{"canonical":"https://books.mozaikallc.com/en/works/dima-zales/reluctant-psychic","locale":"en","author":"Dima Zales","type":"work","modified":"2026-11-06T00:01:38.395682+00:00","data":{"title":"Reluctant Psychic","author":"Dima Zales","authorUrl":"https://books.mozaikallc.com/en/authors/dima-zales","year":2018,"heat":4,"isbn":null,"seriesTitle":"Sasha Urban","seriesOrder":3,"seriesUrl":"https://books.mozaikallc.com/en/series/dima-zales/sasha-urban","tropes":["ancient-witch-antagonist","forbidden-mentor-mentee-romance","Found Family","morally-gray-vampire-boss","multiverse-and-portal-travel","Mystery","prophecy-and-fate-subversion","Psychic","reluctant-seer","secret-magical-lineage","supernatural-rescue-mission","Urban Fantasy"],"summary":"Life as a seer is not all it’s cracked up to be. Especially when you’re unemployed, and your former boss blacklists you  everywhere.\n\nOr when a legendary Russian witch calls in a favor owed, demanding the unthinkable.\n\nWhen danger threatens everyone around me, there’s only one man I can turn to—and he may not be what he seems.","pitch":"Reluctant Psychic by Dima Zales is a 2018 romance. Tropes: ancient-witch-antagonist, forbidden-mentor-mentee-romance, Found Family, morally-gray-vampire-boss, multiverse-and-portal-travel, Mystery, prophecy-and-fate-subversion, Psychic, reluctant-seer, secret-magical-lineage, supernatural-rescue-mission, Urban Fantasy. Heat 4/5. Book 3 of Sasha Urban.","publisher":"Mozaika Publications","ownRecap":true,"englishUrl":"https://books.mozaikallc.com/en/works/dima-zales/reluctant-psychic","chapters":[{"n":2,"title":null,"summary":"Sasha wakes to an intrusive call on the first morning of unemployment, sharing potato pancakes with roommate Felix and their domovoi familiar, Fluffster. The mood shifts when Ariel returns home glowing and manic, wearing last night’s clothes, and the group recounts how the succubus Harper infiltrated their apartment and nearly killed them before Fluffster intervened. Ariel dissolves into tears and guilt for abandoning them, while they debate why Harper fell outside the Mandate’s protection—possibly fleeing prejudice in the Otherlands or tied to a necromancer lover. As Ariel rushes off to work looking pale and secretive, Sasha senses a wave of dread reminiscent of Nero’s previous attacks, ending the chapter on a private phone call that promises new danger.","url":"https://books.mozaikallc.com/en/works/dima-zales/reluctant-psychic#chapter-2"},{"n":3,"title":null,"summary":"Sasha Urban battles creeping anxiety over a series of private calls that trigger her seer intuition, suspecting danger rather than coincidence. While navigating cramped apartment life with Felix and her chinchilla Fluffster, she discovers financial precarity looming despite Nero's recent bonus. A lunch with Rose in Le District introduces her to Vlad, the vampire head of the Enforcers, forcing Sasha to recount her traumatic TV performance and Council interrogation while carefully managing explosive secrets about Gaius's threats. The conversation reveals vampire lore—daylight immunity and glamour-based cover-ups like Rasputin's faked death—but ends on a jolt of dread as another mysterious call rings, signaling the danger is far from over.","url":"https://books.mozaikallc.com/en/works/dima-zales/reluctant-psychic#chapter-3"},{"n":4,"title":null,"summary":"The narrator, a young illusionist with hidden seer abilities, performs an elaborate card trick for her vampire friend Vlad and witch companion Rose, only to have Vlad dismantle every method with supernatural precision. When Rose asks to walk arm-in-arm with Vlad, the narrator escapes their romantic moment to run errands. In a public restroom, she comes face-to-face with Roxy and another werewolf from her Orientation bully clique—enemies who previously tried to harm her. Trapped with no weapon and surrounded by literal monsters about to shift into wolf form, she bolts for the exit, leaving the confrontation unresolved as the chapter ends on a knife-edge of violence.","url":"https://books.mozaikallc.com/en/works/dima-zales/reluctant-psychic#chapter-4"},{"n":5,"title":null,"summary":"The narrator flees through Battery Park, pursued by the b-hive—specifically the dual-identity Ashley/Maddie and the predatory Roxy. Racing toward a secluded gazebo, Rose’s favorite spot, she hopes to find allies Vlad and Rose, but the structure is empty. Cornered between the two pursuers who have shed their heels and stripped bare, she attempts a bluff with a phantom weapon, only to watch both women transform into wolves. With Roxy lunging and her heart hammering, the chase ends in a snarling cliffhanger as the beasts close in. The chapter ratchets from desperate flight to primal confrontation, establishing the hunters’ shapeshifting nature and the narrator’s resourcefulness under pressure.","url":"https://books.mozaikallc.com/en/works/dima-zales/reluctant-psychic#chapter-5"},{"n":6,"title":null,"summary":"Sasha narrowly escapes a pack attack by Roxy and Ashley/Maddie in their werewolf forms when Vlad and Rose intervene, capturing the girls and revealing Roxy's paternity to Chester, a probability-manipulating