Chapter 9

　　Tuesday, A Day That Never Was

　　The first thing Maria learned about being a Psychic was that it was completely at odds with the other two forms of insight. At least that is what she believed an hour into her new school day, when she attempted to cultivate in quiet.

　　Tsss.

　　Maria hissed, as she rubbed her temple frontal sinus cavity, every time she attempted to cultivate.

　　"Brain Freeze." Maria said, as she rubbed her sinus cavity, as if that would somehow cause some internal heat to come into play with the disused organ. By disused organ, she of course meant her newly opened psychic node that now sat clearly in her mind. Also clear in her mind was the fact that she had no clue how to exercise said node. Her core was easy to operate, but it seemed that either the node to her head had different meridians to use, or internalized energy in a completely different process.

　　Still, this was something she swore she would get good at, as this could be the way their planet finally gets out of the odd limbo that it has been in for a while, steadily losing more and more people to be reincarnated without any powers and without any knowledge of what happened. This time, she swore to herself that if she made it to the end, she would ask to remember everything, like the cheat days, and not just free shake Thursdays, but real cheat days. Like important days that were to come. As it was, she knew the integration was soon, but being today, she almost wondered if it wasn`t going to be today. I mean, today doesn`t feel like the day the world is going to end. It is a Tuesday, one of the more likelier days for the world to come to an end, but was it really this Tuesday? And if it wasn`t this Tuesday, then when was it? So many questions formed in her head that she could barely think straight.

　　This was why she found she had such a hard time concentrating on her cultivation.

　　Crackle.

　　Suddenly there was the sound of glass breaking, or at least some type of thin film finally breaking within Maria`s mind. She had felt something similar to her core, and almost thought she had dreamed the occurrence, but now that she had a repeat performance, as it were, she now felt that this was in fact the correct way to open her mind. Likely she would need to experience something like that if and when she opened up her magical abilities as well, but that was something far down the road. For the moment, she felt both powerful and sick, as if she had eaten too much sugar and caffeine and was now trying to get her racing heart to level out, while also enjoying the few moments of complete clarity that this condition seemed to offer her.

　　Seeing the time: 4:18 AM, Maria knew that she still had time. Also her sister, Anita, was up, and had the lights on and was doing her angry typing, you know the one where she clacks her keys in that angry way people do to purposefully be annoying, all so you will interact with them. Maria almost bit on the talk, but clearly saw that her gift of the two rabbit`s feet might have been in bad taste without any warning or context. Also, without the system, just seeing the rabbit`s feet wouldn`t mean much, as you can only see their importance through the HUD that comes with integration. Even now, Maria found it hard to fully access her own HUD, having to instead be near a comatose state, or in an alternate dimension entirely to see it. Even then, she only gets brief, non-sharable, alerts when she does something extraordinary. Even then, she has a severe headache right afterwards that makes it so she is often confused by what might have actually happened.

　　At the end of everything, the only thing she has is how she feels, and yesterday it was obvious that she felt great after cultivating. Today, she feels like she is getting a massive brain freeze. Though, that isn`t stopping her from trying to cultivate with her newly opened mental node.

　　Taking another deep breath, Maria centers her mind, body, and thoughts, and once again forces her mind past the intense burning cold in her mind and continues on. Maybe this is why so few went for the Psychic route, the only way to get good at being a psychic involves getting a massive brain freeze whenever you use your powers, Maria thought to herself as she centered her mind and focused through the pain.

　　For a moment, all she felt was the intense burning pain of absolute zero taking over in her mind. Then the next second, she focused beyond the pain and then found it, an intense calm.

　　"I can`t believe it; she is so disrespectful. I mean who leaves dead animal parts just lying on a pillow? I mean, yeah, I get it, but that was Grose and unsanitary. I might have to burn my favorite clothes and pillowcase now, if the bloodstains won`t come out. I`m glad I got rid of those stupid rabbits feet too, clearly they aren`t that lucky, as evidenced by the poor dead rabbit."

　　Words and complete thoughts flowed like an icy river straight into Maria`s mind. It was like there was a firehose that was spraying thoughts in a non-stop way directly into her mind.

　　Gasp!

　　Maria jerked forward, gasping for air.

　　"What?" Anita said with a snarl, all but daring Maria to act out, or to say something to her.

　　Maria looked at her sister, and then felt confused by the look of horror that came to Anita`s face.

　　"Oh my god, your face& your, your nose&" Anita stammered. "MOM!" Anita screamed as she began trembling and came forward hesitantly, as if any sudden movement would cause Maria to be startled away.

　　Seeing her sister`s frantic state, Maria chuckled slightly, as she almost imagined her being one of the rabbits she recently faced off against, not the necromancer rabbit, but you know one of the regular rabbits that had been turned into a bunny corpse. Then suddenly the image of her sister being a cute human sized bunny to being one of the diseased flesh rotting rabbits came to her mind instead, and suddenly the scene wasn`t so funny, not anymore. With that sudden change, Maria remembered why this was serious, why it wasn`t a joke at all.

