The Erotic Mind-Control Story Archive

Assignment: Futurist

by Wrestlr

1.

Robots. I hate fighting robots.

Why does every self-styled evil genius decide his ultimate creation is going to be some army of killer robots? Do they have annual Evil Genius Conventions or something where they compare master plans for world domination that feature killer robots? Why isn’t their plan ever to—oh, I don’t know—capture the hottest military man they can find and clone him four thousand times into an obedient army? I could handle an army of four thousand hot soldiers. As long as the lube supply holds out, at least.

But against robots, my telepathy is useless. I have to deal with rampaging killer robots just the same way a Normal would: by running from them or by shooting them. Repeatedly. Give me a gun—or better yet, a rocket launcher—and I can deal with robots. As long as the ammo supply holds out, at least.

Right then, the three of us were doing a lot of both: running and shooting. That’s why I was glad, for once, to have this man beside me. The Colonel is a remarkably efficient killing machine, only of the human variety. I don’t know whether he’s a Talent like me, or just a well-trained Normal who enjoys shooting things—I mean, really, really enjoys shooting things. And is good at it. The Colonel told me when we were first assigned together that, if he ever so much as suspected I was scanning him with my telepathy, he’d put a bullet through my brain before I could blink. I believed him then, and everything I’d seen him do since has made me glad I did. Which means I never tried to get a definitive answer to the whole Talent versus Normal question as far as he was concerned. He was my handler, and he could kill me just as easily as he incapacitated these oncoming robots, and that’s all I needed to know. Oh, sure, the higher-ups would probably have complained if he did put a bullet through my brain, and there’d probably be a couple of forms for his paperwork-hating self to fill out, but fat lot of good that would do me if I were dead. And generally speaking, I didn’t want to be dead. Dead didn’t sound like much fun.

Speaking of oncoming hordes of robotic death, we were in the path of one at the time. “Shoot for the neck!” the Colonel shouted to me over the cackling of the evil genius de jour blasting from the loudspeakers. Because—yes, of course—the most vulnerable part of these robots would happen to be the hardest spot to hit with bullets.

And speaking of cackling evil geniuses, why do they all laugh like that?—It’s always some variation of the same laugh. At those annual conventions, do they hold workshops on how to do it? Introduction to Maniacal Guffaws? Advanced Sinister Snickering? And this genius de jour was a master of the fine art of cackling. I mean, seriously, who can laugh like that for five minutes straight without taking a breath? Just try it sometime.

“What?” I shouted back at the Colonel over the din. Because obviously his no telepathy or I’ll kill you rule meant I couldn’t just connect us up mind-to-mind for a little genteel conversation in the midst of this melee.

The Colonel was shooting robots in the neck with his usual unerring efficiency and trademark grimness. One robot, one bullet. He’s a peerless marksman, whereas I’m more a spray ’em with bullets and hope to hit something vital type of shooter. The Colonel flicked one of his guns toward the overhead loudspeaker and—bang!—destroyed it with one bullet, same as always, and then there was no more evil laughter deafening me.

“Thank you,” I shouted at the Colonel.

Because, really, who wouldn’t rather listen to gunfire and the cacophony of an oncoming horde of robotic death?

Me?—I wisecrack under pressure. That’s just my way of dealing with stressful situations. And pardon me if I call being chased by a hundred mechanical marvels hell-bent on killing me a stressful situation.

What worked most in our favor was the tight space. The three of us were retreating—a polite way to say running for our lives—down a long hallway, but the relatively confined width meant only three or four robots had a clear line at us at any given time. Shoot them, and then their mechanical siblings had to take a moment to step over the wreckage before they got their shot at us. Their shot at being shot at by us. Heh. Damn—sometimes I crack myself up.

Still, it was just a matter of time until a robot got lucky, or we ran out of ammo, or more robots appeared at the opposite end of the hall and cut off our fall-back route. Hey, in real life, stuff like that happens.

“How’re you coming, Junior?” I yelled over my shoulder at the new kid as I popped out an empty clip and jammed in a fresh one. Hey, this ain’t the movies—in real life, guns need to be reloaded.

“Junior’s” name was Jase, but I couldn’t be bothered with details like that at the moment. He had a firearm but, since the Colonel and I were mostly between him and the oncoming robots, he couldn’t do much with it—not without likely shooting one of us in the back, that is. I hoped he handled pressure well enough to realize that would be a ... What do they call it? Right: A Very Bad Idea. Body armor or no, the Colonel does not like getting accidently shot by one of his own team. Trust me on that.

No, Junior had another role in this particular situation, and he knew it. This time, his main weapon was his Talent, and his job was to find us a way out of that situation before the inevitable reinforcement robots put in their appearance at the other end of the hall and caught us in the crossfire. If that happened, we were well and truly fucked. Unlike robots, real life doesn’t come with a reset button.

“Come on, Junior! Time’s a-wasting here!” Dammit, if he didn’t hurry up, I’d shoot him myself and save the robots the trouble.

Oncoming robotic death situations tend to make me impatient. Sue me.

Junior—Jase—looked around, then up. There wasn’t much to see in this hallway, but he wasn’t looking with his eyes. He was a Talent, a telepath like me. And he’d just found what he was searching for, then checked it against the building schematics we’d memorized. Good boy. “There!” he shouted and pointed at a door. “That way!”

Rule number one: When you’re in a fight with the odds stacked against you, change the game. Well, maybe it’s not rule number one, but it’s got to be in the top ten.

We were on a mission, and the best way to get out of this situation and complete the mission was to take the fight to the evil genius de jour. Looked to me like Junior had successfully cut through the noise of the hostages’ minds—terrified people’s thoughts are loud—and found our evil genius. Either that, or Junior just guessed right.

We’d debrief on that later. Right then, Junior and I were too busy busting through the door while the Colonel kept whittling away at the oncoming robot ranks.