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Joined in Mind and Body

Chapter 8

Andrew wasn't sure whether to be shocked or not. But his own plan had worked against him quite well, that was definitely true. A small suckle from Serina and he melted again, unable to panic in the afterglow.

"I know it's kind of a shock," she sent, rubbing his belly to try to help him keep calm. "And I admit, I have ulterior motives really. You're... Well, you're my size... and you're psionic. So you and I together could actually accomplish energy for me. Then I could stay here. And... well... I like you."

"But... How can I be...? What does this mean for me?" Andrew asked, still trying to wrap his mind around the idea. Him, psionic? There weren't any psionic humans at all. How could he possibly be psionic?

She released his softening member from her muzzle and gave it an affectionate lick. "Well, it means that at the very least, you are psionicly sensitive. You might have psionic abilities too, or you might not," she said. She crawled up his body and put her forelegs over his thighs, resting her upper torso on his upper body and snuggling.

"Well, like what?" he said.

"I don't know. You'd have to go in for official evaluation to find out," she murmured. "If you want, you can just enjoy time with me, and we'll both get energy from it. Lacking psionic energy affects your whole life, and having a good pool and cache is always a good idea. Hmm. In fact..." She pondered. "If you've been psionic all this time, but never had a good energy pool, you've probably been affected by psionic leakage your whole life. If we get your energy levels up, you will probably get your instinctual shielding up, so you'll feel a lot better all around."

He pondered and stroked her back, which caused her to slowly begin to purr. He found a spot that she liked and scratched nicely, eliciting more purring as he considered the situation. He realized two things: First that he somehow knew exactly where she enjoyed being rubbed, because he almost felt an echo of the rubbing on himself, and secondly that petting her did seem to invigorate him in a way.

"Sooo... I might have a skill of some sort, and I'd have to be evaluated by Kathari to find out?" he asked. He found himself curious really. But then he thought, what would the humans think? Would he be shunned? Outcast?

What the humans think doesn't matter. You have something nobody else has. Don't hide from it.

He had a feeling that he didn't really care what the humans thought. This was something new and exciting, and definitely much better than just going around and fixing computers.

"Yeah," she said, purring happily at the rubs on her back. "I don't know exactly how we'd accomplish it, but we could try to find a way. You could get evaluated, and trained, and... Um..." She lifted her head and looked at him, her amber eyes fascinating him still. "...maybe even be my... working partner?"

Andrew blinked at the depth of her gaze. 'Working partner' was not what she wanted to say at first. "Working partner?"

She nodded. "Well, a working partner pair is responsible for maintaining their energy levels to do whatever their task is. Working pairs also get some nice benefits over just humans on the ship."

"Oh. What is your normal job?" he asked her.

"I... err..." her ears laid back. "I've never had enough energy to be fully evaluated for a job position. My parents pulled strings to get me to here, hoping I would find a way to get my energy levels up." She grinned and her ears perked. "I almost didn't... but then you came along." She squee'ed in delight and suddenly rolled onto her back, dragging him with her and hugging him with arms and forepaws. "Oh, I'm so happy!"

Her delight was contagious. He found himself laughing and hugging her warmly. He had never had anybody who liked him so much in the past. He got along well enough with machines, but women had never really been his forte. "Okay... I'll get evaluated, and see what comes up. And if I can, I'll be your working partner, or whatever else we decide together."

He realized that he genuinely liked this feline. He didn't know her very well, but maybe it was kind of like how Kats read people. Maybe he had read her? Whatever the case, he had felt an attachment somehow since he first saw her in the bar the night before.

"YAY!!" She exclaimed, and hugged him even more. "Umm... You should probably call your keepers then. They already know about this. They might have some good ideas. Oh, wait..." She looked up at the door, her ear flicking. The door slid open and Tyrin and Kelia stepped in. "They were waiting outside," Serina explained, "So I just let them know they could come in."

"You two look cozy and happy," Kelia observed. Andrew thought about blushing, but Serina gave his face a lick and purred to him, and his embarrassment melted away. "It's nice to see a happy new couple," Kelia purred as she and Tyrin climbed onto the bed. "Oh, Serina..."

There was apparently some telepathic communication that Andrew was not a part of, and Serina perked up. "Really?!" Serina exclaimed. "Oh, you two are so great!" She turned her attention to Andrew. "Your keepers knew you might find out. So they've got everything set up already, just in case you did!"

