Psycher Chronicles

Chapter 25

The Proof

(Misha)

By Wednesday Misha’s muscles burned. Not just burned but felt like they were coiling and constricting bands of cords that pulled her body together. Yet, despite their increased tension, they provided movement that was unlike anything that Misha had ever felt within her body before.

Just the act of moving was tough, but at the same time limitless. By taking a single step, she felt that the distance she could cover was increased by a few centimeters. While this wouldn’t amount to much for a single step, the distance gained per step would add up. Mentally she tried to do a few tests, first she calculated the time it took to run new distances.

While her muscles were tight and constantly felt like they were burning with each stride, she realized that almost half a minute had been shaven off her normal mile time.

Another thing that Misha began doing was counting her paces, or at least attempting to, to see how many steps she was cutting out from her normal runs.

Also, there was a coiling bounce to her step that she was able to keep and maintain, where each step taken helped propel her forward just that little bit further, until she was at her goal.

Realizing that she was going to have an easier time with movements, her next process was seeing her lateral movements and conditioning drills.

Yet, with each test her body performed flawlessly. It almost felt like she had spent the past few months working with dense weights on her body that had now been removed. Another way to look at it would be to assume she had suddenly landed on a planet with a lower gravitational pull than what she was normally used to.

Not a lot, but enough to be apparent. Her body could move, and even jump higher.

Realizing that this was just the changes from two solid days of maximum advancement, Misha felt true fear in her heart. For this growth rate was exceptional and, in her heart, she knew there were likely limitations to her progression. Limitations that she needed to document, while also pushing this body to its absolute maximum to see what level of conditioning a single body could gain from this Bakshee improvement method.

In her mind she had visions of the perfect combination forming of the Psycher Mind training, being linked to Bakshee bodies that could grow and adapt rapidly to external stimuli.

Of course, such a thought alone was heretical. To be a Psycher meant that you placed your mind and conditioning above all else, that you were given one body, and one clone template to build and adapt from that could support your enhanced Psycher capabilities while utilizing the least amount of resources possible. By comparison these Bakshee bodies were extremely wasteful and inefficient, only to achieve such exponential growth rates due to the rapid waste of planetary resources that would prove inefficient for a self-sustained fleet.

In a way, everyday that Misha was in this organo-tech body, she was breaking the tenants of the Psycher codes that had been etched into her training for generations. Yet, as far as she could see, this was a necessary evil, if anything her rapid growth rate, while wasteful, could be seen as a good thing as she was ultimately reaping from future Bakshee supply planets. However, those were all just excuses meant to hide the true problem that Misha was now facing.

Namely, Misha was gaining power, and felt that her mind could interact with the world around her in such a way that made her feel truly powerful. As if she herself could take down hordes of Bakshee on her own with knowledge of how the universe truly works.

Tingle.

Whoosh!

Misha was so lost in thought that a small fire had started to burn the dead grass out on the field. Misha’s first response was to run over and squash it, trampling on the flames with her feet, yet that wouldn’t help. A second ago, that flame that spontaneously combusted, was not as spontaneous as many might think, for she had inadvertently caused the fire.

Her mind wandered, and that allowed her body that had been generating friction from running to expel a large doze of electrical discharge, in a focused manner that was released in a wave of lightning around her. Lightning flames are of course the most devastating and hardest to put out, making them the most dangerous to deal with. Given how dry the grass in the fields were at this time of year, they caught fire in an instant.

Focusing on the flames, Misha’s mind told her to panic, as she had burned to death many times in multiple past lives. As a technomancer it was her job to fearlessly charge into the burning hulls of a worn-torn ship and try to put out the flames so that the ship might be able to escape. Her innate knowledge and control of Pyrokinesis, or the ability to wield flames, made her invaluable to the team. There was also the fact that, being one of the few Psychers who had developed extrasensory powers, she became fearless in her job performance, always counting on the fact that she would be revived.

It was because of this very fearlessness, and her expertise that Misha had her auxiliary growth pods approved constantly.

Now she had a new talent of controlling electricity that she needed to harness and practice. Focusing on putting out the flames that she had inadvertently created was a great way to practice her craft and find out more about what she could do with this new power of hers.

Focusing her mind, she focused on both the secondary flames, and the base electrical discharge, trying to get both to work in tandem to put out the flames.

The process wasn’t easy, but within a few moments she had stopped the spread of the flames, containing the flames to a tight circle. Then with its outward momentum stopped, she then slowly brought the flame in, until the chemical reactions ended.

By the time the flames were out, all that remained was a dense charred black mark on the ground in the shape of a circle. Almost as if someone used a metal trashcan to set a blaze and then the heat burnt the grass underneath a coal black color.

