The Permutation

Results (Part 8) Paul

Monday 9 p.m. October 3rd

The human body is a miraculous symphony of organ systems working in perfect synchronicity. I have so many pieces to play with.

Paul had spent the last two hours in his Relaxzen Rocker poring over the ins and outs of human anatomy looking up the perfect ways to exact his revenge. The death of Joseph Banford had been a mistake that he regretted. A potential source of income that had gone to waste, but it had taught him a valuable lesson. Whatever that violet light had been, it had bestowed upon him a gift that he intended to take full advantage of. Those four were never going to laugh at Paul Neiman again.

Paul had kept tabs on them over the years, waiting for the right time to strike, but the opportunity never seemed to present itself. Until now. Cade Jahns was the most logical target. The sorry piece of shit hadn't done anything with his life after his football days. As it turned out, impregnating some trailer trash in Idaho and getting a job at the local sugar factory right out of high school wasn't the recipe for a fulfilling life. From what Paul had gathered via the Idaho State Repository, local news outlets, and various social media postings, it sounded like he'd blamed the Missus for his own shortcomings and let her know with a clenched fist. She took the kids when she finally had the gumption to leave, and something told Paul ol' Cade didn't shed any tears over their departure. A few years after that, a bum knee, courtesy of his football days, blew out, and the lucky bastard had been collecting disability ever since. Now, he spent his days drinking at O'Connells on the dime of Amalgamated Sugar. In other words, Cade Jahns was a sitting duck.

While driving back from Boise after the Joseph incident, Paul's mind reeled with all the potential applications of his newfound talent. From what he had gathered, he had the ability to manipulate the immediate environment using only his mind. It wasn't long before he'd pinpointed the source of his sporadic feelings of weightlessness that morning. Not only could he affect the things around him, but it seemed that he also could apply it to himself to a certain extent. He itched to experiment on passersby, but he managed to restrain himself until he reached the comfort of his living room. He'd been rewarded for his patience, and he wasn't about to squander his talents on innocent bystanders. They were reserved for VIP members on his shit list.

Upon arrival, the experimentation began in earnest, but he hit a stumbling block right out of the gate. Paul found that he struggled recreating the strands that he had witnessed at the coffee shop. Try as he might, he could not move even the lightest household objects. With each object he tried, his frustration mounted. Sweat poured down his face from the effort he expended in the sample task of moving a crumpled napkin across the floor. His legs trembled beneath him threatening to collapse under the continued strain of staying upright; even the feeling of weightlessness had departed. Paul stumbled his way to the sweet release offered by his Relaxzen Rocker.

Panting, his breaths coming out in ragged gasps, Paul realized that all this exertion had left him thirsty and famished. He reached for something to drink off of his side table only to find it empty. The expanse of space between he and the fridge may as well have been insurmountable. Closing his eyes, Paul visualized the entire living room and kitchen, every individual piece of furniture. Next, he envisioned the strands extending from his mind and connecting him to all of it. That did the trick. They erupted from the core of his mind coming into contact with the entire room until he had complete awareness. It was time to put his abilities to the test; after he got that drink of course. Dr. Pepper had never tasted so good.

Upon further experimentation, he discovered that there was no discernible weight cap to what he could lift. The entertainment center stocked full of DVDs, video game consoles, and his 70" TV was just as easy to lift as the television remote. However, there was a limit to how many things he could control at once. He could only manipulate as many objects as he could concentrate on, which at the time, was about three. The second his focus wavered, he'd feel his grip slip on all the objects he was holding. The last discovery he made was that walls were not a hindrance. His reach extended all the way to the boundaries of his property, but an inch past that was blankness as if nothing existed at all. Every individual blade of grass was connected to him just as surely as the contents of his living room. Armed with this knowledge, Paul had begun his research into the functions of the human body.