‘Touch and go.’

April 18th, 2000

American classrooms, much like aquariums and formicariums, have a delicate socio-ecological balance dedicated to protecting the ego of children who think they’re adults. No matter where you go, you end up with little cliques and groups that wouldn’t form in proper society. You get the jocks, drama kids, nerds, and all those other subgroups that populate your closed environment. By the senior years, these groups are set in stone — sedimentary rock pressure formed into fine layers over the course of many years. So when change comes a knockin’ to these sheltered boys and girls, the world may as well be ending.

Such is the world-ending gaze directed at me when I walk into class this morning, sleep deprived as usual.

Mr. Pelchat helped accelerate social darwinism by allowing students to pick their own seats. In the back of the class, the snoozers. In the rightmost corner, closest to the door, are the beefy boys. Front left, the girls who substitute brand name clothes for personality. In the middle left, hugging the windows, are the smart kids. A good portion of them stare at me aggressively as I take a seat beside Felix — a kid who has a spare in this time block.

The rune of necessity inscribed onto his body allows me to sense his general location and condition as long as he’s still in Sapphire Isle. But really, it’s much easier to just keep an eye on him when I can during daylight hours.

As things settle down before the bell, Felix looks at me, at the disapproving class, then back at me. “Why is everybody staring at us?”

“It’s complicated,” I say, shrugging. “Don’t worry about it.”

“...Should I be here?”

“They won’t bother you if you’re with me. So shut up and sit around for a while.”

A single glare in the various group’s generation direction sends them visually skittering back to the safety of their conversations. Good.

Truth be told, I like being the spooky outsider. I get to take up other’s mental real estate without even trying — people get out of my way if I sneer at them. I’ve got my tiny group that buys my brand of bullshit. Not that a witch actually needs friends. They can just make their own if they really want to.

For the third day in a row, Mr. Pelchat’s substitute comes in. He’s been sick, so they’ve replaced him with a literal mustache twirling villain who’s sacrificed all of his head hair for the most fine mustache I’ve ever seen in my life. He’s even got a little tin of wax to keep the ends of his mustache in a perfect golden ratio spiral.

“Good morning, ladies and gents,” he says, bracing against the podium. “Today, we’ll be covering cellular activity and microbiology. Open up your College Preparation — Biology textbooks up to page 237.”

More stuff I’ve already read. I sigh, put my chin on a propped up hand, then resolve myself to one hour and thirty minutes of tuning out.

Class comes and goes. Felix twiddles his thumbs as he occasionally reads from Marie’s textbook — the girl herself spends the entire period drifting in and out of consciousness. Not the optimal way of studying, but he can respect the hustle.

English class comes next — Gabriel’s jaw drops as soon as Felix wanders in. He slams his hands against his desk, a miniature thunderclap, and breaks the quiet conversations in the preclass wait. “Felix, my man! You’re already back from the car crash?”

Car crash? Felix looks around and takes note that all eyes are suddenly on him — the faces of people he never got to know are now focused on him. “Uhhhh…”

He recalls the car that was thrown at him during the duel between the two green eyed witches. There was certainly a car and a resulting crash, but he gets the feeling he shouldn’t mention that out loud. “Yeah. Only received a few cuts and scrapes, but I’m fine now.”

“Great. Because Block 3’s getting pretty busy now — it’s almost tourist season. Gonna need all the hands we can get on deck. So what about it, eh?” Gabriel steps forward and claps Felix on the shoulder hard enough to send him directly back to the hospital.

“Guh—” 10:48 AM. Second ticks.

“Oh. Whoops.” Gabriel then claps several more times, a little lighter, laughing off Felix’s pain the entire time. “Ah, you’re a tough guy. You can handle it.”

“I needed those bones,” Felix croaks, slumping into his desk.

“Naaaaaaaah.” The brute kicks his feet up on the adjacent desk and huffs. “Good to see you, though. You haven’t missed much — just more literary analysis bullshit. Hate it.” He pauses, looks at the clock, then looks at Felix. “Say, you seen Marie anywhere? She’s been skipping this period for the past week.”

