Free Teleporter (a Hyllis family story #2) by Laurence Dahners Page A

him over to the table, Farley was beginning to speak. “Wha’ happen’d,” he grunted confusedly.
    The biggest guard said in an awed tone, “You had a stroke Bossman! The lady here,” the guard nodded at Eva who was still gently massaging Farley’s neck, “she started rubbin’ your neck and you been gettin’ better!” He lowered his voice, “I never heard of nobody getting better from a stroke before.” He leaned down a little closer to Farley’s ear and said, “She’s really good! Wish she’d been around for my Gramps.”
    Farley slowly woke up, acting confused like anyone else who’d been unconscious for a while. He kept asking what had happened, and the big guard patiently explained it to him over and over again.
    Eva stopped massaging the man’s neck and slowly wandered away. She seemed to be wandering aimlessly and Tarc looked at her curiously. Her face had a stricken expression so he got up and walked over to ask her what was the matter.
    She stared at him for a moment, then said, “You used your talent to harm another human being!” She looked aside for a moment then turned back to him, “I know, I know, you used your talent to guide knives and harmed a lot of, of, of men when Krait was here. But,” she looked away to gather her thoughts, “those men were… evil.” She turned back to Tarc, “And then… then I… carried out a subterfuge with you, pretending that Mr. Farley had a natural stroke and even worse that I was curing him.”
    Wide-eyed, Tarc said, “But Mom! Farley was threatening dad! That’s pretty evil in its own right.” After a moment he continued, “Besides we didn’t hurt him permanently!”
    “We don’t know that!” Eva said almost vehemently. “Cutting off blood flow to that part of his brain might have some permanent effect we don’t recognize.”
    “Oh come on! People get choked by the neck, which does the same thing, and recover completely all the time!”
    Eva shook her head, “There may be some subtle changes in their mental function that we just can’t detect.”
    Tarc shrugged, “If we can’t even tell it happened, I don’t think the loss of function is very important.”
    Eva looked off to one side and gave a minute shrug, granting that he might be right. Then she turned back to Tarc, a tear running down her cheek, “Even if we didn’t do him any permanent harm, we did him temporary harm. And then I lied to him, well, to the guard, by implying that I was the one that made him better.”
    Tarc tilted his head as he studied her curiously. “Mom, you lie to patients all the time. Your placebos… and telling them you’re ‘thinking’ when you’re actually sitting there sending your talent inside their bodies.”
    Eva stared at him for a moment, then her eyes crinkled a little bit at the corner in amusement. “Well, I guess you’re right. I do lie to patients all the time, but those are “white lies” intended to help the patient. This lie wasn’t intended to help the patient, it was intended to help me .”
    “And your family! It wasn’t just a lie for you.”
    Her eyes drifted away, then returned to him. “Well, that’s true.” She put her arms around him and gave him a hug, Tarc feeling surprised to realize that her head barely reached his shoulder. She whispered, “Thanks. I still feel guilty, but I think I’m going to be able to rationalize it now.”
    Tarc clumsily patted her back, feeling like he hadn’t really done anything except tried to justify his own actions.
     
    After about five more minutes, Farley said he wanted to get up. To Tarc’s surprise, his guards wouldn’t let him up until Eva came back over and checked on him. Tarc wasn’t quite sure how Farley had gone from being the bossman to being restrained by his own guards at the whim of a woman whose family he’d been shortchanging on a deal.
    Eva proclaimed him ready to sit up and the guards slowly maneuvered him into that position while he protested that he could