As it turned out, the planet of telepaths was in turmoil, which in retrospect Bob realized shouldn’t have surprised him; the whole galaxy was a mess. What Felix had spoken out against was a race of his people that, over thousands of years had developed rudimentary mouths to speak with. They weren’t common, but the gene had become dominant. Felix and his cohorts believed this race of “speakers”, as the two bully telepaths had put it, were destroying the sanctity of the mind by speaking their thoughts.

Though it seemed Felix viewed all life-forms with a mouth as lesser beings, Bob was a man true to his word; he stood by Felix at all three cafeteria hours and on courtyard days. He was hopeful that if he kept the telepath alive and somehow got him off his medication, he might find himself a free man once again.

The other telepaths, whom Bob had learned were brothers named Yiti and Yhor, were appalled that Bob was helping him. With the much stronger human guarding Felix, they were unable to take his nutritional paste. Every day during all three meal-hours, the brothers watched Felix murderously as he rubbed what little paste he was rationed into his yellow skin for absorption.

One evening, during the last meal of the day, two enormous four-armed Ghats approached the strange duo. Bob recognized the leader of the two as Fjjar, an uneducated fellow who spoke better with his fists than his mouth. “You Bob?” He asked the human.

Bob stood up from the table he and Felix shared. “Yeah.”

“Outta the way.” He returned simply, his four fists clenched tightly. The protesting group of women, who’d given up on their hunger strike looked on anxiously from the table across from Bob and Felix.

“Why?” Bob motioned for Felix to stand. He knew the telepath would be no good in a fight, but at least he should be ready to run.

“He’s sick in the head; the galaxy will be better off without him.” Fjjar said, casting a lengthy shadow across them. He was fully four heads taller than them. Bob clenched his jaw; this might be the end for him.

“Have you been talking to the twins?” Bob asked, referring to the telepath brothers.

“Yeah. Felix is a known criminal on our side of the galaxy. We just didn’t recognize him until they told us. So, outta the way. Unless you’re a genocidal maniac as well—then you can stay too.”

Felix stood up and tapped Bob on the shoulder with a long finger. It’s okay. You can go. Thanks for everything. He said with a blink, his hands knotting together nervously. A human your age can’t possibly stand up to them.

Bob ignored Felix, and stood in front of him. “I need him to stay alive.”

The cafeteria had gone quiet, and the prisoners began forming a circle about them. The women protestors could be heard whispering quietly from the sidelines. Someone behind them whispered excitedly, “it’s about time that bigot got what’s coming to him.”

Felix looked panicked as adrenaline began pouring into his systems. Bob broke out into a sweat as well. “Look fellas, he may be a racist, but he’s not violent. Let’s just let him die naturally here. You don’t want to add to your sentence?”

“Ha!” One of the women said. “They’re too lazy to add on to sentences. They can’t even keep up with the garbage.” She pointed to the rotting corpse, still slumped against the wall, almost preserved by the cleansing liquid that rained from the ceilings every night.

Bob scanned the room, looking for anything; an avenue of escape or perhaps something to defend himself with. He saw nothing, and looked to the cafeteria window, hoping the guards might break up the fight, but the employees merely watched as well.

The human then turned to Felix, and was about to tell him to duck under the table when he noticed the telepath’s eyes were wide open with fear, sweat pouring down his yellow skin. He’d stopped knotting his fingers together and was simply clasping them—choking the blood from them until they’d turned white. It seemed he was about to have a heart attack. Instinctively, Bob stood back. “Are you okay?”

Felix’s eyes narrowed. I’ve had enough.

Suddenly, everyone in the room aside from Bob and Felix gasped and began clutching at their heads. Screams arose from the crowd and various prisoners began falling to the floor. It took a moment for Bob to realize what was happening; Felix was fighting back. He’d never heard of a telepath who could use his mind for attack, but then again, Felix was a mutant.

When they’d had enough, Felix turned to Bob. They evolved mouths only to use their fists to fight. Disgusting.

A moment later, guards burst into the room, and the two were taken away.

They were placed into solitary confinement, which wasn’t actually solitary; they had to share a cell on account of the prison being so overpopulated. The chamber was extremely dark; a fragile blue light that fell through a small window of bars overhead was their only light source.