Felix glances at the nap spot Marie usually snoozes in. Nobody there. The desk is pristine, a shiny block of wood and laminate. “I just saw her last period. She sat beside me and fell asleep.”

“Beside you? Damn, son. You serious?”

“Yeah. She seemed really tired after what happened last night.”

“Oh. Say no more, hound dog.” Gabriel puffs out his chest and offers a proud salute. “You’ve done the impossible. On behalf of all men, I salute you.”

There seems to be some sort of misunderstanding afoot. “What?”

“I’ve known you for less than a month, but know that I’m proud of you. You were like a son to me.”

This is seriously getting out of hand. Felix feels something twitch in his brow as he struggles to understand. “W-What?”

But before he can get any answers, the period-end buzzer blares. The English teacher clears her throat and stares in Felix’s and Gabriel’s direction — both of them decide to drop the conversation. For now.

After attendance and the day’s introductions, another trite interpretation of classical literature spews from the teacher’s lips. Felix decides to take a play from Marie’s book and withdraw into his own mind. There’s a lot of things he still has to answer for, even if just for the sake of answering to himself.

On his left wrist is the watch that’s constantly attuned to the local radio stations. He never questioned it until now — a tool like this couldn’t have been easy to come by. What was once a comforting anchor is now a foreign curiosity; he cannot fathom why it was so important to him at one point. But with some deductions and rational thinking, he can garner a guess.

Day by day, ever since he arrived in this town, he’s been slowly gaining awareness and diverging from his initial state of near machine-like behaviour. He’s been in close proximity to Marie Weiss the entire time — he found himself attracted to her almost subconsciously. The things he did were automatic, like he was following a script. He still remembers a good amount about the field of oceanography, but the thoughts barely feel like his. Normally, he’d be glad to write himself off as just going insane, but he’s confirmed the existence of magic and other things. Nothing is off the table now.

From the way she was talking, it seems like she claimed this entire city as a territory. There might be something going on with the land itself — he recalls the black obelisks scattered around the isle. Perhaps it wouldn’t be unreasonable to assume that the general flow of mana has been doing something to him over time; when he woke up in Marie’s manor, his lucidity was almost frightening.

Felix checks his watch again: 10:55 AM. Still another full hour to burn until lunch break. No wonder Marie sleeps through her blocks. Instead of learning things, he can actively feel himself losing brain cells listening to a monotone reading of Hamlet.

What was he doing here again?

A ear-rending buzzer jolts Felix back to awareness. He shakes the noise mosquitos out of his ears and looks around.

He expected to see the other students getting up and packing their bags and generally trying to get out of the classroom as fast as possible. But that isn’t happening today.

There’s a girl in a white jacket standing in the doorway. He rubs his eyes — Marie is blocking the exit with a tight-lipped smile. She’s looking directly at him.

“Felix Conti,” she declares, folding her arms behind her. “We have business to take care of.”

Everybody between her and the object of her scorn; the other students are visibly trying to get out of the way of the visual crossfire. All but one of them.

“Yo,” Gabriel says, raising a hand. He leans back, crosses his arms, and breaks into a very big smile. “Didn’t know you were into that kind of business. Not my place to judge, but damn.”

Something immediately shifts in Marie’s expression — those luminous green eyes lose all of their emotion, now replaced by murderous intent. “Felix?” she says, now glaring at him.

The air freezes. A thread in his chest tugs downwards. Felix feels real panic seep into his system — he lurches to the side and covers Gabriel’s trap with both of his hands with an awkward laugh. “Hahah, haha, ha, no, nothing of the sort — he’s just talking about random topics—”

The pseudo-jock easily pushes away Felix’s hands and stands up. “Oh, yes. Don’t think you can hide anything from the all-seeing eyes of Gabriel Markov. One glance and I already know everything—”

Threads wrap around Felix’s heart, squirming, tightening, squeezing hard. He winces as his entire spine burns; it feels like his body is about to implode, crumpling like an accordian and squeezed through a dime-sized hole like slow depressurization and—

“I hope you kids used condoms,” Gabriel says, proudly. “We don’t have a Life Education course in this school, so take it upon yourself to practice safe sex.”

