Majgen Ch. 008

The Femaron had scanned the child to see if she would be in need of empathic therapeutic aid, and to learn more of how his student had handled the situation prior to his arrival.

In the child's mind, he had seen that Majgen had transmitted soothing emotions to the child. Baglian considered that an appropriate course of action for the situation and was pleased his student had displayed that much therapeutic understanding.

'Considering her lack of theoretic education in therapeutic areas, that was a promising judgement call,' Baglian thought.

But he had also seen in Ukrial's mind, that Majgen had transmitted her own understanding of matters to the child, by returning some of the child's own memories to her, embedded with Majgen's feelings regarding them.

When seeing this in Ukrial's memories of the park, Baglian had assumed Majgen had not known better. His student was severely undereducated for a mentarion of her age. Empathically showing one's own opinions in that manner was normal amongst mentarions. So at first Baglian had estimated her actions to have been caused by ignorance, an impression he had held on to until entering his own living-room and sensing Majgen's emanations.

Through the course of the past eight days Baglian had learned to interpret more subtleties in Majgen's emanations. The same way a non-empath would get better at interpreting the body language of another person over time, when getting more acquainted with that person.

Before he entered the apartment he had expected Majgen to be anxious to some degree, nervous that she might have done something wrong, but he expected she had not been aware of the errors of her ways - in the park. So he expected that if she was nervous and anxious, she would be insecure if she had actually displeased him.

He had been surprised to find himself wrong. As soon as he was in the doorway leading to his living-room, her emanations had washed over him. Powered by her fear they were clear even halfway across the luxuriously spaced room. He had recognised their nature immediately. These were the types of emanations he always felt from her when she knew she had displeased him, when she was certain he would punish her.

Baglian had taken this as a sign that his first understanding had been wrong. And that worried him. The child had not been harmed. But, if Majgen had known that the light invasive procedure she had performed could, in theory, have been harmful, then he would have to punish her in accordance to her knowledge of the offence. And he was not sure Majgen's mind could carry a punishment of that magnitude.

----=(Consequences 2, Ukrial's parents)=----

All matters concerning Baglian regarding the incident in the park, had been settled. He had given a full statement of what crimes he had learned of to the GED. He had informed the GRD of the mental state of Ukrial. He had even managed to convince the GED to confiscate all visual recordings Ukrial and his student in the park, he had convinced them it would be the best for the abused child. His motives in that regard, however, had been to keep his student's face out of news broadcasts; for Ukrial's sake partial confiscation of the recordings made by onlookers would have been sufficient.

Baglian was relieved that the threat of his student becoming a public figure had been averted.

The GED would not call on him further for the process of prosecuting Ukrial's parents. His statement as a Femaron was sufficient evidence for prosecution, unless Ukrial's parents should choose to demand authentication of his statement. In which case they would have to submit themselves to Drug Combined Lie Detector tests.

Baglian hoped they would.

A factual statement from a professional mentarion was sufficient for a conviction, but a cold and dry listing of facts did not have a strong emotional impact on judges. If his statement was the only evidence submitted at trial, Ukrial's parents might very well be punished in the lower end of what the law allowed for such crimes. Maybe as little as eight years deprivation of freedom for the mother, some of them partial, and as little as ten years deprivation of freedom for the father, followed by half-consensual non-empathic therapy to help him control his pedophilic urges.

Most normal citizens did not know how drugs for lie detector tests worked. They would often volunteer to those tests because they considered it a chance to get their own view across, to make themselves seem less criminal and more victims of their own background. A few even believed they could partially cheat such tests.

No human could cheat a drug combined lie detector test. But it was correct that it was a chance to get one's own view across. What most didn't realise was that it was their unmodified view they would display in such a test. The drugs did not just make a person unable to lie, they temporarily removed all motives for lying too.

When influenced by those drugs a person did not care about consequences for their actions. They did not try to enhance the least abominable motives for their crimes, in attempts to hide their more horrid motivations. They spoke completely freely. Of course, if they truly felt guilt other than fear of punishment the test revealed that too.

Baglian had not sensed much guilt in Ukrial's parents - only fear of consequences. Especially in her father. If he took a lie detector test, Baglian could predict the outcome. He had seen audio-visual recordings of sex-criminals like that pedophile from lie detector tests in the past. Often such recordings showed a man rubbing the front of his pants, explaining how he had molested his victims, while supplying detailed examples. A wide grin would often be on such a man's face, when he added how much he had enjoyed it.

Such audio-visual recordings efficiently convinced judges to go for maximum punishment within the limits of the law. They were far more efficient than any listing of facts could ever be. Baglian had faith that if Ukrial's father submitted to the test, then he would most likely face twenty years of full deprivation of freedom, followed by a lifetime of being chemically or surgically deprived of any abilities to feel sexual desires.

----=(To scan non-empathic people)=----

Baglian expected the answers that would confirm or disprove his worries regarding Majgen's motives, were to be found in her memories at the time she performed the invasive procedure, but he resisted the urge to skip directly to that memory. Instead he studied her memories from the moment they entered the park.

There was no urgency, justifying rushing to answers. Baglian had no other places he needed to be. He had nothing more important to do for the remainder of the day, than working on educating his student.

