I don't have to.

I took a sip from my bottle and noticed the beer was warm where my hand touched the glass. I really lost myself in that memory and also I was horny as fuck now. I didn't want to risk losing myself again, so I refrained from entering her mind another time. I tried hard to think of a reasonable explanation for my odd behaviour but I got lucky. Just as I was going to open my mouth to stammer out an awkward attempt at excusing myself, we heard someone open the door. „Ah, Leon's coming back. Let's say hello.” I said, so we got up and greeted my flatmate. „Good evening to you, Sir. I trust you had an enjoyable journey?” „I most certainly had not, thank you and a good evening to you to. Diane, hi! Seeing you here makes up for all the mishaps of my trip.” „Leon, hi. Sorry to her that” she replied. „Beer” I asked him, as he dropped his bag where he stood. „Yes, please! I am in dire need of a refreshment.” „Then you're lucky. I made a supply run with our lovely neighbour and stocked up our emergency supplies.” „How considerade of you, thank you kind Sir.” Dianes eyes wandered between us both. She chuckled and shook her head. „Do you two ever act normal?” Leon put on a shocked face. „If by normal you mean lowering ourselves to the communicational standards of the common barbarians, that besiege our fair institute of edification, I am afraid I must indeed belie your expectations. Rest asured though, Diane. You are and will always be most welcome within the walls of our humble hyem, regardless of your choice of words.” „I'm flattered, Leon.” „A reasonable reaction, yet a gratuitos one.” Diane shook her head in laughter and we took a seat on our large but old and squeaky living room couch. „So, tell me, what news are there to exchange” Leon asked to open a topic. „I believe your flatmate, our good Neighbour D. here, is not in good health, Leon. He shamelessly mislead me into consumimg **** instead of pursuing my studies.” „Well he has been reported to have a bad influence on the young and the fairer sex alike” answered Leon while I just smiled and nodded. „The fairer sex? You...”, Diane lokked at him, but the she sighed and shook her head again. „Anyways... Also he assured me he would - brace yourself now - sweettalk professor Smith into giving me more time for my paper.” „If you believed him, I know not for the health of whom I fear more my dear.” „Oh my God. You are right. I am doomed!” „My dear Diane. As my esteemed flatmate said, you are at all times welcome within these walls, regardless of your choice of words. Your god however is not.” She rolled her eyes and I chuckled.

So the evening goes by with a nice chat and some jokes between friends. I cannot say I could steer my thoughts away from the intense anal I had dug up in Dianes memories. Still the evening went by uneventful. So Diane left two drinks later, I had a chat with Leon and then went to sleep. Contrary to my customs I set my alarm clock to wake me up early, so I could get to university well before my usual time.

As the alarm clock rang, I suppressed a whole row of rather colourful curses and went to take a shower. As the hot water ran down my body, I thought about what I was going to do. Maybe I had lost my mind and just didn't notice... Leon had of course not made any coffee yet so I just put on some clothes, I went for respectable ones, took my bag and left. As I neared the campus, the voices grew in number as well they became louder. I shut them out and made my first stop of the day at the coffee machine. Thank evolution for caffeine! Then I checked Professor Smith's office hours. Back then the best way to do this was to check next to the office door. Papers were updated more quickly and more reliably then online information these days. Carefully I let my senses wander. I was on the lookout for Professor Smith. I had never reached out to her mind so it was difficult to identify her but I was sure there were two presences behind the office doors. So she propably was in her office talking to someone, but office hours were still some time from now. I tried to make out, which presence behind the door was Professor Smith but I wasn't entirely sure. Just as I was going to leave as the door opened. Out came Smith, she was a woman in her late fourties, her brown hair was short. She was dressed casual but neatly.

„Okay then, thanks for the update, William”, said Smith to an elderly colleague of hers. I knew the guy, Professor Eber was a skilled teacher, an expert on english linguistics and popular with most students. So we exchanged greetings and Smith stopped, looking at me. „Good morning, were you looking for me?” „Good morning professor Smith. Yes. I was checking your office hours to talk to you about something.” Well if you wait a minute, I'll grab a coffee and we can talk then.” I cheered with my own coffee mug and said, „Thanks. I'ld appreciate that.”

