Psych

“Hey. You. Get up.”

I groggily open my eyes and look up. There’s a teenage boy standing above me, baseball cap slightly off kilter, revealing a shock of mussed brown hair. His worn jean jacket hangs off his thin frame.

“W-what?” He scowls at me and kicks me in the ribs. I gasp and instinctively curl into a ball.

“I said, get up. They’re coming. Get up.” I sit up immediately. Who’s coming? Who could be coming? Now that I think about it, who is he? What in the world is going on?

“Shh! Not so loud! They can hear you!”

“What? What is going on? You tell me right now!” I stand up and poke him in the chest, hard. Then I notice that he’s at least two heads taller than me. Curse my height and lack of observation skills.

He grins. “To answer your questions in order, They are, same answer as before, I’m Daniel, and we’re trapped in your head. Good to know you have zero observational skills. Now, come on!” He grabs my arm and takes off running. I stumble and almost fall. And then I take in my surroundings.

We seem to be on some infinite plane. Everything’s white. The floor is white, the nonexistent ceiling is white, the horizon is white. I’m already getting sick of white. The strange thing is, this place seems to react to my thoughts. As soon as I think, “Ugh. White,” the whole thing changes. Black seems to ripple outward whenever I touch the ground. It’s like every step I take is a pebble thrown into a stream. To be honest, I don’t want to be a pebble. Pebbles just take up white space. I don’t want to be just a filler. I want to be the main subject, if that makes any sense.

Daniel slows down to a stop, and look at me, humor illuminating his eyes. His lips start twitching, and he bursts out laughing. “Oh, god. Do you know how ridiculous that sounded? I don’t want to be a pebble. Ha! That’s going on a t-shirt. ‘I don’t want to be a pebble.’ Classic. By the way, you should really learn to shield your thoughts. You’re projecting them loud and clear.” At this point he’s clutching his stomach, he’s laughing so hard.

“What?”

He rolls his eyes, still grinning. “Just imagine a wall around your brain. Nothing can pierce or penetrate or crack it. Not even a… Sun-Sized boulder. Got it? They’ll trace your brain waves to our location if you keep going on like this.”

When I give him a look of incredulity, he yells, “DO IT!”, all traces of humor gone. I jump and comply, startled. I imagine a steel — no, a titanium fortress around my mind that nothing could shatter. I reinforce it with bars, and bolts, and… memories.

Daniel lets out a calming breath, lets it hiss through his teeth until there’s almost nothing in his lungs. He looks relieved. It’s scary how quickly he can go from being joking to being dead-serious. He sits down on the now black plane and pats the space in front of him.

“Sit.”

“I thought you wanted me to stand.”

He glares. “Shut up and sit down.”

“..Fine.”

Unlike before, our banter is light and friendly. Daniel’s even smiling a little bit. But immediately, like before, he turns serious again. I wonder what could have happened to make him this… on-edge.

“I can only imagine what you’re thinking now that you’re shielded. Luckily, you’re a natural. Your shields are pretty strong for a beginner. Now, I imagine you have questions?”

I stare at him blankly. He nods toward me with an almost eager expression on his face. It’s like he’s trying to get this over with. He probably is.

I open my mouth, then close it again, thinking. “I… Just… Can you just explain things to me? I don’t know where to start.”

Daniel rubs his temples and looks around. “This will probably take a long time. We may have to cut things off short so that They don’t catch us.

“I’ll start off with this: Who are They? They are… mind wraiths. They’re highly sensitive telepaths that feed off of the mind, knowledge, and sanity of a being who is also telepathic. They can’t draw from someone who is naturally, impenetrably shielded from them, aka not telepathic. Telepaths, though… their brains are way more active than normal people’s, and for their mind to be that active, their natural shields have to filter out the extra energy, so it doesn’t build up and… you know. Boom.” He shook his head. “ Anyway, my… group and I are protected from Them. We help others break free of their hold. I imagine you’re wondering, how? We, as in you and I, take a journey, see, because when they latch on to you, they trap your consciousness inside of you. We have to trek through your memories and thoughts and knowledge and ideas. We have to take a journey… to the center of the mind. Your mind. At the center of your mind is a bright spot, untouched by anything. Your true self, who you really are underneath all of that knowledge and memory and experience. Someone educated in the ways of a telepath like me will be able to turn that bright spot into a temporary portal for me and you to escape. Your mind is now a target for Them and we have to keep running because your mind keeps shrinking, like… that garbage compressor from Star Wars. Except this time, it won’t stop compressing unless you get out and kill the wraith. If you don’t escape… you die.”

