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 5: Platform #8 is Falling

Chapter 5: Platform #8 is Falling

"Does this look strange to you?" said Croft.

He stood with Agent Waverly in a large banquet hall. A benefit was being held to raise money for the zero gravity ballet. Very fancy-fancy men in fancy tuxedos and women in even fancier dresses were milling about.

Except the men weren't wearing any pants. Or underwear. And the women had ripped off the bottoms of their dresses.

And all their buttocks were colored purple.

"Yes, this looks strange to me," said Agent Waverly.

A long line of people were waiting for something. Croft and Waverly went to the front of the line. A distinguished gentleman, presumably the host, was sitting on a chair. A guest would lie down on his lap, and he would wack their bare bottom with his hand.

"Thank you very much!" the guest smiled, getting up gracefully, so the next person could take her turn.

"This Mind Bender seems to have fetishes about nudity, and embarrassment," said Agent Waverly, watching the spankings dispassionately.

"And League destroyers," said Croft.

"That wasn't so nice," said Agent Waverly. "But it just proves how erratic he is. One moment he is engaged in the silly, and the next something serious or deadly."

"The crew of the destroyer wasn't so amused," said Croft. "When Wender's suggestion wore off, they found themselves the prisoners of the Slurians."

"Are you going to get them back?"

"We'll probably have to give the Slurians something in return," said Croft. "Some political or economic concession. But they'll have a field day with our destroyer. It was one of our most modern ones."

Croft and Waverly passed a station where guests were bending over to have their buttocks painted with a purplish substance.

"I also notice he seems to like purple," said Agent Waverly.

"I don't know what possible use that information is," said Croft, watching someone's tush get painted purple.

"I'm just trying to build a complete profile," said Agent Waverly.

"But you think this is all strange, right?" said Croft anxiously.

"Definitely," said Agent Waverly, watching a guest get up, with paint dripping from his buttocks, as he thanked his illustrator.

"So that means Wender isn't here," said Croft. "If he were here, we would be thinking that this is normal."

"Not necessarily," said Agent Waverly. "He might want us to be aware enough to admire his work."

"No," said Croft. "If he were here, we'd be getting our bottoms painted purple and we'd never wonder about it."

"Perhaps you are correct," said Agent Waverly.

They returned to Column HQ. Preston gave them an update. "The news networks are being flooded with false stories."

"What kind of stories?" Croft asked. He eyed Mongo, sitting in a corner, muttering to himself.

"Well, let 's see." Preston checked a datapad. "August is about to crash into the sun. Free money is being given out at the Palace. August is officially being turned over to Sluria. The Secretary of Foreign Affairs is having a secret love affair with a mutated goat."

"That last one has a ring of truth to it," said Croft.

They stared at him.

"It does, sort of," said Croft. He had always had his suspicions of the Foreign Affairs Secretary. Croft wondered for a split second if he should edit what he said before saying the first thing that came to mind. No, he decided, honesty and bluntness was always the best policy. For his own satisfaction, anyway.

Preston said, "In each case the false news story is professionally written, with details, in a serious tone, like a real article."

"Why aren't editors pulling these articles before they're published?" said Croft.

"He's gotten to the editors too," said Preston. "The stories are pulled once they start getting complaints, but each story can be out there a while before someone with a brain notices."

Croft knew how rare and far between those kind of people were "Which news service was affected?" Croft asked.

"It's not just one news service, it's a bunch of them. The Mind Bender has had a busy day," said Preston grimly.

"Yes, he has," said Croft.

At that moment the nondescript man casually walked into the office.

"None of you see me," he said, equally casually. He walked right by Croft without Croft giving him a glance, and made his way to the area where the agents were sitting. The nondescript man made a few whispered suggestions.

One agent wrote a short letter saying that he was a secret operative with the Column. Then he arranged to have this letter published on a public electronic message board that all could see.

Another operative located a series of electronic files from the Column database, and then, in bunches, started transmitting them.

To Sluria.

"We have to figure out where he will strike next," said Croft, trying to think.

"I don't think you can figure it out," said Agent Waverly.

"Why not?" Croft asked, genuinely curious. It seemed an odd thing for Waverly to say.

Someone whispered something in the background.

"Because you're an idiot," said Agent Waverly, somewhat mechanically.

