1 The Fortune Teller's Den

Author's Note: 'Will be used for character's inner thoughts.' "Normal dialogue tags will be used for speech."

Bold text will be used at the beginning of a sentence to indicate a scene change.

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Strange noises and paths that seemed to double back on themselves…the forest was vast, but he had finally found it.

One year ago, near the colony named Crater, the boy called Pearson hiked through the outer woods alone. The tunnel of trees surrounding him blocked out all the light from above. Even though the sun hadn't fully set that day, it still forced him to use a flashlight to navigate the natural labyrinth of trees, as the lightning bugs in the area did little to illuminate his surroundings. Despite this, the thing that kept him from turning around was the knowledge that the stairs of the den were almost in sight.

Trudging forward, his fingers rubbed against tree bark, feeling for the markings.

After tripping over a particularly large tree root, Pearson's flashlight settled upon the staircase he sought.

"Thank God," he muttered while swatting away a carnivorous nocturnal butterfly the size of his hand.

The animals and insects around Crater seemed to be ‌stranger than what an outsider would typically expect to see in the rural mountains. They were bigger, more aggressive, and some had weird mutations—unexplainable by most scientists. Once, a colonist who left Crater's gates claimed to have seen a deer whose fur was neon green and had the eyes of a frog. The theory was that the leader of Crater had placed‌ them in the area, deterring the unwanted.

Pearson walked up the narrow, windy metal stairs and towards the seer's den. He was quickly lamenting the fact that he had chosen this job. Since he had just earned the triple-star rank earlier that week, new jobs were accessible to him. He chose this as it seemed the most interesting and wasn't a one-time thing but a weekly ordeal. He would archive the seer's fortunes and bring them to the Hounds to be evaluated.

After a tiring climb, Pearson knocked on the wooden door and yelled out, "Hey, Ms. Aca, oracle-lady... uh, my name is Pearson. I'm here to archive your fortune!" He waited, but he only heard the buzzing of insects and the distant calls of animals from the forest. The forest had made a small clearing around the seer's house. It was round, with a few small circular windows facing Pearson. Heavy curtains had been pulled in front of the windows to block any lines of sight inside. He could see the faint flickering glow of a candle at the edges of the curtains. Moss and vines had crept up the side of the orange stucco walls. They didn't have to reach far to get to the roof, a rickety wooden thing held together by rope. He knocked again, this time louder than before, calling out, "Aca, open the door!" Again, there was no response.

He turned around and looked out over the sea of trees; it was so densely packed that it looked like a bunch of tall men in black tuxedos standing shoulder to shoulder surrounding Pearson. 'Well, this sucks,' he thought. At the edge of the treeline, a loud croaking sound echoed toward him. He watched as a beast, covered with green fur and a mouth large enough to swallow him in one motion, hopped from one side of the clearing to the other.

The colony's seer, Aca, had the ability of clairvoyance. But the limiting factor was that she could only speak the prediction and only say it once. She will feel it inside her and send the Hounds a message for someone to come and archive it. Once she has said the fortune, it will be erased from her memory. At least, that's what the man who briefed him on his job had explained to Pearson. The truth was that very few colonists had ever seen Aca; they considered her more of an urban legend than an actual living person. The Hounds had always claimed that she was real, but it was hard for anybody to believe them because most had never laid eyes upon her.

He was just about ready to call it a night and head back to the colony, but out of the corner of his eye, he saw the light behind the window curtains expand. He turned to see a face concealed by shadow peeking out at him. Only their eyes perforated the darkness. They made eye contact and stared at each other for what seemed to him like an eternity before the face receded behind the curtains. After a few moments, there was shuffling near the door and the sound of several locks clicking open. The door swung open, and the smell of freshly baked chocolate chip cookies wafted out of the home and instantly drowned out the smell of damp leaves and dirt. Pearson hadn't realized how hungry he was until his mouth started watering uncontrollably, and he had to wipe his mouth of drool.

Pearson walked forward and stuck out his hand with an award-winning smile, "Hey, I assume you're Ms. Aca. I'm Pear-"

"Yea, I heard you the first time." She interrupted while looking him up and down, not shaking his hand. She didn't look the least bit impressed with what she was seeing.

"Um, okay then," Pearson said while rolling his eyes. He put his arm down by his side and looked at her, waiting for...well, he wasn't sure what. He half expected her head to do 360s while puking everywhere.

Aca stepped to the side of the entrance. "Well?" She said while gesturing inside the house. Pearson looked one last time at the outside world; he got this sinking thought, 'What if this still isn't Aca? She could be some evil witch, as far as I know.' He had little time to dwell on that thought before taking an enormous step through the doorway.

