Telepathy & Empathy
Telepathy is an ability of the mind to read the thoughts of others. It is an ability that is often inherited, and manifests early on as empathy, or the simple reading and understanding of the emotions of others. While telepathy is at its strongest inherited, nearly all individuals have the ability to use it, though it is a trait that is mostly dormant and undeveloped. A vast majority of individuals are at least mildly empathic, and this ability is not limited by race either; though some races are more inclined to it. Air, Water, and Life related elemental races are highly inclined to it, while Light and Dark elemental races follow at mediocre, and Earth and Fire are some of the lowest inclined. Humans cover a vast spectrum of abilities; some are highly inclined, others not so much. Only about 3% of the human population show a strong inclination toward high level telepathy. Less intelligent races such as Iengi, Kuzo, and Samiss barely have anything beyond basic empathy, if anything.
It is easiest to read minds with eye to eye contact, though the more skilled a telepath, the easier it is to pick up thoughts from a short distance. Usually, this distance is no more than a few feet, and even in a crowded room, with some focus on a specific individual, their thoughts can be reached. In very rare cases, pairs of individuals can forge a telepathic link that keeps them aware of each other, even if they are hundreds of miles apart. This most often occurs between twins, siblings, or close friends or lovers where at least one is a telepath.
Furthermore, telepathy has a small, underappreciated value of being able to imprint a thought into another person’s head, coercing the person to start thinking along the lines that the telepath wants information towards. Exceptionally skilled telepaths can impose their own thoughts into another person’s mind as if they were speaking to them, allowing a form of two-way communication where they implant their thoughts and the other person responds by allowing their surface thoughts to be read by the telepath.
Empathy
Empathy is the ability to decipher a person’s emotional state. It is a common ability, and sometimes a combination of telepathy and a simple understanding of expression and body language. Empathy can also be applied to extra-species interaction, such as human and animal relations. While most people can gain a good understanding of a person’s emotions from cues through body language, others can look deeper and read a person’s real emotions, especially if they are skilled at keeping their feelings hidden. A true empath, someone who can read emotions instead of taking physical cues, has the potential to advance further into telepathy.
Surface Reading
As telepathy grows from empathy to actual reading of thoughts, the first sign is being able to read the surface thoughts of people and animals; snippets of sentences or words from people, or impulses from animals. After a bit of practice, fully formed thoughts can be gleaned from others, but only surface thoughts.
Very quickly, telepaths learn to put up their own mental filters and blocks to protect their sanity. Without this defense mechanism, they would be inundated with thoughts from every person and creature that came within range. This may hamper development for some people if they do not actively exercise their ability and keep their guard up at all times, but those who wish to advance in skill learn to focus on a single person and relax their mental barriers when needed.
Deep Reading
The most talented telepaths can delve deep into the minds of others, below the surface thoughts, to read the deeply buried thoughts, retrieve memories and information, find the truth behind lies, and other things that the recipient may be hiding. This usually requires eye to eye contact, and can cause quite a bit of psychic damage to the one being looked into.