Primary Inversion (Saga of the Skolian Empire) Paperback Read Online Free PDF Page B

Taas yet, maybe not even Helda.
    Tiller looked at me—and I caught it. Feedback. He was
feeding my surprise back to me.
    Are you getting it too? Rex thought. I was trying to draw
him out.
    You could ask him, I thought.
    Too personal.
    I think he wants to know. And he seems more comfortable
with you.
    Rex considered that. Then he spoke to Tiller. “How long have
you known you were an empath?”
    “What?” Tiller turned red. “I never claimed—”
    “You’re in a feedback loop with us,” Rex said. “You’re
picking up our emotions and sending them back to us.”
    Tiller gaped at us. “You’re kidding.”
    “Not at all,” I said. “Didn’t you know?”
    “Of course not.” He paused. “Well, I mean, I’ve always suspected,
at least I thought—but you don’t go around saying things like that. People
would laugh at you.”
    A breathless feeling came over me, like fear and hope mixed
up together. It was an odd sensation, pleasant in a way but also foreign. At
that exact moment Tiller said, “You really think I could be an empath?”
    Rex smiled, the lines around his eyes crinkling. “You ought
to get tested.”
    “I’ve thought of it. That’s why I spent so much time
learning Skolian. But I can’t afford passage to a Skolian world.” He looked
from me to Rex. “I’m probably fooling myself, anyway. I mean, I just don’t see
any evidence I’m different.”
    “It’s not something you see,” Rex said. “It’s your brain.”
    “There’s something wrong with my brain?”
    “Not wrong,” I said. Though I supposed that depended on your
point of view. “It contains two extra organs.”
    Tiller laughed. “In my skull? There’s no room.”
    I smiled. “They’re microscopic. More people have them than
realize it. The Kyle afferent body and the Kyle efferent body. The KAB receives
input and the KEB sends it.”
    “What input?” Tiller asked.
    “When you think, neurons fire in your brain,” Rex said. “My
KAB picks that up.”
    “Why?” Tiller asked. “How does it know my neurons fired?”
    “The molecules in your brain are described by a quantum probability
distribution—”
    “Wait.” Tiller put up a hand to stop him. “I don’t
understand quantum.”
    “Imagine an invisible hill centered on your brain,” Rex
said. “That’s the probability distribution. Its ‘foothills’ fan out in all directions.
They get smaller so fast that they’ve dropped to almost nothing a few
hundred meters away from you. The closer you are to me, the better they overlap
my brain. When you think, it changes the shape of those hills and my KAB picks
that up.”
    Tiller considered him. “So why doesn’t this quantum hill overlap
everyone?”
    “It does,” Rex said. “But without a KAB, a person has no way
to read it. The more intense your feelings the more molecular sites they
stimulate on my KAB. The KAB then sends messages to neural structures in my
brain called para centers. Only empaths have them. My paras interpret that
input as your emotions.”
    “And the KEB?” Tiller asked.
    “Amplifier,” I said. “It increases the range and intensity
of the signal you send to other empaths, so much so that they may even be able
to decode your thoughts from it. KEB sends. KAB receives.”
    Tiller grinned. “No wonder I’m so slow. With all this extra
business going on, I never have time for just thinking.”
    Rex laughed. “Actually, the increased number of brain cells
in your cortex may make you more intelligent than average.”
    “Not me,” Tiller said. “Not compared to my siblings. My
sister is a math genius and my brother is a philosopher.”
    “Don’t underestimate yourself,” Rex said. “The traits are hereditary.”
    “That’s the strange part.” Tiller spread his hands. “My
parents are just average types. They’re as surprised as everyone else by their
children.”
    “The genes are recessive,” I said. “Maybe they carry them unpaired,
like a blue-eyed person with