former Councilor embroiled in a deadly feud with Darian. Rose threatens to lock Roxy's shifting for weeks while Vlad dismisses Sasha, who retreats home to decompress with her pet Fluffster. Seeking calm, she replays Darian's meditation tape, but the practice escalates dangerously when lightning manifests on her palms—nearly arcing toward her eyes before her panic extinguishes it, leaving her shaken by the near-lethal intensity and realizing the next step could kill her.","url":"https://books.mozaikallc.com/en/works/dima-zales/reluctant-psychic#chapter-6"},{"n":7,"title":null,"summary":"Sasha grapples with an involuntary awake vision—lightning flooding her eyes as she witnesses Nero choking Darian in a luxury elevator. Driven by suspicion about Darian's motives, she tracks his real address from a shipping label and ascends to his Upper East Side building, only to intercept Nero mid-threat. After a tense staring contest that ends with the doors slamming shut, Sasha chases Darian downstairs but loses him to a departing cab. Alone, she spirals into paranoia, wondering if Nero surveils her apartment and saw her private moments. When Felix reveals an unknown caller is Baba Yaga's restaurant, Izbushka Na Kurih Nojkah, the witch phones to collect the favor Sasha owes her. The chapter closes with Sasha retreating to Battery Park with Felix for a fragile moment of normalcy, haunted by unanswered questions about loyalty, desire, and who is truly watching whom.","url":"https://books.mozaikallc.com/en/works/dima-zales/reluctant-psychic#chapter-7"},{"n":8,"title":null,"summary":"The narrator ignores a call from Baba Yaga and meets Felix near New York Harbor to discuss their fears that their former boss Nero is surveilling their apartment. Felix reveals he designed Nero's security system without a backdoor but possesses a custom hacking device called FELLATIO that could penetrate it if placed near Nero's workstation for hours. They agree to plant the device in Nero's pocket using the narrator's card magic, despite the lethal risk if discovered. Returning home, the narrator discovers Nero has blacklisted her from every job she applied to, filling her inbox with false rejections. Filled with rage, she abandons her meditation practice and resolves to confront Nero directly the next day while hiding the FELLATIO in her deck of cards.","url":"https://books.mozaikallc.com/en/works/dima-zales/reluctant-psychic#chapter-8"},{"n":9,"title":null,"summary":"Sasha Urban infiltrates her former office building to confront her ex-boss Nero, only to discover her security ID remains active—suggesting Nero may be in denial about her resignation. In the elevator, she confides in Lucretia, the firm’s empathic psychologist, but the conversation veers into uncomfortable territory when Lucretia senses conflicting emotions and defends Nero’s character, leaving Sasha defensive and eager to escape. After brushing past Venessa, Nero’s hostile assistant, Sasha enters his office concealing a compact device in her palm. Nero, dressed in an expensive bespoke suit, greets her with smug familiarity, unaware of her hostile intent. As she strides toward him with mounting rage and a hidden plan, the chapter ends on a knife-edge of confrontation, with Sasha determined to force Nero to acknowledge her departure.","url":"https://books.mozaikallc.com/en/works/dima-zales/reluctant-psychic#chapter-9"},{"n":10,"title":null,"summary":"Sasha confronts her former Mentor Nero in his office to resign and accuse him of sabotaging her job search, but their charged encounter devolves into a dangerous game of physical cat-and-mouse marked by forced proximity and a near-kiss confrontation. While secretly planting a surveillance device in his pocket, Sasha battles Nero's supernatural speed and lie-detection abilities, fleeing with only word from her ally Felix that camera access has been secured but system penetration remains incomplete. The stakes escalate when every job application is mysteriously rejected, confirming Nero's blacklist, and a tense call with her mother adds familial pressure. As Sasha and Felix coordinate to crack Nero's 'Felix-proof' password protection, they discover Nero used Sasha's old corporate phone to spy on her private conversations. The chapter ends on a cliffhanger as Nero reaches for the planted device in his pocket, threatening to expose their infiltration.","url":"https://books.mozaikallc.com/en/works/dima-zales/reluctant-psychic#chapter-10"},{"n":11,"title":null,"summary":"The narrator frantically orders Felix to destroy the FELLATIO device on Nero’s screens, but Nero produces a pen instead, foiling the plan and forcing a new strategy—perhaps planting the device in his pants. Shaken, the narrator burns off nerves at an executive gym, tries yoga, then meditates at home, only to plunge into Headspace: a bodyless, non-dimensional realm where consciousness perceives fractal shapes as taste, temperature, and music. Exploring this impossible geometry, the narrator touches a warm shape and is swallowed into oblivion as awareness short-circuits. The chapter closes on this unresolved cliffhanger, with the surveillance