My name is Ryan Cardano. And this is not shaping up to be a good day.
I sat back in my seat, leaning back slightly as I fidgeted with my pen. As I twirled it, ghostly afterimages trailed along the tips, a grayish sparkle floating through the air before fading. Well, afterimages is inaccurate. Beforeimages might be the better term.
I slapped the pen back onto the desk and straightened up as the lecturer entered the room. Both he and the class already hated me, there was no need to worsen their impression. I hastily got out my notebook and got ready to take notes
Professor Degardia stomped into the classroom, a slight scowl crossing his gnarled face as he glanced across the room and made eye contact with me. He flexed his hands, which had been covered by an assortment of stone cubes in the shape of a gauntlet, and a pair of chalk cubes flew off, and began writing on the chalkboard. Degardia was well known to be a terrakinetic, and a quite accomplished one at that, though his abilities leaned more on the side of control and finesse rather than raw power.
“Good morning class,” He began, his gruff voice tinged with a slight European accent. “As we discussed in our previous lesson, power interactions are the cornerstone of training to be an effective PRA agent. Now, today’s subject matter is certainly the most thorny we will be encountering this semester. Precognitive power manifestations. We will be spending the next two weeks covering the subject matter, and I have worked with Professor Tamara to put together a special seminar, a joint effort between the Psychology Department and Mental Science Department. The seminar will be next Friday at 7:00pm in the Psychology Building. I encourage all of you to join us, as it will be an enlightening discussion.”
Degardia stepped away from the podium, and began pacing back and forth on the ground floor of the auditorium, a wireless microphone hovering around his chin as it had been glued to a chunk of quartz.
“Now, can anybody tell me, what is a precognitive? Raise your hands, I will be taking several answers to get a baseline.” He said, nodding to the class.
One redheaded girl raised her hand lazily, and Degardia nodded at her.
“Sir, a precognitive is any mentalist whose abilities enable them to see the future.”
Degardia nodded approvingly at that.
“Very good, see the future. Any other opinions?” He said, as the chalk scribbled ‘SEE THE FUTURE’ onto the board.
He pointed his finger up at the other side of the auditorium, at a dark haired boy who was rumored to be a hydrokinetic of some sort.
“Sir, precognitives have the ability to predict the future. Sight isn’t necessarily the only medium used.” He said confidently.
“Good, good, a touch of nuance.” Degardia said, as he scribbled down the addition.
I rolled my eyes at this before leaning back again. This was a waste of my time. I knew it, the professor knew it, the telepaths in the class looking into my head to try to get an advantage knew it. I heard a laugh from Jessie at that last one. Figures.
“Mr. Cardano, what is your professional opinion?” Degardia said, eyes flicking to me as his lip curled sardonically.
“It’s a trick question. Precognitive mental expressions are an umbrella. You may as well ask what makes a kinetic.” I reply lazily, not intending to get drawn into this bullshit more than necessary. Then I start swearing internally as I see Degardia’s most likely response before he voices it, causing the aforementioned telepaths in the audience to snicker. Including Jessie, which was annoying because we usually got on well enough, though perhaps not friends.
“Very astute Mr. Cardano. Please come down, and join me for a demonstration. You are after all, uniquely qualified to show the class the difference.” Degardia said, smirking.
I began stepping down the staircase, annoyed at this whole affair. I probably should have skipped class to be honest. It doesn’t take predicting the future to know this class will turn out poorly, since the good professor had passed out calendars with the planned curriculum at the beginning of the semester.
I make my way onto the ground floor, a surly expression crossing my face. Degardia smiled at me, but a tinge of contempt lingers in his eyes.
“Now class, I am going to flip this coin a couple times, and have Mr. Cardano tell us which side will come up. Now Mr. Cardano, please explain to the class a bit about your manifestation.”
“Its probability based,” I started, deadpan. “I am able to see the probability of any given event that I focus on, and extrapolate more complex systems when I exert myself.”
“Yes indeed. Now, I am going to flip this coin,” Degardia said, as he showed me the coin resting on his thumb, before brandishing it in front of the class.
I look at the quarter, a dull grey smoke only visible to myself forming around it. A dozen different trajectories manifest, as phantom quarters begin flying every which way out of his hand, like a fountain.
“Seventy-four percent chance of heads,” I state confidently.
He flipped it, the metallic ting of his nail against the metal audible through the room. The coin rose up, the silver blur resembling a sphere as it spun in the air, and then fell into his palm which he slapped against his arm.
“Heads,” Degardia announced triumphantly, checking it. “Now Mr. Cardano. Most people would agree that a coin flip is only something like fifty percent chance of one outcome or another. What is the rationale of your prediction?”
“Context,” I explained wearily. “The fact that you started with heads face up, coin in your right hand, as well as the strength of your hand gave it seemingly disproportionate odds for anyone who cannot reliably take into account those factors.”