The tension in Felix unravels and is near instantaneously transferred directly to Marie. The effect is almost magical — he can see her visibly trying to contain herself. She closes her eyes and her smile grows tighter. Left eyebrow begins twitching. “Felix…?”

His name is strained, like she put it through a lingual cheesegrater. The witnesses to this scene are struck with a sudden spell of perplexity. Nobody is sure what to make of what’s going on. Not even Felix.

“Well, no, but, uh… Erm… Ffff…” He quickly realizes there’s no way to recover from this. Gabriel has taken it upon himself to become a being of pure chaos and instil strife — he might as well have detonated a block of plastic explosives right in the middle of the classroom.

Is this what high school students are like? A different shudder runs down his spine, the realization of a young adult’s potential for cruelty. He decides to accept the loss, packs his bags, and meekly walks past a quietly fuming Marie.

And as he leaves the classroom, Gabriel starts cackling like a hyena that just tore apart its prey.

They beat a hasty retreat to the school’s rooftop, far away from the fallout of Gabriel’s jackassery. Marie spends the entire walk biting at her nails and practically twitching in rage, muttering things such as: “That fucker… that mother fucker… I swear I’m gonna… Need a new hex right about now...” Among other things. Things that probably shouldn’t be repeated. Ever.

Felix does the smart thing and stays completely silent until Marie reaches the shade of a maintenance shack. There, she lets out a very long sigh — then smashes her forehead into a concrete wall. Bone against hard object sound. He winces.

“Alright,” she says, turning to him. The skin above her brow is red, but somehow isn’t torn from the seemingly vicious impact. “Got it out of my system. Completely, utterly out of my system. That never happened. Got it?”

Felix looks at the slightly bruised concrete wall and gulps. “Mhm.”

“Good. Great, even.” She huffs, then walks to the front of the maintenance shed — she fishes out a key from somewhere in her jacket and unlocks the thick bronze padlock on the handle. Chains rattle as she completely unbinds the door. “Don’t think I’ve dragged you up here for a picnic.”

He watches her pull open the maintenance door and disappear inside. Doesn’t bother peeking within. “What… did you drag me up here for, then? What if I had plans?”

“By my authority as a person who can kick your ass, I declare your plans officially overwritten,” she says from inside the shack. There’s a lot of rummaging and clinking noises inside. “We have a lot of issues to go over — starting with your little toolset in a briefcase. But first—”

Marie leans out and flings something brown and fast moving; Felix reflexes kick in and snatches it from the air. His fingers feel warm paper — smells really nice. Lemon, paprika, pepper, garlic. All the hallmarks of something delicious. She steps out afterwards carrying both a black briefcase and a full on picnic basket.

“I thought you said we weren’t here for a picnic,” Felix says, suppressing a smirk.

“Shush. The occult is a hungry job,” Marie says, taking a seat in the shade. She gestures to the spot beside her. “Sit. Now.”

He does that. Dirty concrete isn’t the most comfortable, but at least it’s nice out. The salt-scented wind ruffles his hair and pricks at his skin — he can see a glimpse of the city past the forest that surrounds the academy, and a shimmering ocean past that.

“Jeez,” she mutters, glancing in his general direction. “What kind of psychopath are you? Real people don’t go to sleep at 1am and then immediately wake up at sunrise. Come on, now.”

“I didn’t want to bother you two. Not like I could find either of your rooms in the first place.”

He glances at the picnic basket and witnesses Marie unpacking a full three course meal. Everything is hot and crisp sounding and emits mouth-watering joy in smell form.

“Where… did you get all of this from?” Felix asks, unwrapping the bag given to him. Inside is a sandwich of sorts — a fried schnitzel slice between a brioche bun, topped with mustard, homemade sauce, and sauerkraut. Probably the best sandwich he’s ever seen.

