The Dark Edge Chronicles - Hardwire

Aftermath

Preacher was slowly pouring brandy into the third of three snifter glasses as he watched two young women, their naked skins glistening in the warm light cast by the antique floor lamp near their heads, silently writhe on a leather-covered mat.  Stunningly beautiful by anyone's standards, one blonde and the other a brunette, both were blindfolded and within centimetres of each other on the large mat.  Yet, neither touched the other, their mouths thrown open in silent screams of ecstasy, their minds filled with the coerced pleasure that Preacher was pumping directly into their pleasure cortexes.

The lean Brotherhood leader wore a thin smile on his face as he empathetically siphoned off the women's pleasure into his own pleasure centers.  It was called 'tapping', a decadent pleasure many powerful psionics engaged in, when they grew jaded with simple physical pleasures.

Completely consumed with the tapping, he nearly dropped the glass of brandy he had lifted in his hand when his smart phone went off with a soft 'peep' in his robe pocket.  Ruthlessly quashing his irritation, he frowned as he put the smoky bottle back into the liqueur cabinet before stepping from his study.  He left the two women twitching in the throws of their induced sexual frenzies, letting their pleasure build in his absence.  It made for a more powerful tap upon his return.

Of course, despite his power and ability to erase their minds, Preacher didn't want to run the chance of them remembering him talking about Brotherhood business.  So he would take the call in the office, at the end of the hall.  Tugging the robe of fine Chinese silk, his only clothing, closer about his lean and muscular body, he pushed the door to the office open and stepped in.

"This had better be good,"  he growled as he pulled the phone from his pocket to look at its display as he stepped around the massive oak desk sitting in the center of the opulent office, a near mirror to his larger office in the city.

"Like Henry telling me he's got the renegade in his hands!"  Making note of the number, he tapped the auto-dial button on the phone's face even as a tendril of psyken turned on the lamp on his desk.

As the warm light from the antique lamp filled the luxurious and well-appointed office, a series of soft tones sounded in the dim air as he lifted the phone to his ear.  Then:

"Mr. Preacher, sorry to disturb you at home," Henry's voice stammered, sounding not so much apologetic, but panicked.  "But the situation has taken a turn for the worse.  I would advise you to come into the office immediately."

"And just what the hell is that supposed to mean, Henry?"  Preacher barked into the phone, no longer able to resist the flood of frustration that burned through him. "The situation has gotten worse?"

"It's Braddox, sir.  He's had an engagement with the renegade.  And he took heavy losses."

"What?"  A cold tingle raced down Preacher's spine.  "How many?" he husked.

"There were two separate incidents, sir.  Three dead at Curly's, including a mover who had the air in his lungs gelled and turned solid.  The rest were badly wounded."  The man on the other end paused for a moment, obviously struggling to regain his composure.  Preacher could hear him swallow nervously.

"Go on, man," he hissed, sensing Henry's turmoil even through the phone.

"In the second ... ahem, the second confrontation, triggered when Braddox sent a team of movers and burners after the renegade, we lost ... we lost twelve more movers to something an observer called a 'psionic storm'."

"Psionic storm?"  Preacher frowned.  Then it hit him: fifteen dead.  "Burn me to ash," he bit out.  "How did Braddox fair in all this?"

"Uninjured, sir.  But perhaps you should hear all of this from him."