Authors: Pamela Foland
Annette leapt to her feet. “No, today is the final test! Tomorrow, when I’m enrolled in factor training, I’ll go talk to Tina. Today, I’m not going to let Niri or myself down. I’m fine. Please, can we just go back to figuring out the test?”
“Angela would understand if Tina put a medical hold on the test,” Tawny suggested.
Annette thought about it. The trouble was that after all the symptoms Tawny had listed, plus a few she’d kept to herself, she had a strong suspicion of what was wrong. She was preparing to have a
metamorphosis. If that was true, it could be months before she was ready to take the test, and by then the point might be moot. She could end up just the sort of telempathically powerful candidate Sinclair salivated over. Then it wouldn’t necessarily be her doing it, it might just be her new abilities. She wanted to make it in clean, knowing that she earned it. “Tawny, I need to know that I earned my way into training. Not telepathy or anything else.”
Tawny remained quiet for a minute, Annette felt certain
the program was trying to backwards engineer her statement. “So, a metamorphosis?”
Annette nodded, “Tina may not have gotten back to me, but I think I know what she figured out. “
“Well, I suppose congratulations are in order. You’re getting what you wished for,” Tawny said.
Annette shrugged, “What I want is to know that I could do the job without the powers. I remember how shocked I was to learn that Tina got to where she is without them. I want to be able to say the same.”
“Okay, so you figure you passed the first test. Angela knows you are willing to make personal sacrifices to help people. What other traits do you think Angela considers important for a factor to have?” Tawny said softly.
Annette sat again, she pulled out her mental picture of a factor, “Bravery, intelligence, compassion, problem solving, piecing things together from unrelated clues.”
“Check on all counts,” Tawny said, “Now how do you prove that to Angela?”
Annette crossed her arms and looked around the room. It was stark, empty, especially with all of her things packed into her knapsack or another larger duffel. Annette glanced at the time displayed on the media screen. It was a quarter to seven. She’d already eaten up a lot of time this morning. “I don’t know. I can’t know until I get to the test. It could be anything.”
“Yes, it could. You could approach Angela before hand and tell her everything you’ve figured out, that would show her the last two things on your list at least. Though, I’m not sure where that would put you in terms of the test,” Tawny answered.
Annette rolled it around in her mind some more, and laid her head back on her pillow. It was a more comfortable position to think from. It wouldn’t hurt if she relaxed a little more before the test.
She had worked herself up to the point she might not be able to decide on a course of action when the need arose. A yawn escaped from her mouth and a blink took longer than it should.
- - - - - - - - - -
Angela dropped the box of doughnuts on the table and glanced around the room. Mario and Maria sat quietly reading their comic books. They possessed their father’s nonchalance about life in general. Angela stared at them openly. They were small strangers, reading comic books. She hadn’t had the time for such triviality even when she was that age. Instead she’d been into gymnastics and school, all “A”s never had it occurred to her to be any different. She’d always been just as driven as she was now.
Boy, was that a terrifying realization.
Suddenly she had to stop blaming the job, blaming The Chief. Angela Daniel’s was her own problem. Even if she no longer wore the mantle of chief she still probably would not escape the woman, the self, of being The Chief. She was her own Benedict Arnold. Now, which half was doing the betraying.
Maria blinked at her loudly and Angela realized she’d been staring at the girl very hard, without seeing. Angela flashed her daughter a smile and the girl turned back to her reading. Mario held a cinnamon roll and was munching on it making the same near purring sounds he’d made when he nursed, oh so many years ago. Like when they were babies his eating noises seemed to make his twin hungry because shortly Maria had teleported herself a cinnamon roll as well.
Angela held the smile on her face remembering the children as babies, so soft, so sweet, their smiles had been disarming. Her smile faded as she realized how few and fleeting those memories were; they were her babies but she hadn’t really raised them. She thought of her husband, he’d done most of the work. Angela thought of how little time she’d spent with him recently. Aside from the brief unconscious hours of sleep there really wasn’t much time spent together. Their pairbond was likely the only thing that held him to her at this point. Angela covered her fear at the thought that flimsy tie could break by teleporting herself one of the chocolate glazed doughnuts from the box. Eating kept her mouth from forming a frown.
Just as Angela was beginning to wipe away the worries hassling her when the outer door hissed open, revealing Niri and Annette. Startled by the arrival, Angela waved towards the doughnuts.
The girl seemed nervous and she watched Niri for a moment before joining the older woman and selecting a doughnut.
The girl sat silently and began contemplating, rather than eating, the doughnut.
“So, you’re ten minutes early. I guess you’re eager to start the test,” Angela finally said after chewing and a sip of coffee.
The response wasn’t immediate, the girl sat picking at her doughnut for a time, perhaps expecting Niri to respond. Annette glanced at Niri, making brief eye contact before suddenly blurting, “Uh, okay. . .”
Angela had thought the girl would be more enthused, given the early arrival, “I’d expected more enthusiasm than that.”
The girl turned her face up towards Angela,
“No, I mean yes. I mean I am eager to get the test over with, but we came in early so I could talk to you about a few things. I figured it out.”
Angela felt the first stirrings of an enigmatic hope, “You figured what out?”