mission still pending and the narrator lost in the abstract void.","url":"https://books.mozaikallc.com/en/works/dima-zales/reluctant-psychic#chapter-11"},{"n":12,"title":null,"summary":"Sasha awakens from her first conscious vision in Headspace, having accurately predicted roommate Felix's exact arrival and dialogue—proving her nascent seer abilities extend to specific future events. Sharing the experience with Felix and her domovoi familiar Fluffster, she grapples with whether Headspace functions as a simulation interface or prophetic tool. Tension mounts as Sasha investigates roommate Ariel's mysterious behavior—skipping sleep and possibly entangled with vampire Gaius—checking for bite marks, though Rose refuses to discuss vampire relationships without Vlad present. Testing antagonist Nero's influence, Sasha applies to jobs from Federal Reserve positions to snake milking while battling interruptions from an unknown caller. After a gym and yoga detour fails to unlock deeper meditation, Ariel briefly appears deflecting questions about Gaius, before Sasha finally slips back into Headspace amid crackling lightning.","url":"https://books.mozaikallc.com/en/works/dima-zales/reluctant-psychic#chapter-12"},{"n":13,"title":null,"summary":"Sasha navigates the geometric dreamscape with her domovoi companion Fluffster, touching a vision-shape that reveals a terrifying summons: Koschei demands she appear before Baba Yaga at Brighton Beach tonight at ten. Racing back to reality, she evades the incoming call by spoofing a disconnected-number voicemail, successfully dodging the trap. Her relief curdles when she discovers every job application has been rejected—sabotage she blames on her vampire employer Nero, who also owns her apartment. The final indignity: despite her resignation, Nero has deposited her paycheck anyway. Enraged by the manipulation and financial tether, Sasha storms out to confront him, leaving Fluffster to wonder how they'll survive if the payments stop.","url":"https://books.mozaikallc.com/en/works/dima-zales/reluctant-psychic#chapter-13"},{"n":14,"title":null,"summary":"The protagonist storms into Nero's glass-walled office seeking confrontation over his unwanted money, only to find him absent in Europe, leaving her boiling fury unspent and the covert operation postponed. She spends the day with Ariel acquiring a concealed black Glock 19—which Ariel cherishes as Precious—training at a firing range until her marksmanship improves, and enduring a brutal gym session followed by yoga. She briefly finds calm through meditation and the comfort of her therapeutic pet Fluffster, even predicting movie endings with her Seer abilities. Yet as they exit the gym onto a secluded street, her powers trigger intense dread: a black van screeches to a halt and grim-faced armed men stream out, ending the chapter on an unresolved violent ambush.","url":"https://books.mozaikallc.com/en/works/dima-zales/reluctant-psychic#chapter-14"},{"n":15,"title":null,"summary":"Sasha and roommate Ariel are ambushed in a back alley by four men led by a hulking figure with prison tattoos. After a brutal fight where Ariel demonstrates devastating super strength—flipping a van to disable pursuit—they disarm the attackers and escape home. The incident leaves Sasha sore but resolute; he agrees to stay under house arrest with Ariel's supervision. Their fragile safety is shattered when Gaius, Ariel's vampire companion, arrives at the door, prompting Ariel to leave abruptly without explanation. Alone, Sasha enters Headspace and witnesses a cryptic vision of a folder labeled with his own name in Cyrillic, suggesting a Russian connection—possibly Baba Yaga—rather than the expected password from Nero. With Felix's help decoding the text and Fluffster the domovoi unexpectedly learning Russian, the chapter ends on unresolved tension: who ordered the attack, and what does the vision portend?","url":"https://books.mozaikallc.com/en/works/dima-zales/reluctant-psychic#chapter-15"},{"n":16,"title":null,"summary":"Sasha wakes early on a Saturday, anxious that Ariel has again failed to return home. During meditation she enters Headspace and experiences a multi-hour vision of losing a fighting game to Felix, only to realize she can use this foreknowledge to win in reality—discovering that Felix cheats too via his technomancer abilities, bonding them in mutual awe while revealing that long visions drain her powers. Unable to re-enter Headspace, she prepares for the dangerous Orientation trip with concealed weapons, only to learn Felix plans to chaperone the younger Maya instead. They drive through Queens, narrowly avoiding detection by Roxy’s father Chester, before arriving for Dr. Hekima’s lecture on the Otherlands, which ends as his illusion transforms the classroom into an impossible landscape, leaving the true nature of these worlds suspended in the air.","url":"https://books.mozaikallc.com/en/works/dima-zales/reluctant-psychic#chapter-16"},{"n":17,"title":null,"summary":"Dr. Hekima whisks the class on a breathtaking tour of the multiverse—snapping his fingers to shift between a floating island hub of Gates, an underwater