most severe injury in both cars," said Agent Waverly.

"Wender must have been controlling my mind," said Croft.

"How?" said Preston. "Do you think he can control minds from a distance?"

"Maybe," said Croft. "Or maybe he was in the car with us."

"What? How?" said Preston.

"If he can control our minds, conceivably he can tell us to ignore his presence," said Croft. He looked across his desk. "We could be staring at him right now and not even notice."

"I was thinking the same thing," said Agent Waverly. "I think I was wondering if he was with us when we interviewed the Wenders. At the time I thought they were reacting to posthypnotic suggestion, but after the fact some of their artificial responses seemed... spontaneous."

"I remember thinking the same thing," said Croft. "And then I remembered thinking that he couldn't possibly be there. Why did I think that? Perhaps because he told me to."

"We can't be constantly second guessing our thoughts," said Agent Waverly.

"Our thought processes are all suspect now," said Preston. "We don't know what's really happening and what's not."

"All right, let's put the brakes on the hysteria," said Croft. "Until we know otherwise, we have to presume that we are experiencing our own thoughts right now. Wender can't be everywhere at the same time."

"So far there's been no sign of him," said Preston. " His holoimage has been sent to all law enforcement units. If he's on August, he's evading the security forces of the entire planet."

"Probably not a very difficult thing for someone to do if he can control minds," said Croft. "If a policeman recognizes him, and moves to arrest him, what do you think will happen?"

"He'll take over the policeman's mind, and make him go away," said Agent Waverly.

"Wender will not only make the policeman go away," said Croft. "Wender will make him forget he ever saw him. He probably did the same to us yesterday when we were with his parents. Come to think of it, Commander Rentlo was acting strange as well. Wender was probably in the room with us the whole time."

"He could be here now," said Preston.

"He could be," said Croft. "But we have to proceed as if he's not, unless we're ready to give up."

His wristcomm bleeped. "Yes?" said Croft, speaking into it.

The other end of the conversation was not audible to the others.

"Not now, Levi. I don't have time for a cooking show," said Croft.

A tiny voice came through the other end.

"All right," Croft grimaced. He turned to a nearby holoreceiver.

"What is it?" said Preston.

"Levi wants us to watch a cooking show or something," said Croft. He turned to a channel, and the image of Tony Spagetti, the most famous chef on August, appeared on the screen.

"I call this my pineapple surprise," said Spagetti, grinning wildly. He poured a half glass of pineapple juice into a blender.

Croft spoke into his wristcomm. "Levi, I know his show gets good ratings, but this isn't really my sort of thing."

"Then you add a bit of sugar," said Spagetti, holding up two dead rats. He put them in the blender.

Croft, who had been reaching forward to change the channel, stopped.

"Then you add a fair amount of lemon juice," said Spagetti, and at that point he did something totally unexpected: he dropped his pants.

Then, if possible, he did something even more unexpected. He urinated into the blender.

A tiny voice came out of his comm. "All right, all right," Croft said, speaking to Levi over the open line. "I gather this is not one of his more exotic recipes?" They heard a tinny but angry reply. Croft responded, "Sorry, I just wanted to be sure. You know how exotic some of these chefs can be."

Croft watched with a mixture of fascination and disgust as Spagetti, still maintaining his poise, raised his pants and started the blender, acting like nothing unusual had happened. It whirred merrily for a moment as the pineapple juice, rat parts, and chef urine mixed together.

Then Spagetti took the black and yellow mixture and poured it into a large cup. He held it up to the light. "Looks delicious, eh?"

He raised it to his mouth.

Two stage assistants raced out and grabbed his arms. "No, no!" Spagetti yelled. Spagetti struggled to get the glass to his lips. There were shouts, and the contents of the glass splashed on one of the production assistants, there was a loud yell, and then a still image replaced the live feed, with the written message "Technical difficulties, please stand by" appearing on the holoscreen.

"Very odd," said Agent Waverly.

"It's not exactly what you'd expect from a gourmet chef," said Croft. "On the other hand, it is ratings week."

Waverly stared at Croft with sharp eyes, and for a brief moment he reminded Croft of Steven Quick. Quick, of course, had silvery eyes and was a supergenius; but his top men, including Waverly, were also selected for their thinking ability.

"Consider the irrationality of it all," said Agent Waverly. "There is no consistent pattern. He blacks out part of August, to demonstrate his ability. He maliciously kills the crew of a cargo ship. But then he does harmless things, like this."

"He doesn't care if he does harm or not," said Croft. "Bender's a prankster, albeit an incredibly dangerous one."

"Bender?" said Preston.

"Wender," said Croft. "But that's what he is, a Mind Bender." He turned to Waverly. "He tried to have us killed by having me crash our hovercar. Why did he choose that method?"

"To make it look like an accident, perhaps," said Agent Waverly.

"Look at this man; is anything he does subtle?" said Croft. "If anything, he's trying to broadcast his abilities, not hide them. If he wanted us dead, he would have had us shoot each other with our blasters."

"Are you suggesting he didn't mean to kill us?" Waverly said.

"I'm suggesting he didn't care," said Croft. "He just thought it would be amusing to put us in a car crash. And that's why you can't find a pattern. Because there is no pattern. He's just amusing himself. I don't see any higher agendas; no blackmail demands, no puppets pulling the strings."