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PROLOGUE

MADNESS

Clinical insanity

The number one cause of death for F-Psy before Silence

Death by insanity? For the F-Psy, it was very much a harsh reality They became lost in the visions of the future their ot to drink, and, in extreot to make their hearts beat The Psy are their er function

But the dead were the fortunate ones Those who broke under the pressure of the visions and yet survived were no longer sentient, no longer anything close to sentient, their minds locked in a world where the past, present, and future clashed and splintered over and over As time fractured, so did they

Surprisingly, the F-Psy were divided about the iht it would be a precious gift to feel no emotion, for then they'd be safe from the threat of insanity, safe from the hideous illusions of their mindssafe But there were others who saw Silence as an act of betrayal against their very gifts The F-Psy had stopped countless ood, but they had done it all with emotion Without emotion, their abilities would be controllable, but crippled

It took ten years, but the proponents of Silence won the ed across the millions ofthe human darkness of the future and withdrew into the sheltered walls of the business world Instead of the saviors of innocents, they became the most powerful tools of many a Psy enterprise The Psy Council declared their services too valuable to share with the other races and gradually, the F-Psy disappeared from public view

It is said they prefer to reht

What very fehat the Council has hidden for over a century, is that though they are wealthy and cosseted, the once-resilient F-Psy have beco about their ability to foresee the tangled threads of what could be leaves the constant surveillance and care

The F-Psy rarely travel, rarely le, rarely function on any level aside from the mental Some of them are close to mute, able to communicate their visions and only their visions, by scattered bursts of sound or, in severe cases, through diagraesture The rest of the time, they remain locked in their Silent world

Yet the Council says this is what they were meant to be

Chapter 1