Andrew peered at Kelia and Tyrin. "You not only knew about me from the start, but you were ready for me to maybe find out?" They both nodded.

"Get dressed, Andrew-l'es," Tyrin said. "We've got a slow time right now where we're going, and I don't want too many questions."

Andrew squirmed a little, then blinked. "Um, Serina..." he paused and decided something. "Serina-l'es... You have to let me go if I'm going to get dressed." She blinked and purred happily at the suffix he gave, releasing him and helping him off her chest. He dressed quickly before looking for his PPDU.

Tyrin had the PPDU. "I've readjusted it," the Kat told him. "More isolation. I don't want curious Kats poking at you mentally." Andrew nodded and strapped it on his wrist. No sooner had he done so than he was scooped up by Kelia and placed on Tyrin's back. Andrew blinked. There was a backpack on the Kat's back too, as well as effectively saddle bags, the strap of which Andrew was sitting on.

"Hold onto the backpack and cross your legs on top of the saddle strap," Kelia told him. Andrew blinked, but did as he was told. He was not in contact with the Kat at all now, sitting on the saddle strap and holding the backpack. Kelia caught his chin and turned him to look at her.

"Okay, Andrew, we are going to have to hide you the whole way there," she told him, looking very serious. "You are going to be shielded, skin-tight, with a refractive energy shield. So that you don't fall off, you'll also be telekinessed inertialessly. Tyrin is going to be doing this. You won't be able to move at all, it'll be like your whole body is held in a clamp. And you won't be able to see anything. All energy, including light, will be going past you as if you're not there, because of the shield. So it won't be hitting your eyes. Your chest will be free, so you can breathe, but Tyrin will also be assisting your air flow."

She watched him as he took in the information, turning a bit pale. She continued. "Tyrin will be projecting himself to you, so you know what's going on. This will be... odd... I think... since you're not used to it. You need to close your eyes and open your mouth slightly, and we'll get set to go. Just remember: Don't Panic."

Andrew gulped. Ooooh kay. He closed his eyes, let his mouth drop open slightly, and hoped for the best. He was aware of the light from past his eyelids snuffing out completely, and then his whole body had pressure against it, constricting him just a little. He fought a rising panic as breathing became hard, but he felt air traveling past his lips and nose. Strangely it was going in his nose and out his mouth in a constant flow. He managed to kill the panic finally, relaxing mentally. Then the projection started.

Odd was true, yes. Fucking awesome would work too though. Andrew was aware of his own body, but he was also suddenly seeing the world through Tyrin's eyes. More than just that, he felt the Kat's body too, as if it were his own. It was like watching a show though. He had no control. But he could focus on it and tune out his own body, and it was... wow. He -WAS- a Kathari for this moment.

"Andrew likes it," he heard himself/Tyrin say. "We're out of slip space, right? Did you get clearance to use an intra-ship hole?"

Kelia nodded. "We have clearance. Weird thing though, the consulate pushed approval through directly, and without questions. I wonder how many people actually know." She looked at the outer door. "In fact, a security team just arrived to escort us to the travel node at the end of the hall and secure the hole. Oooo... and no Kats on it."

Sure enough, the door rang an alarm advising that it was being overridden, and the security field went down as five armed humans entered. Andrew was amazed at how different they looked from a Kat's point of view. Besides being short, the actual vision was different. Further both into IR and UV range, and much clearer-seeming.

"We were ordered to escort three Kathari from this suite to the hall E-travel node," the security lead stated. Another member of the team scanned all three Kats, but obviously the scan missed Andrew. The scanning individual nodded to the lead, and the lead nodded to his team. "Let's go, then."

The escort formed around them as they left the suite, locking the door behind. A few humans and Kats in the hallway looked curious, but moved out of the way. One Kat contacted Tyrin mentally, "What's going on?"

Tyrin answered in kind, "We're taking E-travel. We're working on something important, and we've been called to get our tails over there now or sooner. Secure information, sorry."

The Kat sent back acknowledgement, and went on hir way. The rest of the trip to the end of the hallway was otherwise uneventful, and the security team used their special access to gain access to the hole generation controls. Some codes were punched in by Kelia, and a wormhole large enough for the Kats to pass opened up, leading to another section of the ship. The security team took up positions to ensure nobody else followed them through.