"Yes, I am an idiot," said Croft, nodding sagely.

Preston wrote the word IDIOT in big letters on a piece of paper. Then he taped it to Croft's shirt.

"That was helpful, thank you," said Croft politely. Then, "Think, people, think! How do we stop him?"

Suddenly alarm bells rang. Agents rushed into the room.

"What's going on?" said Croft.

One of the agents looked at Croft, with the big idiot sign on him. "Secure data is being transmitted to the Slurians."

"From where?"

"From this room!" said the agent. He raced passed Croft to an agent, who was still typing away, until the agents grabbed him.

"It's the Mind Bender, he's here!" said Croft. He activated his comm. "Monitoring station four, do you see him?"

"Checking." There was a short wait, while, at a remote location, the room was scanned by other operatives. They had been given a holo of Wender's appearance, but there were a lot of agents in the room.

"Negative," said the voice. "But are you aware that you are wearing a big sign that says "Idiot"?"

Croft looked down, and, suddenly noticing it, ripped it off. "Go to storage backup, and review the past thirty minutes."

"Standby," said the voice.

Croft looked at the piece of paper, and crumpled it. "He was here, right here, and we didn't even notice it."

"It certainly looks that way," said Preston.

"Mongo!" said Croft.

Mongo looked up. Mongo was probably affected like the rest of them, but maybe, while Wender was here, he had sensed something....

"Mongo, did you see the strange man?" Croft asked.

"Strange man," said Mongo, in a low voice. "Yes, I saw the strange man."

"Can you tell me what he's going to do next, where he will be?" Croft asked.

"Strange man... will be on atmospheric platform 8, in one hour," said Mongo, in a dull tone.

Something sounded off. Not what Mongo was saying it, but how he was saying it. Usually Mongo wasn't so... direct. He had to be prodded, cajoled.

"Mongo, are you sure Wender-"

Someone on the far side of the room drew a blaster and fired at Croft. The blast hit Croft's desk. He ducked.

The person kept firing. An agent fired back, hitting the attacker. The attacker fell to the ground.

"Clear," someone said.

Croft got up. "Who was it?"

They looked. It was one of their agents.

Croft said, "Undoubtedly before the Mind Bender left us, he made a number of suggestions meant to take effect after he left. But how did Wender trigger-"

Another agent whipped out his blaster. Croft, a little quicker this time, ducked behind his desk before the agent could fire at him. The agent fired, the bolt grazing the top of Croft's desk. Another operative fired, stunning the latest attacker.

"I think we've found the keyword," said Agent Waverly.

Croft, his blaster drawn, peered up from behind his desk. "Wender!" he said again.

Suddenly, another agent drew his blaster, but he was stunned before he could aim it.

"Wender!" said Croft again, peering from behind his desk, where he still crouched.

"Wender!" said Croft again. "Wender Wender Wender!"

"It appears to be safe," said Agent Waverly, looking around, with his blaster in hand. "You can get up from behind your desk now, I think."

Croft spoke to the agent in charge. "Take them to sickbay," he said, referring to the stunned agents. "They will be all right in a few hours."

"What about the people on the atmospheric platform?" said Agent Waverly.

"We've got to go help them," said Croft. He went to his holoconsole. It was blasted. He went to one on a neighboring desk, and started typing.

What was he typing? "We can't delay," said Agent Waverly.

"A little delay is always good," said Croft, typing rapidly. After a moment he got up. He motioned to Preston, pointing at the terminal. "Make sure this gets done!" Then he turned to Waverly. "All right, let's go!" He grabbed Mongo by the arm.

"Not to touch!" said Mongo, jerking back.

"Then come on!" said Croft.

Goaded by the fear of Croft's touch, Mongo started walking quickly towards the exit.

They went to the roof where they strapped themselves into a multiseater gravitator. Croft took off even as Mongo was only beginning to strap himself in.

Mongo gave a scream to show his lack of appreciation as he struggled to hang on. Croft gunned the gravitator at full speed, periodically glancing at the online map.

"What do you think he's going to do?" said Agent Waverly.

"He's going to crash the platform, of course," said Croft.

Real estate in August, especially in Sarney Sarittenden, was at a premium. This was, after all, the capitol of the League and the Alliance, and the bureaucracy, already huge, only grew more so over the centuries. So buildings were built with hundreds of stories, and many buildings grew as big and wide as a city block.