“I took some time to cook before I headed to class,” she says, nonchalantly. “No big deal.”

“How did you even…”

Marie gives him an annoyed look as she starts assembling her lunch. “Hey. Food is important — there’s no point in learning magic and everything if you can’t use it to better your quality of life. Call me a hedonist, but I don’t care.” She pulls out a small runestone with a complicated shaped X shaped sigil in the center. “This keeps things warm. Saves a lot of money, too.”

“Witches care about money?”

“Of course we do. Modern civilization is great. Running water? Electricity? Movies? Wonderful. Last thing I’d want is to move into a hermitage somewhere to perfect the art of something stupid like turning people into newts.”

But she’s already done that. She lives in the middle of a manor in a mystical forest. “If you say so.”

They eat in silence for a while. Felix’s sandwich disappears in six bites — he was hungrier than he realized. He looks between the briefcase and the sight of Marie eating; her brain seems to have flown somewhere else, leaving all cognitive function to her stomach.

She looked a lot more elegant from a distant, Felix muses. Maybe she doesn’t care about her appearance or reputation, a free-spirited person. A feast like this goes way beyond a stress eat — it should be impossible to maintain her lithe frame on a diet of bratwurst and junk food. Then again, magic.

Maybe he should just stop asking questions. That would make life a lot easier.

It takes me a few minutes to finish devouring enough food to recharge my mana. I don’t get much rest these days, but a nice meal or two or twelve is a nice substitute. And these past two weeks have been nothing but brutal on my sleep schedule.

“I would’ve waited until you finished with your job and got back to the manor,” I say, dumping all the dirtied plates into the basket, “but this is a good time as well.”

The briefcase between me and Felix is several times more scuffed than it did when he received it several weeks ago. Looks like somebody ran it over with a tractor and hit it with a pitchfork several times. Which, really, isn’t too far from the truth. Erika must have taken out her anger on it instead of Felix himself.

He doesn’t seem too bothered about the briefcase’s condition. “What did you want to talk about?”

“Right. We need to go over you.” I gesture for him to open up the thing and keep talking. “Things have gotten weirder than usual ever since you arrived. Now, I’m not trying to insinuate anything — but seeing as there’s no small amount of inconsistencies in everything you do, we’re going to have to investigate.”

“Yeah.” He puts the case in his lap and meditates on it. “I guess I have been wondering that, myself. Lots of rhetorical questions that probably shouldn’t have been rhetorical…”

Felix seems different, nowadays. A little more talkative. A little more aware. Lucid — Downright suspiciously so.

I haven’t just been spending the past five days dilly dallying around town. Besides covering up for the fight at Centurion mall, I’ve already done some preliminary research. Namely, tracking down the briefcase’s origin and investigating the nature of the new mage in our territory. Felix is the key to both of these issues — assuming he can even remember anything. But I’ve already done more than enough talking.

“It’s easier to show you than explain everything again. Open up that briefcase.”

He reaches out, then hesitates. Something like dread crosses his lower lip.

“It’s not trapped,” I say, rolling my eyes. “You think I’d kill you after spending so much effort sparing your life?”

Felix turns and looks at me with the expression of a man who has to explain that chocolate milk doesn’t come from brown cows.

“...Just open the fucking thing.”

He does. I’m surprised he still remembers the code — he thumbs open the latches and opens the briefcase. Inside, the infrared scanner and caliper. He looks at me questioningly.

I point towards the scanner and motion for him to pick it up. “Point that thing at me and fire.”

Felix places his hand on the grip, worried. “Are you su—”

I glare at him and hold out my arms. “It’s not like it’s an actual gun. Come on.”

He points the scanner at me. I watch his lumpy adam’s apple bob once before he resolves himself to pull the trigger.

Click. I wince as bright red lasers trawl over my body — I feel a faint tingling sensation throughout my insides, a brush of a wet feather.

Felix’s eyes go wide as he looks at the display screen. He looks down at the camera, then back at me. “Your sigil…? How?”