Phew.

The minute the flames were extinguished, Misha let out a breath that she didn’t know she had been holding.

Only once she lost her intense focus on the flames, did she let her mind relax, which was when her senses were able to see everything around her. To take in more stimuli and realize that she had been watched.

Turning her head, she saw granddad there.

He just stood there, eyes wide in disbelief. It was clear from his posture that he had seen the fire and her reaction to it. At first Misha wanted to refute the fact that the flame was her doing, but as she turned, she realized that her left hand was still extended towards the flames.

“I, I can explain…” Misha began, hoping that there was a way to not frighten her granddad, the person that meant so much to her. Even now she felt her mind breaking another core Psycher Tenant, never get close to the enemy.

If her granddad disowned her, or told her to leave, she didn’t know what she would do.

All she could do was sit there and wait for him to respond.

Finally, after a second, he spoke, and forever changed Misha’s life in this new world, on this foreign planet well beyond enemy lines.

***

(Phil Tulley)

Misha was up early as always. That is part of why Phil felt so proud of her, as she never ceased to amaze Phil with her ingrained discipline. If there was a task, she would solve it, or sit down think about it and then solve it.

If Misha wanted to get stronger, she would do a second workout. The fact that she was put on the B-Team for practices didn’t go unnoticed, and was something Phil himself had worked out with Ms. Green.

“Make her earn the spot. Make her show the varsity members that have held their positions for years that she is not only better, but hungrier than everyone else.” Phil said, and at the time Ms. Green seemed to doubt the approach but acquiesced to get his blessing for his granddaughter to join the team.

From what he heard; Ms. Green was more than appreciative of the suggestion as she was already noting how hard everyone was working during practices.

Apparently, Ms. Green had also taken a liking to his Misha, as she had called him for an emergency meeting about Misha’s pending probation.

Fortunately, he had managed to drop everything and get to the school on time to make a difference. He even had enough time to get Misha to tell him exactly what happened. He knew that there was no way Misha would contact someone else for help on how to cheat with computers. If anything, those fancy people at Microsoft should try to contact her for advice during her class time, but that was a different subject.

Now, less than eighteen hours after being accused of cheating and potentially being kicked off the team, she was out training faster and harder than ever.

She was so fast that Phil jokingly thought to himself that she would start a fire.

Little did he know, his thoughts would prove accurate when a small brush fire started right as she ended her mile run.

Whoosh.

The blazing orange light was bright in darkness before dawn.

Seeing the flames, Phil ran on reflex, grabbing the small fire extinguisher from the kitchen, and rushing out the back towards the flame and his granddaughter.

“Don’t worry, I’ll…” was all Phil could get out, before he got closer and saw that Misha was focused intensely on the flames. Her hands were out, and she began slowly moving her hands inwards, until finally they connected.

Phil couldn’t help but notice that as her hands moved, so too did the flames, until finally she managed to put the flames out entirely.

With that display, Phil just stood there in shock.

Then she seemed to become aware of her surroundings as her head instantly swiveled and turned towards Phil, at which point she spoke, “I, I can explain…”

Hearing that, Phil paused for a second, before dropping the fire extinguisher in his hands to the ground. That was when he shouted, “I knew it!”

At that Misha paused and almost seemed to tremble. “No, it’s not what it looks like…”

With her trembling, Phil went on reflex and charged forward. Arms out wide.

Misha for her part just stood there and looked down in resignation.

“Oh my baby girl, I am so proud of you.” Phil began, grabbing Misha up in a giant bear hug, and lifting her off the ground, or at least trying to. “Oof, you have gotten big. But look at you. I knew there was magic, and of course leave it to my little pumpkin to prove it.”

“Granddad, that wasn’t magic.” Misha began, a note of desperation in her voice.

“Oh, of course, right. Wouldn’t want the men in black out here, but that is fantastic!” Phil said, as he let down Misha and stared at her.

“I, I just…” Misha began.

“Shh, enough said, this will be our little secret.” Phil said, giddily as he felt like he had finally proven something to himself that he had always just known existed. “Oh, this is so fantastic. Thank you, thank you.”

Then Phil kissed his granddaughter on the cheek, as he could finally rest assured, feeling vindicated that he had been right all this time. Also, this just further cemented in his mind why Misha was his favorite offspring ever. Not only did she enjoy working with him, but she was living proof that magic existed.

“Now all we need to do, is figure out how we can both keep this a secret, while making sure you can put out a fire you create in under a minute.” Phil said, pointing to the circular burn mark in the ground.

“Yeah, about that…” Misha began.