bubble city, Gomorrah's brimstone skies, and dreamlike realms—before returning them to a mundane classroom, leaving everyone awed and humbled by the countless worlds beyond Earth. Afterward, Maya uses psychometry on a mysterious knife, triggering a harrowing vision of its owner, Russian mafia enforcer Innokentiy Charnetskavoy, committing a vicious assault; Felix pales at the bloodshed. Guilt eases when Felix and Maya flirt in the cab, and Nero deliberately drops them off alone for privacy. Back home, a wave of dread stops Nero at the door—where the admiral himself stands smiling menacingly, closing the entrance behind him.","url":"https://books.mozaikallc.com/en/works/dima-zales/reluctant-psychic#chapter-17"},{"n":18,"title":null,"summary":"Sasha barely fends off Admiral Innokentiy’s knife attack in her stairwell, but he overpowers her with a syringe and abducts her in a car trunk. After slipping her handcuffs using a hidden lockpick, she’s brought before the ancient witch Baba Yaga in a sprawling Russian banya. There, Baba Yaga reveals her true demand: Sasha must conceive and bear a seer child for her, fathered by Yaroslav, a bannik whose powers are tethered to the steam rooms. Horrified by the proposal, Sasha is escorted into the scalding parilka, where Yaroslav’s disembodied voice blocks her escape, leaving her trapped in the suffocating heat with an unseen entity and an impossible ultimatum.","url":"https://books.mozaikallc.com/en/works/dima-zales/reluctant-psychic#chapter-18"},{"n":19,"title":null,"summary":"Trapped in an overheated banya with Yaroslav, a bannik who claims seer powers, the narrator faces a coercive threat from Baba Yaga demanding pregnancy. Yaroslav proposes a desperate plan: she must injure him to create evidence of resistance, then they'll escape at a precise moment. After an accidental blow to his face leaves him bleeding, they rehearse the timed door-kick while he teaches her about Headspace and vision-draining. He reveals a trickster named Mraz' betrayed him to Baba Yaga, entwining their fates. As the countdown to 6:55 p.m. approaches, they prepare to kick the door together, the chapter ending on the precipice of their escape attempt.","url":"https://books.mozaikallc.com/en/works/dima-zales/reluctant-psychic#chapter-19"},{"n":20,"title":null,"summary":"The chapter follows a high-stakes escape from a Russian banya. The protagonist, working with Yaroslav, executes a precise timed plan to slip past guards while disguised in a stolen bathrobe and towel. After staging a bizarre performance with birch branches to maintain cover, she navigates the steamy corridors, backyard, and a dingy building to reach the Coney Island boardwalk. Gunfire erupts as she scales a fence, leaving her breathless and bruised but free—temporarily. She summons a cab amid the festive crowds, dehydrated and shaking, only to spot two pursuers waiting across the street, turning a narrow escape into an unresolved cliffhanger.","url":"https://books.mozaikallc.com/en/works/dima-zales/reluctant-psychic#chapter-20"},{"n":21,"title":null,"summary":"Sasha Urban narrowly escapes a daylight ambush at her apartment building by Baba Yaga's armed associate, fleeing in a cab after promising the driver a fortune for speed. Once safely inside her apartment with her telepathic furry guardian Fluffster and her roommate Felix—who has summoned police to stand guard—she recounts the terrifying encounter: the witch intends to force her into bearing a child seer. Shaken but defiant, Sasha retreats into a self-imposed lockdown, developing a compulsive time-checking ritual to prepare for future visions while her powers remain dormant. When her friend Ariel vanishes for an entire week, Sasha receives a chilling call from Baba Yaga on Ariel's phone, escalating her paranoia. Arming herself with a handgun and a textbook doorstop, she prepares to venture out to consult Rose and Vlad, determined to find a way to turn the tables on her supernatural captor.","url":"https://books.mozaikallc.com/en/works/dima-zales/reluctant-psychic#chapter-21"},{"n":22,"title":null,"summary":"Sasha visits Rose and Vlad's apartment seeking help with her coerced visit to Baba Yaga's banya, but Vlad—head of the Enforcers—explains the Council won't intervene due to Baba Yaga's political ambitions on the New York Council. Their attention shifts to Ariel's disappearance after she drank from vampire Gaius, whose claim of a \"casual arrangement\" fails to convince anyone; Vlad reveals that vampire blood creates a powerful addiction with withdrawal symptoms and that a vampire's scent lingers for weeks, blocking other sources. As Sasha grapples with guilt over having introduced Ariel to Gaius, Vlad offers to triangulate Ariel's location using genetic material. Sasha leaves to search for Ariel's hair, only to remember her own precarious situation as the elevator doors open and she draws her gun.","url":"https://books.mozaikallc.com/en/works/dima-zales/reluctant-psychic#chapter-22"},{"n":23,"title":null,"summary":"Sasha retreats to her apartment with Felix to process disturbing news about Ariel's blood addiction and erratic disappearances. Desperate to