Mind Reading

Written for https://reinventionsreena.wordpress.com/2023/08/17/reenas-xploration-challenge-293/

Our minds interlink for the first time; it is unusual not to speak, like something alien is inside my mind. To hear that person’s thoughts. A mutual respect is needed, but how do I know I can trust the person sitting in front of me?

‘Hello,’ he says.

The silence in the laboratory is weird, but we have been in silence for over twenty hours now. It is the only way, the leaders say, we can truly home in on our psychic powers.

‘Hello,’ he says again.

‘Hello,’ I am thinking it now. No words are leaving my lips. I stare around the room, but we are all the same. ‘My name is Lily, it is nice to meet you.’

I sound like my grandmother, such an English thing, politeness. A light floods into my mind. Is he laughing at me? Probably. I stare into his blue eyes, and they are bright and his cheeks flushed red.

‘Hi Lily, Scott, although my mates call me Scottie, cause I am a big Star Trek fan. I’ve always wanted to do this. Although, I hope we are not Borg.’

It was my turn to laugh, having watched the last series of Star Trek, with Seven of Nine, I don’t look much like her. I am too plump in the wrong areas. Although it does feel like we are in the future. AI, having more power than ever.

‘Call me Seven then, Scottie. Does this feel weird to you, not talking?’

‘A little, can you tell where I am from?’

‘America, not sure where.’

‘Good, at least I haven’t lost who I am.’

A voice into my mind stops us talking. ‘Keep to the script,’ it says.

‘Sorry, My name is Lily and I am eighteen years old, can you hear what I am saying?’