Think Tank

Allan remained standing, near the room entrance, and Chaha could feel the insecurity in his voice. And yet, she could not resist her childish urge to both needle and impress him: she rose from her chair, ostensibly to invite him over to the table, but in truth she moved with slow, fluid grace, to display herself in all her magnificence and overpower him with regal poise.

"I was treated like a Goddess today. As for you, Allan, tell me please: is this how you pictured me... when you chose me for The Most Beautiful Sound on Earth?"

"Chaha, my imagination is far too limited to conceive such beauty, and I am thankful that you would let me see you, like this, with my own eyes... but you really should change into something more comfortable before your flight."

"I will, don't worry... but not now: I am hungry and we really need to talk, so please sit, Allan." He did.

The waiter saw this as his cue and asked for appetizers. "Do we sample a rice beer this evening, Chaha? Or maybe a Bangalore whisky?"

Chaha retorted with a grateful smile. "You're cute, Allan... it's very nice of you to try to turn Indian for me... especially considering the kit I'm wearing... but, if you don't mind, I am already gorged on tea and I would like some Champagne for this occasion."

Allan was perplexed, but quite eager to please nonetheless. After a brief discussion with the waiter, he ordered a bottle of Taittinger. And then, remembering Chaha was hungry, he beckoned her to order right away, for both of them.

"There... we will have more time to ourselves. And I hope that what you have ordered is not forcing you to renege on your ideals of sustainable agriculture."

"Probably... but you really don't want to talk about that, here and now?"

"Why not? Until the Champagne arrives and I get to know what we will be toasting about, it's as good a subject as any... and I'm fascinated that an IARI graduate from Midnapore would take up that cause... I mean, you know better than I do the impact of the green revolution in India."

Chaha did not respond right away; she kept watching Allan intently and remained pensive, as if deliberating a life-changing decision. When she answered, it was as if she relented. "Yes... of course... but there was a cost..."

"Then, in the bigger picture, I guess it comes down to balancing ecological benefits versus actually feeding people. So go ahead: take your best shot and try to win me over. I would really enjoy hearing your arguments on the question."

That cinched it for her. After a disbelieving sneer, Chaha went into full advocacy mode: soil sustainability, local markets, water use, demographics, competition with the biodiesel market, resistance to disease, GMOs, pesticides, nutrition, greenhouse gas emissions and whatever else her mind could get a hold of. She carried on for some time after the arrival of the Champagne and Allan was completely absorbed by her case, constantly frowning or visibly pondering her points or data. And Chaha was delighted to feel that he was not just marking time.

When their curry and tandoori dishes were served, Allan filled their glasses and took a mockingly formal tone. "Here, here! Huh... what are we drinking to, this evening, Chaha?"

Chaha answered, nervous and flustered. "To... a long-awaited reunion."

"Cheers!" After his sip, Allan was intrigued. "That, young lady, was a very flattering but somewhat mysterious toast. I'm happy that you feel that way... don't get me wrong... but I cannot fathom how our meeting could carry so much significance."

She was fidgeting and could not look him in the eyes anymore. "But it does... in fact, I have dreamed about this moment for more than half of my life..."

Now, Allan was baffled, as her hearing aid was nowhere near that old. He was about to correct her, but she carried on.

"No Allan... don't say anything, please... let me fumble through this and then we can talk, argue or you can run away if you wish but... just let me have my say." Her plea stunned him shut.

She closed her eyes for a second, to concentrate, and then took a visible leap of faith. "Allan, before I begin, know that we are all alone and we can talk freely, truly freely. All right?"

Allan silently gave his assent. He was captivated, and a little apprehensive.

"Allan, what do you remember about August 23rd, 1997?"

Allan was still too weary for complete transparency and measured his words carefully. "That was a good day for me. It was my 26th birthday and, even though I celebrated alone with Nam, I did... a good deed that day. And that made me feel fulfilled... even happy... and that, sadly, does not happen often."

Now she was ready. Her voice was steady and she looked at him straight in the eyes, right through him. "Allan, I remember a part of that day as clearly as if it had occurred today. I will even admit that, in a sense, I replay that memory almost every day. It is my memory of the Human Tank rescuing me from a fire... of YOU rescuing me, Allan."