locate her missing friend, she swallows a sample of Focusall—a concentration drug from her past research—and slips into Headspace, the mental realm of Cognizants. There she discovers a foreboding purple shape that, when touched, pulls her into a sterile chamber where Ariel sits motionless, consuming soup with jerky, unnatural movements. Suddenly the admiral Innokentiy ambushes Sasha, and the vision turns violent as he attacks her with blade and bullet, ending on a harrowing cliffhanger that leaves Sasha's fate uncertain.","url":"https://books.mozaikallc.com/en/works/dima-zales/reluctant-psychic#chapter-23"},{"n":24,"title":null,"summary":"Sasha awakens from a terrifying prophetic vision revealing that her friend Ariel has been kidnapped by the witch Baba Yaga and is being held in a warehouse with a knife-wielding admiral. Realizing Baba Yaga has taken Ariel as leverage to force Sasha into a grotesque bargain involving forced pregnancy, Sasha struggles with guilt over not seeing the trap earlier. Joined by her tech-savvy friend Felix and the psychic rodent Fluffster, she races to find a way to locate Ariel, settling on using a DNA sample from Ariel’s toothbrush to track her. When Baba Yaga calls, Sasha feigns compliance with the demand for egg donation while secretly planning to stall, sending a box of literal chicken eggs as a malicious loophole. As the clock ticks toward 3:24—the moment her vision showed her own death—Sasha arms herself and heads toward Rose’s door, determined to rescue Ariel despite the fatal omen.","url":"https://books.mozaikallc.com/en/works/dima-zales/reluctant-psychic#chapter-24"},{"n":25,"title":null,"summary":"Sasha returns to Rose's apartment with urgent news of a vision and Baba Yaga's call, setting in motion a desperate rescue. Vlad uses a personal item to pinpoint a warehouse in Brooklyn's Sunset Park, revealing the location of their captive friend. Tensions flare as Vlad insists Rose stay behind, offering instead a potent energy boost followed by an intimate blood exchange that leaves her visibly drained. Despite his gruff leadership, the team—including a reluctant Felix with forbidden weaponry—prepares with makeshift comms gear. As they speed toward the target in Vlad's sleek car, a Seer named Darian delivers a cryptic warning about a red light. The chapter ends with Sasha's danger sense screaming as they barrel toward an intersection, leaving the mission's fate uncertain.","url":"https://books.mozaikallc.com/en/works/dima-zales/reluctant-psychic#chapter-25"},{"n":26,"title":null,"summary":"The chapter opens with a high-speed drive where Vlad's vampire instincts slam the brakes to avoid a speeding garbage truck, narrowly saving the narrator and Felix from a fatal collision. To ease the tension, the narrator performs a card trick that forces the seven of clubs, proving Vlad and Rose share a destined connection. They arrive at a rundown warehouse where Vlad uses hypnotic glamour to put waves of guards to sleep while breaching secured doors. Felix's Gomorran weapon provides holographic night vision as they penetrate deeper. The playful mood shifts to tactical infiltration, ending on a cliffhanger as they enter a dark chamber where twelve gunmen in hospital gowns and sunglasses resist Vlad's command and aim their weapons at his head.","url":"https://books.mozaikallc.com/en/works/dima-zales/reluctant-psychic#chapter-26"},{"n":27,"title":null,"summary":"Trapped in a room swarming with hospital-gown-clad attackers codenamed Johnnies, Nero and Felix open fire in a desperate firefight. When the Johnnies prove disturbingly resilient—continuing to move even after decapitation—Vlad arrives and dispatches them with brutal, superhuman speed, tearing off their heads in a display of horrific carnage. In the chaos, Nero shoots and kills his first sentient being, discovering with unsettling clarity that adrenaline has numbed his conscience; he feels no remorse, only a cold readiness to kill again to protect his friends. Felix fights back with the Gomorran gun’s blaster beam, but after Rose’s frantic screams in Nero’s earbud finally cease, Felix collapses to the floor—possibly struck by the final bullet—leaving Nero staring at the blood on his hands and wondering if Felix is dead.","url":"https://books.mozaikallc.com/en/works/dima-zales/reluctant-psychic#chapter-27"},{"n":28,"title":null,"summary":"Sasha, Felix, and Vlad survey the grim aftermath of a skirmish that left Johnnies massacred across the floor, with one enemy killed instantly by a Gomorrah gun's death ray. Vlad revives a fainted Felix by forcing his eyes open with a mirrored gaze, and the determined trio prepares to advance despite Felix's embarrassment. Rose offers anxious support over the comms until Felix mutes her earbud after she screams during the gunfire, scaring her cat Luci. When Felix injures himself kicking a reinforced door, Vlad opens it with a light tap, and they enter a new room marked only by a red light. Sasha's foreboding spikes to the stratosphere, and she hisses an order for everyone to hit the ground as the chapter cuts to