Parkarka kneeled down beside the mound of rocks.

This broken city wasn’t a place she was particularly familiar with, but she did know what the place was. It was one of the first cities attacked by The Living Catastrophe. Jana had once been here.

She had spent quite a bit of time sorting rubble out of the city, it seemed, and even created new shelter with her permafrost. It wasn’t as if that surprised Parkarka; she knew Jana was a good person on the inside.

But she got on her nerves. Or, rather, Jana made Parkarka anxious. She didn’t understand why she’d suddenly cut her off a while back, after just a few passive-agressive words.

Then there was the matter of Psychi. It would have been one thing if Jana were alone in avoiding her, but why was she with Jeremy? Parkarka’s thoughts leaned toward it being a hostage situation, but she knew better. Jana was a good person, and it simply made no sense.

She stood from the rubble after briefly inspecting it.

Jana had made herself quite annoying to track down. Parkarka hadn’t expected her to go here of all places, let alone to Samuel Horshov’s home. Just what did she want there, and what was her connection to him? And why would she bring Psychi’s brother there?

She floated upward, looking on to the mansion in the distance.

The puzzle pieces just didn’t add up, and unfortunately, Jana had dashed off just before she could find the darn girl. It left only one person who might be familiar with her intentions.

Samuel.

Parkarka headed to the mansion.

Jeremy and Jana looked at his computer thoughtfully, light pouring into his rented room from the morning sun. It showed a map of the world with a path drawn on it.

“So…” Jeremy said, “We’re going to the Psychic Master of Clairvoance to ask if her clairvoyance can see the two robe weirdos, then if that works, we’ll ask her to use her precognition powers to find the other robe weirdos?” he said.

They’d spent a decent amount of time later the last day figuring out this extremely simple plan. Basically, they were reviewing it.

“Basically that,” Jana said, leaning back as she looked over his shoulder.

“So…she specialized in finding lost things, you said? Lost treasure, phones, murder weapons, that type of thing?” Jeremy asked.

“You’ve never watched her show?”

“Her show?”

“Yeah, she’s got a live television show.”

“Huh. Well I just knew she was a Psychic Master. Why are we asking help from someone who runs a show?”

Jana sent him a skeptical look. “Who else is going to be able to find a bunch of invisible people who can teleport across the globe on a whim?”

He looked to the side, reluctantly and silently agreeing with her.

“Have you met this girl?” Jeremy asked.

“Nope. Not at all.”

“Then how do you know she’ll give us the time of day?”

Jana smirked confidently. “I think you know the answer to that.”

He sighed. Jana’s upfront personality, common involvement in corporate politics, and greater number of connections made people treat her a lot differently…in good and bad ways alike.

“Well,” Jana said after a moment. “She is affiliated with the Psychic League in a few ways.”

“Why? She can’t fight or anything.”

“Yeah, she can’t, but we have a global ‘Psychic Registration Program’. It’s run by a different branch of the Psychic League that focuses on information-gathering, and basically profiles psychics…well, I mean, that’s how it makes money. We sell their data to governments.”

“Sounds shady,” Jeremy commented.

“Say hello to your search engine,” Jana responded, rolling her eyes. “Anyway, registering into the program is purely non-compelled…in most countries, and by registering into the program, psychics get a giant boost to their discoverability. I’m sure you’ve heard of Psi-App?”

“Yeah, where you can look up psychics in your area and ask for their help and stuff.”

“Basically, that. They’re also logged into a few of our databases, which has…ups and downs for them.”

“Very shady.”

“Again, bitch about it to your search engine before you bitch to me. It’s not exactly a secret.”

“So how does any of this have to do with her?”

“Since she’s a Psychic Master, she trains a lot of psychics.” she said. “I might be able to offer a deal to work with her graduates and disciples, if she’s stubborn.”

Jeremy snorted. “I’m sure you’ll find some way to bargain.”

“I’m getting real tired of spending so much time in the air,” Jeremy said as they flew through the skies an hour later.

“It’s just a three-hour flight,” Jana said with a twinge of annoyance. “We’ll be in Italy quickly enough.”

“Do you even know Italian?”

“Pfft, no,” Jana said like it was obvious. Not much, at least.

“Then how do we plan on talking?”

“With English?”

“She speaks English in the show, so I’d figure she can converse. How did you think her show got on Canadian television? With subs?” Jana glanced back. “Wait, do you speak French?”

“Uhh…je ne parle pas français,” he said awkwardly.

“I’ll take that mess as a ‘no’.”

“Why did you ask?”

“Just cause’ I prefer to speak French…sometimes.”

“That makes sense. I’m pretty sure you said it was your first language.”

“Yeah.”

They sat in silence for a while, but Jeremy eventually said, “Hey can I borrow your phone to look something up?”

The phone levitated from her hands. “I’m using it to navigate, but sure. Just don’t throw it to the ground.”

“I won’t…” he said absently as he grabbed it from the air. After a quick search, he scooted up beside Jana and showed her the page he’d brought up.