Going through the wormhole while being shielded was... odd! It felt uncomfortable, definitely, but Tyrin sent soothing thoughts that helped the matter, and it was quickly over. They were in another hallway, the wormhole closing behind them as they got their bearings. Down the hallway then to the right, and two Kats stood guard at the double-doors at the end of this hall.

The Kats looked curious as the party of three came down the hall, and Andrew felt Tyrin being mentally scanned by them. Then they both suddenly got aggressive, shielding themselves and stepping in front of the door. "You can't try to bring a human in here. Strictly off-limits. Did you think you could get away with that?"

Then another telepathic message, that obviously the two guards could hear as well as Tyrin. "The human is cleared," it snapped. "Stand down immediately and see them in. Why do you think you've been turning everybody else away?" Tyrin grinned and Andrew chuckled internally as both guards jumped and their shields went down. They looked sheepish as they turned and unsecured the door that they had been sending everybody else away from for about an hour.

The three of them passed through the door into a lobby and four Kats met them. Two of them were the two that had processed Andrew's intake scan. Once the doors slid closed, one of the Kats said, "You can stop hiding him now. It's secure from here on out."

Andrew felt the telekinetic field leave his body at the same time as the shield around him, and he slumped slightly, but Kelia caught him as Tyrin's projection faded, and Andrew found himself with his own sensations only. "Wow..." the human murmured as Kelia lifted him off Tyrin's back and set him on his own feet.

"Good afternoon, Andrew-k'is," one of the two Kats he had not met stated. "I would like to say that everything is well under control, but in all honesty, we have no clue ourselves how best to deal with this. This is completely unprecedented, and we really had no plans in place for it. We're going to proceed as we know how, but because you are human, we'll be taking a lot more precautions for your safety and ours."

He...? - Andrew wasn't sure... The Kat's voice was indistinct; even though shi did not have breasts in phase he couldn't say - looked at Serina and tilted his head. "You have a lot more energy. I can tell even without testing. Andrew-k'is may be very good for you. Hmm. We'll do partner testing then perhaps."

"Take good care of them," Kelia said. Tyrin nodded and rubbed Andrew's shoulders.

"They'll be doing some things that may scare you", Tyrin sent to Andrew mentally. "The important thing is that you trust them. We all really do have your best interests in mind. Good humans are hard to find. Psionic humans are one of a kind. Literally."

Andrew looked up at Tyrin and nodded, acknowledging the message. "We should be fine," he told Kelia, putting on a brave face. Honest to god, he was pretty nervous... well, no... scared shitless. In under 24 hours, his life had been turned around dramatically. Serious change, and he had NO clue where he was relative to his old home. After slip space, they could be anywhere.

Serina took his hand and stood beside him. "I won't let anything bad happen to you, Andrew-l'es." She nodded to the four waiting Kats. "We're ready."

The Kat's turned and gestured towards the doorway. Andrew and Serina preceded them, and with a glance back at Tyrin and Kelia as they sat to wait, Andrew stepped into the hallway just beyond. The hallway was short, opening out into huge spherical chamber beyond. Andrew was shocked to see at least forty or fifty Kathari waiting within, grouped into clusters in a circle around the chamber.

"Srel arrow a tht sr'rowl?" asked one of the Kats inside.

"Andrew-k'is cannot speak our language yet. Communicate in Katharin telepathically," one of the Kats who had escorted them in sent. "And yes." Andrew blinked. The telepathic signal was definitely Katharin language, but he understood it anyway. Must be an effect of telepathy.

The Kat who had addressed them outside turned to them. "There are too many of us to introduce to you, Andrew. Depending on your skills, you may learn how to identify Kats instantly. Anyway, because we don't know what to do with you, we will do the basic tests on Serina first. Then we can explain things to you as we go. I am the lead in the tests."

Andrew nodded and looked at Serina. She smiled. "I haven't done this in years, but it's fine," she sent. She stepped into the middle of the room and spread her stance on all four paws.

There was a click and a whirr and Andrew was aware of a powerful isolation field coming up around the whole room. Eight of the Kats from one group moved in and formed a circle at eight points around Serina, a good ways away, with every other Kat being slightly further out. Andrew tilted his head as he saw a shimmering shield go up around Serina, just inside the circle of Kats.

