Oracle

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I apologize for making you uncomfortable. I know many find the way I stare unsettling, and like you, they always look away, hoping I won’t notice their awkward shoulder shrugs or the way they turn their heads.

I don’t do it on purpose. It’s just the way I am. It makes me uncomfortable, too, and while you might have to contend with a stranger’s awkward stare, what I have to deal with is far worse.

They found me in a crack house when I was an infant, unwanted and unloved. If not for their intervention, I wouldn’t be alive today. Sometimes, I wonder if they ever truly loved me. Their concern for my well being seemed genuine, but at the end of the day, I was human and they were not. On some fundamental level, a communion of equal minds was impossible, and when I look back, I wonder if I might just have been some alien child’s adopted puppy or kitten.

Either way, they turned me loose upon the Earth on my eighteenth birthday. It was hard going at first, with no human schooling or skills. Human relationships and social interactions were a mystery to me, and it was a while before I learned how to eke out a modest living for myself.

Most challenging of all was coming to grips with how other humans perceive time. For most, it’s a line that flows in only one direction, when in reality it’s more like a universe, expansive, multidimensional, and bubbling with probabilities. My caretakers perceived this truth, and they no doubt passed it on to me.

Like an oracle, when I behold the world and the creatures who inhabit it, I see their futures, fanning out before them like an endless cosmic sea. I view both good fortunes and bad—unexpected inheritances, reunited families, forthcoming promotions, and financial prosperity; or else addiction, poverty, gruesome murders, and terminal diseases. I have a morbid fascination with the latter, and though I do my best to ignore these dark and pallid visions, sometimes, like a trainwreck or a fatal car accident, it’s impossible to look away.

As for the terrible things I see in your future, well, I’d rather not say. Humans are better off not knowing their fortunes. I understand this from experience. Just know that I wish you all the best, that if our paths should ever cross again, I mean you no harm. As I’ve told you already, I don’t mean to stare.

It’s just the way I am.

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4 thoughts on “Oracle”

  1. Whoa again!!! This and the Fog deserve further exploration!!! I feel like I’ve been given a taste of chocolate ice cream, and then someone took the bowl away, lol!!!

    1. Sometimes I go back and write more, so it’s always possible I’ll choose to do so in the future. I also have a patreon tier for those who want to choose what I expand on, so that’s an option if you’re desperate for more 😉

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