The Pellegrine - Initiation 1

Date: 1 December 2672, Sunday

Heath awoke in the morning feeling refreshed and totally in love. He felt the warmth of Jacques next to him. It was a wonderful feeling. Heath had not felt so happy and contented in ages. The deep breathing of his companion next to him brought back the events that occurred the night before. Jacques had planned the evening since they finished their final exams at the Academy in the middle of November. Getting the use of the personal transport vehicle from his father, Jacques brought Heath to a small village tavern for dinner. It was called St. Andrew’s Spot. Heath’s birthday fell on St. Andrew’s Day which explained his very first name Andre. The dinner at St. Andrew’s was special and romantic. Heath enjoyed the food and appreciated the lengths at which Jacques had gone to find the place. Then they came back to Heath’s grandfather’s house for the night. They had made passionate love until early morning. Charles’ little tips proved useful and Heath had a very wonderful first experienced of being made love to as well as making love to Jacques. Jacques had been a wonderful friend and had become a wonderful lover. Heath moved his hand to touch the face of his love whose head was resting on his chest.

“Good morning beautiful,” mumbled Jacques as Heath stroked his face.

“Good morning, Jacques. I didn’t mean to wake you.”

“You didn’t wake me, I woke up by myself. Your hand stroking my face was so tender that I had to acknowledge it.”

Heath felt his blood rushing to his groin and his organ moved the covers a little.

“I know I didn’t do that,” Jacques said.

“Do what?” asked Heath innocently.

Jacques moved his hand under the covers whilst stealing a kiss from Heath. Then the two started getting very aroused. Soon, Heath’s face was between Jacques’ legs

“Yes, Heath, that feels good,” moaned Jacques. A few moments later, he asked between gasps and moans, “What else besides my dick do you like Heath?”

Heath stopped and sat up, moving slightly away from Jacques. Jacques raised his head to see a very puzzled face.

“What’s the matter?”

“How did you know I was thinking that?”

“Thinking of what?”

“That I liked your dick.”

“I heard you saying it,” said Jacques.

“How could you have heard? I didn’t say anything,” said Heath.

“But I heard you say it.”

“How could I have said it with my mouth full?”

Jacques realised that what Heath said was true. “But I did hear it! It was you saying it. I wasn’t imagining it.”

“I did say it … in my mind. I didn’t say it out loud. This isn’t the first time, Jacques. What’s happening?”

“I don’t know. What do you mean that this isn’t the first time?”

“The first time I noticed something funny was when you called me some months back. I so wanted you to call me and when you did, you said you had a feeling. Then there was that time in the cafeteria when you bought me an expresso when I never mentioned that I wanted one. I was thinking about having an expresso during class but I never told you. There was the other time when we were doing our homework together, you turned and offered the answer just when I was thinking of giving up trying by myself and asking you. You anticipated my actions as if you read my mind. Jacques, you’re scaring me. Are you able to read my mind?”

“I don’t know. I get these thoughts about you but I often think it’s the result of my lovesick imagination. But it’s cool, isn’t it … to be able to read your mind?”

“No it isn’t. Every thought to be known by someone else, even if it’s someone I love dearly. Just think. I can’t surprise you with a gift because you’d know about it beforehand. What fun is there when I can’t even sneak up to give you a kiss because you know everything I plan to do?”

Jacques did not think of that before. He realised that it was terrible for Heath to be totally opened to him. He also realised that he would not be having more fun because he would never be surprised.

The two men were suddenly aware that they were clothed. They did not remember putting anything on.

“I put them on you,” a voice sounded. They turned towards the door of the room and saw a relatively tall man. He had blond hair that was greying at the temples. His hair was long, about an inch short of reaching his shoulders. Jacques found his presence strangely familiar.

“Who are you? How did you get in here?” asked Heath when he finally got over the shock.

“I’m Jorg. I’m here to answer your questions regarding Jacques and to tell you more about yourselves.”

“Jorg? It sounds familiar,” said Jacques. Then suddenly he remembered. It was the name he heard when he was unconscious in the doctor’s house. He could not figure out why he had not remembered this incident before.

“Jacques, stop worrying. You’re not losing your mind. I had to block the memory from you because you discovered your true nature prematurely.”

“You haven’t answered my second question,” said Heath. He was not comfortable because they were all alone at the house. Heath had made sure that the staff were all on holiday for the next two days.

“I got in here the same way you’re getting out,” answered Jorg.

The two men realised they were no longer on the bed at the mountain house but sitting on a couch in an unfamiliar place.

“Welcome to my house.”

“Where are we?” asked Jacques.

“I thought I just answered that,” said Jorg.

“I mean where in the world are we?”

“Just know that you’re in one of a group of islands that used to be called Micronesia.”

“Why have you brought us here?” asked Heath, getting angry and afraid at the same time.

“To answer your questions about me and those like How could Jacques read your mind?”

Jacques looked at Heath and saw his love afraid. “Heath, stop worrying. He’s not going to harm us. I have this feeling.”

“You have this feeling? I’m …” Heath was indeed anxious. He felt that he was suddenly thrust into something he was totally unprepared for.

