Chaos Theory is an attempt at proving that there is some sort of order to any seemingly random event that can affect certain systems and change their behavior. This baffles me, that someone could consider the events of their life to be random. I'd always believed every curveball I was thrown in my life to be completely orchestrated by a monster I'd nicknamed Gray. Nothing about my life was ever left up to chance, because if he didn't plan it, then Dad and I did. Eleven years later I'd found out it was actually my mother who'd been torturing me, trying to lead me to York, Nebraska, to the emergency room, to a man named Damian Ford, to a doctor practicing under the name of Joseph Talbot-Lilley, to a man whom I'd known as Ian in my dreams, my birth father whom she'd thought could cure me from my headaches if I ever fell ill with them.

Talk about affecting my systems and changing my behavior.

Talk about chaos.

But nothing was ever random.

Well, something was. Or, rather, someone was.

The Butterfly Effect is a theory that branches off of Chaos Theory. This one claims that everything in the universe is connected and, therefore, affected. For example, the delicate flapping of a butterfly's wings from one hemisphere could create the tiniest gust of wind that picks up speed and volume as it travels, resulting in a devastating tornado in another hemisphere. I've been thinking about this one a lot lately. Sometimes I think the weather is the only thing that still connects me to the people of York. The weather and the roads. When it rains in Denham Springs, Louisiana, I wonder about the snow that melts into puddles in York, Nebraska, and is evaporated back into the clouds and how much of that is transported here.

And the roads. I never drive myself, but any time I'm riding in a rideshare, I think about how I could pay the driver to keep driving, not stopping, and take me back there. And any time I'm on a bus, I think about how I could stay on it, not getting off, and take it back there. And any time I'm in an airport, I think about how I could book a flight and be there in hours.

On day three in Denham Springs, Louisiana, it is raining. I am researching widely-accepted philosophical theories on my laptop in The Whistle Stop. On day three in Denham Springs, Louisiana, I meet a young lady named Charlotte Brownfield.

When I'd walked in, she was there, behind the counter, smiling at me. "Welcome to Whistle Stop," she'd said softly. "What can I get for you?" Her aura was pale and desaturated — she was tired. It was a little after 8 am. I'd ordered a french vanilla cappuccino. I'd watched as she made it. I was looking for anything unusual, but she'd made it the exact same way Dan had the first day and Ben had the second day. I'd smiled nicely when she'd handed it to me. I took my coffee to a table and opened up my laptop and got to fake work.

Day one of Target: Charlie is purely for reconnaissance. I watch how she interacts with the guests; I watch how she behaves when she thinks no one is looking. And what I find is that she is about as soft and gentle as they come. Her dirty blonde hair is parted down the middle and hangs, fine and smooth, just past her shoulders; her eyes are brown and wide like a baby deer's. Her aura remains pale even as the day goes on, and I gather that it is not because she is tired, but because, instead, she is thinking quietly. Her voice is a tiny, musical thing. Like bells. She is timid and calm and slow to speak and slower to count out change. The customers' reactions to her are almost one hundred percent positive. I might be in love with her.

My mind spins with the possibilities of her ability. Does she have superhuman strength, I wonder? Is she inhumanly fast like The Flash? Can she yell, like, really, really loudly and shatter glass and pierce force fields? Only someone who can do something extraordinary would be so careful with their movements. Johnny is the only one I've met so far who can do something physical — everyone else's abilities have been neurological like mine. Maybe Charlie is like Mitch. I don't test my theory, though. Not 'til day two.

Some time after lunch, Charlie comes in to the lobby to pick up some trash and push in some chairs. I'm pretending to write again, and she comes to my table. "Can I take your plate?" she asks — I'd ordered a ham and swiss panini and it was delicious — and I reach to hand her the ceramic plate at the same time that she reaches to lift it. Our fingers touch briefly, and her aura flashes lime for just a portion of a second before fading back to normal. I look up to meet her gaze, terrified that she's somehow found me out; she knows what I am; but her expression shows no signs of startlement. She just apologizes softly and takes the plate.

Now I'm left to think that maybe she can produce an electric current from her fingertips and she'd been scared for a second that she might've accidentally shocked my central nervous system. I go back to my "work". I make a note in my phone. "Can possibly produce electric current."

Charlie's shift ends at two pm, and when she begins slowly counting her drawer I begin getting ready to leave, as well. I'll go back to the hotel today. In a few days, I'll ask what there is to do around here, and if I'm lucky, she'll invite me to a party, or something. That's how I'd successfully infiltrated Darya's crew. I put my laptop in my backpack. I don't need to make friends with her, not today. There'll be plenty of time for that. I stand to go, push my chair in. I hear the faint tinkling of fairy bells. I turn.

"Did you say something?"

Charlie's aura is scarlet — embarrassed — and she shakes her head no. I must look at her funny, because then it turns a royal shade. "Actually, yeah," she says, "I asked why you were on the roof."

What?

I play dumb. "What roof?"

"This roof."