"Chaha... huh..."

"Please believe me, Allan... this is not a hoax or the result of sleuth." She then raised her hair to expose the back of her left ear. Allan had never seen the scar, but he instantly remembered the baby's cry of pain that marked this wound: the hard contact of flesh and skull on a searing-hot armor plate. Both shivered at the same time and Chaha immediately answered his quizzing gaze of astonishment.

"Yes, Allan... I felt it too. I am sensing your thoughts."

"So, this afternoon..."

"When you were thinking about leaving for this fire and Nam-il played his part in your cover story, you both spilled the beans. Has he always known?"

"Ever since I decided, after one of our grief support group sessions, to begin this madness. I could have never done it without him, and certainly not for this long. As for you... is that why you chose me for your hearing aid?"

"I have been pondering that question for the last hour. Who knows what trace can a traumatic memory leave when you are an infant? But, to my knowledge, our reunion remains a twist of fate: this morning, I was getting ready to meet my acoustics benefactor and nothing more. But it IS why I always cherish any excuse for a trip to New-York... and why I always have this with me." She showed him the title page of her Tank archive. Allan recognized the images from where he sat.

"I see. Well, how do you feel now? I have always believed that having, instead of wanting, can be a letdown..."

"It is not logical... but it is often true." She laughed shyly. "Who can argue Star Trek wisdom? I feel good, Allan. It is very nice to be able to speak freely about all this. And I can thank you at last... not just for my hearing but for my life! Plus, seeing that you are not freaking out, I even dare to hope you will help me make sense of that memory... and I could try to explain to you, in return, just how much it meant, and still means, to me."

"Before you erase all this from my mind? Very well, I'll be a good sport... fire away: what do you remember?"

"You have read too many X-Men comics... and I will let you pick my brains about all this afterwards, I promise." Chaha then closed her eyes and, in a mere instant, seemed to reach complete inner harmony. She spoke evenly, with her eyes still closed.

"I remember being so scared that I was not crying, and the heat waves being so intense that I could not open my eyes. Then I heard you... you were stomping around, as if searching for something. I opened my eyes and you were not looking for me. You left my room and came back, with a pile of blankets on your arms. Allan, why didn't you use one of your freeze blasts?"

"That's how you call them?"

"How do you call them?"

"Hyperpressurized supercooled refrigerant bursts..."

"I'll stick with freeze blasts."

Allan laughed heartily. It was the first time in more than 15 years that he was talking freely about his secret life with someone other than Nam-il. And one of the few times he could talk to a rescuee. His heart was thumping. "That night was one of my very first patrols and I had not envisioned using them with people around, especially not someone so young."

"Your Tank voice was scary... I remember not wanting to go with you. You picked me up and I struggled. Then all was dark under the blankets. I kept screaming... help me, help me! My throat was hurting from the hot air and the smoke."

Allan was totally focused on her voice.

"Then, I saw again, but all was white, blue and green... and I heard a loud, steady breathing sound, and humming too. I also heard a voice... but not yours... it sounded very distant, but I saw no one. I always thought I was delirious or dreaming at that time."

"No..." Allan had to clear his throat. "No... you were somehow seeing through my own eyes, watching with my thermo-imaging system, hearing me breathe and also hearing firefighters on my radio receiver." Allan took out his right hearing aid to show her. His face was flustered.

"Are you sure? I have never performed that sort of feat..."

"I'm positive. The depiction of your memory is exact."

"But... then I felt a drop, like Alice in Wonderland, and everything was white... and smelly. How does that make sense?"

Allan laughed softly and blushed furiously, like a child reminded of a misdeed. "I was making rookie mistakes back then. I was looking all around and not where I was planting my feet. The floor ceded under my weight and I fell, with you in my arms, in an inferno and under falling debris. The smell... well, that was me crapping my shorts."

Chaha scoffed. "Euuugghhh! Allan, don't you have... I don't know... some sort of storage or reclamation system?"

"You have been reading too many Iron-Man comics. Just how many systems do you think one can fit inside a powered suit without it becoming a real tank on wheels? Anyway, in my first year, I ruined so many shorts that I eventually swallowed my pride; I wear diapers now."

