Overlap

Chapter 125: Global Atrophy

<10/31/2018 - 19:00 | Link Street, Marietta, GA, USA>

Even with winter's approach foretold by our beautiful sunset evening, I was reminded once again of the many little things continuing to stress me out. I called Lumina again, just after getting home from my shift. This time, I went through the day without those horrible chain of headaches or other such issues. Even so, it was still difficult this time to contact her.

"There must be something to it. I can assure you there is no such thing as rapid aging." Lumina and I just got through bouncing ideas about the recent difficulty I've been having when contacting her, but she was out of ideas just as I was, grasping at impossible straws.

"Well it has to be something Lumina. All I know is, this isn't right. It's too soon for me to be having these problems." For what felt like a minute, Lumina and I both were in silence, thinking all the way back to compare to the current moment.

I've kept this issue on the down-low, since I just didn't want to think about it anymore, but the problem is only getting worse. It's been affecting me ever since that time way back, when I nearly crippled my own brain by using excessive psionic energy in an unstable connection. Ever since that day, little by little, I can tell I'm growing weaker as a Scion. It's getting harder each time over the years to successfully contact Lumina, even when all of the weather conditions are perfectly favorable. That's not all. There are times now where the things we used to be capable of in a strong connection now require an even stronger connection than they used to. Ultimately, I'm becoming weaker, and the rate of it now is alarming.

"There must be an explanation Reed. It has to be something we can control."

Lumina is on the optimistic side, which is more than I can say for myself. I can't come up with any leading ideas, only possible theories. It's really bad, because if I suddenly become too weak for telepathy, that will be it for me; my life will be over.

Lumina has assured me over and over that this kind of decay in psionic aptitude over time as humans age is supposed to happen, be it at a much slower rate. The problem is, if I can notice the decay, it isn't slow enough. I'm twenty-two years old, and the estimated cut-off age for psionic support is about 62, so yeah; it's too soon to feel this weak.

I can easily compare then to now. Back then, it took me only a few seconds to call Lumina with my brain with almost no energy draw. Now, it takes somewhere between 22-39 seconds if I'm lucky, and of course I can feel dizzy after doing so until I drink more water. Mental Synch is becoming more difficult a thing to invoke. Seeing through her eyes is so much harder even in freezing cold temperatures as it was not before. Even phasing the connection is now a delicate task. Of course, I can feel the difference in energy too, that buzzing sensation in my head nearly absent each time. I don't know what is wrong with me, but it has greatly impacted my psionic potential in negative ways, and if this rate keeps up, I'm ultimately going to be screwed.

"There has to be other connections Reed. Think back. What else changed over the years?"

I was already putting my full mind onto the idea, but it took me a long time just walking around with Lumina in silence to come up with any potential meaning. "I don't know Lumina. Is psionic atrophy really like this? Am I going to lose telepathy because my body can't handle it anymore?"

"No, it's not going to happen that way. If your body is struggling to handle it, causing a global atrophy, then it has to be something else you are doing, something else you have changed."

What's changed over the years...? I asked this to myself for many years after noticing the issue. We've already lost about four-degrees worth of connection strength regardless of all other factors, so I can't afford to lose more...