I think I just about exploded from overload of knowledge. So, apparently I’m a telepath who’s slowly being killed by some also telepathic ghost and being saved from the telepathic ghost by a telepathic human (I think he’s human) who somehow is inside my (also telepathic?) mind. I stare at him for about twenty seconds with my mouth hanging open before realizing what I’m doing. I quickly clamp my mouth shut.

Daniel glances around again, apparently sensing something, and stands up, alarmed. “Time to go. Come on. We need to run. No questions.”

“No—”

He grabs my arm and shakes his head, a deadly calm and fierce determination reflected in his eyes. “No. Not now.”

And he takes off running, dragging me behind him. Once I fall into step beside him, he lets go.

The thing I find strange about my mind is that I don’t get tired. I look, at least from the chest down, as I perceive myself in my head. I feel fit, unlike I normally am in the real world. My vision and hearing are sharp and distinct, and I imagine all my other senses are as well. And the closer we get to the center of my mind, or my true self as Daniel calls it, the better I feel. It feels like someone is pumping energy into me, turning me into a polished piece of art instead of a rough piece of wood. It feels… good.

Time passes. I have no clue how much. It could be minutes, hours, months, even years. All I know is that I keep running. Just… running. Along the way, sometimes, my… mindscape, for lack of a better word, changes. Sometimes we’re in the forest, or the desert. Sometimes we’re just on an empty plane. I’m pretty sure I once spotted my mom in a memory-scape, which we would sometimes also run through. My memories would play over and over around us, but we had to ignore them and keep going. So, we did.

Daniel ignored my feeble attempts at conversation, so I eventually stopped trying to get him to speak. Eventually, after immeasurable amounts of time, Daniel stops. I skid to a halt beside him.

“We’re here,” He says, sounding like he is barely getting the words past his dry throat. He looks tense, ready to jump into action at any given moment. “We’re at your core. We’ve made it to the center of your mind.”

I grin. This journey has been long, but I would finally be free of the confines of my mind! I am bursting with energy, ready to break free and be the best I can be. Which is actually saying a lot. Normally, in the real world, I was a quiet person, submissive, passive. Not now. Now I can actually do something with my life. And I know exactly how.

“When I escape… would it be possible for me to train with you? Join your group?”

His smile is radiant underneath the sweat and grime and tattered clothes. “Of course. Let’s get you out first. What you need to do is focus on the thing that anchors you to the world. It can be anything, a person, and idea, a dream. I’ll do the rest.”

I close my eyes and concentrate my entire being on my anchor. I already know what it is. I focus on my hope for the future and leave my past behind. I am what I will be. I imagine myself as an adult, going through a mid-life crisis, then as an ancient, wise woman. I see the future that will come to be.

Time passes, and I hope.

A shout of joy alerts me to the outside (inside?) world.

“It worked! IT WORKED!” Daniel runs to me and crushes me in a hug. “You are a miracle worker. Thank you,” He whispers into my hair. Then, all of a sudden, he lets go and holds me at arms length and looks me in the eyes, an apologetic and sorrowful look shining in his eyes. “Come on. Let’s go.”

He walks over to a hole in the floor. It shines with inner light, and when I peer in, the bottom isn’t visible. This must be the portal to the outside world.

“I’ve got to tell you some things before I — we go,” he says, turning back around to me. He looks morose and upset.

“What’s bothering you?” I ask, concerned. He looks away, chewing his lip.

“I — I wish I didn’t have to do this to you. I like you, I really do. But… it’s my job. To protect everyone I can.”

