Parker

The few seconds between bungling her over-practiced landing and actually slipping the black ring onto her finger were the most precarious of Hodja's entire life…

When Elyria found the black ring, she used it as an escape hatch from her own life, exempting herself from the toils of work & school & embarking on a vacation cruise around the world. She wanted a life worth taking pictures of, like so many others' lives she'd been following online. But after a few months at sea, & stops at more than a dozen tropical destinations, she found herself once again growing just as bored as she'd been at work & at school. She began to feel as if the very palm trees were mocking her, the rolling tides laughing at the flimsiness of her wishes.

Julietta was proud of herself for making it up into the tree without injury, though considerably less proud of the reasons that prompted her to climb it in the first place…

Inka, aware of the Minders for several years now and long past cycling through self-doubt (am I dreaming? high? crazy?), had simply accepted their presence, and the fact that no one else seemed to be able to see them, as a novel fact of her life. For the most part, they just floated around, though it was clear from the get-go that they gravitated toward populated areas…

Not quite alone in the woods, Sybil had an exceptionally clear vision of a very murky immediate future.

Zofya had long ago achieved a level of fame at which everyone knew her last name, but rarely felt a need to use it. She was a singular talent, a fact made all the more evident by the unprecedented scope of her interplanetary concert tour, and her insistence on traveling to perform in the flesh, rather than relying on the industry standard remote holographic projections. Still, by the last leg of her year-long journey around the galaxy, she was as ready as anyone would be to get home to Earth and take a break.

Farrah, walking home alone from the only club that still stays open until sunrise, wearing the black ring…

Dizonia was not fooled by the assorted spirits' blatant attempt to throw her off their scent…

Pasithea, suffering from insomnia…

Rosalia had never been a daydreamer. Nor had her dreams at night meant much to her or stuck with her through the days. She was fine with this, blessed with an innate talent to find fulfillment in the pragmatic. What life threw her way, she enjoyed tackling, even when it felt like life was throwing an abundance of pipe wrenches at her ankles…