But that wasn't big enough.

So the city burrowed underground, creating multiple levels under the gigantic buildings.

But even that wasn't enough.

Even on August, there was still space to spread, both north, west, and south of Sarney Sarittenden. But when the prime measure of one's influence within the government (or with the government from the outside) was often measured by one's physical proximity to Sarney, spreading out too far wasn't an option.

So the antigrav platforms were created. They were tremendously expensive, because each one had to carry thousands of pounds of weight, but they could house hundreds of bureaucrats (people). They generally hovered several hundred feet above the skyline, acquiring whatever expensive air rights they could to hover high in the air, above already tall buildings.

No one ever gave any thought to the fact that unlike buildings, antigrav platforms were held up by an active technology. It was just assumed that this technology, around for hundreds of years, would never fail.

But what if the platform were sabotaged... or someone simply turned off the antigrav?

"He'll be killed if he's on the platform," said Agent Waverly.

"I'm sure he'll have his own escape planned," said Croft. "Probably a gravitator of his own where he can watch the spectacle of a huge platform smashing into the buildings and streets below."

"Well, this does conform to his pattern--random acts of humiliation or violence," said Agent Waverly.

"Maybe Quick will give you a gold star for spotting the pattern, but it doesn't help us any," said Croft. Directorate agents were trained to be analytical, but sometimes they could be too much so, for Croft's tastes. He turned to Mongo. "Can you tell us exactly where or when he's going to sabotage the platform?"

Mongo said, "He will sabotage platform number eight in one hour."

Croft looked at Mongo. "That's word for word what you said before." He turned to Waverly. "The Mind Bender got to him."

"Yes," said Agent Waverly. "So this is a trap."

"Most probably," said Croft.

Waverly was silent for a moment. "So we're going into a trap."

"Yes," said Croft.

"I just wanted to be sure I was following what was going on," said Agent Waverly.

Several minutes later the platform came into view. It was a large, impressive structure, and even at a distance they could hear the antigrav motors underneath, glowing with power that made deep throbbing sounds.

Croft knew better than to drive the gravitator directly under the antigrav units. But he did a quick skim around the edges of the platform.

"If you're looking for sabotage, you're probably wasting your time," said Agent Waverly. "He'll just have someone inside turn off the antigrav generators."

"You're probably right," said Croft.

He maneuvered the gravitator close to a landing pad. As they landed, Croft said to Waverly, "If you see him, shoot to kill."

"I'm glad you're seeing things my way," said Agent Waverly.

"When a platform is about to crash and kill hundreds if not thousands of people, one's perspective changes," said Croft.

They landed on the platform. Croft and Waverly got out of the gravitator. But Mongo didn't move.

"Mongo?"

"Mongo stay here," said Mongo.

"Mongo comes with us," said Croft.

"Mongo stay here," said Mongo. "Safer."

"Are you sure about that?" said Croft, drawing his blaster.

Wordlessly, Mongo got out of the gravitator and onto the platform.

"That's quite a working relationship you have there," said Agent Waverly.

"You should see the size of the fruit basket I get him on Mutant Appreciation Day," said Croft.

They headed for the bottom level of the platform. That was where the antigrav engines would be housed. When they got there, they made their way through dark, narrow corridors.

Suddenly, Mongo stopped.

"Mongo?" said Croft.

"Switch, up ahead," said Mongo, sounding more like his old self. "Bad man will be there. May be there."

"Will be? May be?" said Agent Waverly.

"Mongo isn't sure if he's there yet," said Croft. "There are a number of possible futures. But do you see any of them in which we kill the Mind Bender?"

Mongo shook his head, then mumbled something.

"What?" said Croft, anxiously looking down the corridor.

"Is possible. If you go forward, and other man goes around," said Mongo.

"What is possible?" Croft persisted.

"May surprise the bad man, giving time for this one to shoot him," said Mongo, indicating Waverly.

"May?" said Croft. "What are the chances?"

Mongo shrugged. "Mongo does not know chances. But Mongo sees many, many futures where you fail, and bad man controls you, controls you both."

"That doesn't sound so good."

"If you go in directly, together, bad man will definitely control you," said Mongo. "But if one of you goes around, you may win."

"How many futures do you see us winning in, if we try this?" Croft asked.