“What are you talking about—”

“They’re already latched on to you. Once that happens, there’s no escaping it. You’re marked. But,” He swallows and continues, “Since you’re marked, They can be killed. When They’re feeding… then and only then. It’s possessed your body… destroyed your life. It lives in your body while you’re trapped in your mind. The only way to kill it is a stab to the heart. I’m sorry,” He whispers. “I thought you deserved to know… We’re not supposed to tell the victim… but I thought you deserved to know.”

I’m left again with my mouth hanging open. “Wait! Don’t go! We can fix this! Please!” He shakes his head and backs up to the portal. “Daniel! Don’t do this!” I’m screaming it out, on the verge of tears. “You gave me hope! And you sucked it away again! You don’t deserve to save anyone!”

A solitary tear runs down his cheek. But he still backs up and dives headfirst into the portal. As soon as his feet pass the rim, the circle of light and stolen dreams snaps shut, gone in the blink of an eye.

I stand there for a while, stupefied. I collapse to the floor, crying softly. This is never what I wanted. This… is something I never dreamed of.

My mindscape is pitch-black now, I can’t even see myself. But soon, I feel the smooth floor beneath my legs change to vibrant green grass. I look up, and see myself in a clearing rimmed with pine trees, a blue SUV parked in the distance. I hear fireworks crackling above my head. The stars are brightly lit, in all shades from icy-blue to lemon-yellow. When I look closer, I see that they’re falling… towards me. Attracted to me like a magnet. They surround me, and blanket me with warm light. I look up to the sky, now illuminated only by the moon. I look down again, and I see myself in a soft white dress, woven with light. I stand up, tears still in my eyes, to admire my mind’s last dying gift to me.

When I turn around, Daniel’s standing there. A soft, sad smile is on his face. He’s now in nicer clothes, a dress shirt with a tie and black slacks. I step closer to him, not wanting to believe it. He holds his arms out, and I step into them gladly. I don’t see it when his image flickers, and fades for a few seconds. For some reason, I’m feeling weak, weaker than ever before. I’m shivering, the mindscape now being a frozen tundra flurried by snow, Daniel, now solid again, sits down, me still in his arms. I’m weak… too weak. My eyelids flutter shut, too tired to open again.

“I’m so sorry,” Daniel says, sounding like something inside him broke.

“It’s… fine,” I reply. “Everything’s going… to be fine…”

Daniel exclaims angrily, “No! It’s not fine! I did this to you, and now I can’t save you!”

I smile softly. “It is… fine. I don’t have much… in store for me anyway…” My arm droops down from where I was holding his hand.

“No! Calista, no!”

I laugh a bit. It hurts. “So… you learned my name…”

“Yes! God, yes. I couldn’t — not.”

“Good… Remember me… If you can’t save me… remember me,” I whisper.

Suddenly, intense pain flares through my abdomen. I gasp, and my eyes fly open. Around Daniel and I, my memories flash by. Me in middle school. Me as a fairy for Halloween one year. All of my memories flash by faster than you can see. My mindscape is constantly changing, mutating into a different situation. A voice in the back of my head whispers to me.

Daniel stabbed you. He’s not actually here, he’s just a final parting gift to you… because you’ve been stabbed. And it’s finally catching up. You’re dying. You’re dying.

It was repeated over… and over… and over, and over, and over, until the words weren’t “You’re dying”, but “I’m dying”.

“Daniel, leave… before you’re trapped,” I choke out. He shakes his head, eyes squeezed shut.

“I can’t. I can’t leave.”

I nod. I can’t hold on anymore, let alone argue. I see black around the edges of my vision, slowly creeping in to the center… to eternal darkness.

“I’m sorry, I’m so, so sorry,” Daniel says, voice laden with tears. I nod, but I don’t know if the motion is perceptible. The darkness has almost completely taken over. It tingles, but doesn’t hurt. I relax the last of my muscles, and let a tear leak out from the corner of my eye. I exhale, quietly, and find that I can’t take another breath. Daniel slowly fades away, and I’m alone, under the inky sky and shivering in the cold snow.

And that cold darkness is all that’s left.