“What happened in there? Can all  telepaths attack people like that?” Bob whispered the moment they were alone, still in awe of the telepath’s power.

I’m the only one. I don’t like to do that, though. I like to believe us telepaths are above violence.

“And the drugs don’t inhibit that ability?”

No. It’s not a power many people know I have. I’ve only used it a few times before… three times in my youth and once just now.

Bob hadn’t talked to Felix about his bigotry yet, but now seemed like a good time. They’d be stuck in the tiny cell together for at least a week. “No violence, but discrimination against telepaths with mouths is okay?”

Felix was taken aback. You know--? How long have you known?

“Since the day I said I would help you.” Bob heard a jangling of keys and two guards entered the cell. One held Felix by the shoulders, and the other pushed his head back. The one holding his head then took an eye-dropper in a heavily gloved hand and squeezed a few drops of something into each of his eyes.

More drugs. They think it can prevent me from mind-attacking. Felix said after they left, then returned to their conversation; You’ve known all this time about my opinions on mouthed telepaths and yet you helped me? You’re far more evolved than I thought.

Bob rubbed his head with a tired hand. Humans were susceptible to migraines if a telepath talked in their heads for too long. “What sort of things have you done to your people if you’ve never been violent to them?”

Mouthed telepaths AREN’T my people. Felix said sternly. The views I shared across my planet with my Galactic Reach was simple; I don’t want them to breed anymore. Yes, they should continue to live, but their kind are tainting our gene pool; ruining all that is sacred in the silence of the mind.

The human tried to put himself in Felix’s shoes, but having used a mouth to share his thoughts his whole life, it was difficult to imagine the religiousness Felix seemed to have for brain-to-brain communication. “Do you find all mouthed beings to be lesser?” He asked after a moment.

I know this will offend you, but yes.

Bob couldn’t believe he thought less of him simply for having a mouth. “Clearly it offended your people as well, seeing as how they threw you in a location-less jail.”

Yes, sadly most of them didn’t agree with me, even though mouth-speakers tend to be less intelligent, crude individuals. The telepath said with resolve. Then he looked down at his frail body, and his voice lowered as it re-entered Bob’s mind; However… I never thought that communicating my thoughts en masse would end with me here, dying alone… my evolved mind turned to dust.

Though Bob was irritated by his views, he couldn’t help but feel sorry for the alien. While he was a racist, he wasn’t sure Felix should be locked up in a prison filled with murderers or dangers to the Galactic Government like himself. Bob sighed, “If it makes you feel better, I’m probably going to die here too.” He looked down at his own body—he was beginning to look quite emaciated.

The cell was quiet for a good thirty minutes after that, and Bob’s mind began to wander. He thought of the woman waiting for him on the outside; the time they’d spent together, her touch, the home they’d made, and the trust they’d formed over only the short course of one year…

Officer Jarrett seems like quite a mate. Felix said suddenly, literally breaking into Bob’s thoughts.

“You were reading my mind?” Bob was a little embarrassed. Felix had told him that unlike other telepaths he could read minds, but this was the first time he’d seen him do it. “How often have you read my thoughts?”

This is the first time. I’m sorry, it’s another thing I try to avoid… but since we’re going to die—well, I’m trying to keep my mind off things. You were brilliant in the way you protected her from your criminal life. I’m glad you got to experience true happiness with such a woman… though it was only for a year.

“Thanks.” He decided not to get angry over the mind-intrusion. “As cliché as it is say, she’s the love of my life.” Bob felt his heart sink at the notion of hurting her by dying.

I know how you feel. I’m leaving a wife and two children behind. Felix closed his eyes, imaging them. They’re the loves of my life.

Bob crossed his arms over his body, shivering against the cold of the cell. “I’m glad you got to experience happiness as well.” It was nice to have common ground with him.

After a few hours, a guard came by and stuffed a few flimsy, tattered blankets in through the door and left. Bob gratefully wrapped one about himself, and Felix did likewise. “Felix…” Bob started, “If people keep hurting you for your discriminatory views, why not stop? At least for your wife and kids’ sake?”

