From dmb@any.isis.rl.ac.ukSun Nov 12 15:53:21 1995 Date: Thu, 9 Nov 1995 18:46:47 +0100 From: Devious Brownies Reply to: b5-creative@blob.best.net To: B5-CREATIVE@blob.best.net Subject: The Kingdom of the Blind - [Complete] The Kingdom of the Blind. ------------------------- This is a one-part story following on immediately from the events in "Divided Loyalties". Considering the tension in the actual episode, don't be surprised if the language gets a little strong. This story is being done as an exercise in writing technique by me. It is written from start to finish in one go without notes or rewrites, so will undoubtedly include several grammatical and logical errors, although I will spell-check it for readability. These "go with the flow" exercises can give a writer an impression of how they REALLY write, and criticism (and self-criticism) of the stories is an excellent way of identifying where one's writing is weak (as the author isn't allowed to fuss about with it, one-pass remember). So any criticisms positive or negative to the list or dmb@any.isis.rl.ac.uk PLEASE! Come- on a bit of bile is good for your digestion! All characters and situations are the intellectual property of Warner-Brothers and are used without their consent. But they needn't bother suing me as I'm poor. ----------------------------------------------------------- The Kingdom of the Blind. ------------------------- Ivanova heard the door slide shut behind her with a serpent like hiss. she thought. She didn't laugh. She could feel the weight of her bones dragging her down. Her stomach was gone and it's place was the `black-pit' she remembered so well, deep, hollow, lined with pitch, flavoured with bile. The same gutted feeling she had savoured when she found her mother's body, and experienced again when she heard Ganya wouldn't be coming home. The same sickness that enveloped her while she watched her father die. Now Talia was dead. So briefly her friend, so barely her lover, so nearly her confidant. But someone else was looking through those eyes. Susan hadn't believed until she saw it for herself. No pity, no remorse, the mind of a monster. Her spine tingled. Yes, the monster was still there, perceiving her emotions, laughing at her distress. The commander felt a sudden, violent longing for distance, and set off towards her quarters, her pace hurried, her face flushed. In her mind she felt (imagined?) a sudden burst of mirth. she thought, or was it her? Shivering she walked faster still. Unexpectedly, uncontrollably, Susan started to cry. ===***=== Ivanova pushed through the half-open door to her apartment, impatient for the privacy, the protection of solitude. She hit the panel savagely until the door shut and locked then leant back against it drawing laboured, sobbing breaths. She wanted to be covered, wanted to be warmed, to be loved, be protected, cosseted, understood. Suddenly she was a child again, lying huddled against another door, crying other tears, but wanting the same things. The neighbourhood children had been taunting her about her mother again, about her dull and dazed stare, her inane, `stupid' smile. The same drugs that had taken away her psi `abilities' had now robbed her of her dignity. Then her mother was there with a blanket and all the attention Susan craved, and needed. Susan felt her mother's mind straining to maintain the brief lucidity long enough to comfort her daughter. Susan brought her tears under control and huddled closer to her mother. "Thank-you Momma!" she said quietly. Her mother just smiled and Susan watched a dreamlike distance smooth-out the features as the blockers reasserted their dominance. Her mother stroked her hair in a way that was both tender yet impersonal. Feeling the sadness welling up again, Susan held her mother tighter. On the floor of her quarters Ivanova pulled the blanket closer about her. It was warm and soft, and smelled of other places. With a start she jerked upright, where had the blanket come from? Across the room Lyta Alexander sat stiffly on a low chair, waiting, watching. "We have to talk." the fey telepath commented flatly. "GET OUT!" Ivanova screamed aloud, while he mind screamed in harmony. said her subconscious, She wavered, looking at the blanket she held, suddenly unsure. "I thought you needed it! I didn't read ..." Lyta began. She looked shaken, pallid. "Save your pity!" Ivanova interrupted, "Better still, SHOVE your pity! Shove it and get out!" "We HAVE to talk!" Lyta persisted. Her eyes pleaded with Ivanova. "WE have nothing to say to each other!" Susan snapped, but with less resolve. Lyta's temper frayed. "You can't not be what you are! I know why you kept it hidden, but it is always there and you can't make it go away by ignoring it." "I don't care! If you're here to tell me how blessed I am you'd better have very understanding medical cover!" Lyta stood up. "And if you come one step nearer NO amount of medical cover is going to help you!" Ivanova added vehemently. "You don't understand!" Lyta insisted. Her face became inimical, her eyes hardened like setting steel. "You can't possibly imagine! Can't you see? Can't you conceive of why I'm here?" The telepath deliberately stepped closer, daring Ivanova to make good her threats. "Do