Taboo Online

Lauren’s training was different, but it was no easier.

She spent most of the week in a quiet medical room surrounded by specialists, monitors, and recording equipment. Dr. Miriam Cole supervised the sessions, while ability researcher Dr. Adrian Cross recorded the results from behind a bank of screens.

Before every session, one of the assistants secured a wide blackout blindfold over Lauren’s eyes.

The Bureau had already confirmed that closing her eyes was not enough. Blocking out light entirely reduced the conflict between her normal vision and the images produced by Oracle’s Glimpse.

Electrodes were attached around the blindfold and along her temples, while additional sensors monitored her heart rate, blood pressure, brain activity, and any unusual energy changes caused by her power.

Dr. Cole remained close enough to catch Lauren if she collapsed. Cross recorded everything she said and compared each prediction against the information appearing on his monitors.

A third member of the team watched the medical readings and repeatedly reminded Lauren when to stop.

Lauren rarely listened.

"Start with five seconds," Dr. Cole said on the first day. "Do not push farther unless we tell you."

Sitting upright in the padded chair, Lauren rested her hands on her thighs.

"Five seconds is hardly worth the effort."

"It is enough to establish a baseline."

"I already know my baseline."

"You knew it inside the game," Cole replied. "This is different."

Some of the amusement faded from Lauren’s face because the doctor was right.

Inside Powerforge, the system had supported her ability. She could activate Oracle’s Glimpse and feel the skill respond, while system notifications confirmed that the power was working and helped separate its effects from ordinary perception.

Outside the game, she had none of that guidance. There was no notification explaining what she was seeing or warning her when the strain became dangerous. She had to control the ability herself and endure the full pressure it placed on her mind.

Lauren drew a slow breath and reached for the unfamiliar sensation buried behind her thoughts.

The darkness beneath the blindfold shifted, and for a moment, she saw Dr. Cole raise one hand.

The vision ended. Two seconds later, Cole lifted that same hand to adjust her glasses.

"You are about to move your glasses," Lauren said before she touched them.

Dr. Cole froze while Cross quickly entered something into his tablet.

"Again," Lauren said.

Her next vision showed a metal tray falling from a table. She warned them, but nothing happened at first. Everyone waited while Lauren frowned, wondering whether she had misread what she had seen.

Then one of the medical assistants turned too quickly, caught the tray with her sleeve, and knocked it onto the floor.

The crash made several people jump. Lauren smiled at the interest in Cross’s voice as he described the result into his recorder.

Looking a few seconds ahead barely bothered her. The real difficulty began when they asked her to reach farther.

They increased the range from ten seconds to twenty, and eventually to thirty. With each attempt, the future became less stable.

Several possible movements overlapped in her mind. In one future, Dr. Cole stood near the door. In another, she sat beside Lauren, while a third showed her leaving the room to call for additional equipment.

The possibilities crowded together faster than Lauren could separate them. Sounds arrived before the movements that caused them, and for several disorienting seconds, she could no longer tell which moment belonged to the present.

A dull ache formed behind her eyes.

"Stop," Dr. Cole said.

Lauren ignored her and pushed deeper.

The pain sharpened as her fingers curled against her thighs, and more futures opened around her. Someone brought her a glass of water, but she saw herself both refusing it and drinking from it. In another outcome, the glass slipped from her hand and shattered.

Every possibility vanished at once.

Lauren returned fully to the present and realized she had leaned forward in the chair. Something warm ran from her nose, and Dr. Cole quickly pressed a cloth into her hand.

"That is enough."

Lauren wiped away the blood.

"I can continue."

"No."

"I have endured worse."

"That does not make this safe."

Turning toward Cross’s voice, Lauren faced the exact spot where he was sitting.

"My ability will not become safer if I refuse to use it."

"It will not become safer if you damage your brain either," Dr. Cross replied.

Lauren pressed her lips together. She disliked being told to stop and hated being limited even more, but she understood why the training mattered.

The government was not merely trying to confirm that her power was real. They needed to learn what it did to her body. Inside Powerforge, the system had somehow carried part of the burden. Here, every vision placed the strain directly on her mind.