“What’s- Is that my Psi-wiki page?”

“Yep.”

“Bruh, why would you pull up that cursed place?”

“I dunno, but do you want me to read it to you?”

“Didn’t I tell you that was cursed? You might never forget what you read on that page!” she said playfully.

“I think I’ll be fine. Let’s see… ‘Jana Pontoon is a Super Psychic born and raised mostly in Canada. Blah blah blah, she is most well known for her contributions in the creation of the Psychic League, the first psychic sports ring to formally train…psychics using military training tactics’?”

“Hmm? Oh, yeah, we do that. We basically just paid some American veteran a shit ton of money to teach us how to teach people to fight.”

“Huh…”

“You wanna know more?” she asked with a raised eyebrow. She’d worked with her dad on some details in the past, though she was too young to participate in much of it. Still, Jana was more than informed on how her company was run in the department of training.

“Be my guest,” Jeremy said, shrugging.

“Well, you know Psychic Teamfight?”

“Yeah?”

“That’s a scrimmage activity originally formed by the military. We…kinda got a ton of flack from the American government when they realized that we’d basically stolen their entire shtick and made it an internationally practiced sport, so they tried to sue us. I’m really not sure how Dad got us out of that one,” she said with a laugh.

Jeremy began to frown with disbelief. “Wait…are you just…training people to fight wars?”

“Oh, yeah, totally. That’s another part of our business model: a total monopoly over talent.”

“That’s just devious.”

“Fuck yeah it is!” Jana said loudly with a flex of her arm. “We don’t sell psychics to teams, we sell psychics to militarys. Well, to be fair it only counts for a little less than a tenth the profit we make off talent, since people who already have good careers don’t want to be sold as mercenaries to foreign governments and all but…well, it gets us connections.”

Jeremy tensed his neck, looking out toward the landscape in thought. “And now I see why people think you’re morally ambiguous.”

“Hmph…” Her mood changed quickly to one of annoyance. “And idiots they are. There’s a reason I’ve doubled down on that shit.”

“A reason? Do you just like money?” he said, turning to look at her questioningly.

Jana caught his eye. “Because I don’t want another Catastrophe. I want an army.”

“A-ah…” Jeremy’s voice fizzled into an empty breath as he got a far more serious response than he’d expected.

“Uhh, I guess I sound a bit weird when I say that. I just thought it’d help if I could gather the best of the best through competition, and then maybe, you know, we wouldn’t need to rely on people like me to babysit…humanity itself.” She clicked her tounge. “B-but let’s move on from that subject…”

“We can definitely move on from all that. Umm…where was I…right… ‘Psychic League’s net worth is considered greater than most countries…’ that’s vague, ‘umm…it’s known as the largest sports corporation…blah blah blah…okay, to the juicy stuff…‘Power Level:’. That’s an…interesting caption. ‘Jana was a participant in the battle against The Catastrophe, but is rarely attributed to the overall success of the defense. Between people in-the-know, however, it’s thought that she was a major factor in the stalling of…” He paused, hesitating as to whether he should sub out the explicitly stated name. “The Catrastrophe. She was the first super psychic to arrive on-scene and…battled…” He trailed off, reading the rest in his head. ‘The Living Catastrophe for an estimated day…’ How does a fight last a day straight…?

He glanced to Jana, just to make sure she was alright. She was looking away from the screen with a stony expression. He…thought that was an a-ok to keep reading.

“This should reasonably put her on par with the most powerful super psychics such as Parkarka and Gercie, although she hasn’t gone on record to state the exact limits of her abilities. Firsthand stories from survivors of The Catastrophe have noted that they remembered her being capable of lifting skyscrapers, however this feat has yet to be confirmed and has been disregarded by other super psychics.” The heck is ‘cursed’ about this? “She has frequently been scaled to in power to Psychi Purdue, another psychic she frequently sparrs with.” Jeremy paused to catch a breath then said, “They’re really putting you over, huh?”

Jana cracked her neck, worrying Jeremy for a moment. “Yep. People love to guess that I’m actually super strong or something.”

“Are you?” he asked.

Jana clicked her tongue without a response. He could guess that was an unconfirmed ‘no’.

“So…what’s so cursed about this?”

“Scroll down to the subsection labeled ‘family’”

He looked at it, then began to read aloud as a smile began to grow on Jana’s face. “‘Parents…Jana’s father, (_), is known as the founder of Psychic League, and shares Jana’s white hair, however…” he squinted. “It has been speculated that he is not, in fact, her father’?!” He glanced to Jana, but she just sent him a raised eyebrow, pushing him to keep reading. “They do not share many characteristics besides their white hair, and white hair, a physiological trait attributed to cryokinesis, is known to not be genetically passed down…’ Is that true?”

Jana nodded. “That is. Keep reading and you’ll see what’s cursed.”