It was so bright inside that it took a second for his eyes to adjust, but when they did, he was greeted with a room that looked like a grandma's living room. There was an old box television set up in front of a couch. Sitting in front of the sofa was a TV tray stand with knitting equipment, and what looked to be a half-made sweater dawned with the Crater colony's logo: a minimalistic drawing of a mother cradling her child. In another part of the room was the kitchen. About one hundred pots and pans hung from the ceiling, and a medium-sized wooden table sat in the middle of the kitchen area. On top of the stove was a fresh batch of two dozen cookies cooling on a cookie tray. The wooden floors creaked as Pearson wandered in with a look of awe on his face. He nearly bumped into a narrow metal spiral stairs that jutted into the ceiling.

Aca cleared her throat to get Pearson's attention. He turned towards her, finally getting a good look at her in the bright light. He wasn't sure what he expected, but his jaw opened to say something, but all that came out was an, "uh..." Pearson rarely had a problem talking to anyone, especially girls, but this one had caught him so off guard that he was at a loss for words for the first time in his life. Aca had light blond hair that looked almost white; she had these intense but tired sea-green eyes. She wore a white t-shirt and jeans, over that a dark purple apron that looked like someone had worn it on the front lines of a battlefield. Holes that looked like they were created from a shotgun and red splotches of what Pearson hoped was tomato sauce covered it. The thing that confused him the most was her face. She was young, impossibly young. In fact, she looked to be the same age as him, fifteen—but if what people had told him about her was true, that couldn't be possible.

He blinked and tried again, "So, uh, as you heard, I, uh, need to archive something." He said while taking out the pen and notepad from his pocket.

She looked him up and down again, "Where's the other guy?" She asked more as a statement than a question.

"Uh, I think he quit. Not sure why, but the position was open, so I took it. And honestly, I barely found the place." He said with a forced smile on his face. "I'm sorry, but like, how are you this young? I thought you would be some old, dried-up woman with fifty cats, but you're like...hot," He instantly regretted what he said the moment it came out of his mouth. But as per usual, he always put his foot in his mouth.

A slight smile crossed her lips. She shook her head in disbelief, "Long story. Too long, in fact. I can tell you it some other time. But anyways, sit down. You look hungry. Do you want cookies?"

Pearson heard his stomach growl at the mention of the cookies. He nodded and then sat down at the table. She grabbed some plates from a wooden cupboard above the stove, loaded them with cookies, and placed them on the table. She sat down across from him and watched as he started to absently devour the cookies one at a time. Through bites and a full mouth, he spoke, "Ms. Aca, these are really freaking good!" She just smiled and watched him eat.

"You can drop the 'Ms.'; just call me Aca." Aca said as she reached into her apron pocket and pulled out a golden needle. She turned in her chair and grabbed a golden urn from the countertop. She placed it in front of her on the table.

"I gotta be real with you, Aca," Pearson said between bites. "You really gotta live inside the colony or something 'cause I can see why that other guy quit. I wouldn't want to walk out here weekly, either."

"Well, I value my privacy over convenience."

"I guess, but doesn't it get lonely living like a hermit?"

"No, I prefer to live alone. I used to live in the colony quite a long time ago. Being a 'celebrity' is bad enough, but being a celebrity known for your foresight is about ten times worse. People will plague you with questions all day, not even interesting questions either."

Pearson had finished the cookies on his plate and was eyeing the other cookies on Aca's. "Oh, yea? Like what?"

"'When will I find a soulmate?', 'What are the lottery numbers?', 'When will I die?' 'What stocks should I invest in?'" She said in a mocking voice. "Honestly, ridiculous."

Pearson laughed, "Okay, that was pretty good."

"It's like I tell people that this isn't how the ability works at all, but they don't even listen half the time! Eventually, I couldn't take it anymore, and one of the Hounds had found a house built out here a while back and renovated the whole thing to make it livable, and here I've been ever since."

"Wow, so how does it actually work? Does it use that 'shimmer' stuff or something else?"

"Hold on. You're telling me that they haven't taught you what energy is yet? How old are you, seventeen?"

"Fifteen. And yea, I kinda know a little bit here and there, but they haven't taught our year anything about it. I think it might be like, illegal to know or something."

"Illegal? That's strange, but yea, I don't know. It's not my ability or anything; it's something I've always had. Anyways, were you told about the process?" Aca said while picking up a golden needle and holding it over the urn's opening.

"I just know I need to write down what all you say, and then you'll get amnesia or something."