I try to smile innocently. "I don't know what you're talking about."

"Yes, you do," she insists, braver now. "I saw you."

I pull my backpack up and over my shoulders, trying my hardest to seem casual. Now I know what her lime aura had been about earlier — she'd recognized me. How on earth had she seen me? "When?"

"Day before yesterday." She puts a hand on her hip as if to seem tough. I could laugh. She is the least thing in the world from intimidating.

"I just got to town three days ago," I tell her.

"Day before yesterday would have been two days ago," she tells me.

I think for a moment. She's not going to back down, her aura is firm. But there's a way out — there's always a way out. "How would you have seen me, anyway?" I ask, feeling for my way out. "If I was up on the roof."

Her aura jumps to olive again before it simmers as she speaks. "Because I was on the roof."

"No, you weren't!" I say without thinking. There was hardly enough space on the roof for one grown adult person, much less two. "I mean. Wouldn't I have seen you? If I was on the roof?"

"Not this roof. A different roof." She's olive-aura'd again.

"What roof, then?" I've found my way out and I'm climbing through it.

"A shop..." She clears her throat. "A shop in Antique Village," she says, louder this time. She's lying. I can feel it in her aura. She's lying.

"Which shop?" I ask her, and I feel a hand go to my hip, too, but I can't stop it. "I went shopping there the day before yesterday."

"Y'know... The one with the, uh..." she stumbles for a shop name and I've done it; this'll be the quickest one yet. She's going to tell me that she can fly or that she has x-ray vision, and I'll give her the speech I have perfected and I'll get a new location and then a new name and I won't miss this town very much at all. "The one with the furniture," she says.

"The Rusty Rooster or Ashley Furniture?" I ask. I know that she's lying because her aura is black, but it's still entertaining to play along. I get so bored during the first few days of a target.

"Rusty Rooster."

"How'd you get up there?"

Her fib comes quicker this time. "My aunt owns it. By marriage. On my dad's side." Too many unnecessary details. She doesn't lie too often, I'll bet. "She co-owns it, actually."

I nod. "Okay, well. If, from your view atop the roof of The Rusty Rooster, which your aunt by marriage on your dad's side co-owns, you happened to see a dark-haired white girl atop the roof of The Whistle Stop, surely the distance is far enough apart that you can't be one hundred percent positive if picking said girl out in a line up of other like-faced dark-haired white girls." Do I really have to be so cold, though? Now she'll never invite me to a party.

She shrugs, unaffected by my words, and goes back to counting her drawer. "I know it was you." She's right... She's right and she somehow knows it. But I know something else — that she wasn't on the roof of The Rusty Rooster. I would've seen her. Wouldn't I have? I make a mental note to add invisibility to the list of hypotheses.

"Was anything vandalized?" I ask her. "Anything missing? Was there a single shingle out of place?" She doesn't answer me. I wait for a minute, but she doesn't have any evidence that a crime was committed, and I know that without reading her mind.

"Have a good day," I tell her as I leave.

She begins to respond with a "You too" out of habit, but she stops herself, her aura flashing embarrassed again.

She might not crack as easily as I'd hoped.

🦅

The next day, she's not there. I ask about her casually. "Is Charlotte working today?"

Dan the Owner answers me, open and trusting to a stranger whom he knows nothing about, one who had broken into his attic and snuck onto his roof. I'd forgotten how blindly faithful Southerners were. "She has class on Tuesdays and Thursdays."

"I didn't have any cash to give her a tip yesterday," I add unnecessarily in an attempt to seem less creepy in case he tells her I asked about her. I regret it immediately, because I realize that it could be misconstrued as a bribe to forget that I was on the roof, something I haven't openly admitted to.

"I can take it for ya and put it in the back for her," he offers.

"No, that's okay," I say and smile kindly. "I'll get it to her tomorrow."

He doesn't mind at all. "French vanilla cappuccino and a banana nut muffin?" he asks.

"Let me try the blueberry today, actually."

Even though she's not coming in today, I decide to sit for a while. I've got nothing else to do. I pull out my laptop and e-mail Charlotte's name to Na'ama, who'd agreed to help out my cause on occasion for twenty Venmo'd bucks. Within an hour, I receive a password-protected .pdf containing Na'ama's findings on Charlotte Brownfield. The document reveals that she's a part-time university undergraduate student working towards a bachelors degree in journalism. That could be my in. Other possible ins are that she volunteers on Saturdays at the local animal shelter and sells homemade pottery on Etsy, which is adorable. She seems like such a wholesome person. It's a shame I've already accepted payment to shake up her entire world.

I know that she'll be back at work tomorrow, so I devise a plan. It's one I've used before; I call it Codename: Clumsy. Basically, I'll make sure that everything that could possibly go wrong with my order goes wrong, and I'll see if anything out of the ordinary happens as she tries to fix it, aka if she takes any supernatural shortcuts that normal customers wouldn't notice. It sounds silly, but this is how I'd found out what both Kylen and Nicholas can do. Remembering Nicholas makes me feel a little dark blue, so I go back to the document.