“I’m more interested in the ‘why’ than ‘how,’ personally.” I lean over to confirm the images on the thermal display — the sight of translucent black webs underneath my clothes — and nod. “I’m honestly not completely sure how it works. You don’t need to be a mage to detect mana. Some people get things like shivers or goosebumps or premonitions when they pass through an especially potent current — but that’s not important.” I point to the caliper and grimace. “You’re a smart guy. You can figure this out, right?”

He places the scanner back in the briefcase and rubs his chin. “This equipment that showed up one day is able to detect magical activity. But… What about the caliper? There doesn’t seem to be anything magical about it…”

I scoff. “You kidding? You went toe to toe with both an eldritch amalgamation of legends and a full on nightmare realm with that thing. Don’t you find it a little bit suspicious that a little mathematical tool can do that?”

“Well, now that you mention it. Wait. How did you figure all of this out?”

“I’ve been doing some experimenting, among other things. I gave up for a while when I couldn’t detect anything magical about these, but I realized that they might just not give off any signatures. There’s plenty of ways to conceal magic, y’know. Ran a few scans and experiments last night and blam. I found out.”

I rest my head against the concrete wall and concentrate on the wind and sun on my face. Natural senses. “That thing right there is an artifact of some kind, I’m pretty sure. It may look mundane, but as they say, all war is based in deception. Thing might as well be a mace or war pick — specifically designed to deal with magical creatures.”

The cogs in Felix’s brain visibly turn — his eyes crease, go wide, crease again, wander to the edge of the school’s roof, then hyperfocus on me.

“I was sent here to do something. Is that what you’re saying?”

“Not just something.” I hold my thumb to my neck and draw a line across my throat. “You were sent here to hunt witches. To kill me.”

Felix pales — some level of pure flabbergast metabolizes on his face and sends him into a gibbering spree. “Wait, no, but, uh, hold on—”

I raise a hand and laugh at his expense. “Relax, relax. I’m joking — this stuff is general anti-mystic, anti-Phantasma gear. I’ve dealt… deal with proper church-aligned witch hunters. Exorcists, they’re called.”

That seems to calm his nerves. Colour returns to his face — he huffs and crosses his arms, a child too prideful to throw a full tantrum. “You shouldn’t make jokes like that, Marie.”

“I already know that I’m not going to make it in standup.” I push myself to my feet and look down at Felix. “But, anyway, the point here is: something real fishy going on, and we’re both in the thick of it now. Don’t let your guard down, keep those tools with you to protect yourself.”

I extend my hand to Felix. He takes it after yet another twinge of hesitation, and I pull his dumb ass to his feet.

“From here on out, I’d like to enlist your help with some investigations.” I start cleaning up the remnants of our little lunch excursion. “If you can’t remember anything, that’s fine. We’ll just have to start aggressively prying into your past.”

He rubs his forearm with a hand and looks down at his feet. “...Sorry.”

“Don’t care for apologies — make up for it with hard work. Right now, we have the mystery of where those tools came from, the mystery of who’s been sending those nightmare creatures, and of course, the mystery of you.”

Of course, there’s one thing I’m leaving out on purpose. I already have a good idea of why all these things are happening.

This place has been marked by my grandmother as a place of some importance and assigned Erika to guard it until the time comes for me to inherit power. There might be some catalyst or artifact somewhere around here that wields great power — that would explain the sporadic interest from other mages, monsters, and Erika’s silence on the whole matter.

I’m not stupid, nor am I helpless. Even though I want to enjoy my everyday mundane life, I’m self-motivated enough to protect it with my own two hands. I can’t rely on Erika forever.

For over a decade, she’s monitored the status of our territory and kept it safe from everyone. Now that I’m on the cusp of becoming a real witch, I should actually make an attempt to act for myself.

“So we’ll be doing some investigating. Some real private eye shit. We have to start with Pelchat — he’s got connections with universities and other things, and he’s been away for the past week. Tonight, we’ll knock on his door and ask him a few questions.”

Felix purses his lips. “Tonight?”

Something’s up with him. “Yeah, tonight.”

