PSI Corp

Ortega was dying.

Everyone else thought he was already gone, but we knew better. We know our team, inside and out. If anyone bothered to look, they'd see his finger still twitching. They likely thought it was just nerve damage.

And I know why the director decided to summon everyone – from his direct subordinate down to the part-time janitor – to file past the mangled remains. To show everyone Ortega's loyalty. To show it could happen to any of us. To see if any of us had the balls to do the same thing, in the name of getting the bad guy.

But could we let the guy expire without making him a freaking exhibition piece? Couldn't we even hold our buddy to ease him past the veil? Did we have to make him see himself, reflected in our team's minds? He was still here! He was recoiling in horror even as we had to keep our faces blank.

That's what gave me the idea.

Ortega was a master of staying in the background. We used those skills to take ourselves out of the courtyard, and upstairs to our rooms. We fired up our sensor chairs.

We were full-fledged members of PSI Corp. Psychic Services Incorporated, at your service. Inborn talent, training, enhancing chips, sensor chairs. All the bells and whistles to take our mental skills to the next level, all in the name of getting the bad guys.

Well, what about keeping a good guy?

Ortega had been in this gang when he was a kid. He'd gotten out before his brother was slaughtered, before his blood brother took over and turned a two-bit street gang into one of the worst drug trafficking cartels in this hemisphere. We'd been slowly taking out the itty bitty characters for months, but the big bosses? Completely out of reach. After months of chasing ghosts, Ortega had done the unthinkable – went back, knowing he faced certain death for desertion, with his circuitry on full record-and-send. And what he experienced, what he went through, got channeled through us. So we could hone in on where he was, and take them all out. He was banking on us getting there in time, even when we all knew we wouldn't. Even him. He drew out the torture by mocking them, to make sure we had them dead to rights.

We play for keeps. We know how to kill with precision. We were there to get him out, not take prisoners.

Our chairs were warmed up. I wasn't the only one quietly injecting myself to make sure the rapport took fast hold. This had the possibility of breaking our minds if it went wrong.

I didn't care. Neither did my crew. Ortega was worth it, even as I heard him tell us not to try in the back of our minds.

You see, in PSI Corp, we live up to our name. Psionic abilities, courtesy of natural ability and government enhancement. Teams were built with care. By the time we were in the field, we all shared a closer bond than any family. A piece of us was in each other, always there, always on.

Ortega was fading, and we couldn't take it. Not when we might be able to do something about it.

With the chairs on full power, we could reach halfway across the world. Down to the courtyard in our own building? Piece of cake.

Can you pull a soul out of its ruined body before death? We were about to find out.

For all his protests, Ortega clung to us as the lifeline we were. We pulled, and we sorted. We took his memories, his personality, into ourselves according to our team strengths. Riviera was his sparring partner, so he got the training and fighting memories. Smith was his mentor, so he got the childhood memories. Tank was his wingman, and they lived together, so he got the off-duty stuff. Perry was the other girl besides me; she got all the high school and deep philo stuff. The things you think about deep in the night, when the party's over. I was surprised I didn't get those, since I was usually there, debating with him in delight. I love the dark end of the mind pool.

Me? I got all the sex and romance. And the full force of his personality, not just his memories. I made as much room as I could in my head for it all, since we'd be sharing space for a while.

I didn't realize Ortega had been that deeply in love with me, till he was all in there. He'd kept it very, very quiet, the weasel.

Not fair, you're technically my superior!

What about all those nights being Tank's wingman?

The answer was clear: Tank got the girls, and Ortega was there for the free booze and the occasional extrication when Tank picked one with five gallons of cray-cray squished into a two gallon bucket.

You've wanted me for how long?

That was clear as well – since day one of orientation, when his eyes met mine for the first time. He worked his ass off to get on my team, I'd known that, but he'd always said it was because he knew I was the best team leader there. Well, to be fair, I probably was, but for being in each other's minds all the time, Ortega'd kept this secret so close to the vest I think he shaved and oiled his chest.

Another thing I love about you, those odd turns of phrases, make me want to laugh...

Somehow, the cat out of the bag made all the room for him he needed. He settled in like an old friend, but keeping his dirty boots off the furniture.

I come potty trained, after all...

Smith's actual voice cut over the inner dialogue. “Everyone got everything? Feeling comfy in your heads?”

We didn't need to nod. We've known each other too long.

“Then Ortega, it's only fair you cut the cord. It's your right.”

His sigh came out of my mouth. “I'll miss that body, even that bum knee.” It was the first thing they'd shattered, to make sure he couldn't get away.