black.","url":"https://books.mozaikallc.com/en/works/dima-zales/reluctant-psychic#chapter-28"},{"n":29,"title":null,"summary":"Nero, Vlad, and Felix drop for cover as Johnnies open fire with assault rifles in a sudden ambush, Vlad dispatching seven attackers in a blur of super-speed while the group deciphers Darian's cryptic warning about a red light. They discover a stadium-sized hidden ward where hundreds of Baba Yaga's wounded minions lie on life support, only to confront Koschei, her lieutenant and a fellow Cognizant, who moves with vampiric speed. Bullets fail to slow him, but Vlad kills him by snapping his neck—only for purple energy to resurrect Koschei with his Mandate aura restored. The chapter ends with Vlad urgently commanding them to flee as the seemingly immortal enemy stands, leaving the trio trapped with no clear escape.","url":"https://books.mozaikallc.com/en/works/dima-zales/reluctant-psychic#chapter-29"},{"n":30,"title":null,"summary":"Nero and Felix fight for survival in a hospital ward overrun by reanimated patients, racing to escape while Vlad battles the seemingly immortal Koschei. When Koschei’s chest expels a bullet and he rises again with a purple shimmer, the stakes spike: the duo picks a locked door and plunges into a hallway where gown-clad attackers—eyes swirling with black energy—keep advancing despite grievous injuries. With nine rounds left and hundreds of beds looming, Nero channels raw adrenaline into a steady aim, firing shot after shot as the creature refuses to fall. The chapter closes on unresolved tension: Ariel still needs rescuing, and the relentless enemy is inches away.","url":"https://books.mozaikallc.com/en/works/dima-zales/reluctant-psychic#chapter-30"},{"n":31,"title":null,"summary":"The narrator and Felix fight through a corridor swarming with Johnnies, barricading themselves in a small room while the narrator picks the lock to the chamber where Ariel is imprisoned. As scraping claws tear at the door behind them, a crushing dread signals that death awaits beyond the next threshold. Felix urges them to enter together, but the narrator’s intuition screams against it—until a sudden realization hits: the euphoric focus flooding their mind isn’t adrenaline but Focusall, a drug that mimics meditative clarity. Desperate to summon a vision that could save them both, the narrator battles Felix’s interruptions and the ticking clock, finally breaking through into a blinding psychic explosion just as the door looms.","url":"https://books.mozaikallc.com/en/works/dima-zales/reluctant-psychic#chapter-31"},{"n":32,"title":null,"summary":"The narrator pushes past their daily limit in Headspace to secure a second prophetic vision, desperate to prevent a looming death. Inside the vision, they and Felix breach a barren room where an admiral waits, executing a calculated hit that mirrors a previous failed attempt. When their shots miss the target's head, Felix's Gomorran gun drops the man dead—only for Felix to collapse, felled by the adversary's thrown blade in the vision's cruel echo of fate. The chapter closes on the narrator's devastation as their companion bleeds out in their arms, transforming a tactical victory into a personal catastrophe and raising the stakes for whatever the vision was meant to avert.","url":"https://books.mozaikallc.com/en/works/dima-zales/reluctant-psychic#chapter-32"},{"n":33,"title":null,"summary":"The protagonist snaps back to her body after a nested prophecy vision in which she watched her companion Felix die at the hands of a knife-wielding admiral. Though the Focusall coursing through her veins sends her thoughts racing at supersonic speed, she recognizes the vision as a branch she must avoid. When hostile Johnnies batter down the hallway door, she makes the cold choice to face the fateful room alone, sacrificing herself to spare Felix from the fate she witnessed. Masking her terror with practiced lies worthy of her illusionist training, she sends Felix to hold the breach with his gun while she opens the door to whatever waits inside, leaving the chapter poised at the threshold of mortal confrontation with unresolved dread.","url":"https://books.mozaikallc.com/en/works/dima-zales/reluctant-psychic#chapter-33"},{"n":34,"title":null,"summary":"The narrator re-enters a recurring vision-space where a Russian admiral ambushes her with a knife. Deviating from her precognitive script, she endures a cleaved ear and broken ribs but turns the tide by feigning weakness, blinding him with cards, and repeatedly stabbing him with Ariel’s blade until he dies. As she rises, wounded and triumphant, her friend Ariel—now wearing sunglasses and moving with unnatural speed—betrays her, slamming her chest with superhuman force and sending her hurtling toward a lethal impact. The chapter ends on this cliffhanger, trading hard-won victory for sudden, devastating betrayal.","url":"https://books.mozaikallc.com/en/works/dima-zales/reluctant-psychic#chapter-34"},{"n":35,"title":null,"summary":"Sasha survives a fall only to land on the admiral's corpse, her ribs screaming in protest. Before she can recover, Ariel looms over her with eyes black with corrupting energy—the same sigil Sasha recognized from Johnny. Someone