"We form a shield around her to avoid potential problems in the case of accidents or a wild burst," the lead sent. "Then the test administrators form a network amongst themselves, which you don't see, and each one works to contact her. The one with the best link becomes the focal point of their network, and all the tests feed through hir. From then on, the test subject needs to relinquish full control of their mind to the administrators."

Relinquish full control of their mind? That thought gave Andrew the shivers, but he was told to trust them. He watched as Serina's tailtip twitched.

"There are two parts of psionic energy," the lead sent. "The first, outer part is the cache. The second, much bigger, inner part is the pool. Think of them as two equally-tall open-topped containers separated by a pipe at the bottom and filled with liquid. Everything going in and out is from the cache, but the pipe allows the height level in the cache to equalize with the pool, just not too fast. Any psionic action takes energy out of the cache, and then it is slowly refilled from the pool. Any energy gain goes into the cache, and slowly feeds into the pool from there. So consider the pool to be long-term energy, and the cache to be short term energy.

"Since the pool is so much larger than the cache, and only energy in the cache can be directly accessed, many Kathari have something like an energy pump that keeps the cache about half full no matter how low the pool is," the lead continued. "Otherwise if a very large pool was very low, the cache would be too low at all times to do major things even if the total amount of energy needed was available in the pool. For the purpose of these tests, and testing energy levels and capacity, we turn off that movement mechanism, and occasionally block the pipe itself.

"So, we have turned off the energy pump between Serina's pool and cache, and we wait for her cache to level out at the same level as the pool... ah, there." The lead sat down and watched carefully. "We have no way of measuring the actual VOLUME of either of these though. We can only measure it as a relative change. So we calibrate our measurements as 100%, and then cause her to expend a known amount of psionic energy, and view the change."

Andrew watched as another Kat stepped forward and formed a small shield globe in front of Serina. A very small psibeam formed just over Serina's shoulder and shot at the globe, which crackled in response. A few seconds of energy, and then the beam faded.

"We consumed five psiens in that beam, and he energy cache went down by 74.1714%, so she had around 6.7411 psiens of volume in her cache. This is very low, but considering that she's been averaging less than one in previous tests, this is a semi-decent improvement," the lead sent, seeming pleased. "The total improvement depends on how large her pool is. With less than a psien in the cache, we couldn't determine previously."

Andrew was at least able to understand the way this worked. Strange that psionic energy worked similar to fluid dynamics though.

"So now we release the block on her pipe, and allow the levels to even out again... There... and compare the current level at a five psien deficit with the original level. Aaaand..." There was a mental equivalent of a blink from the lead. "There is a change of 0.2015% and it took 2.381 seconds for it to re-equalize. That's indicating an original combined pool and cache of around 2481 psiens, and a passive recharge rate of about 2.1 psiens per second." The lead sounded somewhat amazed.

"Is that... good or bad?" Andrew asked warily.

"It's VERY high," the lead admitted. "Normally a pool is around 50 times the size of the cache. So we'd expect about 330 to 340 combined. That's about the amount of energy gained from spending some time with good company and a bit of snuggling. But that makes her pool about 368 times the size of her cache, give or take one or two with the small numbers used to calculate. She has the capability to store very large amounts of energy compared to the size of her cache. Maybe one in fifty thousand Kats have this high of a pool to cache ratio. Not quite one for the record books, but the first I've seen in a long time.

"And the average passive recharge rate is about 1.1 PPS, so she's almost double that. She'll recover from energy consumption much more quickly," the lead said.

Andrew guessed it was good then. The lead continued, "Normally we would check the capacity of her cache now, but she doesn't have enough psiens available to fill half of an average cache, so we'll have to skip that until she has more energy available. We'd also need more energy to do a full capability test suite. The passive evaluation shows that she can do class four telepathy, telekinesis, indeterminate shielding, psibeam, local sensing, mind sweeps, possibly remote sensing, teleportation, and basic matter adjustment. That's not bad at all. A very wide range of talents just at first glance.