I’ve been sentenced to life, Bob. There’s no way I get out of here alive, so I might as well stand by my words. His blanket was wrapped all the way up about his neck, leaving only his gray eyes peering over.

“Sentenced to life?” Bob was astounded. He’d thought Felix’s punishment was too severe before, but now it seemed beyond reasoning. “And… you really never did anything violent to mouthed telepaths? Like that mind-attack? Just said things?”

Like I said; I only ever used my mind for attacking a few times in my brash youth and just today. Violence is not my way. Felix gave a drug-induced slow blink and fell asleep soon afterward.

After they were released from solitary confinement, Bob decided to go full-tilt into a plan for escape. It would be difficult, but if he could get just a few people on board, it was possible to get a message out.

The main problem was getting Felix off the drugs. Felix was administered the eye drops by a guard every morning before he left his cell. Bob considered several plans, all of which were fraught with too many loopholes to work; hiding in Felix’s cell and knocking the guard out cold, making Felix a weapon to be used on the guard, hiding him overnight in some place away from his cell until the drugs wore off… all of it was folly.

Over the next few days, Bob was spat at by the group of female protesters, jeered at by Yiti and Yhor, and beaten several times by the Ghats, all while trying to keep the ever-endangered telepath from dying. Their meals were constantly stolen away from them at lunch and what was worse: the other prisoners began to identify Bob as a bigot as well simply by his association with Felix. No one bothered to ask him what the truth was.

After their time in solitary confinement, Felix began talking to Bob more—especially at night. As it turned out, their individual cells were close enough together for his drugged mind to reach telepathically. Because Bob couldn’t speak to Felix through the walls, he began to think  his responses back to Felix, who would read his mind to keep the conversation going. It took a lot of discipline for Bob to keep his thoughts on track; he’d never realized how much the human mind tended to wander.

One night, as he was falling asleep while thinking up his eightieth escape plan, Bob heard Felix say something in his head. He thought back, What did you say? But there was no reply. A few moments passed and he heard him again… but it wasn’t English. It seemed Felix was communicating in the telepathic language. Bob attempted to respond several times, to no avail. Then realized what was happening; Felix was sleep talking.

The Telepathic language was inhumanly complicated—as though one could describe anything they were seeing in a few words. Bob’s brain was abuzz, translating it all so that he could almost see what Felix was thinking.

Felix’s thoughts ran through Bob as if they were music rolls feeding into a self-playing piano. He heard echoes of the past; Felix’s quiet childhood and the nourishment of his mutant gifts by his parents. He heard his worries of the future; possible fights in the cafeteria with strange monsters his mind was making up—faceless beasts pursuing him in the dark. He heard snippets of his bigoted speeches against the “mouthed ones” to all who lived on his world.

Finally, after many minutes, Felix’s thoughts began to grow quieter as he drifted further and further into the deepest part of sleep. Bob could hear a heartbeat in his ears—possibly Felix’s own… No- it wasn’t his. In a moment of clarity Bob heard Felix talking to his wife as if she were there in the prison. He was dreaming that he was holding her close so that he could hear her heartbeat, and he shared novels of loving words with her, which played in the background to the lub-dub that pulsated in Bob’s mind.

Felix poured his heart out for her, like telepathic poetry. Bob heard gentle birdsong, the feeling of wind on bare skin, the sight of billions of stars on a clear night, a thrill of cold in the air that seemed to promise snow, and the smell of embers faintly burning somewhere in the dark…

Suddenly Felix’s thoughts dropped away into the mist of deep sleep, leaving Bob with the rhythm of a woman’s heartbeat he’d never met still softly pulsating in his ears.

In Felix’s despair, his sleeping mind had tried to use his Galactic Reach to find the one person who could truly comfort him—give him the love he needed to stay alive for just one more day. Being unable to find her, he had accidentally reached out to Bob instead; the human was the closest thing he had to a friend.

Bob lay awake, his brain still confused at all he’d heard in just a few moments of native telepathic thought. He couldn’t help but feel his heart breaking for the poor alien. Felix’s reams of love for his wife reminded him of his love for his own woman.

He decided then and there that Felix was his friend, even if he was a bigot. He was a living, breathing soul who needed help.