The Cacophony of Voices

Here's a little teaser from the  middle section om my novel Light. I have posted about a quarter of the book online, but am saving the rest for the final publication. This section occurs at a point where Greg Marks has been doing the odd psychic reading for other students on campus. One was for a medical student named Chloe, who also has a more skeptical medical student colleague named Jonathan.

The scene occurs also just after a time where Greg has a run-in with Dr Dusker, who is not only the Morgan Hall director, but a staunch member of the university skeptics society. In a previous scene (which I have not posted) Greg gets into an argument at the skeptics society meeting while Dusker is attending.  

Marcus

  *     *     *

I ambled into the Hall office and walked over to my pigeon hole. There was a single envelope there with the Hall logo on it. However I was too tired to wonder much about what its contents might be, and headed back to my room and lay down on the bed. I didn’t bother to get up as I opened it. My eyes widened as I read on.

          Dear Greg,

It has come to our attention that you have been engaging in inappropriate matters relating to religious and spiritual engagement on Morgan Hall premises. That this has also involved the soliciting of money from other students is a very serious violation of Hall protocol. Under section 11.7 of the Morgan Hall Rules and Regulations handbook, this violation may involve expulsion from Morgan Hall and legal prosecution.

You are requested to attend a meeting to discuss this matter on Wednesday, 17.00, in room C220. You are strongly advised to be present. If you will not be attending, please advise immediately, as your nonattendance may result in legal charges being brought against you in your absence.

Dr. Michael Dusker, PhD, JP, NIID,

Director, Morgan Hall

“What the fuck?”

A large, black ball of nausea filled my stomach and I felt the darkness pierce my skull. Then came the anger.

What the hell was this all about? Inappropriate religious and spiritual engagement?

“Shit!”

This had to be about my readings. It had never struck me that they might be against regulations. But money? I hadn’t been taking any money. Then I remembered. Chloe’s twenty bucks. I knew I shouldn’t have accepted it. A steady sense of panic began to overtake me. Chloe? Why would she have told anyone about that? It didn’t make any sense.

I stopped, took a deep breath and connected with her energy. I could see her in my mind’s eye. But there was nothing strong that I could sense. There was no agenda against me, nor malicious intent.

I saw it then. She opened her mouth and spoke a single word to my inner ear.

“Jonathan.”

I slapped my forehead. That was it! She had mentioned the reading to that tall streak of misery and he had gone and blabbed to Dr. Dusker. I shifted physically, instinctively turning thirty degrees clockwise and brought my attention to Jonathan. His face came to me. His brow was furrowed, his lips forced down. Immediately I could feel it.

“You are a fraud. Full of shit. You humiliated me. Now you must pay.”

I didn’t need to look any further. His intention was clear.

I shook my head. “What an arsehole!”

Next I turned to Dusker. His energy came strong, dark. Ghoulish.

“You are finished here. I will destroy you.”

“Shit, shit, shit!”

I paced back and forth across the three-meter breadth of my room. I felt like a man already tried and convicted, waiting for his final all-expenses-paid trip to the gallows. Yes. I was finished at the Hall. There was no way out. But a legal conviction? That would surely end my uni days. They were sure to run the story in the student union newspaper, emphasising the part about my psychic delusions. My future was lying in ruins before me. What employer would hire a guy with only a high school diploma, and who had been kicked out of university? Who would want a convicted felon, a delusional one no less?

 I was screwed

In that moment and for the first time, I regretted being able to read energy. Not only was the entire university turning against me, I could feel their energy closing in on me, circling like buzzards about a wounded buffalo lying bloodied and helpless on the savanna. I could see the twisted faces, feel the lecherous thoughts, and hear the cacophony of voices clawing their way into my skull.

You are nothing. We will destroy you. Look at you, you pathetic fool. Do you think you are the messiah? You are a joke. You are a piece of shit!

I lay down, hands on my head, trying to turn it off.

There was just one other thing I knew, something I felt just as strongly as the terror that filled me. I was starting to lose it.