Override (Glitch)

leaned in and whispered, “Molla’s not on any task force because of the baby. But Jilia said it’d be good for her to still come and meditate with us when she can.”
    I stared at Ginni. She seemed to know everything about everyone. It made me wonder what she told others about me.
    Finally, Jilia came in. After everyone had settled in, she began.
    “My job is to help train you in the study of your own minds, so you can control your powers when it counts.” Jilia walked around the circle. “Studying the mind is the key to controlling anger, joy, all your emotions. The same parts of the brain are linked to glitcher Gifts, so controlling and understanding your emotions will help you do the same with your Gifts.”
    My back straightened at her words. This was what I was here for. Maybe I’d finally be able to get my powers under control.
    “We’ll begin with twenty minutes of silent meditation when I ring the bell,” she said. She held up a small bronze bell. “Try to empty your mind and let all your worries and hopes and fears drift away. A wise man called Dogen once said that to study meditation is to study the self. To study the self is to forget the self. And to forget the self is to be connected to all things.”
    “Aw, Doc,” Rand complained, his long muscled legs folded awkwardly on the cushion. “Can’t we skip to the fun stuff? Like melting that bell and making it into something useful?”
    “I’ve missed you too, Rand,” Jilia said with a smile. “Your complaints, as always, are noted. I’ll sound the bell now. Juan, will you begin playing as well?”
    I looked up in surprise to see that Juan was sitting on a chair in the corner of the room holding a strange contraption that rested on the ground with a long stringed neck. One of Juan’s hands hovered over the strings, and the other held a long slim stick with a ribbon strung along its length.
    “Juan’s cello music will help us all relax and connect to our emotions. Empty your mind and try to be at one with the present.”
    Doc positioned herself back on her own cushion and rang the bell. Almost simultaneously Juan put the ribboned stick to the strings, and the most aching sound moaned out.
    My eyes widened. Music. I’d heard of it but had never actually heard it. When I was still a drone in the Community, they used to play long tones over the Link during Scheduled Subject Downtime, but it was nothing like this. After a few moments of listening, entranced, the beauty of the sound made my chest expand outward.
    The buzzing in my mind seemed to vibrate in response to the rising notes of the instrument. It was both scary and exhilarating to feel the power build so quickly. I knew Juan could affect moods with his music—maybe this was finally the key to gaining control.
    My power responded. I felt the shape of the entire room and everyone in it inside my mind. Nine heartbeats, no, ten. A small fluttering one. The baby. I could feel Molla’s baby. My breath caught.
    Then instead of one long weeping note after another, Juan put the ribbon to two strings at once in harmony. The music swept me up beyond the room where we were all sitting. I was disoriented by how quickly it expanded.
    Suddenly I could feel everything, not just the shape of the room or the hallway outside. I zoomed outward like a lens readjusting. I could see the entire compound. The two main hallways of the Foundation ran like little tubes, with rooms between and branching out to the sides. I could feel the level below ours too, and the main elevator that led up to the air-transport deck. One second I could sense the complex components that made up the engine of the transport and smell the oiled metal, then the next moment I’d zoomed out again even farther this time.
    It was going too fast. I was starting to feel dizzy. Quick as the moment it took for another breath in, I could feel the shape of the whole mountain above us, the canyon stretching out beside it, and the mountain range beyond.
    And then I was hurtled into the sky.
    Panic spiked through me. I wasn’t in control. Not at all. I was being dragged outward helplessly into the endless sky. No shape, no contour. It just went on and on forever. The sky had always terrified me, and now I spun recklessly through it with no tether holding me to the earth. I couldn’t sense my own body anymore at all. I was going to get lost.
    It was exhilarating and terrifying.
    I had to pull it back, had to get control. The instrument