else is wearing Ariel's body, speaking with an ancient, androgynous Russian voice, and they have no patience left for Sasha's smooth talk. When Ariel's hands close around Sasha's throat, the chapter becomes a desperate fight for air as the killer squeezes, determined to silence Sasha permanently. Just as consciousness begins to slip, Felix bursts in with a Gomorran gun, interrupting the murder and leaving Ariel slumped beside Sasha—possibly dead, possibly not—as Sasha gasps her final horrified realization.","url":"https://books.mozaikallc.com/en/works/dima-zales/reluctant-psychic#chapter-35"},{"n":36,"title":null,"summary":"The chapter opens on Sasha waking from a violent vision of being strangled by Ariel, only to discover the attack was real but non-lethal—Felix saved them with a stun setting on his weapon. As physical agony and panic subside, they realize Baba Yaga has mind-controlled Ariel and other hostiles using black energy hidden behind mirrored glasses. While Vlad holds off the enemy army via earbud, Sasha and Felix painfully carry the unconscious Ariel through a warehouse littered with bodies, racing toward escape. The relief of survival curdles into shock when Felix suddenly trains his gun on Sasha, ending the chapter on a knife-edge betrayal.","url":"https://books.mozaikallc.com/en/works/dima-zales/reluctant-psychic#chapter-36"},{"n":37,"title":null,"summary":"The narrator and Felix fight through a warehouse swarming with reanimated assailants to rescue the unconscious Ariel, picking locks and dodging collapsing bodies while the narrator’s bleeding ear leaves a trail. Reaching Vlad’s Tesla, they commandeer it using Felix’s technomancer abilities to scatter the pursuing horde, though the car nearly crushes them in the process. As they speed away with Ariel secured in the back, the narrator tries to reach Vlad and Rose over comms but gets only static, forcing Felix to seize remote control of the vehicle moments before it veers toward a streetlamp. The chapter ends on a knife-edge: escape achieved, but with the pursuit still raging and the driver’s seat now controlled by a desperate ally.","url":"https://books.mozaikallc.com/en/works/dima-zales/reluctant-psychic#chapter-37"},{"n":38,"title":null,"summary":"Sasha and Felix race along I-278 East in Vlad's damaged car, pursued by Baba Yaga's Johnnies, while monitoring a brutal webcam feed of Vlad tearing apart the resurrecting Koschei. With Sasha's ribs screaming and Felix's Gomorran gun manipulating traffic lights to clear their path, they desperately video-call their mentor Nero, who agrees to meet them at their apartment within ten minutes. As they plunge into a tunnel and lose signal, Nero's pixelated image reveals him in a limo with two enigmatic companions—a sunglassed Enforcer and a familiar nurse from his blood drives—raising the stakes for the rescue and leaving the chapter on a razor's edge of high-speed pursuit and unanswered questions.","url":"https://books.mozaikallc.com/en/works/dima-zales/reluctant-psychic#chapter-38"},{"n":39,"title":null,"summary":"Sasha and Felix flee in a high-speed chase through New York streets, pursued by three armed assassins known as Johnnies. When the pursuers ram their Tesla and one climbs into the backseat, slashing Felix's hand and face with jagged metal, Sasha screams for help—only to connect with Nero Gorin on the phone. Nero's chilling, fluent Russian exchange with Baba Yaga, who possesses the attacker, forces the Johnnies to freeze; Baba Yaga then makes the possessed assassin turn the weapon on himself. With the immediate threat neutralized, Vlad reports all hostilities have ceased—but the car's brakes fail as Sasha tries to stop for a child. With Felix unconscious from blood loss, Sasha jerks the wheel toward their apartment building, crashing through the glass lobby into the elevator wall and blacking out in the impact.","url":"https://books.mozaikallc.com/en/works/dima-zales/reluctant-psychic#chapter-39"},{"n":40,"title":null,"summary":"Sasha awakens in the shredded remains of Vlad's Tesla, her shattered body knitting back together under the golden energy of Isis, a Cognizant healer whose services command a fortune. Nero looms over her, demanding she resume their mentor-mentee dynamic as the price for saving her gravely wounded friends Felix and Ariel. Trapped in a desperate bargain, Sasha stages a moment of intimate proximity to conceal a device on Nero's person while negotiating terms. Once he relents, Isis drains herself—aging visibly—to heal the group at a cost of nearly a million dollars, though Ariel remains mysteriously unconscious. Carried into her apartment by Nero's surprisingly strong arms, Sasha navigates the charged tension between attraction and resentment as they grapple with mounting debts and the lingering threat of what the planted device might trigger.","url":"https://books.mozaikallc.com/en/works/dima-zales/reluctant-psychic#chapter-40"},{"n":41,"title":null,"summary":"Sasha wakes refreshed in the aftermath of battle, sharing tea with Felix while Rose quietly leads Vlad away for a private moment. The conversation turns to Nero, who made a terrifying