Chapter 11 Part 4

Rei looked through her pad. As expected, she had the normal bounty of bills. As she was sorting through some of the junk mail, though, she noticed an advertisement that had the word "Cerberus" written on it in bold letters. She paused again. Was she losing her mind, or did it seem like her reality was becoming more and more about her silly message? It was probably that her mind was particularly sensitive to information where Cerberus was involved, so she was seeing it more readily. Or, at the very least, that's what she told herself.

Rei had proven this to herself when she had to decided to try to really want a particular thing she had no desire for to see whether or not she saw it in reality more readily. She decided that she would set her mind on a particular design of watch, with small interlocking loops. They were not extremely popular at the moment, and she could not recall seeing anyone with one on. As soon as she made it a point to become aware of this kind of watch, she noticed three advertisements and no fewer than six people wearing it. Clearly, these things would have been there before, but her mind would have blocked it out. At least, that's what made sense.

Rei glanced more closely at the Cerberus advertisement. It was apparently an invitation for a band. The picture emphasized the wildness of the event with some lead signer apparently adorned with chrome and studs photographed at a diagonal to give the shot more dynamism. The text of it again caught her attention. "You are invited! Get ready to party HARD!" Rei smiled again as she thought of how much she must be kidding herself. When she flipped past the band invite to the next piece of junk mail, her smile disappeared. It was apparently for a literary event for a local author who would be reading his work. The caption is all she saw, "Leave your own books at home, we've got that covered."

She thought back to her message. "Be watchful and aware of your surroundings."

Either Rei was heading for a mental breakdown, or something beyond her ability to understand was happening. Either way, she wished she hadn't opened that damn message.