He was not bothered by Majgen's perception of and views on his approach to his sex-life. He did not find anything of interest in Majgen's memory of their arrival at the cafe. She seemed to be her normal obedient self, eager to please and stay out of trouble. Calm and stable, as she mostly had been while in his custody.

The intuitive nature of her mind scans of the non-empaths in the cafe, reminded him how much training she still needed in the mentarion ways. But he was pleased to notice yet another example of how carefully and intelligently she considered and adapted instructions. In this regard, the instructions he had given her on how to scan inconspicuously.

Both mentarions and weaker empaths were, by law, allowed to scan their surroundings, as best to their abilities. Any information they gathered that way were, however, covered by laws of professional secrecy. The information a mentarion received that way was allowed to be shared with other mentarions, but would still be protected by the laws of professional secrecy and privacy of mind.

Information about crimes was not protected by those laws. On the contrary, mentarions learning of crimes this way were legally obliged to report their findings to the GED. Certain smaller offences were not grounds for such a legal obligation, but most crimes which could upon trial lead to a larger penalty than a fine was a basis for obligation to report.

Hence, it was completely legal for Majgen to scan her surroundings, and very useful for her training too. The reasons for teaching young mentarions to scan non-empaths inconspicuously were based on the personal safety of the individual mentarion and for the sake of the general popularity of the mentarion minority.

Most non-empaths found the concept of being mind-scanned disturbing. Persons who were inclined to respond to insults or other unpleasantries with violence, were very likely to physically attack an empath if they got the impression the empath was invading their privacy.

Also very important to the empathic minority in general and more specifically the mentarion fraction of empaths - was the aspect of general popularity. Only one in a million humans had any empathic abilities. Only one in eighty million had abilities strong enough to be called mentarion. The history of human empaths was a very clear indicator of what could happen if their small minority lost its general popularity in the majority of the population.

Baglian had not mentioned these political aspects to Majgen, when explaining proper public behaviour in regard to scanning. Like Ottearon Weissme, Baglian considered Majgen's political understanding to be at an intolerably low level for a mentarion her age.

During her five years at the Mentariata Majgen's political understanding had barely developed. Ottearon Weissme had tried to supply her with academic training in political matters. He had even cut down on her academic training in other matters. He had also supplied her with private tutors.

Weissme's efforts had been to almost no avail. Majgen was fairly intelligent, but her daily anxiety and fear kept her too dense to be able to follow complex explanations, and her constant recital of trivial data had made her further unable to absorb the information needed to understand events and causalities in a political context.

Baglian had not mentioned why he gave her the instructions on how to be inconspicuous when scanning, but Majgen had perceived the knowledge from his emanations.

In her time with Baglian Majgen's anxiety had in general been lower than the previous five years, and she had been forced to abandon trivial thinking and other mind-numbing thought-techniques. Hence her intelligence was no longer severely inhibited, and her natural curiosity had returned with the full vengeance of five years wasted.

Baglian was beginning to understand how much information Majgen gained from emanations, but he hadn't understood how much she learned from it. Majgen was not just quickly learning to understand Baglian's view on many political aspects, she had begun to compare it with what she saw in the minds of others around her. She was not ready to form views of her own yet. However, her semi-conscious processes had begun moving towards such stages.

----=(Majgen's protective side)=----

'She left the café without even thinking of alerting me,' Baglian noticed,'That is very atypical for her.'

He realised that her emotional make-up in general felt different than what he had grown used to sensing in her.

'Another side of her personality. One she has not showed around me earlier.'

He followed her memories as she followed the child.

'I had no clue Student Majgen was able to forget herself this completely.' He followed her memories further, noting Majgen's complete lack of professional distance to the child's emotions.

'She thought she might not be allowed to transmit soothing emotions to the child. Yet she didn't hesitate a moment to consider the consequences to herself, if she was right.'

Baglian frowned with his eyes still closed, forming a furrow between his brows.

Majgen could not follow his emotions nor his movements inside her mind, not with her empathic senses shut down. She saw the furrow forming and she wished she knew why his expression changed. However she was already so terrified that her own emotions did not change significantly with the change in his face.

Baglian opened his eyes when he reached Majgen's considerations regarding transmitting the child more than mere comforting emotions. But he did not see with his eyes, Majgen's memories had his full attention.

'She knew I would consider it wrong of her, she knew, and still she did it. I was within yelling distance but still she chose to treat the child herself.' Baglian was too surprised to feel anger at his student's reckless choice.'She not only knew, she overestimated the penalty for her offence.' Baglian replayed the memory again and again, to understand why Majgen had so quickly decided to expose herself to punishment.

'Love,' he concluded,'In that moment she loved the child, as if it was hers. She would have died for the child without blinking.'

Baglian withdrew himself partially from Majgen's mind. He blinked when he realised his eyes were open, and turned their gaze down to Majgen's face. She was trying to uphold a mask of mentarion dignity, and failing miserably. Her fear was clearly visible would have been even to a non-empath.