I took a seat and just after a few minutes, Smith returned with a steaming mug in her hand. The smell of coffe of a quality notably better than the one available in our regular cafeteria rushed ahead of her and filled the hallway. „Mr. D. come on in then.” We entered her office, it was like all offices in this department just a small room, cramped with books, a desk buried under even more books and some papers, and a few chairs. The university in this small town was good, maybe even better than its reputation but there was nothing of the ivy league university cliché you may think of. I took a seat and Smith sat down behind her desk. „So what is it I can do for you?” „Nothing really, professor Smith. I am not here on my own behalf.” She ogled me with some interest. „Oh, really? How very uncommen. Why are you here then?” Now was the time. I took a deep breath, focused and reached out. It was as I hit a thick black fog at first. I was used to minds, easy to enter, defenseless in a manner of speaking. But Smith's mind was shrouded in Darkness, well at first. I felt the energy in my body moving aroung and shooting up to my head forming a üillar of energy from my lower body up to my cranium. As I made eye contact with Smith, the fog became lighter up to a point, where it felt like I entered her mind, but it was still different from the minds I knew. Jaz's emotions had always been somewhat visable to me. Diane had strong and intense memories pop up. Leon was focused on current plans but these plans still lay before me. Smith's mind was like an endless hallway lined with doors or a library: structured but not easy to navigate if you didn't know how. So I tried to stay there and at the same time, talk to her. Although that took some effort it worked. I wasn't as distracted as I was by Diane's memory though. „I am here to talk about Diane Miller, my friend an neighbour.” „Ah Mrs. Miller. A bright young lady. I never knew you two were neighbours.” „Our flats are next to each other. Down by the copy shop, this little grocery store and the restsurant.” „Ah I see. Well I must disappoint you. I am not inclined to discuss other student's affairs with anybody. That is part of the mutual trust between student and teacher. I'm sure you understand.” The image of her mind shifted now, or maybe I had entered one of the doors, wandered down a hall and ended up in a free space much like a greek temple with stone pillars supporting a roof. „I know and I appreciate that. I am not here to ask about her. I am here to make a request in her favor. Diane is a very ambitiois young woman so I am sure, she would never ask you this herself, but given the circumstances, I frankly think you should give her more time for her paper.” She looled at me with suspicion. „I trust you know I never give extra time? Things need to be fair.” One pillar seemed to vibrate, even glow in her mind. As I approached it, the image became clearer to me. This certainly felt like a principle of hers. If Smith started to give extra time to one student, deadlines would become unfair to other students. Well duh. What a surprising revelation. Still if she saw these principles as strong as the stone pillars, she imagined them, that explained a lot about her. And there were more than one pillar after all. „I agree and I would not come to ask you this if I weren't convinced it was a matter of...” I walked along the other pillars. One seemed about loyalty, one about integrity, compassion, trust... Nothing out of the ordinary. Smith being a true scientist I also came across pillars that called upon objectivity, auto-criticism and the will to see the opposity possibilty. I thought for a moment, then I approached and touched this pillar. Though I still had to find the right words to end my sentence. „... I think I'ld call it fairness and reason.” I tried to get this pillar to resonate but there was no reaction at first. „Could you get a little more specific Mr. D? Please do not waste my time.” The sky above the nice image of a greek style temple darkened as I reached out to the pillar of trust. Much to my elation this one reacted, though faintly. I felt it heating up to my touch until the cold stone surface was nice and warm to the touch. At this point I was imorovising. I walked into this situation wholly umprepared! What was Inthinking? So I focused my attention on interacting with this pillar, evoking a feeling of trustworthyness. „You see, I came across her yesterday in the late evening. She obvioisly was in emotional distress and she told me she had to spent some time with her family over the past days. From previous talks with her I know about a close relative of her being seriously ill. I don't wan't do go into further details as it is not my information to share but I hope you understand. Oh, and also I know, on her way back her train was stuck for several hours.” Great story, you idiot! But another pillar started to resonate. I examined it more closely and I think it was compassion. When I touched it, images appeared on its surface. Memorys, only faint and much less vivid than they appeared in Dianes mind. I could make out a loved one in what seemed to be a hospital bed. I could not see the details of the person's face but I felt a deep grief as I watched the images float across the cold stone surface. I did not find anything else to do, so in heartbeat I decided to follow the pity route further. „Diane is too ambitiois to ever talk to you about this on her own. And I know her to be very principled when it comes to keeping her personal affairs separate from her studies, so I decided to come to you on her behalf. I really felt obliged to talk to you about this. I'm sorry if this seemed like a waste if time for you.” Several pillars now began to vibrate. The sky above the temple cleared and the compassion pillar even seemed to glow with memorized images. I tried to focus on that as the ground itself began to shake and the fairness pillar cracked. The rigid and unyielding stone pillar really cracked and began to crumble but it didn't fall to dust or something. The principle of fairness still stood and supported the roof. But its visualisation started to shift and change. The image was still very hazy but I think I tended towards a tree, being abe to bend and grow.

I honestly don't know if I had caused this by entering and influencing her mind or if it was just my words. I have no idea, if the image of the stone temple is her usual visualisation of her principles or if the gauzy image of the tree was just another side of her personality, usually hidden when she's in her job. Maybe she sees her principles more like a grove when not in a professional setting and I just reached that level of her personality. Or maybe I am just a hallucinating linatic? All I know for sure is that her mind appeared more structured and her thoughts more focused to me than I had ever deemed possible since I first developed this... I'm still not sure... insight? Ability? Delusion?

„Mr. D. Thank you for talking to me. I appreciate your concern for your neighbour, but you must understand I can not give mrs. Miller any extra time for her paper.” She took her notebook, looked at me and opened it on today's page. I saw her scratch a note with Diane's name on it. Then she flipped the pages to next week and made a new note. „However I can tell you this. As I cam see in my notebook, I do not expect her to hand in the paper before next week. Also let me be clear: Do not talk about the details of this conversation to anyone. Not even Diane. And especially no other student. Am I understood? I trust you here.” „Yes, clearly. Thank you.” „Have a nice day, Mr. D.” „Thanks, you too professor Smith.” I left the office quite baffled. I walked down the staircase and tried to think... I was specifically told not to talk about this to Diane, though this was ordered under the impression she did not know of my visit at Smith's office. In order for this to work, I had to make Diane my accomplice. So I looked for a quiet area, took out my phone and called Diane. „D. What... Why you calling?” „And a very good morning to you too my esteemed neighbour.” She yawned. „Yeah yeah. What is it?” „Our mutual friend and valued professor will tell you that she is expecting your paper next week. It is...” „What!?” „Listen to me. It is important that you reveal no knowledge of me talking to her. Or this might not work and we're both in trouble. I am coming home now and I would appreciate to discuss the details with you there in person. Okay?” „How did you...” „I am coming home now and I would appreciate to discuss the details with you there in person. Okay? Give me 15 Minutes please.” „Okay... I'll take a shower then.” „Bye” „Bye.”