Dr. Cole’s team needed to determine how far Lauren could safely look, how often she could use the ability, and whether repeated use caused lasting changes.

The following day, they moved on to controlled vision-sharing.

Lauren had already shared visions with Luke, but their partner resonance made him unusually receptive to her power. She had also forced a future into Red Hound during the evaluation, an attempt that ended with her collapsing beneath a severe neurological spike.

This time, the doctors wanted her to transfer a simple vision to an unfamiliar but consenting recipient without overwhelming either of them.

Nurse Claire Bennett volunteered for the exercise. She sat across from Lauren with both hands resting on her knees, attempting to look calmer than she sounded.

"Ready when you are," Claire said.

Lauren’s first carefully controlled attempt failed.

She reached toward the nurse, found the thread of the future, and tried to push the image into Claire’s mind, but nothing happened. Lauren gathered her concentration and tried again.

This time, Claire flinched.

"What did you see?" Dr. Cross asked.

"A door," she said uncertainly. "Opening."

Several seconds later, the door opened and another doctor entered.

Cross immediately began asking Claire to describe the image in more detail, while Lauren leaned back in the chair and tried not to show how badly her head had started to throb.

Sharing the future with someone other than Luke was much harder.

Lauren had to hold the vision in her mind while guiding another person toward it. Without their partner resonance or the system directing the transfer, the process felt clumsy and unstable.

Sometimes Claire saw only colors. At other times, she felt the emotion attached to the vision without seeing what had caused it.

During one attempt, the nurse panicked after Lauren shared the sense of approaching danger without the image that explained it. In another, Dr. Cross saw a cup shatter and briefly believed it had already happened.

For hours, Lauren practiced shaping each vision before passing it on.

She started with simple images: a hand reaching for a pen, a chair being pushed away from a desk, Dr. Cole turning toward the monitors before one of the machines produced an alert.

Even those brief moments required careful control.

If Lauren focused too heavily on the event, the recipient felt detached from it, as though watching through a dirty window. If she included too much emotion, the feeling overwhelmed the image and left the other person confused.

Claire once experienced Lauren’s irritation without understanding why and spent several seconds glaring at Dr. Cross before the effect faded.

Cross adjusted his glasses.

"Was that part of the vision?"

"No," Claire said. "I suddenly found you very annoying."

Lauren smiled beneath the blindfold.

"That part may have come from me."

Dr. Cross made another note.

By the fourth day, Lauren could reliably share simple events a few seconds before they occurred. On the fifth, she showed Cross a vision of his own movement.

In the shared future, he reached toward the monitor and changed the display.

Cross received the image, hesitated, and deliberately kept both hands in his lap.

The expected moment passed without him moving.

Lauren frowned beneath the blindfold.

"You were supposed to touch the monitor."

"I wanted to see whether the future could be changed."

"You ruined a successful test."

"I created a different successful test."

Cross checked the recordings while Claire covered a quiet laugh.

"The vision was transferred accurately," he continued. "I recognized the movement, understood that it belonged to me, and consciously chose not to perform it. That suggests the futures you share remain conditional."

Lauren pressed her lips together.

"You could have reached that conclusion after allowing me one successful demonstration."

"Probably."

"I find you increasingly irritating, Doctor."

"That also appears consistent with our earlier results."

Dr. Cole did not bother hiding her amusement.

The experiment should have felt satisfying, but the strain caught up with Lauren before she could enjoy it. A tremor passed through her hands, and the chair seemed to tilt beneath her.

Although Lauren kept her expression calm, Dr. Cole noticed immediately.

"That is enough for today."

Lauren opened her mouth to argue, but the room shifted again. She grabbed the armrests, and Cole caught her shoulder before she could slip from the chair.

"Lauren."

"I am fine."

"You nearly fell out of the chair."

"I said I am fine."

"You say that every time."

Lauren slowly settled back, breathing through the headache pulsing behind her eyes. She hated how weak her voice sounded when she finally asked, "How much progress did I make?"

Cross checked the results on the monitor.

"More than we expected."

That satisfied her enough to stop, at least for the day.