“Very good. Now, turn around, and I will flip it out of your view.”
I turned around, already understanding the point he was trying to make.
“Fifty-four percent chance of tails.” I say, halfheartedly.
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I heard the ting again, followed by the meaty slap of Degardia’s hand against his wrist.
“Heads again. Mr. Cardano, please return to your seat, and we will proceed with the lesson.”
Whispers follow me, as I make my way back to my seat. I nudge my backpack to the side before sitting back down.
“An interesting turn of events, no? Mr. Cardano is allegedly precognitive, so why did he not predict the future as expected?”
Degardia smirked, and then showed the quarter on the projector. He slowly flipped it, revealing it to be a trick coin, with both sides displaying heads.
“What Mr. Cardano did not know, that I did, is that the chance of heads, is one hundred percent. This illustrates a very important point. Cardano is what is called a false precog, or anyone whose powers enable them to form more accurate than normal predictions of the future, but without the ability to generate any new information.
That is to say, any prediction, any extrapolation made by our precog here, must be done from his own knowledge. He did not have any reason to suspect that the flip was rigged, and thus could only give the prediction based on what he knew. Mr. Cardano knows a lot. Physical trajectories, the rough estimation of hand strength, coin positioning. But it is not enough when unforeseen information enters the fray.”
I slouch lower into my seat. Degardia did not give me a lot of good options to be sure. I wasn’t lying about the chances, but contrary to his statement, I did have reason to suspect the coin trick. It happens every bloody time I have to demonstrate my powers, every goddamn time to prove I am not an abomination upon the Earth.
Seventy-four percent chance indeed, after making the assumption that the 14% chance that it was a fair flip was true.
Of course, moaning and bitching about it won’t get anywhere, and the presence of the telepaths means the rest of the class will know I was lying for that asshole’s lesson by the end of the day. But there was no need to rock the boat. My classmates hate me, but the Professor is the one who controls if I pass or not.
“Now, how does this distinguish from a true precog? Very simple. True precogs are considered to be a sort of simulationist, in mental science terms. While Mr. Cardano may simulate a projectile trajectory, or a social situation, he does so constructed from his knowledge alone. A true precog simulates the universe as it is at time of power activation, and pushes forward the virtual timeline. A true precog would be fully capable of knowing from the beginning that the coin flip is rigged. Now tell me, what is the problem with precogs?” Degardia asked, a knowing look upon his face.
The room went silent. Nobody wanted to say what was on everybody’s mind. A whisper echoed in my ear as a gray phantom of Degardia pointed at me. That asshole couldn’t stop himself from picking on me, could he? And to think I was going to stay quiet.
I raised my hand, shattering the gray visions like glass, as the future changed.
“Professor, the problem with precogs is that save for specific and somewhat rare power interactions, the use of their powers cannot be detected.” I answer.
“Precisely. Now, there exist certain individuals who can counter precogs, but we will cover those next class. Ignoring them for the moment, how do you know if you are in a simulation? The answer is, you don’t. If you were placed face to face with a true precog, you would be completely at their mercy. They could torture you to death for all the information you might have, within the single instant it takes for their power to activate. They could do so recursively, torture you over and over, commit any crime, murder, rape, assault, and go back to the present, leaving no evidence or witnesses. There is also the infinite genocide theory, that has been part of the popular consciousness for some time now. For the sake of discussion we will disregard that theory, but it is worth noting that it has not been dis-proven.
We all know that during the interrogation of Markus Reid, code-name Tarot Alpha, he admitted to generating a long term simulation spanning decades, and using his power to work his way into the US Government, until he was in such a position to come into contact with the President, and start a nuclear war. At this point, he began heavily recursing, sending multiple waves of missiles to attempt to find the perfect configuration. For his crimes, resulting in the deaths of trillions of people, albeit future people, he was sentenced to death.” Degardia said somberly. He looked around the room, his graying hair catching the light.
“On that cheerful note, we will be breaking out into discussion groups for the remainder of class. The assignment will be to determine what actions could a precognitive feasibly undertake, if you found yourself at odds with one. Groups are by seating row, feel free to move closer to one another. Limit of four people per group.”
I glanced down my row, and saw several unenthused faces looking at me. With a sigh, I picked up my study materials, and began moving closer, since nobody had opted to sit close to me at the beginning of class.
“Hey, I am Ryan,” I said awkwardly, as I sat down in the seat.
There was a moment, before one of the group members, a skinny, Hispanic looking dude replied.
“I’m Raphael. This is Candice and Amanda.”
At that, a pale brunette girl and blonde girl waved their hands respectively.
“Interesting class discussion huh,” Amanda said, trying to break the ice. “You got any good insights for us Ryan? After all, well, you know.”
“Maybe you guys go first,” I said uneasily. “It’s as the prof said. I am a false precog. I might know a touch more about real precogs than most people, but my power is going to bias me regardless, since it is too close contextually to what I do.”