　　"What is it?" Momma Alvarez came in and stared daggers at Anita. It was clear that despite having spoken last night, she had still not forgiven the girl. Now staring at Anita, her face changed as she saw the way Anita was nervously shifting forward. Momma`s eyes then looked forward to see Maria, at first she still held the anger in her shoulders, but then her hands clutched her mouth as if she was trying to hold back a scream. Seeing both their reactions, Maria couldn`t help but feel off.

　　"What?" Maria asked.

　　"Your, your face. You`re bleeding." Anita said, this time finally able to complete her thoughts. Having heard this, Maria nodded, not that she knew she was bleeding, but now what her sister was trying to say made a lot more sense. This was common, a true cultivator often shed impurities in the blood, and given that she just opened a node right in her head, even going so far as to feel the shattering of said protective layer, this made sense to her. Reaching up, she touched her face, and realized that her sister was correct.This story has been taken without authorization. Report any sightings.

　　"Oh, I guess I am." Maria said, though again her mind felt fine, and other than having fought through the slight pain from earlier, she felt normal. Well normal now that most of her brain freeze was gone.

　　With that, mother and daughter both charged forward, touching, holding, and cleaning Maria`s face. Maria almost wanted to lash out, to say that she was fine, that this was just her way of cleansing her body to be ready for when the integration happened, soon.

　　Of course, her mother and twin sister would have nothing to do with her attempts to keep them away. For a moment Maria almost thought about pushing them away, but realized she needed to hold back her strength, lest she hurt her mother and sister, who were by all means trying to be helpful.

　　"We need to get you to the doctor." Momma Alvarez said.

　　At first Maria wanted to protest, but then having a few baseline scans of her mind and body might be helpful, especially using pre-integration style technologies.

　　"Okay." Maria said.

　　"Okay?" Anita asked, a slight note of confusion coming over her as she remembered how adamantly her sister had argued about not going just last night, stating "there would be no point. I`m fine now, anyways." To see her twin go from adamantly opposed, to fully willing to go in such a short time, made her sister more than a little concerned. But seeing the amount of blood from her nose, maybe her sister was not doing well, and finally felt bad enough to go to the doctor`s.

　　Just before Momma Alvarez was to take Maria away to the doctor`s office, Maria decided to act on her thoughts that sparked this whole event.

　　"Anita?"

　　"Yes?"

　　"Did you throw away my rabbit`s feet?" Maria asked.

　　***

　　BEEEPPP!

　　"Well, we have some good news." The doctor began. "Maria is healthy, completely healthy. After reviewing the results of both the MRI and CT Scan, we can say without a doubt that Maria`s brain is functioning normally. In fact, maybe a bit beyond normally. There is some elevated activity that was noted, but nothing that should cause the damages that you thought. There are no signs of immediate trauma, or any contusions." The doctor said, then pulling up an image, he did show a graph that seemed to be bright red in places. "If anything, we think part of the problem might be that your brain is a bit too active, which might be causing some of the issues. As you can see here, there are regular levels, and then there are the elevated levels that we are witnessing here. Unfortunately, we don`t have an accurate baseline to test this against, but generally increased brain activity doesn`t normally result in the activity you were describing. Normally with increased brain activity we would expect uncontrollable twitching of the muscles, changes in mood or thoughts. Also, while increased brain activity normally does accompany a blow or injury to the head, we have not seen any indications of where the trauma to the brain might have occurred. Nor can we find any clotting or blockages that might cause the problems you are experiencing."

　　"So there is nothing you can do for my girl?" Momma Alvarez asked the doctor.

　　"I can get her on a blood thinner, and a few muscle relaxers. Please bring her back if the bleeding you identified occurs again or continues."

　　Silence.

　　"Are there any other questions?" The doctor asked.

　　"Yeah, can I get a copy of these images?" Maria asked.

　　"We can send you an electronic copy of them, sure, I don`t see why not. You interested in becoming a doctor?"

　　"Something like that."

　　And like that, the three-hour long hospital visit was over, and Maria got a slightly better version of Excedrin and Ibuprofen, while getting a series of inconclusive lab images. This was not how Maria expected to spend the day before the end of the world.

　　***

　　"Is there any way I can go to school?" Maria asked, as she realized her mother was making no movements towards going towards her high school.

　　"No, not today. I think it is best for all of us, if you just rest today." Momma Alvarez said.

　　With that Maria almost wanted to protest, but then she realized that her head was sort of hurting, and that Tuesday might not be the day the world would end. I mean, who lets the world end on a Tuesday, that just sounds terrible? Also, the more Maria looked, the less signs she saw that the integration was happening today. First, the number of nodes present was still far too few. Secondly, she could only see a few traces of ambient energy floating in the sky.

　　No, she decided that today she would spend resting and learning to cultivate or try to learn to do the equivalent with her mind. At least that was what she thought at first, but then she remembered her sister, and the fact that her sister was devoured first thing on the day of the integration. Realizing that, and that if she wasn`t there to help her this time, that something terrible might happen, Maria decided to use this moment to act.

　　"Is there any way Anita can quit her electives and spend time with me after school?"