"Pretty much. I get a strange feeling inside me, and I do a ritual here that lets me foresee the potential future. There is no telling exactly what the fortune will be. It could be something small and inconsequential or a significant event that could affect the whole planet or anything in between. So this needs to be taken very seriously. My message may not be straightforward either; it's often very cryptic, so be ready for that. Are you ready?" She said while looking at Pearson as he scrambled to open the notebook.

"Yeah, yeah! Alright, I'm ready." He said while looking up at Aca for confirmation. She took a deep breath and pricked her finger with the golden needle. A single drop of blood fell into the urn. A green aura started flowing around her body, undulating and bubbling.

There was popping and hissing as a sweet smell, 'roses?' Pearson thought as it spread through the cabin. Less than a second later, the golden urn glowed red hot as a green smoke rose from the jar. Aca leaned forward with her eyes closed, inhaled as much smoke as she could, and held her breath. Her skin paled as she did so. Once ten seconds had passed, her eyes shot open; the pupils and iris of her eyes had disappeared, and the whites of her eyes were a grass green that had a slight glow. Something held her hair as if an invisible person were behind her, yanking it. Her face split into a smile, impossibly too large for her face—her bright white teeth reflected the molten vessel; it looked to Pearson that her head would bisect if her smile grew any larger. A breathy laugh escaped her throat.

She suddenly snapped forward, her face only a few inches away from Pearson's, her hand grabbing onto his, her skin feeling so cold that he thought it might give him frostbite. She opened her mouth, and a small amount of green smoke escaped her lips as she spoke; her voice sounded doubled and distorted. The sound of nails on a chalkboard inside his head, but he did his best to write every word he had heard. He spoke them aloud as he wrote to ensure he didn't miss a single one.

"Forever set a year from now, a cold moon rises. On a day dark and dim, a choice polarized: forgiveness or pride. In an oval room, you must decide. She shall return to raise the colony with a woman from an eastern pantheon by her side. Longing for its bearer. With eyes of gold, she comes to call. Half a demon, the other death. She awaits her creator with labored breath.

"In a serpent's maw, she expires. For rekindling the spark, the ultimate price is the only qualifier." He repeated.

He finished writing the last words and looked into her eyes, waiting for more, but her eyes turned glassy and vacant. Aca collapsed back in her chair, her head staring up at the ceiling. The last bit of green smoke escaped her cracked lips. She sat back up again. Her skin had turned back to its standard shade, and her eyes looked human again. She opened her mouth to say something, but she started coughing. It got so bad that Pearson ran to the sink, filled a glass with water, and handed it to her. She took long gulps of it and finished the whole cup within seconds. She set the glass down on the table a little harder than she meant to. "That was rougher than usual." She said while clearing her throat.

"Is it normally that intense?" Pearson asked with a worried look on his face.

"It usually doesn't hurt that much, but yea, it's a weekly occurrence for me." She said while leaving her chair to fill the glass with more water. "I'm used to it at this point."

Pearson looked down at the notebook, a puzzled look on his face. He turned the page towards Aca, "Do you know what this could mean?"

"No, No, No, No! I don't read those!" She said quickly while stepping away from the table and averting her eyes back toward the sink. "Yea, I make a habit to not read those. It tends to bring bad luck if I do." She glanced out her window towards the top of the tree line. "Well, it's almost pitch-black outside, so you should probably get going. I don't want you to get eaten."

"Eaten? By what?" he laughed.

"By Aye, probably."

Pearson reached over and stuffed some cookies in his pockets while she had her back turned. "Alright, well, thanks for everything!" He said while quickly exiting the hut before she noticed the food missing.

While outside, he noticed how cold it had gotten. Despite it being in the mid-eighties when he had entered the home about an hour prior. He could see his breath in the dim light emanating from the hut behind him. "Well, at least the cookies in my pockets are keeping my legs warm." He muttered while descending, hugging the side of the house since the narrow stairway had no handrailings and had become slick since he first ascended them. He looked back up towards the home; its smell seemed to follow him, as if the house itself was enticing him to come back, to not leave it. He thought, 'I could ask her if I could crash on her couch until the morning. I'm sure she wouldn't mind.' But he knew ‌he had to get the notebook back as quickly as possible; Pearson had already wasted enough time dilly-dallying around; he could see her again anytime he wanted, he guessed.

It took almost an hour, but he finally returned to the colony, Crater, and into the Hounds' oval-shaped building. Only four of the five Hounds were in attendance. Neph, Amelia, Aye, and Lummock were all sitting down, awaiting the prophecy. Aye had been pacing around and complaining about how long it had taken Pearson to arrive. He was a hulking man; his muscles almost burst through his dark suit with every movement. Neph had been trying to calm him down; while Amelia looked like she was going to fall asleep, the two massive black dogs by her side mimicked her yawn.

