Chronos Ascending

Who are you?

~~~

  After Meena had placed her handkerchief in the man's hand and began walking away, she heard clear as crystal in her mind, 'Did she just call me an i***t?' Her heart leapt in surprise but she continued walking, processing the power that she'd just acquired. Mind reading, triggered by touch, to begin with. When she activated it, minds almost seemed like rooms. Rooms full of thoughts and memories. She attempted to put up a mental barrier for her own mind immediately, in hopes that the man could no longer read her thoughts. She moved purposefully through a crowded part of the room, brushing arms with many people as she passed. Several trains of thought floated through her mind, most of them about business opportunities, some personal opportunities. Nothing that sounded too important to Meena and nothing that hinted towards the Chronos research facilities.

  'Is she... triggering an ability?' she heard the Chronos man's voice again and the hairs on her arms stood on end. Out of the corner of her eye she noticed that he had started to follow her. She began making her way to the nearest exit to hide just long enough to change clothes and lose him. She followed the flow of the crowd leading through the double French doors into the tea garden. She tucked herself out of sight behind a wall to the side of the dimly lit patio and shifted into new clothes. Luckily, before he could get a good look at the garden she'd just escaped into, a boisterous couple called his attention away.

  Meena released the breath she was holding and adjusted her new green feathered mask over her eyes. Her heart was beating wildly with anxiety. She hadn't expected the man to have an ability THIS powerful. 'Score!' she thought as she calmed herself and chuckled nervously as she slipped back through the party. She was careful to stay far enough from the man while trying to keep track of his thoughts. The distance was a difficult medium to stay in, though, because the further away she strayed, the harder it was to hear him. She decided to place herself in the outskirts of large groups of conversation to remain inconspicuous.

  The dress she was in now was black with a dark green lace bodice that flared into a mermaid skirt. It was harder to move around in this dress but it was the first design she could think of while she was momentarily unseen in the garden. She clicked her tongue as she watched the younger brother now from afar. He was much quieter than the older Chronos brother and he looked like he'd really rather not be there, completely disimpassioned. His wide smile didn't reach his gray eyes and he lacked sincerity when he laughed. Meena could sympathize; she hated talking to people, too.

  All of a sudden, Meena heard a yell in her mind and she choked on her champagne as she heard the elder brother's voice say, 's**t, s**t, s**t, s**t! TAKE THE CLOTH OFF MY FACE!' Meena looked around fervently as she set her glass down but she lost track of the man. She went out to the garden, trying to retrace his steps. 'Crap, I might lose consciousness...' she heard his voice again in her head. Meena tried not to look too alarmed as she scanned the crowd outside. She noticed several men in black suits and plain black, matching masks all heading deliberately towards the back of the garden and she trailed behind them subtly. She searched for security around the garden as she weaved through the crowd, but didn't see a single one. She actually didn't see any when she had hurried out earlier either. The last ones she saw were the ones standing just inside the house's foyer. Why weren't there any security guards outside at a party this prominent, even with the lowered defense?

  The man was no longer forming any coherent thoughts and she couldn't hear any thoughts from the group of suited men either. Meena followed them to a gazebo at the far end of the tea garden where very few lights were lit. They circled around behind the trees that surrounded the gazebo. Meena heard a strange buzzing noise that she didn't recognize and tiptoed just close enough to peek through the trees as one of the matching-mask men stood there holding a folded handkerchief in his palm and looking very confused with himself. The other men were trying to lift the Chronos man, who was slipping in and out of consciousness. Did this mean that the drugged-cloth man stopped because he was mentally told to? Was that another part of the elder brother's power?

  Meena bit her thumb and weighed her options. Option 1: save his butt now, never find out what these men are kidnapping him for, risk getting caught, risk becoming Chronos Corp.'s lab rat. Option 2: keep tailing these guys until there's a less risky time to save his butt, possibly find out what these men are trying to do, still possibly get caught, still possibly become a lab rat. Wow, those were crappy options. With a mental sigh, Meena dug up a useful ability she borrowed a couple years ago and chameleon-style camouflaged into her surroundings. As the suited men dragged the elder brother away, Meena followed quietly behind as her body changed to become almost invisible. They tossed him like a body bag into the back of a van and luckily there was a matching second van right behind it that they hadn't reached yet. Meena climbed into the back of that one unnoticed while they shut the first van's trunk and all piled into the vehicles.

  The men took him to a row of garages, the kind that you could rent monthly, and entered one with him. Meena slipped in through the back door before it shut, making a mental note of that escape route. Knowing the exits of a building was something she was used to after all those years on the run. Can't be too careful when your life is at stake, right? That definitely looked to be the case here, Meena thought as the men tied up the wrists and ankles of Chronos man and chucked him into the corner of the garage, causing him to lose his breath for a moment and cough.

  The masked men sat on cheap folding chairs around a card table as one of them pulled out a phone and held it to his ear. "We got him at the garage. ...Let us know when. ...Got it."

  Yikes. What were they holding on to him for? A ransom? That didn't make sense though, who hires bandits to collect a ransom? Was there something they wanted from Chronos? As questions built up in Meena's head, she noticed the man beginning to rouse himself and sit up with a groan.

  The man coughed again before hoarsely asking, "Where am I?" to the henchmen. Nobody so much as looked in his direction. He pulled weakly at the ropes binding him, then took in his surroundings. 'The men have guns. Probably not wise for me to try to make a run for it right now,' Meena heard his thoughts.

  Meena bit her lip and took a deep mental breath before testing out the man's own power on him. 'Please don't freak out,' she sent telepathically.

  The man sat up straight and looked around again. Nope, no visible females in the garage. What the hell?

  'You of all people should know how I'm speaking to you. Please don't show any reaction, they don't know I'm here.' With that, Meena sent him mental flashbacks of her brushing his hand and hearing the thoughts of others, including his own.

  'I knew there was something off about you! You took my power! Wait, are you invisible too? You can use multiple powers?! That's incredible. That's... That might be the strongest power I've ever heard of. Who are you exactly?'

  Meena rolled her eyes and ignored his questions. If he didn't already know the answers, it was safer for both of them that he remained ignorant. 'Stop making faces, i***t. You look suspicious. Listen, I'm limited to three powers simultaneously and I'm currently using two. I need you to be slightly less weak before we get you the hell out of here since I'm probably going to need you to hold off a couple of these guys. So get some rest and we'll wait this out for a little bit.'

  'Yes, ma'am.'