“Calm down, both of you,” said Jorg in a gentle but firm voice. “If I meant you any harm, you’d be dead by now.”

The two men looked at him and Jorg could still sense the fear in Heath. He placed a comforting thought into Heath and that calmed him a little. However, Heath was still very suspicious about Jorg.

“Do you believe in fate or destiny?”

“I don’t,” answered Heath. “It’s all mumbo jumbo. I believe we decide who we are.”

“I never thought about it,” admitted Jacques.

“I don’t usually believe in fate but yet we were meant to meet.”

“What do you mean?” asked Heath.

“I suppose I’ve to start from the beginning,” said Jorg. “What I’m going to tell you is highly confidential. If the wrong people hear what I’m going to say, we’ll all be in the greatest crisis the planet has ever known.”

The two men nodded their heads.

“I’m a human being like you but I’m more. My genetic makeup allows me to manipulate matter and space. It gives me a psychic potential. It allows me to be more than just a normal human. That is why I was able to transport you here from where you were. The psychic and genetic advantages that I have allows me to naturally absorb the energies that are found in all things animate and inanimate. Actually all human beings do the same. Whilst normal humans absorb a miniscule amount of this energy from their surroundings, I absorb about twenty times as much. This allows me to live a lot longer than most human beings. I am six hundred and fifty-two years of age.”

Jacques and Heath looked at Jorg in disbelief.

“I know you don’t believe me but there is nothing I can do to prove my age. However, you’ll notice that I don’t look much more than my mid-fifties.”

“Actually, you look like you’re in your forties,” said Jacques.

“Thank you,” responded Jorg. “I’ll take that as a compliment. Whilst I was born with the potential I spoke of, you two have just acquired that potential.”

The two men looked at each other in amazement. For a brief moment, Heath thought that Jorg was quite mad.

Jorg picked that up but decided that Heath’s reasoning was not illogical. He continued, “Each of you have part of the genetic makeup that make me what I am. Jacques has a little of the psychic potential that’s already active. Heath, I do detect a psychic potential but for some reason, it’s not active. However I do know that when both of you made love last night, your bodies started to exchange the specific genetic material that’ll make you like me.”

“Wait a minute, I know my biology,” said Jacques. “There’s no way we can exchange the genetic makeup of our bodies like that.”

“For normal human beings? No. Remember that psychic potential I talked about, Jacques? You made that happen. When both of you made love, it wasn’t just due to the pent-up sexual urges both of you’d stored up. Both of you wanted to be together, to be united, right?”

A blushing Jacques nodded his head and a red-faced Heath blurted out, “You were reading our minds. How perverted can you get?!”

“I didn’t have to read your minds. That’s what true lovers think about when they make love. They don’t think just about sex, they think about union. What happened was that when Jacques thought about it, it activated both your bodies to exchange genetic material when your … ahem … bodily fluids contacted your bodies. Right now, some cells of your body are already starting to change.”

“You mean we’re turning into monsters?” exclaimed Heath.

“I wouldn’t call becoming better monsters. You aren’t going to change in appearance but you’re going to gain psychic abilities and you’re probably going to live much longer than normal humans.”

“Are you the only one with such abilities?” asked Jacques.

“No, there are about a million of us in the world.”

“One million?! You mean there are a million of you in the world right now?”

“Yes, one million of my kind in the world at the moment. We are called magi. Our origins are shrouded in mystery. We know that our ancestors were normal humans but then one day, something changed us. Pockets of magi were made all over the world. We’re talking about the time of the Cro-Magnon man.”

“Surely there was cross breeding if that was so,” stated Heath.

“Yes, you are correct. However, it would be best for me to present you with the whole thing before you start asking individual questions.”

“You can help by making us normal again.”

“There is no way of making it happen without causing a world-wide witch hunt for all magi and all those who have your genetic makeup.”

“What do you mean?” asked Heath.

“Listen to me first and perhaps you’d understand why I had to interrupt your love making to bring you here.”

Jacques and Heath nodded.

“When the magi race was made, entire groups were made. We weren’t immediately psychic or powerful, our knowledge of our powers developed gradually. Legends tell of shamans in the various tribes who gave instructions to magi regarding their powers. When we were sufficiently developed, we were made aware of other tribes in different parts of the world. We visited each other and soon, in a psychic sense, we became one community. The community’s laws are very strict. Our purpose was to help humanity move towards the next level of evolution. There is a streak of evil in all of us, a potential to do evil instead of good. The evolution of humanity would be set back three to four times if help wasn’t given. So we were given this help. Who gave us this help is anybody’s guess. There were some of our ancestors who claimed that it was a divinity, a god of some kind and there were some who turned to religion for answers. As years passed, it became clear to us that we wouldn’t know for sure until those responsible for changing us reveal themselves to us. Once human civilisations started, magi lived among normal humans, taking special care not to cause suspicion. There were some magi who, consumed by the power they had, wanted to subjugate the human race. The magi law forbids that and the penalty is nullification. What this means is that the magus’ power is removed. We’ve had quite a few instances in history where magi were helping to propagate evil instead of good and all these were nullified before they did much damage. You will recall some conquerers in history that died or defeated when they were at their peak. Then, of course the magi that were corrupted started doing things indirectly, like helping ambitious and ruthless humans. These magi were also treated in the same way when they were found out. Unfortunately, much damage was done before they were found out. Whenever nullification is attempted, the whole community knows about it, so when an evil magus tries to nullify another magus, the whole community knows about it and the problem is usually averted. The rules for nullification are a little complicated for me to tell you now, but realise that it’s not taken lightly nor is it allowed easily. Thus, I cannot nullify you without a just cause. Wanting to be nullified is not a good enough reason.”