Chaha was now laughing her heart out as if she had just heard the funniest joke ever. Allan was charmed by the heavenly sound of her laughter and also slightly annoyed, as she was obviously laughing at his expense.

"Come on, Chaha... it's not THAT funny." He was still not used to a conversation with her.

"Not what you said... the image of yourself, in your mind! If people saw what you look like before you go in your Tank suit, nobody would ever take you seriously! And why are you so white? Is that talcum powder all over you?"

Now, Allan was hurt. "You try remaining inside a sealed armor for four hours with an itch on your nose... or your feet!!!"

Chaha was muffling her laughter by force of will and a scoop of curry. "Yes, yes of course... sorry Allan... you poor thing! After that, I remember a winter chill and everything turning to red."

"I was out of options. It was at that moment, while I untangled ourselves from the burning rubble, that the blankets slipped and you got that burn. I panicked and used a... freeze blast, right then and there. I don't even remember its impact on the blaze... I just wanted to cool the armor pronto."

"I see. I never remembered anything about the wound... thank you for that; but I remember the fear, the despair... I also saw a baby boy in his mother's arms... I heard the name Jonathan... I saw a policeman talking to me... is Jonathan your son?"

Allan's face now had tear tracks. "He... was..."

Chaha was instantly overwhelmed with grief and put her hands on his. "Allan... I kept hearing... not again, not her... and from that instant, I swear, I was completely calm. I was sheltered, I was cared for, I was loved even. I was your treasured daughter at that moment and, in your heart and mind, you were my loving father. That is why I always replay the memory... for the purity and magic of those cherished feelings... feelings I had never felt again, until tonight."

"You really were... you still are, in a crazy sense... but I am so sorry..." Allan was reaching for her burnt ear.

She redirected his strong hand to her heart. He gasped; she shivered. "No! Allan... you will never apologize to me... for anything... ever! Listen to my heartbeat. Every time the police, the NSA, a school paper, no matter who... every time people doubt you or bring up 9/11, every time that you feel that they might be right: that you are tilting at windmills, that what you do has no bearing or meaning, that your violence will only unearth more violence... remember this." She pressed his hand forcefully on her sternum. Both could hear and feel her heartbeat, strong and quick; both could also feel the goose bumps on the voluptuous mounds of her breasts.

Allan was befuddled, and felt his loins wake up from the dead. He softly removed his hand... it was visibly shaking. "Thank you, Chaha... thank you very much. I will. Do you... remember anything else?"

Chaha's intense gaze morphed into exhilaration. "Are you kidding? It got fun after that! A rush of speed and a tumble... I always love replaying the memory of that tumble; I kept practicing it in gymnastics or, even better, on a trampoline. But I never could relive that feeling of... of weightlessness... shame..."

Allan smiled meekly. "It is quite a feeling... isn't it?" He was reliving it now, in his mind, just for her; and she milked every ounce of emotion she could out of his many memories of crashing through walls or leaping over traffic.

"Thank you..." she had whispered in ecstasy.

"You're very welcome." A very long and awkward silence ensued. "So... if the X-Men didn't get it right, did Ringworld? Will we be breeding for telepathy in the future?"

"It's funny you should say that. I have never heard of that novel and, in truth, I have no idea which lobe does what, in your brain or in mine... however, I have indeed come to believe that my birth was not the fruit of love."

"How can you think that? If memory serves, both your parents died that day, in the fire, and your very name means Desired Goddess. What about your middle name? Is it for Mother Theresa? Are you Christian?"

"Wow! You have a lot of questions, Allan. Yes, I am a Bengali Christian; but my middle name honors Saint-Teresa of Avila, founder of Christian meditation. As for my youth..." her voice wavered in shame. Allan took her hands in his. Chaha was briefly amused to notice that they disappeared in his tender grasp.

"My mother was a Bollywood actress. From what I read about her, I gather she was wealthy, independent, frequently courted... and yet she mothered the child of an American bioengineer almost overnight. Even by the time of my birth, their couple - if that's what it was - had no civil standing, hence my full Bengali name. Also, I don't think we were in New-York overtly: when I tried retracing our steps here, a couple of years ago, I have had considerable difficulty doing so."

He spurred her on. "So what do you think?"

"That she was a mindreader, like me, who sought a suitable match, genetic or psychic... and that she charmed him, or worse... until that fateful night..." Chaha was the one holding back tears now.