“Sure,” Candice said, clearly unconvinced. I was getting the vibe that she had a driven personality, probably student obsessed with grades. “Amanda, go ahead and start taking bullet notes, since you have good handwriting. Obviously crime is the big one that the Professor wants us to consider, since we are in the PRA fast track program. So note down the easy ones, like torture, assault, murder, etc.”
“Should we be labeling by motivation? The range of actions someone might take would vary drastically depending on circumstance,” Raphael interjected. “Precognition for financial gain for example. Gambling, stock markets, etc.”
“Its an interesting point,” I murmured. “Go ahead and sub-categorize into impulse, gain, and ideology.”
“Why those?” Amanda asked, looking up from the page curiously.
“They are quite distinct. Remember that true precognitives can recurse, use their powers to look ahead in the future when they are already in a vision of the future. So when analyzing the psychology of one, we are only able to see and judge a finite slice of life of a potentially infinite life. One in which they suffer no consequences.” I replied, crossing my legs.
“Yes yes, we all know that precogs famously lack any kind of impulse control. But that's for psych class, and we are trying to figure out what actions they can take. Spill dude.” Candice said, a look of annoyance crossing her face.
“Fine, fine. The impulse category is what you already have. Murder, rape, etc. I would add a few more. Gluttony for one. Being able to walk into a Michelin restaurant, rack up a couple grand in fees, and then collapse the timeline comes to mind. Similar with mundane substances. Cocaine, heroine, the precog can party harder than most without building a tolerance, or physical addiction.” I said, a slight smile coming to my face at the thought.
“Alright, adding those in. I imagine for gain it’s mostly monetary?” Amanda asked.
“Depends, I suppose,” Raphael tossed in. “Most precogs that we know of were apprehended living quietly, more than enough to get by, but with seemingly inconspicuous housing and expenses. Its only once you enter the simulated timeline that you get massive expenditures, winning the lottery, etc.”
“I can’t imagine much corporate espionage. How do you even bribe a precog? Most of the time, they live in a reality where they can operate without consequences, with infinite money and drugs.” Candice said.
“True enough. It is still worth noting down the lottery and gambling, considering the Pyrrhus Protocols were dismantled.” Raphael replied.
“Right, so we have our gain category. After that, we need to deal with ideology. Precogs influencing nations, attempting genocide, etc.” I pointed out, tapping my finger on the page.
“Kind of broad though. Aren’t we supposed to be focusing on actions?” Amanda asked.
“I mean, sure. Actions in service to that could include interrogation, hacking, etc. I think the key point is that precogs can take any action a normal person could, but with no consequences and infinite attempts.” I say, thinking back to the books I had read about the precognitive manifestations.
Amanda looked ready to protest, but then seemed to change her mind, and jotted it down. Soon, the professor began lecturing again, but this time mostly on historical examples of precogs, a topic which I was already quite familiar with. Eventually, he stopped lecturing, and called the class to a close, enabling me to bolt from my chair in my haste to leave the class.
I could see the ghostly images of students trying to corner me after class, to ask the questions they always asked. About exactly how my power worked, how I felt to be tangentially alike to the greatest mass murderers known to history, if I could predict the future for them. With practice born of experience and not a little help from my ability, I smoothly dodged through the crowd trying to leave, placing my feet and mirroring each ghostly footprint my phantom left, as he moved fluidly through the ghostly students, which then vanished as their present counterparts moved in a similar manner.
Ignoring a couple students calling my name, I slipped out the doors, wincing in the daylight even as my phantom did the same. I made my way to the bike rack, not quite running but still moving a bit faster than I might normally. Without having to glance, my fingers danced over the dial to the lock, clicking it open in a manner of seconds. As I had many times in the past, I thanked the heavens that my power retained all of the information that I had ever experienced, even if I myself did not have an eidetic memory.
Mounting my bike, I tapped it into gear and smoothly pulled away from the building, feeling a jolt as the concrete walking path transitioned into the asphalt of the university street. A faint breeze blew in my face as I turned the corner at the Policy Building and got back onto the walking path. I rode for a few more minutes, before swerving back into the road, empty since it was a college campus in the middle of the day, and arrived back at my dorm. I locked the bike up outside, before tapping my key-card against the door to enter.
Ninety-four percent chance my roommate was home, since I could faintly hear snoring from his room. Not a hundred percent chance mind. Few things in life are absolute, and his boyfriend had been staying over recently.
Walking past his door, I entered my room, and closed the door, locking it. I don’t care to interact with others even in the best of times, and I really just want to go to sleep at this point. Close my eyes and forget about the world.
And I did exactly that. Eyes closed, and doing my best to tune out the calculations which dominated my vision when I stopped suppressing them, I somehow drifted off into an uneasy sleep.