Enthusiasm stirred in the girls face as she opened her mouth for words to flow out, “The whole thing, everything from your twins to the bet between Sinclair and Niri, to you arbitrarily calling time. I figured it all out this morning. I had a feeling, last time, that I was missing something. This morning everything fell together. I talked to Niri about it in the waiting room and we figured I should tell you, because my responses will be different based on what I know. It wouldn’t be right to let you think I’m doing things for one reason when I’m really doing them because I think that’s what you want to see.”
Angela listened to the girl’s words, without hearing. As the meaning drilled itself in to her mind Angela lost her grip on the doughnut. The girl figured out everything about the test? Angela picked up the doughnut and stuffed it into her mouth hanging one of her stock expressions on her face by reflex. The girl figured me out? That thought was almost thrillingly disturbing. How could a prepubescent child figure it out when none of Angela’s subordinates had a clue most of the time? Time, Angela knew she should be responding. Angela sipped at her coffee “I’m impressed. I do have one question though. You honestly didn’t figure this out until this morning?”
“I pieced part of it together five days ago, but didn’t get everything until this morning. If what you’re worried about is the other test, I really
didn’t have a clue then,” Annette answered. Angela listened carefully to the girl probing softly for veracity. The girl was telling the truth.
Angela ground mental gears for another moment before speaking. “Okay, I appreciate you telling me. It doesn’t affect today’s test, much.
I wasn’t going to test your character again. I was going for a test of your problem solving abilities. Apparently you have those in abundance.
I do need to make the assurance to you that it is possible to finish this test. I won’t arbitrarily stop you, unless you have missed something important and will be clearly unable to finish. I will also say that your knowledge might make it harder for you in particular than if you were still ignorant. Though that was probably an unfair clue. I would appreciate it if you wouldn’t show that you know in front of the other candidate.” Angela smiled half at the girl half at herself for taking the surprise so well.
“That went well, I think,” A familiar but long absent voice suddenly interrupted.
“Corrine?” Angela momentarily mistook it for her half sister Corrine before realizing that there was another possibility. The doughnut fell again this time falling farther than her lap. “Tawny?” Angela erupted, looking around the room at the speakers.
“Yeah, ya old softy. It’s me!” Tawny’s voice again came from Annette’s direction, “You don’t call. You don’t write. A program could get the feeling you don’t like it anymore!”
Angela finally saw the small spider shaped pin on the girl’s collar, her eyes widened, and her true expression of surprise spilled out spinning into a nostalgic smile before returning to tight control.
A
How is it, that you came to be in possession of Tawny’s remote pin?” Angela asked stiffly.
“She gave it to me, I’ve been staying in Corrine’s old room,” Annette answered hesitantly.
Angela raised an eyebrow, “Tawny you let her stay there? At Niri’s request? I thought you were utterly against resettlement, Tawny. Last I heard Sinclair tried to delete you over a refusal, and he failed horribly. Why would you take her in?”
Tawny’s remote made a stuttering sound like a person clearing their throat, “I dislike that man intensely. He never requested. He ordered. As intensely as I dislike him, I like Annette. She’s a good egg, if a little picky about her dietary consumption. “
Angela looked the girl over again, not for the first or the last time.
There was so much more to the girl than what was on the surface. She was the person people talked about with the whole, “don’t judge a book by its cover” thing. A laugh slipped out at the idea of being so thoroughly surprised after all these years.
“With such a ringing endorsement from Tawny, and staunch support from both Niri and Tina, and my own observations, I’m not sure I need to see anymore, but it wouldn’t exactly be fair to whatever-his-name-is and Sinclair,” Angela smiled at Annette. It was a firm, genuine smile, given freely and unrestrained by any of The Chief’s masks. “Annette, you have a lot of potential.”
At the unexpected praise, Annette blushed, and stuffed a large chunk of doughnut in her mouth. Suddenly the room seemed to contain only Angela and Annette. Angela felt a surge of hope completely beyond anything else, and a sense that something unusual was happening. Angela looked at Annette
and saw the same inarticulate feeling in the girl’s eyes. Then the moment and the feeling faded. Angela faintly heard Annette longing to ask if Angela had felt it too.
Angela played a hunch and looked Annette directly in the eyes, “Yes,” answering the un-asked question.
A moment of silence passed before Angela heard a stronger inquiry, “You just answered me telepathically , didn’t you.”
Angela teleported herself a fresh doughnut and deliberately took a too-large-to-talk bite out of it, making sure Annette was watching. “What do you think?” Angela projected just as deliberately. The girl was a hesitant telepath, and it reminded Angela of her own awakening to that reality.
Angela watched Annette, waiting for Annette’s response.
Before it came, the door to the waiting room hissed open. Sinclair trotted into the room with a superior look on his face which faded as soon as he saw Niri and Annette sitting and eating. Angela looked at the clock, it was precisely nine-fifteen.
That was Sinclair, never more than prompt, and always eager to upstage. Angela glanced back at Annette sharing a moment of eye contact before addressing Sinclair,
“Good morning mister Chavez.”
“Good Morning Chief,” Sinclair answered.
“Today is the second test for entry into the factor training program. I trust both applicants have studied and trained for this and are as prepared as possible for that which I have placed in front of you. Because they went second last time, I will allow Becky and Annette a five minute head start, and I will keep those five minutes in consideration when it comes to Rupert
and Anthony’s turn. You can wait in the waiting room.” Angela gestured towards the door and watched as Mario, Anthony and the two mentors departed. Angela glanced at Annette the girl seemed preoccupied or perhaps focused. Hopefully the girl was focused. Angela smiled and stepped into the transport pod.