　　Momma Alvarez paused and looked at her daughter for a long moment. "Well, this way I could get some telework hours done. Also, it would mean that we would have a second set of eyes on you." She said out loud, as she clearly weighed the pros and cons of this decision. Finally, after a moment she nodded, "go ahead and text her and Juan both to let them know to come home right after school today."

　　"I don`t have my phone." Maria said.

　　Momma Alvarez, paused like she had been slapped at that proclamation, "you what?"

　　"I don`t have my phone." Maria said, shrugging her shoulders slightly as if to defuse the sudden tension that was in the car. For her part, momma just stared at her daughter like something truly awful had happened to her. "You are okay, right?"

　　"Yeah."

　　"And you do have your phone?"

　　"Yeah, it is on my desk." Maria admitted.

　　"You have it, but you aren`t using it?"

　　"I don`t have it, and therefore cannot use it."

　　"So, you weren`t given it back."

　　"No, it was given back, but I still don`t physically have it on me."

　　At that Momma Alvarez just shook her head, not quite understanding how her daughter had changed so much.

　　Maria for her part still had a hard time mentally attaching emotion to inanimate objects, particularly those that were about to go obsolete. In fact, thinking about it, if she wanted to have the images of her mind, she knew she would need to print them off, quickly. That, of course, would only come in handy if there were others to compare to later. Maybe if she got to the weekend she would go that route, of going to a commercial place to get professional copies of her brain scans. What this would do, and why she would want such a thing was beyond her. Though she did feel that it might be helpful, maybe in the future this time they could find something to key in on, a particular brainwave frequency that could possibly be identified next time. No wait, that is terrible thinking, as that all but means that I will fail again, Maria thought to herself as she got home.

　　"Mom, would I be able to relax in the back yard?" Maria asked, while there wasn`t that much ambient energy in the back yard, there was more in her back yard than there was in her room, as she had cultivated that room clean last night.

　　Momma Alvarez just stared at her daughter again, something that she found herself doing more and more recently. Finally, after a long moment, she nodded. "Sure, I guess."

　　That afternoon, Maria just sat on her back porch, legs crossed underneath her as she sat up straight, closed her eyes, and began to open her mind up to the universe. Knowing that if she focused deeply she would likely begin to experience the true mysteries of the universe that were all right there, waiting for her to come.

　　No sooner did Maria start her inward thinking and focusing on infusing power into her mind, then she was almost immediately awoken from her musings.

　　"Well, I`m here." Anita said, her tone slightly dismissive, while also belying an undercurrent of concern.

　　"Hi," Maria said, then out of a question she found herself asking, "why are you here?"

　　"Uhh, because you asked me to be here?"

　　Pausing, Maria cocked her head to the side, "I did, but that was only for after school. You didn`t need to come home early."

　　"I didn`t, school ended a half hour ago. Oh, and they pulled footage of you. Or at least they tried to. They think there might be a camera dead zone at the far field. Mr. Gaines, the Vice Principal, looked into it. They see the moment you go off, apparently looking like someone called out to you. Then once you get to the halfway marker on the practice field, you just disappear." Anita said.

　　At that, Maria just nodded. She of course knew the real reason why she disappeared, it wasn`t due to an issue with the camera, but rather the fact that for those moments she was not physically on this planet. Though telling Anita that might be hard to believe right now. Though in a spark of insight, Maria realized that she also didn`t tell her sister about what was going to happen, what might happen later today. Or within minutes of now.

　　"What if I told you that the world was going to end soon?"

　　"Well, yeah, I mean we have spoken about this, many times before. With the amount of pollution we generate, we are destroying the planet." Anita said.

　　Hearing that Maria shook her head. "No, what I mean is a more anti-climactic end to the world. One where portals open up to other worlds and where we are saturated in a stream of energy that will attempt to consume us, if we are not careful."

　　At that, Anita just looked at Maria like she was crazy. And from the words she had used, Maria could fully understand her sister`s point of view. Before, when she was in her past life, no one doubted what was happening. Or those that did doubt it, soon met their ends to the strike of a green skinned monster trying to carve out their own portion of their planet, or giant monsters trying to wrestle away control, there was never any need to say, "how would you describe this to someone pre-integration?" For there was no point. Even on the times when it was brought up, the idea was so odd and incomprehensible that everyone gave up on it as a lesson in futility.

　　"I can prove it. Sometime in the future. The World as we know it will change, and we will be integrated." Maria said.

　　"Right," Anita said as she began backing away slowly. Basically, she was doing the exact opposite version of what she did this morning when Maria had been bleeding from her nose. Now Anita backed away, as if what Maria was saying was some form of contagious disease.

　　Then a second later, Anita ran inside the house, where Maria`s enhanced Perception could hear her screaming. "Mom, I think it is time for Maria`s next dose of whatever she got from the doctor`s."

　　"Yep, not quite the best way to broach this subject, but at least I`m laying the groundwork." Maria said to herself, as she let out a deep breath. At least, if the Integration happened today, her sister would be home, and she would be ready for it.

　　Of course, Maria found out that night, that the Integration will never happen on a Tuesday.