It was the first time that Pearson had been inside the meeting room of the Hounds. When he entered the room, he felt all eyes on him. The only sound was of Aye's heavy breathing and the stomping of his footsteps on the checkered tile floor as he paced back and forth in front of the large window that looked out over the colony. The floor was so shiny and clean that it felt like Pearson was staring into a black and white mirror. Some sad-looking potted plants that hadn't been watered in weeks sat in the room's corner. In the middle of the room was a large oak table that resembled the oval shape of the room, with six office chairs surrounding it. The empty one at the head of the table was labeled 'Orion.' Under it, another label, 'Chairman.' The other vacant one placed near the middle of the table was marked, 'Keigh,' with a label under it displaying, 'Second.' It was slightly askew and looked pretty old and dusty.

Pearson stood in front of the Hounds and read Aca's fortune. "Forever set a year from now, a cold moon rises. On a day dark and dim, a choice polarized: Forgiveness or pride. In an oval room, you must decide. She shall return to raise the colony with a woman from an eastern pantheon by her side. The moon longs for home. With eyes of gold, she comes to call. Half a demon, the other death. She awaits the creator with labored breath.

"In a serpent's maw, she expires. For rekindling the spark, the ultimate price is the only qualifier."

The room was utterly silent. Aye suddenly got up from his chair, walked over to Pearson, and snatched the notebook from his hands. He read over it slowly and carefully. He gritted his teeth. "Raise or Raze?" He barked.

"Huh?" Pearson said with utter confusion across his face.

"Did she mean raise, r-a-i-s-e, or raze, r-a-z-e?" He said again, louder this time.

"I don't know what you mean-"

"What you wrote. In your notebook," Aye was almost yelling at this point. "It says, 'She shall return to raise the colony.' So does she mean 'raise' or 'raze'?"

"I-I'm not sure." Pearson's voice was slightly louder than a whisper. Under Aye's glare, Pearson felt like he was only an inch tall. He had always thought Aye was scary, but it was totally different when all his anger was being directed solely at himself. 'I can't exactly hear a difference between raise and raze,' he thought.

"You're telling me that my...our colony is going to be destroyed in a year?"

Neph cleared his throat, "Aye, why don't we sit down and have a talk about this, hm? We should all just read it and discuss things with a rational mind. Most of Aca's fortunes have double meanings. It may not be clear what the fortune means until much, much later. No matter which meaning of 'raise.'"

Aye turned around towards Neph. It looked like a blood vessel was about to pop in his forehead, but he forced a grin and spoke through clenched teeth. "How can I be calm when this kid just told us that the colony will be destroyed in a year? What else could it mean when it says, 'She shall raze the colony.'?"

Amelia rolled her eyes, and one of her two dogs barked as if to amplify her annoyance, "Aye, you're being a drama queen. Sit down!" She said while standing up herself and coming face to face with him. They stared each other down for a few seconds. Pearson was worried one of them would throw a punch, but Neph changed the subject by asking Pearson, "Did Aca mention anything about this by chance?"

"Uh, no...Well, actually, she said something about how this fortune felt tougher than usual. I don't know if that means anything, but that's what she said," relieved to have the tension slightly lifted in the room.

Aye walked over to his chair and sat down with a huff. "We'll be stronger than her anyways, for all intensive purposes; we shouldn't have any trouble killing some girl." He grumbled.

Amelia slumped over in her chair and rested her head in her palm. "The phrase is 'intents and purposes,' dumbass!"

Aye's eyes stared daggers into Amelia as she sat staring straight ahead, ignoring him with a satisfied smirk on her face. Aye opened his mouth to say something but apparently thought better of it as he turned to Neph. "So, what do you suggest we do?"

Lummock spoke; it had been so long since he had said anything that his voice made them all jump. "What'll we do when she arrives? To play devil's advocate, I'll say that we can't just let a ticking time bomb walk around our colony—if we are to believe Aye's interpretation." He looked at Aye—cold eye contact, "But we aren't going to kill her on sight either." His voice was calm but sent out a clear warning.

"What'll we do then?" Amelia asked.

Neph thought for a moment, reading over the fortune a few more times. "There's not much we can do at this time. If I understand this correctly, it says that a year from now, a girl will arrive. We don't know who that will be. From past experiences, fortunes aren't inexorable. The only thing we can do is wait. We just need to play it by ear once she arrives. For now, I suggest we place a gag order on this information—no need to cause any panic if it turns out to be nothing."