you think I WANT to be here? That I get off on the hatred? Maybe I do! Maybe it turns me on!" Ivanova flinched and the telepath's eyes went wide. "So that's it, you think I'm HOT for you!" She ran her hands up her sides, then over her shoulders and into the carmine shower of her hair. "Or maybe you just wish I was!" Ivanova's jaw set hard. "So! That got your attention." "Bitch!" the commander spat. "Believe it! Believe anything you want! I've no intention of being around long enough to care!" Lyta walked right up to Ivanova, until their bodies almost touched! Repelled, the commander turned her face away. Lyta leaned in, her lips the barest distance from the trembling woman's ear. "But you'll still be here!" she whispered, "You haven't got anywhere else to go. And when THEY come for you - in their neat, black uniforms, with their neat, black gaze - they'll take you apart!" The telepath continued, imitating the sneering, callous, sing-song voice of a psi-cop to deadly effect. "And when there's nothing left of your mind but tattered ribbons they'll take everything you told them and use it against your friends. And you'll help them! You will smile and nod and incriminate and testify to the very faces of those you love. And laugh as they curse you, or weep for you. Because you'll only think what THEY let you, and only do what THEY tell you! And if you're lucky - if you're VERY lucky - there won't be enough of the real you left to comprehend what you've done!" Ivanova was pale. Her eyes were pressed shut but the tears seeped from under the lids and trickled slowly down the face. Her hands were balled into hard, white fists. They shook with uneven, shuddering movements as did the commander's body. "What do you want!" came Susan's quiet, small voice. "I want you to practise!" Lyta replied lullingly, "I want you to learn your psi abilities. I want you to increase your control, your range and your power until you peak. I want you to fully realise the potential of your P- rating!" She stepped away. With every step the commander's revulsion lessened. "I'm not a telepath, I'm not going to train to be one!" Susan countered. "All through Psi-corps training we were told that in the kingdom of the blind the man that sees is king." Lyta looked briefly ashamed. "It's a lie. Psi doesn't make you strong it makes you weak! It's a threat and a liability and if you don't know how to control it YOU are a threat, YOU are the liability!" Susan shook her head. "I don't understand." "Is my sight so much better than yours that I can stare you into submission?" "Of course not. No." "Can you hear so much better than me that I must do what you say?" "NO! What's your point?" "Is my mind so much stronger than yours that you can hide nothing from me?" Ivanova was silent. "Because you ARE telepathic you are sensitive to telepathic attack - sensitive to a degree the others aren't. You can't shout a deaf man into submission, and all the telepathic coercion in the world can't touch the normal man. But you'd feel it, inside your head, perhaps for twenty-four hours a day, day after day. Until you can't tell which thoughts are your own. And then they have you." Lyta ran down. Unthinkingly she hugged her elfin frame. "I've seen it done. And I've seen what's left afterwards." Suddenly Lyta Alexander looked small and alone. The feeling of intimidation faded and Susan read the fear in the slim woman's face. The despair in her posture. the commander noted, The other woman's air of defeat finally convinced Ivanova. "What must I do?" Lyta took data crystal from her pocket. "Everything I could think of is on here. Training methods, specific skills and techniques, traps and ploys to watch for. And a method of estimating your rating." She left it on the table- top, "It isn't very much, it probably isn't enough. But it's all the help I can give." Ivanova forced out a thank-you. "Will you be around if I have any questions?" "No. I have one more visit to make then I must go!" the telepath replied. She didn't elaborate. Ivanova just nodded. "I must go." As Lyta walked past the commander the touched briefly, accidentally, for the first time. Instantly the atmosphere changed, the situation became charged and the two women leaped apart. The telepath, now ashen and disturbed, edged towards the door. As she reached towards the control she stopped, turned. "One last thing. When you have no other choice, no other option. Go to the Vorlon." "Ambassador Kosh! Why?" queried Ivanova. "He might help you. He might kill you. By then it won't matter." Lyta activated the door, she walked from the room without a backwards glance. Susan inspected the back of her hand where Lyta had touched it. The echoes of the surge of emotion, sensation, thoughts and feelings that had passed between them still crawled beneath her skin. The feeling had been so intense as to defy analysis. Just the fervour remained, the meaning lost. She looked at the not so innocent crystal. The memory of the ease with which Babylon 5's first telepath had shattered her defences haunted her. And all the time she had spent with Talia plagued her. What might she, HAD she, given away. She picked the crystal from the table. "Next time Miss Alexander, you won't have it so easy!" [The End]