“Umm…‘Although photos of Jana Pontoon as a child are rare, a photo confirmed not to have been edited…” Jeremy’s voice grew in pitch as the ridiculousness of what was about to be said struck him. “Depicts a very young Jana playing with a man suspected to be her real father due to their many genetic similarities…” he squinted at the picture shown beside the paragraph. It showed an oldish man flat on the ground, smiling up at the camera as he waved his arm, which was encased in ice. Jana, who was barely four feet tall in the photo, stood atop him with a triumphant smile.

“Funny, right?” Jana said.

“Pfft, yeah, it definitely is,” he said. “Where did they get this photo?”

“From me. I was undercover in a group dedicated to finding out who my mother was way back when I was eleven. I sent them a phony photo as well as an interview from my dad taken off out of context once I figured it out on my own, and now they think that that guy is my real dad or something.”

Jeremy looked at Jana like she was an idiot, and just said, “Why?”

“Cuz it’s funny? Dude, they’ve been clinging to that shit for years; complete and total nerds.” She chuckled.

“More like creeps…And also, is it seriously not obvious to you that that’s Samuel?” he asked.

Jana blinked. “Uhh, wait…” she squinted at the photo. “Oh shit, that is Sam. I honestly forgot about that. No wonder they were fooled, we are related. Who knows, maybe next time I meet him he’ll say, ‘Jana I am your father’, then I’ll say, ‘Noooo, you’re too flabby to be my father!’ and then I’ll put him in a hospital for fun.”

“You have strange fantasies.”

She shook her head sacredly. “Heyheyhey, I’m just making jokes, let’s not wish into reality that he’s my father or something, kay?”

“I won’t…”

He continued to read about all the discrepancies the section’s writers cherrypicked to seem smart, and Jana disproved and laughed at half of them, and just shrugged at the other half. She didn’t remember half the things they brought up, but it was a good laugh.

Once he finished the section, Jeremy opened the search bar. “Wait, I wanna see if they have any weird things to say about Psychi…” He pulled the page up, and skimmed through much of it. “Most of it seems pretty correct,” he said, almost disappointed.

“Probably because your sister keeps a low profile.”

“Kinda…” he said. He read more intently as he got to ‘Power Level’.

{Psychi Purdue’s abilities seem mostly based in information-gathering and mind manipulation. Among her known abilities, she has the typical super psychic powers, such as the psychic barrier, sonic-level flight, and telekinesis, but little in the way of other kineses. She has gone on record to say that she can manipulate most kineses, but only at a level comparable to ordinary psychics. Her other traditional abilities include Recognition, one-day dream-state Precognition, and Psychometry. She has three other non-traditional abilities, however.

The first is her mind-reading. Mind reading of emotions is an uncommon ability among psychics, but only works in close-proximity. Meanwhile, Psychi can directly read the thoughts of another person, evolving the ability into a shockingly effective tool. It is well known that Psychi cannot control her mind reading, however. This ability can be trained in other psychics to sometimes pick up words in thoughts, suggesting that hers might be capable of more evolution.

The second is her true telepathy ability. Very little is known about it, besides the fact that Psychi accidentally used it on her father once. The ability can apparently link two people’s thoughts.

The third is memory sharing. This ability has only been mentioned in off-hand by Psychi, and its effects and restraints are unknown.

Besides her strange abilities, Psychi has rarely shown her full potential as a super psychic, and has never gone on-record to state her power’s limits.

However, there are hints about how strong she might be littered throughout her public appearances. In videos linked [here] she has been clocked in at a staggering Mach 3 on casual trips. She has also been recorded halting a massive swathe of a large avalanche in another video [here], and certain mathematicians swear by their math, which calculates the force and lifting ability of her telekinesis in the video to be on par, if not significantly greater than the most powerful psychics such as The Living Catastrophe and Parkarka. She did not participate in The Catastrophe Crisis, and her only on-record fights have been with the much more famous psychic, Jana Pontoon, who has been speculatively scaled to be capable of lifting skyscrapers. She has defeated Jana in all of their fights with recorded conclusions. Other evidence seen in links below have shown the scaling to be appropriate.}

“So…” Jeremy said, noticing that Jana wasn’t reading with him, seeming bored. “They think Psychi is as strong as Parkarka?”

“Yeah. Do you think she is?”

“She told me she’d stopped an avalanche for some people once, and I remember her telling me exactly how much she can lift but…”

“The answer is ‘yes’,” Jana said. “I’m not even that strong, and I don’t stand any chance against your sister. They power scale Parkarka really high, but I know she’s actually weak, too. I stand a chance against her, but Psychi would smack Parkarka.”

“Huh…”

“If she wanted to, if she trained, I think she could win.”

“You just said that.”

Jana slowly shook her head. “Not against her.”

Jeremy looked forward, understanding her drift. He then looked back. If Psychi really was that strong…Was that why Jana wanted to help him so much?

Jana sighed. She had justified doing this for that reason, but had never been why.

She had one other reason for saving her, and it was sitting right next to her.