deal with the crime boss Baba Yaga: one year of protection for Sasha in exchange for peace, sealed by threats of violence against her family and the promise of a written contract. Sasha revels in the safety while wrestling with unwanted arousal at her status as Nero's subordinate. She confesses to Felix that she planted a surveillance device in Nero's pocket, hoping his Cyrillic-written name will crack his security. As Ariel stirs from her slumber at the chapter's close, the team edges closer to their next move against their enemies.","url":"https://books.mozaikallc.com/en/works/dima-zales/reluctant-psychic#chapter-41"},{"n":42,"title":null,"summary":"Sasha rushes to help her friend Ariel, who is suffering severe withdrawal from vampire blood after being kidnapped by Koschei. When Ariel attacks Felix and lunges for Vlad desperate for another dose, the vampire uses glamour to hypnotize her into agreeing to rehab. The group travels through the gate to Gomorrah's futuristic Tranquility Center, where universal healthcare will treat Ariel's addiction for free. Along the way, they encounter Councilor Kit, a shape-shifting sex addict who transforms into their friends to seduce them. Back home, Felix hacks into Nero's computer—finding his password is simply his name—and discovers mysterious scanned documents that promise to upend everything they know. Sasha is left wrestling with guilt over not intervening sooner in Ariel's self-destructive spiral.","url":"https://books.mozaikallc.com/en/works/dima-zales/reluctant-psychic#chapter-42"},{"n":43,"title":null,"summary":"Sasha Urban uncovers a terrifying dossier revealing that hedge fund magnate Nero Gorin has orchestrated her entire life, from securing her Columbia University acceptance through a secret donation to blackmailing the police officer who once arrested her. Digging through files that range from childhood transcripts to intimate surveillance footage of a kiss she shared at the Jubilee, Sasha realizes the extent of Nero's obsession crosses into predatory stalking. When her companion Felix suggests the unthinkable—that Nero might be her biological father—Sasha's world fractures. Horrified by the possibility that her attraction to Nero is incestuous, she flees to his Upper East Side penthouse to demand answers, picking the lock and storming inside to confront the man who has been watching her since she was a child.","url":"https://books.mozaikallc.com/en/works/dima-zales/reluctant-psychic#chapter-43"},{"n":44,"title":null,"summary":"Sasha infiltrates Nero’s opulent penthouse and discovers an idealized painting of herself that suggests romantic rather than paternal obsession. Following her intuition to a locked safe, she cracks the Cyrillic interface using her own Russian name and uncovers three startling documents. The first is a 1916 birth certificate naming Alexandra Rasputina, daughter of Grigori Rasputin, as Sasha’s ancestor. The second reveals Rasputin’s prophecies spanning a century—accurately predicting wars, market crashes, and 9/11. The third, a legal document, implies Sasha herself is the prophesied culmination. She urgently calls Felix, who confirms the impossible connection while she struggles with dizziness and the weight of inherited destiny. The chapter closes on unresolved dread: what does it mean to be the descendant of history’s most infamous seer?","url":"https://books.mozaikallc.com/en/works/dima-zales/reluctant-psychic#chapter-44"},{"n":45,"title":null,"summary":"In Nero Gorin's apartment, Sasha listens as Felix translates a century-old contract revealing that Grigori Rasputin—the infamous seer—is her biological father. The document binds Nero to protect Sasha and ensure her adoption by the Urban family, explaining her abandonment at JFK and Nero's lifelong surveillance. Sasha realizes Nero collected her diplomas and work history to fulfill his end of the bargain, only to exploit her seer heritage after his hundred-year prophecy expired in 2016. Overwhelmed by the revelation that her entire life stems from a single transaction, Sasha experiences a jarring déjà vu, then spins to face Nero bursting through the door in a fury that threatens to expose secrets the contract forbids him to speak.","url":"https://books.mozaikallc.com/en/works/dima-zales/reluctant-psychic#chapter-45"},{"n":46,"title":null,"summary":"Sasha storms into Nero’s apartment to confront him with everything she’s uncovered—her true identity, his surveillance, and the secret contract he signed with her father to protect her as his Mentee. Finding him fresh from the shower, barely clothed, the confrontation ignites into a charged standoff where anger and forbidden attraction collide. When Nero blocks her exit and draws her into a blistering kiss that nearly strips away all restraint, Sasha breaks away and flees into the night, leaving him trembling with equal need. Back at her apartment with Felix and Fluffster, she drowns the memory in a freezing shower, realizing that whether she likes it or not, the deals binding them mean she must face Nero again tomorrow.","url":"https://books.mozaikallc.com/en/works/dima-zales/reluctant-psychic#chapter-46"}]}}