“I’m… umm… going to be working. Gabriel said Block 3’s understaffed and they need me there.”

I — wh—

I can’t believe this guy. My jaw requires a herculean effort to prevent it from dropping through the school roof. Even though he saw magic, lived to tell the tale, battled mythological creatures, he’s more concerned about his part-time job than dealing with ongoing problems.

“You serious?” I manage to sputter.

He only answers me with another quiet “sorry.”

I sigh and put my forehead in my palm.

Some part of me expected this result. I’ve only known him for so long, but this is just the kind of person he is. An aloof kid with his sensibilities in all the wrong places. Both clueless and perceptive at the same time. An anomaly. He might be imagining another encounter like the one at the mall lying in wait. Guess I can’t really be that hard on him, in that case.

“Alright, fine. You get off tonight — clear out your schedule for tomorrow. We’ve got lots of leads to look into. No excuses. I can handle tonight myself.” I pick up the briefcase and hand it back to him, enchanted picnic basket in my other hand.

Felix smiles bashfully and takes the black box in his arms. “Thank you for understanding…”

“Bah. I’ll never understand you,” I say with a harrumph, walking towards the rooftop entrance. “I’ve got my eyes on you, so don’t get into any trouble, alright? I’ve got my own day to take care of.”

“Oh — thanks for the lunch! You’re a wonderful cook!” he calls after me. My cheeks flush a bit at the remark. But I don’t hear his footsteps follow.

I’ve never noticed how pretty the manor’s foyer is in the afternoon. On a sunny day like this one, the glass roof collects droplets of golden light and pours them down the staircase. There isn’t a single shadow to be seen in the waterfall of pre-summer, post-spring warmth.

A nebulous in between. A season that can’t make up its mind. I hate how much I can relate to that sentiment — makes me feel like some sort of weak-willed groupie who can’t make up her mind on an overwhelmingly simple decision.

But there’s nothing simple about this life, is there?

As I turn and push myself towards the entrance to my wing of the manor, I hear footsteps. I turn a few times, scanning the rest of the foyer — nothing there — before I hear fingers snap right in front of me.

“You’re back quite early today.”

Erika leans against the nearest doorway, an impeccably dressed wraith. Her dress looks extra new today — a few black ribbons adorn her collar. Maybe the extra frills give her more power.

“And here I was,” she continues, sighing dramatically, “thinking you valued your mundane life over everything. Then you just go ahead and start skipping right before your finals. Dear me.”

“It was only history and social studies.” I shrug and find an equally convenient doorway to learn against. “It’s not like those will ever come in handy.”

Erika smirks. “Don’t you know? Those who ignore history are doomed to repeat it.”

“I’ll be sure to steer clear of politics, then.”

Over the past few days, Erika’s mood has improved immensely. Her fury towards Felix had cooled to complete indifference, and all of that excess emotion went straight to me. She’s starting to act a bit like Aniya — I’m not sure whether that’s a good thing or not.

But these kinds of introspective garbage can wait for another time. We have a single rule in both this household and our lives: no excess melodrama. I’ve told Erika many times to just kill me if she ever catches me lying on my bed, fawning and/or crying over a test message I received. In that same vein, we’ve got business to take care of.

“How’s the search going?” I ask, clearing my thoughts of excess clutter. “Anything new?”

“Nope. Nothing.” She shakes her head and sends a bitter glance towards the sunlit foyer. “There’s still very minor Phantasma manifestations here and there, but by the time I get there, they’re already unsummoned. I detected six last night.”

Ever since I beat one of her trump cards, she’s been keeping me in the loop. If somebody like her thinks I’m a real witch, then I might be capable of something after all.

“One more than the night before that,” I murmur. Not good at all.

“The enemy is acting more brazenly by the day. They seem to be aware of the restrictions of the Order and Syndicate — we might not be able to call upon them for help.”

Whoever’s hunting us seems to know a lot about us. Erika’s boundary would’ve picked up any obvious intruders; they must have taken precautions to not get caught. Somehow.