'Why did she love a child she had never met before? Most feel compassion for any child in pain. But she loved it. Why?' He was curious, but that matter could wait a bit. The differences between care, compassion and love were mostly considered mysterious even by mentarions.

Baglian decided to continue to a more direct interrogation, asking questions while scanning often saved a lot of time in searching for answers. He let his palms slide of her ears and placed them on her shoulders instead, so she would be able to hear his questions clearly.

"So, Student Majgen, you thought that transmitting soothing emotions to a crying child might be wrong." It was not a question, but the wording caused Majgen to think up answers even though she kept them to herself.

"Do you regret now that you did that?" Baglian asked.

Majgen wished she could answer 'yes', but lying was not an option.

"No," she replied.

'Even now she does not regret. Even though she appears to be her old anxious self, worrying about her own hide.'

Baglian was both relieved and disappointed that the protective side of her personality, which had awoken in the park was so well integrated with the other sides of Majgen. Relieved because when it was well integrated it should be possible for him to predict when it would dominate her actions, and it might be possible for him to teach her to act appropriately even when this part of her was dominant. But disappointed for reasons of what he would have to do to that side of her personality if he should fail in such education.

'The prospect of training a student motivated only by corporal punishment, was so much simpler when I thought she was an utter coward.'

If he or another would one day need to destroy an integrated part of her personality she would never fully recover. If Majgen had been a normal mentarion, or even just a strong mentarion maybe even with as much as Syvaron potential, then not even Baglian would seriously consider that option. Even he, with his strong sense of duty, understood that an important goal did not justify any and all means. However, Baglian suspected that Majgen might have Niaron potential, the highest possible rank for a human empath. At that time there was only one living mentarion of the rank Niaron. Before that one had gained Niaron rank it had been twenty years since the last mentarion with Niaron rank died.

Even more important than her possible Niaron potential, he knew she had abilities no living mentarion had ever heard of before.

Baglian looked into Majgen's frightened eyes while he considered the consequences if he could not make her control the protective sides of her personality. He did not allow his face to reveal his emotions. For the first time, his duty to train the special girl felt like a burden rather than a privilege.

He had not allowed himself to develop warm feelings for his student. He did not know it, but if not for a certain fact about her origin, it would have been hard for him to adhere to that decision. Especially now that she was beginning to show signs of a sense of duty and selflessness. The fact was however that Majgen was a Hawlun-orphan, and Baglian would never be able gain deeper personal emotions for a Hawlun-orphan. The shame he kept secret even to himself regarding Hawlun-orphans, would prevent such emotional bonds from forming.

Even without warm personal feelings towards the girl, Baglian's conscience would not feel good about destroying Majgen's personality. The brief realisation that maybe it would be needed in the future, was sufficient to give him a bitter taste in his mouth and a floating sensation of nausea.

'I will do my best to avoid that,' he thought while still looking into her brown eyes,'I will do everything in my power to avoid letting such destruction become necessary. I promise you that Majgen Rahan.'

Baglian was too disciplined to let a single muscle twitch in his face, when he made the promise. So for now Majgen remained clueless about his personal conflict. Baglian had no illusions of being able to keep the promise secret from her in the long run. Everything Baglian knew, eventually Majgen would know. He had accepted that from day one with her.

Majgen's mentor had been quiet a while since she answered his question. Her fear did not diminish. Rather, it felt like it was fluttering through her mind unrest-fully. Her stomach was hurting and she felt cold. She wanted to hug her own stomach and curl up in a small ball, but she dared not move at all.

"You were wrong," Baglian suddenly said.

Majgen was not sure what he was referring to, but she got that answered as he continued.

"You were wrong, when you thought you might not be allowed to soothe the crying child by transmitting simple soothing emotions."

That information brought only a tiny, nearly unnoticeable relief to Majgen. The possible consequences for transmitting loving and caring emotions, had been the least of her worries.

Baglian gave her a moment to absorb his last words before he spoke on:

"So, Student Majgen, you believed that you were not permitted to perform invasive procedures on a non-empathic child."

Again the words, made Majgen form an answer in her mind and withhold it.

"You were right."

The words sounded like a verdict to Majgen's ears, she swallowed nervously. Her anxiety managed to rise even higher. She prepared herself to hearing what her punishment would be, and was unprepared for his next line of words.

"You were convinced you were doing the right thing."

Those words almost caused Majgen to nod an affirmation, but she caught herself in time. Three seconds later Baglian asked a question.

"Do you know what intelligent instinct is?"

"No, Femaron Baglian."

"It is when subconscious and semiconscious processes cause an individual to believe a certain course of action is right. Without having conscious knowledge of why," Baglian explained.

Majgen understood the connection immediately.

'So that's how I knew it was right to do what I did for Ukrial,' she thought and felt relief wash over her to have an answer to that mystery.

Baglian was still in her mind, he followed her stream of emotions. He gave the feeling of relief several seconds to spread and settle. The emotional impact of being deprived of the feeling again would be stronger that way.

"Do you know what emotional pseudo-logic is, Student Majgen?"

"Not entirely, Femaron Baglian." She had heard the term before. One of her tutors had tried to educate her in the basics of empathic terminology. However she hadn't made much progress under that tutoring.