Andrew blinked as Serina's fur began to stand on end and a low growl came from her. The lead sent, "Now the final test right now is control break. We see how much energy she can put towards breaking the control that is currently exerted on her mind. She's fighting the combined energy of all of the administrators, so she's not expected to win, but we measure how hard she pushes. This is a frightening test for the subject, as we push fear into her mind to encourage the most powerful response possible. Once peak levels of break attempt are recorded, we take away the fear, and it's a quick recovery for her, so don't worry."

Andrew frowned as Serina's growl turned into a yowl. He fought back an urge to rush in and help her. His fists clenched as he watched, but the test didn't take long. Her yowl cut short and she stopped and looked around, then relaxed. The eight Kats forming the shield around her stepped back and the shield faded out.

"She was very limited by her energy cache, but she did well. The results of that test are not released to outside parties however," the lead sent.

"See? Piece of cake!" Serina sent to him. She looked happy with herself as she trotted back to him and hugged him warmly.

"Your turn, Andrew," the lead informed him. "I'll advise you, this will take a bit longer, since we have to be extra careful for you. We may not even be able to test you."

Andrew took a deep breath and stepped into the middle of the room. He spread his feet shoulder width apart, and the eight Kats surrounded him. He let his breath out, trying not to be nervous. Serina sent him comforting thoughts until the shield went up and cut them off.

He felt his mind touched lightly by a good dozen Kats, and then one presence more strongly. "Hello, Andrew. I am Charista. I will be your administration link. Please try to relax. I need to take full control of your mind for the tests. I admit that none of us have ever worked with a human before, but we are all being very careful. Any help you can give us would be great, and relaxing and letting me take over cleanly would be the best right now."

Andrew nodded internally and tried his best to relax his mind, not completely sure what to expect. It was almost similar in a way to when the security Kat scanned him, but this time he wasn't kicked forcefully out of control. His mind was grasped lightly and he was nudged away to almost a back seat vantage point. He couldn't control his mind anymore at all. It was almost frightening how easy it was to pass control to someone else.

"You're doing well, Andrew. You have a very comfortable mind, and are easy to link with. I might have to spend some time with you sometime," Charista sent with a mental smile. Was she flirting with him? Guess so. "Wow... you have a lot of self-imposed locks in here, and just plain blockages. I'm passing this information on to all involved, and we'll see what comes back."

Andrew waited for a short time, with comforting thoughts flowing to him and the distinct feeling of parts of his mind being examined from all angles. Then Charista sent, "We are going to try to remove the blocks and locks. They will inhibit you horribly otherwise, and we can't complete the tests. We also found something interesting that we are going to try to free. Um... I'm sorry Andrew, but this might hurt a little. I'll be keeping close track, so you don't get hurt. Are you ready?"

Andrew couldn't speak, so he simply tried to think an affirmative. He felt the hold on his mind strengthen. Then the world exploded into little stars and sparkly lights.

Hurt a little? How about a splitting headache. He gritted his teeth and bore it as best he could. He'd had worse. Like when he fell off a grav lift. He felt energy flowing through his mind, and had a distinct feeling as if it were a circuit board with missing traces and a few bad components. They were simply replacing damaged components, and adding missing parts to connect new functions. But damn, that mental soldering iron was a pain.

Then the pain went away completely, and his breath hissed out in relief. "Sorry that was so uncomfortable," Charista sent soothingly. "There's good news and bad news. The good news is that we were able to clear almost all of the blocks completely, and you have a lot of recognizable skills hidden in your noggin. The bad news is that you also have lots of skills that we can't figure out. We'll give you more information after the tests. Oh, and apparently one of the major blockages was in your energy pipe. We cleared that, and it should help you immensely."

Andrew shrugged mentally. Guess that was to be expected for a human. "You have almost no knowledge of basic psionic shielding," Charista sent. "Normally young Kats learn this in the home environment in their first decade. You don't have that luxury. So we are going to pass knowledge to you for that. It's only basic, as covers all Kats, but you'll be able to mold it to your own abilities quickly. That way you will be able to keep your thoughts private from other psionics, and also keep your own leakage in, and their leakage out."

Andrew felt a burst of information enter his mind, like an inspiration from above. Kind of cool. He knew how to shield now! No more PPDU for him! "Okay, it looks like you have the skill to create a psibeam, so we will use that for levels testing. We're not completely certain that we have your energy pump disabled, because it doesn't quite match ours, but we're pretty sure we do. Your energy is leveled out, so we are blocking your pipe now."

