The space inside the car was filled with an ominous tension. At the wheel was DimeDozen, a middle-aged wide-shouldered black man with a natural talent for proximity combat with custom knives he wore around his hands like brass knuckles. In the passenger seat was Captain MalteseFalcon, alias “Falcon,” an older Asian man whose mild-mannered appearance discouraged a man who had proven himself in combat, near and far, as a stupor-inducing marksman in both the simulation and the Real. In the rear-passenger seat was ClintFastwood, a younger white man with faded-brown hair whose eager-appearing demeanor kept hidden his ability to deceive his opponents with delusions of superiority by pulling out one of seven revolvers carefully placed somewhere on his persons; so far he never had the chance to use his highly-unstable S&W500, a sniper-caliber pistol that he had crafted himself, that he always keeps visible on his upper torso. Behind the driver's seat, in the back, the newly-awoken Kaezrer sat overanxiously: two weeks and he was still attempting to grasp the truth.

“Kaez,” Falcon said as he stared at him through the tilted rear-view mirror. Kaezrer glanced up and locked eyes with him. “Try and relax. You'll get used to it in time.”

“Right,” Kaezrer nodded with an assured stare. If other people have been doing this for a long time, he would think, then I should be able to as well. Clint leaned over and lightly tapped Kaezrer on the shoulder. Kaezrer turned his head from looking at the rear-view to see Clint face-to-face who was smiling widely. “No worries about anything,” Clint said in a high-tone voice, playing it suave, “nothing's gonna happen. Some of us have seen her more than once and nothing's bad ever happened. We go in, she talks to you for a little while, then we leave; it's easiest thing we can do.”

“Some of us,” Dime commented without looking in the back.

“What's that Dime?” Clint turned his head to the driver seat.

“First time Clint saw her he was so. . . 'overtaken' with what she said to him 'Con' and I had to carry him back to extraction.”

Falcon laughed: “We did, didn't we? That had to be the most enlightening twelve minutes of your life Clint to leave you so stuped.”

Clint smirked quietly and nodded a few times, speaking softly: “Yeah. She's good at that as I hear it.” Kaezrer followed along quietly, his focus shifting between the three men as a curious expression formed. Clint's statement suggested that it was a profound revelation, and that suggests that it should be left alone, though he would like to know what she might say to him ahead of time. If she really is an oracle, then she already knows about him and 'they,' too. That'll be an interesting read.

Dime straightened the wheel out. He glanced out the window, looking at the apartment complex. He turned his head to the side and looked at Falcon. Falcon returned the look and nodded. He then turned his head and body to look at Kaezrer directly and said: “Let's go Kaez. She's waiting.”

They made there way up, moving through look-alike hallways with hardly-identifying graffiti designs and marks. Kaezrer tried to drum the path they've taken into his memory and compare it with relevant relation to vertical and horizontal they've traveled, but as usual his over-analyzing thoughts made him forget what color car they just came in from.

They stopped at a plain-looking door. Kaezrer glanced at Falcon quietly, observing his posture from his peripheral and waiting for some kind of obvious gesture. Falcon, casually, nodded once, deeply, and stepped away from the door. Kaezrer focused back onto the door. Slowing his breathing, expecting something to happen to consume him with amazement, he reached for the doorknob.

As soon as Kaezrer's middle fingertip touched the door it pulled back, jolting him as though the door had a static charge. A middle-aged black woman met the two of them with a warm smile. “Captain Maltese,” the woman said with a relaxed voice, “you're right on time.” She turned her head to Kaezrer. “And you must be Kaezrer.” Kaezrer's jaw dropped and his eyes widened: she just said his name correctly; she really is an oracle. “She said you'd have that expression,” the woman said. It was probably at this point Kaezrer's third piece of the mind exploded.

Falcon was going to wait in the living room, taking a seat on a couch with a very homely quilt laying across its seats and back. He closed his eyes and slowed his breathing, entering a meditative state thinking whatever Hoverbarge Captains thought about since the Truce began.