"One," said Mongo. He paused, and blinked. "Maybe two."

"And how many do you see us losing in?"

"Many," said Mongo. "Many many."

"Don't you see anything else where we come out alive, with a little better odds?" said Agent Waverly.

"Yes," said Mongo promptly. "If we head back to gravitator promptly, we will get out safely. Other peoples will fall. The Croft will look very sad, and unjustly blame Mongo, but we will be alive."

"I mean, an alternative where we save the platform?" said Agent Waverly.

Mongo shrugged. "Mongo cannot see all permutations that far ahead."

"But you said you can see far enough ahead to see what will happen if we head back now," said Waverly. "You say you see us saving ourselves and Croft blaming you."

"Well, do not actually see that part of it," said Mongo. "Just using common sense that the Croft will blame poor Mongo."

Croft looked at Waverly, who looked back at him.

"We're talking several hundred people here," said Croft.

"Can they be evacuated?" said Agent Waverly.

"He'll flip the switch before the first one gets off," said Croft.

Waverly took a deep breath. "Then I'll try to go around while you distract him."

"Good luck," said Croft, as Waverly turned down a side corridor.

Croft turned to Mongo. "You can go."

"Go?" said Mongo, looking surprised.

"Surely you can see a future where I said that. Get back to the gravitator. There's nothing more you can do here."

Mongo gave Croft an unusual stare, but whether he was experiencing curiosity or admiration or something else, Croft couldn't be sure. After matching his glance for a long second, Mongo turned and scampered off.

Croft marched down the dark corridor, his breath labored. Mongo said his chances weren't very good. It was difficult to go into a situation where you knew in advance that you had very little chance of success.

But Mongo had been wrong before, misinterpreting futures or viewing futures that didn't come to pass. Maybe this would be one of those times.

Given the Mind Bender's powers, however, it was hard to believe that Croft would prevail.

"Ah, there you are."

Croft blinked, and he found himself facing the Mind Bender, standing next to a bank of electrical panels and a rather large switch. What had happened? It felt like a piece of time had been sliced away.

Croft noticed that his blaster, which had been in his hand, was now holstered. He tried to reach for it, but for some reason he couldn't move.

The Mind Bender smiled at him, as if he knew Croft's dilemma.

"I'm afraid I can't let you shoot me," said the Mind Bender.

Croft's mind raced.

"Nor can I let Agent Waverly shoot me," said the Mind Bender, and he stepped aside, and Croft saw that Agent Waverly was frozen in place, on the other side of the corridor.

"Really, you never were very much competition."

Croft found he could speak. "Is that what you were looking for, competition?"

"You are rated the best, the best of the best, a level one Column agent," said the Mind Bender. Now that Croft saw him up close, he didn't look at all unusual, just an ordinary, nondescript man.

Wender approached Croft. "But you were no challenge at all."

"What do you expect?" said Croft. "I can't control minds like you."

"I know," said Wender. "I can't find any person who is my equal. Depressing, isn't it?"

"Life is difficult all over," said Croft. "Did you hear how taxes went up again last month?"

"Your attempt to be humorous is very feeble," said Wender.

"If I had known you were running a talent show, I would have practiced my tap dancing," said Croft.

"Do you have anything else to say before I pull this switch?" said Wender.

"Yes," said Croft.

Wender waited. "Well?"

"Don't pull the switch."

Wender laughed.

"Is there something you want?" Croft asked.

"Something I want?" said Wender, a maniacal expression on his face. "What do I want? What does anyone want?"

"Philosophers have debated this for ages," said Croft. "Chubar of Greenfields one said that desire is like a little frosted fruit cup that doesn't have a cherry on top-"

"Silence!" said the Mind Bender. He stood close to Croft. "There is nothing I want; certainly nothing that you puny humans can give me. I'm the most powerful person on this planet. Onanyplanet. What is there that you can give me?"

"Is that what this is about? Proving how powerful you are?" said Croft. "I grant you that you have the ability to control minds. But is it really necessary to kill people to prove it?"

"Kill?" said Wender. "Killing applies to sentients. I stepped on a bunch of ants!"

"Is that how you think of us?"

"That's how I think of younow," said the Mind Bender. "I am as far above you as you are above an amoeba, and we have about as much in common. I am a quantum leap ahead in the evolution of mankind."