TIME : August 14, 2015 9:00 A.M.
PLACE : Peter and Hank's room
Peter slowly got out of bed and stretched. Hank had already left letting Peter decide when to get up himself. He quietly got dressed and walked out into the hall. Nothing had changed since the day before, at least on the upper levels.
"Detrina, Lisa, Linda, are you awake," he called softly.
No response. Slowly, he opened the door to the room across the hall. It was empty.
Detrina, Lisa, and Linda had gotten up before him too and no one had bothered to tell him where they had gone. He started down the hall wondering where to go.
It wasn't long before he ran into Detrina going the other way. She looked like she had already had a busy morning.
"Good morning, Peter," she taunted. "I'm glad to see you finally decided to get up."
"I didn't sleep that late," snapped Peter. "Where did you go? I've been looking all over for you."
"We've been talking to the crew of the Marrot V trying to find out what they knew about Corteja and the other scientists," explained Detrina. "Corteja is highly intelligent and not afraid to express her opinion on anything. She likes to keep to hers~21f. The other scientists arrived several months ago and are very particular about who they associate with."
"You were right about,:,Orn. He has been acting rather peculiar lately, even for him. I think he knows something we don ' It." "I know he knows something we don't," commented Peter. "He gets a little carried away sometimes, but remember he's on our side. Have you talked to Rinquin and his family yet?"
"Not yet," confessed Detrina.
"That's were we need to go," declared Peter. "If anyone can help us, Rinquin can."
TIME: 9:30 A.M.
PLACE: Rinquin’s Study
"I suppose it is possible to make a copy of the hypo-psycotic power amplifying machine," acknowledged Rinquin. "but it wouldn't be easy. The machine was created by a technology that comes from an entirely different galaxy. Even if they understand our technology, it will take a while to learn our style of doing things."
"Rinquin has been teaching me the history of the Quadnestine," began Kara. "Their alphabet has thirty-two letters and can be encoded as binary numbers. If you don't know why something was written, you could get your letters and numbers totally mixed up."
"Everyone has said that Corteja and the other scientists are quite intelligent," noted Peter. "Corteja has been here over a year and the scientists have been here for at least several months. They have had plenty of time to learn the Quadnestiine language."
Rinquin pulled out a green book containing the history of hypo-psycotic powers, how they could be created and amplified, and some of the things that could be done with them.
"Orn came here last night and told me he felt someone else needed to have hypo-psycotic powers. Someone outside my family," Rinquin informed them. "Needless to say, he wanted to be the one to have these and pointed out that because he was Security Officer, he was the most qualified. I agreed."
"I showed him how to use the machine and warned him of the dangers of trying to increase his powers to quickly. He asked me not to tell anybody besides you and your friends from M.W.G.D. and he wants you to do the same. Hopefully, we can catch the scientists off guard."
"A special type of acid exists that will destroy hypo-psycotic powers. Unfortunately, it will also destroy whoever it touches. The acid is easy to produce and can be created in most laboratories. It is to be used only as a last resort, but I have a feeling they may force us to do drastic things. I'-will make some for you. Guard it with your life and whatever you do, don't let them have it. If they use the acid against us, we'll be completely defenseless."
"Can I look at the book?" asked Peter.
Rinquin hesitated for a few seconds before giving Peter the book. Peter flipped through the pages stopping to look at anything that seemed even remotely interesting. Some of the book dealt with Nestor and his original experiments with hypo-psycotic powers while the Marrot I was still in the Quadnestine. Although he didn't understand the Quadnestine language, each section had a summary at the end written in a language that he could understand. The book went on to talk about Nestor's failed attempts to build a hypo-psycotic power amplifying machine and his eventual success. Then it talked about the experiments with hypo-psycotic powers that Nestor performed on himself because he was afraid to test it on anyone else. Peter skimmed through the other test results until he came to the actual powers that the people with hypo-psycotic powers had. One of the earliest ones was telekinesis, the ability to move objects with the mind. Telepathy was next, however, it worked only one way. They could send mental messages, but they couldn't receive any unless the other person had hypo-psycotic powers too. Other powers varied depending on the person with no apparent pattern. They included invisibility, hypnosis,-sonic attacks (such as those Tanbrook had use), and a mental shield. The final power was greater than all the other powers combined. The people with the greatest powers could speed up or slow down time in a small area. Such a person could do a regular day's activities in a matter of seconds. For that person those seconds would seem like a day, but that was a small price to pay for such powers. Peter tried to imagine what would happen if Corteja or one of the scientist possessed such a power. They could kill everyone on the entire ship without having to think twice about it. Moving into hyperspeed, as the book called it, was also the most dangerous power. Most of the people who had died using hypo-psycotic powers had died trying to move into hyperspeed. Some simply died from the shock of it. Others began to age rapidly and died of old age in their thirties and forties. Nestor himself almost died trying to use such powers. The final section talked about the acid that would neutralize hypo-psycotic powers and how to make it. Since the acid was sometimes fatal, the book warned that it was only to be used as a last resort. Peter handed the book back to Rinquin.
"Do you know anyone who has the ability to distort time?" asked Peter.
"Only myself," Rinquin replied. "Most people have enough sense to not even try it, but I was a 'Little more ambitious in my younger days. I told Fern and Logan not to try it until they've reached adulthood. They should be able to handle such a power by then."
"When a person first gets hypo-psycotic powers, those powers increase geometrically, doubling every so often. On the first day you have a penny. On the next day you have two. Then four, the eight. and in less than a month you'll be a millionaire. The powers eventually level off. but there's no telling when that will happen. Additional uses of the amplifying machine will start the process all over again."
"Corteja and the scientists were trying to copy the machine," Peter began. "but Drake won't arrest them without proof."
"Drake doesn't want to take any unnecessary risks," explained Rinquin. "At least one, if not all four of them have hypo-psycotic powers and they are becoming more powerful every day. I would estimate they are about twice as powerful as Orn. If all four of them
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