“Not as old as you were expecting, Damon?” the older woman said with a little smirk. Read him like a book, which didn't phase him as much as the overwhelming calm she radiated. “Right,” he said quietly, “and you knew my name, too.”

“I wouldn't be much of an Oracle if I didn't know something like that. Please, sit.” She gestured at the chair, across from the table she was already sitting at. He thought about this for a moment, with a spark of wondering if there was a hidden meaning behind it. Unable to immediately figure it out, he elected instead to focus on the present and consider analyzing it later. “You'll figure it all out in time,” she said. Kaezrer's head tilted to the side as he said: “You don't read minds, do you?”

“I don't have to,” she said smiling.

“Cookie?” She gestured at the plate heavily-stacked with freshly-baked cookies.

“Ah, no,” Kaezrer replied with a timid hand movement.

“Watching your waistline?” She laughed softly.

“No, no,” Kaezrer replied nervously, “nothing like that. And besides, it really wouldn't affect me, right?”

“It might, it might not.” Her smile was warm. “Nothing is completely certain, in this world or the other.” She slowly pulled a cigarette to her mouth and inhaled. She spoke softly as she exhaled: “To speak a little truth, I wasn't completely sure which of you I was going to meet first: you, or Julius.”

Kaezrer's expression became withdrawn, and after a brief silence said: “So you do know.”

“I know. I also know about Cais, the poor boy. No one should ever have to suffer as he did. But, one could look at the blessing from it.”

“Blessing,” Kaezrer hinted at being irritated.

“Both you and Julius. Both of you may not appreciate the lives you've been given, but there's the choice in there to do great things.”

“'The choice'?” Kaezrer's brow tightened.

“Yes. You'll be given the choice to help people, or cause them harm. You'll be given the choice to follow the rules, or to follow your heart. And you'll be given the choice to decide between yourself, and everything else you hold dear.”

“Others' lives?”

“Oh no.” She shook her head lightly. “Even though most of the people you'll meet can't understand you for who you are, they'll understand your heart; they'll never put themselves in a position where you will choose, because they'll have to.”

Kaezrer sulked in the chair and sighed: “This is so confusing. I've given up on trying to explain how you know what you know, and I don't even know where to start with the bulk of what you've said.”

“You'll figure it out. In the end, I'm telling you that you're just going to have to make up your own mind.”

“To not procrastinate, but still keep my head on my shoulders?” he asked with an approval-seeking stare.

She smiled. “I told you you'd figure it out. When things seem to be going too fast to keep up, just remember the important things.”

“Like what?”

She smiled and leaned in, closer to him: “To not take yourself so seriously. You've always seen things clearly when you're relaxed, and just because you now know about the Matrix doesn't mean that part of 'you' is going to change.”

“Ah. . .” Kaezrer quietly sighed happily. That did make sense, he thought. He reached outward and grabbed a cookie. He gestured with it and said: “I really shouldn't take myself so seriously; it would be the stress that would be added to my waistline, and not this cookie.”

The Oracle laughed: “There you go, Kaezrer.”

“I shouldn't count on anybody pronouncing my name correctly, should I?” He sat upright and took a bite, and immediately started to feel more at ease.

“There will be a few who get it the first time; the first one who does after you finish that cookie will mark the day as a 'scarlet day'.”

Kaezrer swallowed lightly, his face became tense and his eyes narrow, as he said: “A 'scarlet day'?”

She didn't say anything, but smiled.

Kaezrer blinked, tilted his head back, smiled, and nodded.

Suspecting that she had nothing left to tell him, Kaezrer rose from to his feet and lowered his head toward her.

Falcon nudged Kaezrer in the hallway. “Whatever she said to you,” Falcon said, “was for you alone. But, there's one thing I'm curious about.”

“What's that, sir?” Kaezrer's brow rose.

“It took me a few days to believe that she was the real thing. I realized it when something she hinted at came to pass for real. When I did realize, I had the same look that you have right now. So you know already?”

“Yes, sir.”

“How?” Falcon's brow tensed at the depths he could be witnessing.

Kaezrer turned his head, and with a clueless expression, said: “She said my name right.”