Free Mindbenders by Ted Krever

job that the bank teller looked at you sideways over. Miriam Fine was a corporation and I was traveling with a freak show. She had every reason to feel good about herself.
    “I made a mistake,” Max conceded, shoulders slumped. “I left town and got thirty miles away before I realized they were after Dave. By the time I got back, it was too late.”
    “So your method isn’t foolproof, it seems,” Fine said. “You aren’t Superman.”
    “He’s pretty close,” Tauber said and that seemed to break the mood, at least shake it up. “He does things we never did.”
    “Of course he does,” she said. “He can’t help himself. So you feel responsible—”
    “To an extent, yes. Dave was my friend.”
    “—and you’re going to make amends? By deciding the old team is in danger—based on what, you’ve no idea—and taking it upon yourself to be noble and save us?” Sarcasm dripped from her voice; the words seemed to hit him like blows.
    But something must have struck him funny, too, because his head rose and he was watching Fine now the same way Tauber had been watching him, sizing her up as though he’d never seen her before. “Dave left a trail,” he said. “Based on the trail and the way it was presented and the feelings I got from it, I’m here. You know as well as I do that we can’t rationalize everything we know. I didn’t take anything on myself—Dave left me the list.”
    “It seems to me he left Greg the list,” Fine said and Max turned immediately to Tauber, accusing.
    “She got that out of your head,” he glared.
    Tauber raised his arms in protest. “She’s my teammate,” he said. “I don’t block her.”
    “So Greg’s the list,” Fine repeated and suddenly I felt that warm feeling in the back of my head again, though it wasn’t as sharp as before, more of a mellow, sympathetic feeling. It would be so nice to have someone looking out for me. She was looking at me in a way that was more than sympathetic. I’d never thought much about older women but she probably had a good TV and really nice sheets. “The list led you to me, is that it?” she continued. “So maybe I’m supposed to make some decisions now.”
    “It’s supposed to help us get the old team together, so we can fight the killers,” I said.
    “That’s his interpretation,” Fine said. “How do you know? Maybe the list needs to be heard by other people. Maybe it needs to be thought about and examined in a peaceful setting, instead of running all over creation like chickens with your heads cut off. Doesn’t that make sense?” With the look she was throwing me, it made lots of sense.
    “Greg,” Max said, “when you gave me the first name, we both knew we had to go find him. I didn’t force you—you knew it was the answer. You felt it like I did.”
    “Based on what?” Fine asked. “What facts do you have for that decision?”
    “We don’t work on facts !” Max spat. “We know what we know! Intuition, embedded emotion and experience.”
    “He’s powerful, Miriam,” Tauber told her. “He’s not a conscript. He’s a natural.”
    “Oh, no question about it,” she said. “He’s the natural. The greatest there ever was.” And now Max looked distinctly uncomfortable again.
    “You know him?” Tauber said, sitting up in his chair.
    “Of course I do. I’ve seen his picture a thousand times. It’s Renn!”
    “Renn?!!” Tauber sat up like the name had attacked his spine. The look on his face mixed awe and horror. I felt like Rip Van Winkle, the alien wanderer, the visitor who didn’t speak the language anymore.
    “Renn,” Fine repeated, holding the name on the end of her tongue. “The cream of the crop, the man who knows everything . Look at him now—tired, poor, hiding from the world. So paranoid he didn’t even realize old Dave Monaghan had enemies of his own. Because everything’s about him, has to be about him.”
    Renn—I was just getting used to Max—stared at her, sullen but not