Included at the bottom is a collage of photos — her senior portrait included in the Denham Springs High School yearbook; a group photo of elementary school-aged kids performing at a piano recital, her among them; her Instagram profile selfie — she's wearing a pair of oversized sunglasses and a wide-brimmed hat and giving the camera a close-lipped grin; a newspaper photo showcasing teenaged her with an award of some kind; and crazily enough, her newborn portrait. Other points of interest are that she was on the President's list her freshman and sophomore years, she was born in Dallas, and her father works for the Sheriff's deparment. There's no information to be found on her mother, which comes as no surprise. All second generations come from a parent who was altered by one of the doctors, and all except one so far have been women — the mothers. This, to me, doesn't so much show that women are weak and easily impressionable, but that men in power are predatory and manipulative. If Charlie was born in Dallas, I'd bet anything that the predatory and manipulative man in power who altered her mother was Ronan Jackson of Fort Worth.

I open up a new blank document and begin journaling my time here in Louisiana so far, starting with day one, a plan forming in my mind of how to get her to trust me, the details of which becoming clearer with each word I type.

🦅

          I can't pinpoint for certain the exact reason why I decided to leave York. Maybe it was the idea of traveling, for the first time, without running from someone. Maybe it was an act of rebellion after finding out that I wasn't really in witness relocation, but in ignorant psychotherapeutic relocation. Perhaps it was the pride that came with being personally selected to do the job. Probably, it was curiousity as to who was behind the unknown-numbered text messages. It has occurred to me (and to my loved ones) that the person "contracting" me may not be a "good guy". Whoever they are, I'd insisted, I could still help these people, these "others", and then get out quick if needed. They'd tried to stop me, insisting it wasn't my responsibility, but I'm stubborn like my mother. And maybe, still, it's because hopping from place to place is my nature, changing colors to blend in to new habitats, chameleon, all I've ever known.

Or maybe it was none of these. Maybe it was a random, disconnected event, orchestrated by the wind with little rhyme or reason.

But probably not.

Na'ama is a computer programmer by profession and a hacker by hobby. After figuring out her ability and coming clean to her about mine, she'd tried to track down my employer for me, but all paths had lead to a dead end.

Every single night my thoughts go to Gray. Could he still be real. Could he be the one behind my travels. Two years ago, this I would have undoubtedly believed. I have to replay everything that happened two years ago in my mind, a film reel on a projector in a basement, The Losers Club from IT, everything Mom had showed me. It's still so difficult to believe, knowing her ability to alter reality, to change all my perceptions with real colors and scents and shapes and textures. But I don't have another explanation for it all, so I take her final gift to me as truth until I can come up with a better one.

At this point, I've been working the job long enough to know one singular thing about my employer — whoever they are, they're legit. The locations I receive are always home to the people who's names I receive next, and the people always have a secret supernatural ability, and they always trace this ability back to a doctor who gave it to them. There are four doctors so far.

No one else was created by Damian Ford. So far.

I haven't yet been able to find a connection between the four men, besides that they are doctors and professors. The only one who currently practices emergency medicine is Ian, though I know that he was a professor first. They all four attended separate undergraduate universities; they all four attended separate graduate universities. They're all four spread across the continental United States. One in Nebraska, née Colorado; one in Fort Worth; one in California; one in Pennsylvania. I reckon I'll soon find a fifth.

I wonder how many there are, how deep this thing really goes. To think, not three years ago I'd believed my mother and I to be the only ones.

I was wrong.

I wonder how many there are, and I wonder how long I'll be on the road, on assignment, tracking down targets. I don't know what's to happen once I've found them all. I don't know what will become of the data I've compiled, or if I'll even share it. I wasn't asked to keep any journal entries or make any charts or document anything at all — I wasn't asked to do a single thing but find them.

The first text message came while I was on a cashier shift at Grand Central Grocery. When I went on break, I pulled my phone from my locker and found a message saying only "East Lansing, Michigan". I'd assumed it was a mistake since only two people in the world utilized my phone number, not counting my new employers. But the message came again a week later, this time, from a different number. I ignored it a second time. The third time, I'd replied. "I think you have the wrong number," I'd said.

"This message is for Aspen Quinn," they'd said.

After a series of double-texts of interrogation were met with no response, I'd blocked the number.

The next week, a new number texted me "East Lansing, Michigan" again, and then a name. I'd Googled the name. He was a locally-famous magician whose most beloved trick was producing fire from his fingertips.

Before I even had a concrete answer or made a concrete decision, I'd known what I was going to do. And somehow, I think the person on the other end of the messages had known that, too.

________________

What do y'all think Charlotte's ability is?!?!?

Look at this drawing of Aspen & Eli by Kidatash! Look how the aura is alllllll over Eli's space and only barely around Aspen!!!!! Look at her freckles!! Look at his braid!!!! He's got a chameleon on his shirt!!!