Andrew gasped in amazement as a psibeam focus formed near his right shoulder. The little shield appeared in front of him, and his own psibeam fired on it. He definitely felt the drain of it though.

"There... 5 psiens expended, cache dropped by 9.6142%, so your cache had around 52.0064 psiens in it," Charista told him. He felt his slight energy deficit return swiftly. "Re-equalized in 1.08696 seconds, which puts your passive recharge at about 4.6 PPS. That's very high! The delta is too low to read though. We'll have to try a second shot. We're going to burn 20 psiens this time, for a total of 25." He watched as the psibeam fired on the little shield again, and definitely felt more drain. Then the beam stopped, and his energy levels returned to normal again.

"Hmm. Wow. 0.1493% drop. So your combined energy pool is around 16,745. That makes your pool around 321 times the size of your cache," Charista sent. "Both of you are major energy batteries for your cache. And we can do a cache fill test on you with that much energy in your pool. Try to relax. This will probably feel odd, since you're not used to it."

Andrew felt a twist in his mind. He observed well, and was pretty sure he could do it too. He felt energized suddenly, tingles running over him and a feeling like his hair was standing on end. It was like preparing for something big... or when he had a really tough computer job that he wanted to get done.

"Your energy levels are rising at a very swift rate, around 120.7 PPS from what we can tell. That's about six times normal," Charista commented. He continued to feel greater energy for about two minutes before he felt an uncomfortable limit get hit and energy crackled around his skin. The flow stopped and the energy quickly began to recede back into his reserve pool. "Astounding. Your cache maxed out at 28,673.3940%... That's about 14,912 psiens of cache space. Almost three times normal for a Kat. If you follow normal pool to cache max ratios, you could potentially hold well over four million psiens!"

Andrew blinked. Okay, so not only was he suddenly told that he's psionic, but now also he can work with huge levels of psionic energy very quickly compared to a Kat. "Okay, Andrew, we are going to do a control break test. We're going to be very careful with this, because we don't know how you will react as a human. We're pulling in support in the control, so our energy pool still exceeds your combined pool. There. Okay, I want you to try to break our control over your mind. We'll do the fear part soon depending on the results."

Andrew nodded to himself. Well, he could try. He wasn't sure how to, but he tried exerting his will against hers. He felt that maybe he was doing the right thing as he felt energy flow, and the push of her control weakened. It quickly regained strength though, so he pushed harder, trying to make his mind his own again. It was like pushing against a brick wall though. He strained, but now he made no progress.

He felt an insidious fear rising. They had control of his mind. What if they thought he was a threat to them? They could destroy him in a heartbeat! He had to get his own mind back! He had to save himself. He pushed with renewed determination, and felt the energy from within himself flowing powerfully. He beat against the grasp on his mind, but it was still a brick wall. Try as he might, he could not break free. He screamed in fear, expecting obliteration any moment...

And then the fear vanished. His scream cut off and he pulled back his energy in surprise. They wouldn't hurt him. He had been told that there would be fear used, but even though he expected it, it still had overwhelmed him. Wow... He definitely had a greater respect for psionics now. He felt drained to a degree, and his heart raced, but it was just an aftereffect.

"You did amazingly well, good job," Charisa told him mentally. Her grasp of control on him faded, and he was in control of his own mind again. He sighed in relief as the eight Kats around him dropped the shielding.

Ask to be pair tested

"I... I want you to pair test us," Andrew said. Then he thought hard about what this meant, but he drew a blank. He had no idea where that idea came from at all. Serina perked up instantly, but she looked both hopeful and afraid.

All of the Kats in the room turned to look at him in surprise though, and quiet murmuring in Katharin started up amongst them. The lead shook his head and spoke out loud in English. "How do you even know what pair testing is, Andrew?" he demanded.

"I don't know what it is... but I have this feeling... I can't explain it..." Andrew admitted lamely.

Serina walked over to him, her ear tips quivering. "Pair testing is a way of testing a pair of Kat's faith in each other... And love for each other, Andrew-l'es. It tries to find out whether they would be good for each other on a permanent basis. If they fail, they can never see each other again, and their memory of the whole test is completely wiped... If they survive..."