We felt the cut, the snapping back. It hurt, godsdammit hurt so bad. Death of one of us hurt us hard, even when he was right there, holding the metaphorical knife.

Well, that was easier than I expected.

Yeah, but now what? I can't claim squatter's rights in all of you, we'll all go mad in days, hours if we're unlucky.

Riviera had that thoughtful head-voice that we loved, since it meant he'd had a clever thought. Did we kill everyone? Or were some just mind-blasted and shut down?

Tank was already searching the cells far below. Flick, flick, sort, select. Conferred with Ortega in my mind, using my mind. That was an odd feeling. It was like two full-grown people trying to share a single-sized bed without shoving one out. But Ortega grinned, and swung us off the chair, tested balance. My center of gravity was much lower, so I elbowed him out of the way and took over. Tank followed, and we made our way downstairs.

Sacrificial choice?

Let's see what our options are. I like Tank, but I also know his taste in women.

Guards got out of our way. I don't know if the director even had a whiff of what we were trying and left orders, or if we were given carte blanche to do whatever to prisoners because of Ortega's remains still in the courtyard. I didn't want to look at any shiny surfaces, and Ortega agreed – though he very, very badly wanted to touch certain parts of me, just to see what it was like.

Later.

There were about two dozen mid-level and low-level lowlifes left over from the raid, but no one of real signifigance. We didn't have time during the raid. I remember feeling resistance from some few members, and being so enraged that I may have exploded a brain or two. Tank recalled taking over someone's nerves, and having that bleeper rip off someone else's leg, and bashing others into jelly. While Tank and I reminisced, Ortega was reaching out, looking for...

Him. One guy kinda curled up in a corner, trying to stay out of the way. He's a distant cousin, got some ability. I can work with that, if Doc does the upgrades.

Here, there's no trial, no appeal. These were all dead men on the hoof, just waiting to be brain dumped for information and eliminated. Then even the records get wiped once they're combed through for data, or more likely, associates we can also take out. Electronic mind space is much more expensive than organic synapses, and these fools weren't worth it. What we were thinking of doing instead was highly unethical, probably illegal anywhere else. Except in this building.

Any regrets, being a blood relative?

None. He could have tried to stop what was going on. Instead, he watched, and had this look like he wished he could help. I motioned for the kid to come, but he wouldn't even look in our direction. Tank reached out and grabbed hold of a few neurons, and finally he jerked upright. I'll give the kid credit, he fought hard. But it didn't take long for us to strap him to a convenient gurney. He wanted to scream. We wouldn't let him.

He got transferred and re-strapped into Ortega's chair, and we stopped to give him a once-over while he struggled. This will be tricky – how to evict a soul without destroying the body? I mean, we've all done mind wipes, but deliberately? I'm usually just angry and want to blast people out of the way so they don't bounce and get me from behind. I don't think about the intricacies of incapacitation without physical damage.

We've got plenty to experiment on downstairs...

There's not enough time. We're already slipping, you can feel it. How about, instead...

I made a quiet mental call, and Doc eased into the room a few minutes later. Each suite had full medical capabilities, and we slid the extra chair into position while Doc prepped. We filled him in on our idea, and our double residency problems. Of course Doc had thought about it before, and had ideas. “A precise electonic pulse would probably do the trick, but I suggest Ortega do it on his own. Personality override seems to be the most effective.” Doc drew blood and prepped a body for mental surgery; eliminating drug influence and giving a mild sedative for implants. “Hm, still tricky. But Ortega cut the cord on his own tie of soul to body, he can probably do the same here before taking up residence.” Scanners were taped in place. “Let's get a quick memory dump so we can fiddle.” Doc had no tolerance for deviants, and it was evident that he felt that one less bad guy in his air space couldn't happen fast enough. He'd seen Ortega's body, and what they'd done to him. He viewed it as an affront to his religion or something. Took his Hippocratic oath beyond “seriously” and into “fanatical religion.” If this guy hadn't stopped the torture, he was just as culpable, blood tie or no, according to Doc.

Was he screaming? Begging for mercy? Sure. We could hear him. But, I hissed in his ear right before the drugs took over: “Ortega was screaming even louder, and you did nothing for him. You could have shot everyone, or gone down fighting. Given us time to get there sooner. You did nothing. Your own cousin, and you did nothing! So now we'll make your body even more useful than the nothing you're about to become.”