“I’m going back to investigating properly today. Think I’ve got a lead — my science teacher has been acting suspiciously as of late.”

Erika nods. “Good luck with that. I’ll keep my eyes on the shadows.”

To put it simply, our territory consists of the entirety of Sapphire Isle. That means that we’re allowed to do whatever we want — with some major restrictions — within the region, and Erika has set up a field redirecting all of the leylines’ mana back to our manor. The enemy mage is most certainly trying to test our capabilities before launching an all out attack.

While I trust Erika to protect us both when the time comes for a showdown, we need to do more than that against a smart mage. If they’re able to disrupt and summon within our territory, they must be somewhere in the town itself. They must have some protection against divinations and scans, otherwise, Erika would’ve hunted them down by now. But all the spells in the world can’t protect against some good old sleuthing.

“Oh, another thing.” Erika fiddles with something in her pockets, humming quietly.

“Hm?”

“The situation might be getting more dangerous from here on out. Take this.”

She pulls something ridiculous out of her sleeve: a black revolver. Then, with a small flick of her wrist, flips the gun in the air and holds out the grip to me.

I’m not really sure how to process that. “Where’s this coming from?” I ask, trying to read Erika’s face. I get nothing from her perfect, doll-like features — I get the feeling she’s trying to mess with me again.

“If somebody mundane attacks you, your martial arts techniques might hold up without being augmented with magic.” She flips the revolver back into her hand, and — you sitting down? — she starts spinning it. “Mundane problems require mundane solutions.”

My eye catches on the twirling metal in her hand. It spins forwards, then backwards, reflecting dull shades of light in the corridor — Erika throws it up in the air, catches it, then starts spinning it sideways. She doesn’t even blink as she swaps spinning hands effortlessly. Localized whirlwind.

“Um.”

“What?” She keeps spinning the revolver, then snaps it to the archetypal action-hero-with-gun pose. Still deadpan.

If I wasn’t already leaning against the wall, I might’ve collapsed from shock. “...Where did you learn how to do that?”

“Oh, force of habit.” The revolver spins into another crazy trick — some forwards, backwards, horizontal into toss rotation. “You pick up a few things after living for a while. Your ancestors took a brief trip to the midwest. And I’ve always been very good with my hands. I can show you many tricks, dear.” She sticks her tongue out at me, a little black sliver.

My heart quivers a little. I’m not sure if it’s out of admiration, fear, or some subconscious swoon over a display of pure cool, but it’s definitely doing something. I tear my eyes away from the gun and look into her green eyes.

“I think I’ll pass for now.”

Erika pouts a bit. Still spinning. “Why not? You could start bringing to this your school — you never know when somebody will attack.”

“Okay. No.” I raise my hands and wave away the idea. “That’ll give a lot, lot, lot of people the wrong idea. No.”

“Huh. Suit yourself, then. Have fun tonight.” She starts walking towards the light, whistling a jaunty cow wrangler’s tune, big iron still in hand.

I quickly remind myself that Erika isn’t entirely human. She probably lacks a conscious — I’m her moral compass, most of the time. A rather shitty one, at that. Probably hasn’t been keeping up with the news.

Not entirely sure how she learned something like that. My great, great, great-whatever grandwitch granny must’ve been doing some crazy shit in America when they weren’t in our ancestral land of Germany. I guess that explains how we’re settled in a mysterious tourist town, but shit — goes to show how little I actually know Erika. I’m looking forward to prying more secrets from her when things settle down.

But she does have a point. I haven’t even had time to explore the breakthrough I achieved the other night. If this city is getting dangerous, then I’ll need to find a way to improve my attacking capabilities; just knowing a few moves and basic spells might not be able to cut it anymore. Probably won’t be able to pull another blackhole out of my ass unless those exact conditions appear again — I highly doubt they will.

I take a very deep breath, look at my hands, and wonder if I can spin a gun like that too. I take my keychain out and try to practice as I head back to my room to prepare for the evening.

I’ve got a long night ahead of me.