Jorg smiled when he saw the disappointed faces of Jacques and Heath.

“Remember that I said we absorb life energies. Well, when magi decide to have children, they give quite a huge part of those energies to their children and after a certain number of children, they become normal human beings and the ageing process catches up and then they die. There’ve been cases where a magus falls in love with a human being. There’re two possibilities: either the magus chooses to be nullified and lives out a normal human life span, or the magus chooses to deceive his love and gives the semblance of ageing. In the past, the former was usually chosen but after the sixteenth century, the second has became more popular. If a nullified magus has children, the offspring may carry some of the magi genes but he or she doesn’t have the psychic ability to activate the genes. If the magus is not nullified, the offspring may possess some limited psychic abilities like telepathy, telekinesis, pyrokinesis and the like but they’re not as powerful as the true magi because their genes need to be activated. The psychic activation of the genes can only be made at birth. If a magus parent decides to activate the genes of his semi-magus offspring without permission, the community has to nullify both parent and offspring. This has occurred only a few times in my lifetime, though we’ve allowed some semi-magi to be activated under very strict conditions. Again, this is complicated. I’m sure you know by now that you’re both semi-magi and that somewhere in your past, one of your ancestors was a magus.”

Jacques and Heath looked at each other in awe. They did not realise that they could actually be half-breeds.

“Don’t call yourself half-breeds! It’s such a terrible term to use,” exclaimed Jorg.

“You were reading our minds again!” accused Heath.

“I wasn’t. You were projecting your thoughts! There’re two modes of thinking in all of us. Thinking privately and projecting thoughts. To most normal human beings, there’s no difference because they can’t sense projected thoughts. To a magus, there’s a difference. We sense projected thoughts and we’re taught from young how to stop projecting our thoughts. Projected thoughts varies with distance and because you were so near, it wasn’t difficult to sense them. One of the reasons I brought you here was that you need to be instructed on such things. Especially that you’re semi-magi transforming into true magi. This has never happened in our history and I’m sure that whoever picks up your thoughts, especially the semi-magi, would want to analyse you for their own purposes.”

“Sorry,” said Heath. “I’m just not used to this.”

“I understand,” said Jorg, “but you must also understand that I can’t tell you why Jacques’ psychic powers were activated until both of you know how to control your thinking. It would seem that both of you were meant to meet because Jacques picks up your projected thoughts easily.”

Jorg saw understanding in both their faces. “Now you understand how Jacques knew what you were thinking. If you learn how not to project your thoughts, you’d won’t have to worry about not having surprises in your lives anymore.”

To those words, both Jacques and Heath broke into smiles. Jorg did not have to read their minds.

“Good,” Jorg continued, “you’ve managed to keep those thoughts private and not project them. I must say, though, that it doesn’t need a mind reader to know what those smiles are for.”

The three of them smiled even more.

“Let’s get back to info time,” said Jorg after a moment’s pause. “I’m quite an independent magus. I’ve my own network of helpers because I was once part of the rescuer corps, a group of magi that help out humans in special need. Through my network, I’ve ascertained that Heath’s the only member of his family with his special genetic makeup. However, I haven’t managed to get information regarding Jacques’ sisters.”

Responding to Heath’s questioning looks, Jorg explained, “Your eldest sister just had her blood checked to see if she was pregnant again. Your second sister is planning to get married and has gone for a blood test too. These happened within the last two weeks and my friends who work in the medical establishment have managed to get samples of their blood for analysis in the magi labs.”

Looking at the frown on Jacques face, Jorg said, “No, Jacques, we aren’t all-powerful. We’ve discovered that science is just as important, if not more, as the powers we possess.”

Turning back to Heath, Jorg continued, “Your older sister’s a regular blood donor. It was simple to get a sample of blood from one of her donated packs.”

“Jacques, we’d need to find a way to see if your sisters have the same genetic makeup. If so, we’ll have to prepare them if they’re also primed for change.”

“You want me to go and prick their fingers?” Jacques asked incredulously.

“There’s no need, Jacques,” said Jorg. “Just make sure you tell me when they get sick because my friends would be able to get their hands on any blood sample that the doctor demands for.”

Heath kept very quiet during this time and Jorg noticed it. The boy did not trust him.

“All right. If you want to learn how not to project your thoughts more efficiently, please tell me when you’re free and I’ll give you lessons. You’ll need at least seven sessions of two hours each.”