"Murder-suicide... from your mother's sperm donor? That's some scenario..."

Chaha sobbed and inhaled strongly to quash it. "The arson report did state that the fire had a suspect, and accelerated, origin."

"All right, so that's one theory that holds water. But there are others. I have fought at least two anti-science militias in my... career so, if you are right about your conception and it somehow got known, a malicious act is certainly a possibility."

"You think so?"

"Well... who's to know, after all these years... but I suppose eugenics could be a part of the story. Come to think of it, it could also account for your..."

"You really think that?" Chaha blushed at the unfinished theory.

"Come on! Don't lay this all on me, please! Chaha, I'm certainly not the only one who ever thought about how beautiful and desirable you are!"

She sneered and sighed. "You have no idea, Allan; how boring it is to constantly read men's surface thoughts: sex in one form or another, or grabbing my breasts, or my looks in all stages of undress, or how unapproachable I must be, or an estimation of my price, or trying to guess my cost of living. I swear, Allan: according to mankind, life is nothing but money and sex."

Allan chuckled and did not dare argue; Chaha carried on. "Mind you, women are not much better off... just more diverse... and so often mean: what cosmetic work I've had done, how many men I have used or crushed, what Emir will I seduce, how I must have graduated on my back... it goes on and on."

Allan did not know how to appease her. "And... you cannot turn this off? Ever?"

"I am sensitive to thought processes; I have no scientific axiom to explain my... gift, but if you cannot stop thinking, then I cannot turn it off."

Allan winced in empathy. "Ouch! The background noise must be awful... how do you cope?"

"I had to learn by myself. When my guardian aunt could not deal with my cries of pain and my constant headaches... and also when she realized I could call all her bluffs and that I could pre-empt all her diagnoses of demonic possession, she signed my legal emancipation, gave me my inheritance and cast me away. I was 15 at the time and we have not spoken since."

"That's terrible..."

"It almost got worse when I sought modern, professional help. According to social workers, psychiatrists, neurologists and what not, the medical regimen required was, from my point of view, exorcism by another name. And complete isolation almost drove me insane..."

"Because of the lack of psychic noise?"

"I think so, yes... my own enhanced version of sensory deprivation."

"Is that why you meditate often? Mind you, I say this only after seeing you doing so on two occasions..."

"Therein lies my salvation, yes. I self-taught myself, from books, in the relative tranquility of my new home. I made peace with myself just in time for college so, this time around, I could study and graduate without having to read my teachers' mind for exam answers... well, not too often, hi hi!"

"And then began your public life: your early modeling, your first publications, the Miss Planet Earth pageant..."

"And now here we are. It feels so good to be able to open myself like this, Allan, I wish I could show it to you."

"You don't think you could? I disagree. I mean, I'm new to this, of course, but I'm pretty sure, now that I'm processing all of this, that you projected your thoughts to me, this afternoon."

"I beg your pardon?" Chaha was startled.

"Did you wish me well, when I was about to leave for the fire? I heard your voice." She gasped in surprise.

"I did, Allan... I was tracking your mind, while I was preparing myself, and I was about to lose you in the distance. But it cannot be... Allan, let's say, for argument's sake, that our minds are walkie-talkies: we can all emit but, to receive, you have to be... tuned in... am I making sense?"

"Very much so. Nonetheless, I did hear you and I am no telepath... could it be that our mutual experience during our first encounter... tuned us both to each other?"

Chaha was breathing quickly and her cheeks had reddened - it was visible through her base and whatever other makeup she had. Allan was hearing excited gibberish and he was giddy: it was her voice he was hearing, but her lips were not moving.

"Chaha, to be able to fully appreciate what we seem to share, you will have to give me time to learn Bengali."

Chaha had her eyes wide open and the expression of a young girl opening a present. "Allan!!! This is so great! Houu, I will never thank you enough! I am so lucky today! And I owe you SO MUCH! My hearing! My LIFE!!! And now, on top of it all, we share a psychic link... like twins!!!"

Allan was basking in all her happiness, seemingly drinking it like an elixir, and he laughed out at his own sarcasm. "Sure! Twins! Twins with a 24 years age difference! That is a rather unique concept..."