Spliced

“Step right up! Step right up! Ger yer fortunes told! Right here! Only 24 coppers!”

Triston stepped in line. Why not? He’d seen almost everything else in this market today. He had thought moving to a small town would help him write, and for the most part he’d stayed locked up in his room. For the past six months he’d been working on a non-fictional book, covering in great detail the history of teleportation regulation. It had been lonely work but was going to be very important for helping the government merge the current mess of regional teleportation laws into one cohesive structure, a structure which should last hundreds if not thousands of years into the future.

Triston watched as a man with a cane and a bowler hat stepped out of the tent, a broad grin spread across his face. He kissed an equally elderly lady right on the lips which seemed to both surprise and please her. “She said I’ve got at least another 30 years.” The old man laughed “Let’s go celebrate.“

Triston waited as another patron entered, a middle-aged woman this time. She also came out smiling.

Then it was Triston’s turn. He stepped inside the tent, not sure exactly what to expect. It’s not that psychics weren’t real. Oh they existed all right, but they were very rare, and given a lot of people liked to know their future there was a lot of business in pretending. It was unlikely this one was real, but 24 coppers was not much to pay for a bit of harmless fun.

The lady at the table sure looked the part. Her hair was dark and staring to grey. It fell over her shoulders in thick curls. Her clothes were coloured in purple and green, and made of velvet that rippled like the surface of a pond.

Triston sat down and held out his hands to her. She placed her palms on top of his. Her hands were unusually cold.

She closed her eyes and swayed ever so slightly. Her dark eyebrows came together in a frown.

“Hmm,” she murmured, “very strange.”

“What?”

“Your end, it seems to have come already. The date of your death is December 11, 2004.”

“That can’t be right,” he laughed, thinking at first she was joking. “That’s six months ago.”

“I see what I see,” she replied simply and said no more.

Triston paid her anyway but left the tent frowning and in a bad mood. What kind of psychic tells someone something they don’t want and aren’t expecting to hear? His thoughts were quickly interrupted however.

“Can you hear the bells?” a young feminine voice asked.

He turned to see who had spoken and was met with a pretty and petite young lady. She was dressed in fine dark clothing, too tidy and smart for this type of location. Her blonde hair was just past shoulder length at the back, layered shorter around her face, and her eyes were the deepest blue.

“No?” he replied, confused. He hadn’t realised there was a bell tower here.

“That’s good, because they say only the dead can hear them.” She flashed a wide smile then checked her watch. “They’re magic!”

“Isn’t everybody?” He replied. Most people had at least one low level power, except humans and vamps.

“That one isn’t.” She jerked her head towards the tent. “She’s a sham, not a real psychic.”

Triston laughed. “Evidently, she told me the date of my death was six months ago.”

I woman seemed intrigued at this. “What a funny thing.”

“Yes” he agreed. “Excuse me, I should probably get back to work.”

“So soon, it’s such a lovely day. Perhaps you’d like to take a walk?” she asked.

Her smile was so captivating that he couldn’t help but say yes. They walked to the edge of the market and entered down a little path that wound itself through the overgrown foliage of the town gardens.

“Perhaps I am dead,” he mused. “It’s certainly a heavenly day.”

“You’re not dead yet,” she replied.

“How do you know?”

She checked her watch, “Because I saw your future, six months ago.”

Somewhere in the distance he heard a bell start to toll.

Stella stepped away from the body and gave a heavy glance down at her blood covered clothes, pleased she’d had the foresight to wear black. She always felt a little sorry for the people who’s futures she saw, and the ones she helped ensure. But it was better this way. The man would have destroyed a lot of lives.

And she hadn’t killed him, not really, she’d just seen his death and ensured the location was private. The teleportation accident would have happened either way, the teleporter had locked on to him specifically in a deliberate kamikaze attack in an attempt to terrify anyone who opposed the new teleportation regulation. To prevent the man’s death would have cost others and worse it would have meant meddling, proper meddling. Not only did taking an observational approach help Stella predict the future with more clarity but she also felt that she didn’t deserve the right to make decisions over who deserved to live or die. Every change had consequences, she simply did the most she could without actively causing harm elsewhere. Worrying over it was the reason so many real psychics ended up going mad, the powerful ones that is. This way at least there weren’t any exploding bodies in the middle of a crowded area. Kids and adults alike would sleep well tonight, blissfully unaware of the event they had come so close to witnessing. There would be no violent snowballing of events, no retaliation.

Stella knew nobody would come by for awhile yet. She contemplated moving the remaining pieces of body but knew that would arouse suspicion. There was about a 30% chance the scene would be found by children playing and a 60% chance it would be found by a man walking his dog. She didn’t bother assessing further for more concrete numbers. Sometimes you just had to risk it and time was short.