"Both of you need to agree to be pair tested for it to happen anyway," the lead stated.

Give her your hand.

Andrew reached out his hand to Serina. She blinked and looked at it for a moment, then took it gingerly. He held her hand and gazed into her eyes, and she stared back at him. In the silence, the other Kats began to chatter in low tones again.

Andrew felt himself almost falling into her eyes. Vertigo overcame him and he blinked. Then he heard her murmur, "Pair test us." The room fell completely silent in shock.

"Are you sure?" asked the lead. "You've only known him a short time, he only got here..."

"PAIR TEST US!" Serina demanded, interrupting him. Her jaw was set. She wasn't going to take no for an answer.

"Andrew?" the lead asked.

"Do it," Andrew answered, his own determination setting in as well.

The lead sighed. "Very well. I hope for safety for both of you, but it can't be guaranteed in this test. Shielders!"

A lot of the Kats that had been standing in reserve for the prior tests were in action now. Sixteen of them formed a much larger circle around the human and the small Kat who stood at the center of the room, still gazing at each other. A high energy shield went up around them, and they blinked, breaking eye contact finally.

Andrew wasn't sure what to expect, but what happened was definitely not something he would have expected at all. His mind was forcefully seized with great power, and control over his own body was removed as well. His breathing became mechanical, and he was forced to take a step back from Serina. He felt fear again, and from his view of her, he knew that her mind was under just as strong a bind.

"Both of you are held with tens of thousands more psiens of power than you have in your energy pools," they both heard. "And while your reserves may be low, Serina, five psiens of power put into a burst psibeam is far more than enough to atomize a full-sized Kat, let alone a human. And we are pulling from your pool to power this anyway. Under our control, you cannot shield, you cannot react psionicly. Your psionics are at our disposal."

There was a crackle in the air and a pair of psibeam foci formed between them, one his, and one hers. They would gasp, but not even their bodies were under their control. "You have sixty seconds to break our control, after which both of your psibeams will fire at each other simultaneously with much more than five psiens of energy. If I have not made myself utterly clear: Break our control, or both of you will die very agonizing deaths. If ONE of you breaks control, you will save your partner. Though you yourself will die, the other will live. You are down to 40 seconds."

Andrew felt fear like he had never felt before. But not for himself. He knew she was so low on energy, she definitely had no chance to break their control. But he had energy damnit! He had to try. Even if she could not save him, he had to save her!

He beat against the control, but it was the same brick wall, ungiving, unyielding. He pounded on it within his mind, trying to break its grasp, but he made no progress.

"20 seconds."

He tried everything he could think of, changing how he hit it, how hard he pushed. He struggled and looked for weak points, but he found none. Her body, like his, was a mask of false serenity, but he could feel her panic. Nobody but the test givers knew what this test involved, only what she had stated.

"Ten seconds."

The psibeam nebulae cracked with energy potential. He tried a different approach, seeing if there was ANY way that he could disable the psibeam without breaking the control. If he could move, or deplete his energy at all, SOMETHING!

"Five seconds."

There was... Something... THERE! A path that was not strangled in control.

"Three."

Desperately he reached down it, finding himself slip past the walls that still controlled his powers.

"Two."

He found himself met halfway by something else. What...? It was Serina! There was no time. Their minds merged in effort, and suddenly drew from a power that had not been there before.

"One."

NO!!

There was an immense burst of power. A blinding light and searing heat. Andrew feared for a moment that the psibeams had gone off. But this was not the case... The brick walls of control shattered as swiftly as if they had been struck by planet-busting ship weaponry. Andrew blacked out from the intensity of the energy flow. But he was still alive...

He came to only an instant later, panic as his first thoughts were for Serina. He felt something in his arms... something furry. His eyes opened and he saw a peaceful feline face. Her eyes opened only a moment after his. They gazed at each other for only a moment, realizing first that they were apparently both still alive, and second that the lights in the room were all out, and a pulsing red alarm light was going off along with a klaxon.

Surprised, they struggled to their feet and looked around the room. It was a catastrophe. All of the other Kathari in the room had been physically thrown up the walls of the spherical room and the psionic isolation field that was still barely apparent showed signs of imminent failure. Staring around at the still Kathari around them, they stood in shock and dismay.

"Oh... shit..." Andrew muttered. This couldn't be good.

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