Read Voices - A Special Abilities Novel Series Page 10

  Chapter 9

  He Shoots… He Scores

  We all got to the gymnasium early. Marty was already in the locker room getting into the mascot uniform. We needed Marty as a mascot during our three scrimmage games as part of our game plan, so Marty worked it out to take over as mascot for a couple games to pay the kid back for helping Marty get a great deal on some custom rims for Stacy’s new ride. The kid had a brother that worked for a custom hot rod shop in town, and Marty thought it would be cool to get some spinners for Stacy on her birthday. That would seem a little flashy or over the top if you weren’t a college student I’ll bet.

  I had stopped into the school audiovisual department today and picked up a camera with one of those foot long zoom lens on the front so I would look professional. Stacy had made Meea and me two official looking press passes to hang around our necks.

  We paid to get in since we weren't really with the school press, and then once in we pulled the fake press passes out from under our shirts. Stacy had done a nice job making counterfeit passes so no one was going to question us. Meea had a steno pad and folder full of papers for looks.

  All we needed was to get close to the Duke Blue Devils coach for a minute. We walked down to the floor where both teams were running through their warm up drills and the coaches were gathered in a pre game huddle by the end of the bench.

  “Excuse me, Coach K.” Meea said looking directly at the coach. When he looked up to meet her gaze she definitely had his attention. Meea has a mesmerizing attraction. When she was in the room it was hard to not always watch her. Kind of like those sea plants that look like food to small fish so they have to swim over to them… and then the plant eats the small fish, only in this case Meea doesn’t eat you if you stare at her.

  “Can you spare just a minute for me to answer a couple pre-game questions, and maybe a few pictures?” Coach K. had a reputation for being very polite and personable.

  “Yes, sure thing, Miss.” Coach followed as Meea back peddled down the locker room hall where it was more secluded. Meea asked a couple questions I had written down for her, just enough where I was able to hear Coach K’s voice answer her a few times. Then Meea looked deep into his eyes and the poor man was a goner. She put him under quickly and then fed him the information we had worked out the night before. We followed Coach K as he walked back out onto the basketball court floor. He motioned for his guys to come in off the floor and then he walked over to the scorer’s table. I was already in position beside the game officials like I was taking pre-game photos.

  Throwing my voice as Couch K as he moved to address the officials “We forfeit, we will not be playing in tonight’s pre-game contest.” He turned back to his team while the other coaches stood there stunned.

  Duke was the obvious favorite to win the contest so the team was bewildered when without one shot being taken they had forfeited. Coach K then walked over into the middle of his team and told them he did not want to give away any plays or tendencies tonight. Actually I said it… they just believe it was Coach K, since it was his voice coming from his direction. We also said the other teams would just have to learn things the hard way by playing us in the regular season.

  The team seemed to accept the logic and headed for the locker room. I guess it would be hard to argue logic with one of the leagues most winning coaches of all time. No bells or sirens went off so I guess we pulled it off just as planned.

  Meea had Coach K set to come out of the trance and programmed to believe this was the right move for his team.

  “Nice job, Meea.” Marty said pulling off the mascot costume head. “Glad I don’t have to wear that head any more tonight.”

  Stacy came up from behind Marty skidding to a stop beside him. She was getting incredibly good in that buggy. “Want some help getting the rest of that costume off?”

  “Sure, come on.” Marty smiled and winked at me.

  “He does have clothes on under that costume right?” Meea said, giving me a crooked grin.

  “I think so… but with Marty one can never be sure of anything. You did a great job tonight, Meea. Everything went nice and smooth.”

  “Thank you. Since the coach was nice enough to follow us into the hall where it was quieter, it helped.”

  “If it's OK, tomorrow night I would like you and Stacy to come over about 9:00PM for a few hours, can you make that?”

  “Yeah, I’m pretty sure we can squeeze you in. Should we bring anything?” She said with a suspicious look.

  “Yeah… about fifty dollars.”

  “Are you charging for lap dances?” Meea laughed, but I could tell it really didn’t matter to her what the money was for, she would bring it just because I had asked her to.

  “I’m setting up a poker game… it’s a test for Stacy. A test that involves people she doesn’t already know. I want to get a better understanding of what to expect from her. I don’t want to ever ask more from her than she can deliver.

  The fact that her money is on the line will also add a bit of pressure and realism to the test. If she can read people as well as I believe she can, you two will get a free shopping spree complements of the generous SA student body that I’ve invited.”