Chapter 5

Lana closed her bedroom door. She leaned against the heavy wood as a wave of intense nausea washed over her.

She pressed two fingers to her carotid artery. Her pulse was erratic and dangerously weak. Her skin felt clammy.

She knew she needed specialized, high-grade organic herbs tonight. But her bank account was still negative.

Lana sat at her cheap desk. She pulled out her cracked smartphone and connected to a secure VPN.

She downloaded "Twitchy." It was the most popular live-streaming app in the US, known for its massive, instant crypto-tipping culture.

She created an anonymous account. She named it "Oracle's Whisper." She set the category to "Just Chatting / Tarot."

She pulled out a worn deck of Rider-Waite tarot cards. She had found them in the host's moving boxes.

Lana adjusted the desk lamp. She angled it so her face was entirely hidden in shadow. The light revealed only her slender hands and the cards on the desk.

She hit the 'Go Live' button. The screen buffered for a moment before broadcasting her feed to the void.

For the first ten minutes, the viewer count remained at zero. The silence in the room was heavy. Her chest ached.

Suddenly, the algorithm picked up her stream. Three random viewers dropped in.

A troll named 'CryptoBro99' typed in the chat.

"Nice setup, fake witch. Predict the next meme coin or I'm leaving."

Lana ignored the troll. Her fingers shuffled the deck. The movement was mesmerizing. It had an unnatural fluidity that bordered on magic.

The rhythmic, crisp sound of the cards shuffling created an ASMR effect. It drew in twenty more curious viewers.

Halfway across the world, in a penthouse in Dubai, Sterling Astor IV sat in the dark. He nursed a glass of bourbon.

Sterling suffered from severe insomnia. He mindlessly scrolled through the streaming app on his encrypted tablet.

His thumb stopped on Lana's thumbnail. The shadowed hands shuffling cards triggered a strange, inexplicable sense of calm in his chest.

Sterling entered the stream. He used the default anonymous username 'User_7749'.

Lana stopped shuffling abruptly.

Her mystic intuition flared violently. A massive, dark energy signature connected to her digital room. Her stomach knotted.

She looked at the screen. Her eyes narrowed as she singled out 'User_7749' from the small viewer list.

Lana spoke for the first time. Her voice was cold, synthesized slightly by the cheap mic.

"User_7749. You are surrounded by the stench of death."

The chat erupted in laughter. They called her an edgy roleplayer trying to scam tips.

In Dubai, Sterling's eyes narrowed sharply. His combat instincts instantly went on high alert at the mention of death. His grip on the glass tightened.

Lana drew a single card. She slammed it face-up on the desk.

The Tower, reversed.

She leaned into the microphone. Her tone was entirely serious.

"The threat is not tomorrow. It is right now."

She stared at the camera lens.

"User_7749. Step exactly three feet to your left. Immediately."

Sterling stared at the screen. His rational mind told him it was a scam. But his honed survival instinct screamed at him to obey.

The chat mocked her command. They typed rows of skull emojis.

Lana tapped the Tower card with her fingernail.

"Three," she counted down in a chillingly calm voice. "Two. One."

In his penthouse, Sterling set down his bourbon. He took a swift, silent step to his left.