We were going mad. We could feel it. That movie, with the Jedi people? Yeah, why does the dark not win? Because you can only sustain hate for so long, then it drains away. It's all hormones and chemical impulses, and they run out of juice. Chemical boosts can only stretch it out so much longer, and then they're kaput. Anger kicked us over the hump to do the really hard part, but hosting Ortega in our brain space was getting harder and harder by the second.

I strapped up in my chair for the second boost, and Ortega dove in when the mental screams faded to whispers.

Ortega, on the other hand, had a lot of pent-up anger, and another body's fear can only hold out so long against five trained agents.

I'm telling you, brains are weird. We should know. Being used as a springboard for a personality to dive into sapient jello and rearrange the pool to suit himself was more than strange. And when the jello is fighting back, but doesn't have the tools, and you and your buddies do, and it's a coordinated attack but you can't hurt the jello physically... Once you get to the fourth or fifth layer of bizarre, reality loses a lot of its punch. And the fruit and ice cream crap you put in the punch only makes it worse.

We just formed a guard of sorts, let Ortega fight his own battle. And made sure little threads of personality didn't sneak around behind him. When you're used to fighting spaghetti with knives and forks, and now you have to use oil-covered chopsticks, things get unhinged. Oh, yeah, and the spaghetti's fighting back.

Ortega held that knife thing he used to separate his own soul from its original body. He used it again for the second eviction, and settled in before the body took notice it was unoccupied. We could feel the memories draining out of us, slotting into new homes.

Some didn't want to fit. This guy's brain wasn't wired the same way as his own, of course. But Ortega was determined to take it all with him, and get it jammed in odd corners and drawers. Do we have backup memory storage? Sure, but policy is to delete a couple of days after the funeral. Yeah, Doc and I slapped some personal stop-codes on his file so fast it left a scorch mark in the circuitry. Now only the director could override, and I left a message explaining exactly what I would do to him if he so much as tried. I wanted a backup for this one way or another.

We could see the original soul take off. In our line of work, that's normal. They don't like to stick around here, though I'm sure some of the bad ones would love to mess with us if they could. Anti-ghost generators were one of the first things invented after the enhancement modules for telepathy and telekinesis proved to work. We've got a big one in the basement chugging away twenty-four seven. And we made small ones for some of the hospitals, to give the staff breathing room.

The body sighed, and snuggled into Ortega's chair. Doc slathered on some numbing cream. “As you can see for yourself, the biofeedback charts now show Ortega's pattern, not the original occupant's. I might as well install these while he's taking a sleep break so he can assist from the inside. And we'll clean out any drugs or nasty viruses that may still be hanging around. Might as well go into static standby – make sure the previous occupant doesn't harass anyone leaving the grounds, no one comes in this room physically, and Ortega stays put. I'm staying too; I want to know how well this succeeds. You realize the implcations, correct? This can completely change the game.”

“This one will need ethics codes, Doc. This is death on a whole new level. Did this one deserve it? Sure. But the next? The one after that? The five hundredth? Maybe not. Let's see if we ever have the power to do that again, even with enhancements, before we decide this kind of immortality is okay.”

“Hmph. Spoil my ego trip.”

“It takes a lot to get that angry, Doc. And even more to maintain a second presence, and even more than that to help transfer. That's a lot of layers of difficulty, with impossible multipliers, and we could have all come down with a bad case of the deads. Or any one of us could have tripped over a stray neuron, and it's all over. And I'm betting machines can only help so far, since you're installing modules by hand and not by computer aid.”

“Showoff. Damn director was right, you're the damn best of us by far. I'm telling you, no other team could have pulled this off and succeeded. Everyone else in this building would have shut down, and not even been able to be with him mind-to-mind during the torture. Getting in, extracting, destroying, then channeling all that afterwards to perfom a frigging miracle of future science? Eh, I should hate you all. Instead, I want to study you till I can publish a secret or two.”

“Well, study us sleeping, because that's where we're headed.” And I did, though machines and computer-administered drugs did as he requested. Guarded, in and out, while everyone else mourned.

We'd have to lie about it. We couldn't tell everyone what just happened. Maybe the director, he might come up with a way to explain the new face we were treating as the old. Explain to the others? No frigging clue. We'd have to come up with something, though. Tomorrow.

Sleep rose up and wrapped me in its own type of spaghetti...

Ortega was waiting for me. In his original body shape.

That wicked looking knife was gone, and instead, he was holding... something else. And the dreamscape blurred into a bower, hidden deep in the woods, away from prying eyes and team mind-thoughts. And he quirked an eyebrow at me, like he used to.

This... would be interesting...