7:30 PM. The onslaught continues. Felix grabs a speedloader from his belt and jams it into the machine of war. The thing’s gnashing-gear teeth chow down on the clip and reduce it to ammunition. This is only enough to fend off one or two waves — he forces himself into the storage room and picks up as many ammo boxes as his arms allow him to carry.

At the vanguard, Aniya hollors out her commands, one after the other, machine gun fire. “Affogato, Two, Large! Drip:one, Macchiato and special, table three!”

“Damnit, we’re moving as fast as we can! Felix, take the next few — I’m reloading!” Gabriel dives over to the unattended espresso machine and wrestles with the gears and knobs — a gasket spews out a bucket of steam, whistling.

Felix goes. The special takes priority over anything else. He ducks back into the kitchen and relays the command from the frontlines; the poor squadron of four chefs squeak out a confirmation as Felix collects their dishes and sends them into Aniya’s waiting arms.

Chaos. Mortar. Coffee.

This is Block 3’s finest hour.

A battle of unseen proportions rages on in the shop. Among the enemy belligerents, a never-ending horde of sharply dressed businessmen. A flock of tourists from upstate New York (the accents give them away). Old people. A clammy dude who keeps ordering enough espresso shots to put Felix into a depresso streak.

Among the allied forces: One waiter, two baristas, four chefs.

They just don’t stop coming. A tireless wave of death.

Normally, Block 3 would close up and turn people away, especially when the manager proper isn’t here. But this is the first blood of the season. All of these people have seeked out Block 3 due to its reputation for good-ass coffee and delicious soups with paninis. And that means big tips.

To a crowd of impoverished high school students like Felix and friends, a twenty dollar tip is like receiving the holy grail. They’re ready to fight a war over it — not only is the cafe’s reputation at stake, but their futures are on the line as well. Everybody is willing to fight to the death.

But resolve is a fickle thing. Money loses its meaning in the thick of the action. Felix delivers four cups of coffee and the special (a free-range Filet Mignon melt with caramelized onions and truffles and cheese and a side of soup and whatever) to the front. Aniya takes over from there — she charges into abyss, declaring her challenge against the tides of consumerism.

But there’s only more. More and more orders come in. They just can’t keep up. Half an hour of battle later, and the front-end crew is reduced to exhausted blobs of meat. Felix can barely move his arms; this fight actually might be more difficult than Marie’s assault from the other night.

Aniya braces against the counter, panting and huffing. Her blouse is marred with brown and red stains from split foodstuffs. “I can’t handle this anymore,” she mutters, glancing towards the equally pittered out Gabriel.

“As much as I want to go on, I think we need to close up,” says Gabriel, collapsed in a stool. Felix is barely holding on himself — he’s starting to get legitimately dizzy after two hours of straight work.

“Agreed,” Felix says, running his hands underneath cold water. The coffee burns are starting to hurt a bit.

Retail is hell.

But, just as all hope is lost, the back door’s bells ring like the arrival of an angel.

Felix cranes his neck towards the back. Then his breath catches in his throat.

The rest of the part-timers. Aprons uniforms pristine, hair waxed, six brave new souls with war faces on. They’re led by the most chiselled looking Indian guy Felix has ever seen — he might as well be Karna, the demigod hero from the epic Mahabharata. A walking legend.

“We’ll take it from here,” he says, giving the battered vanguard a wink and a smile. Even Felix feels his heart flutter a bit.

They’re saved.

The gang receives a thirty minute break, and they capitalize on it. Hard. It’s a period of licking wounds and unwinding — they may have survived the dinner rush, but the late night still awaits. Who knows if there’s another horde coming in the not-so-dead of night.

“I can’t believe we lived,” Aniya says. She’s drooped over a bench in the tiny break room — looks like she’s melting. “Christ. How am I not dead?”

“The power of money,” says Gabriel, who is currently on his third bottle of protein meal replacement drink. He’s laying on his back, completely pittered out.

Felix has found a nice nook between two lockers to recuperate. This is his corner. It was practically made for him. “Is this normal for retail?” he asks, mostly rhetorically.

“Oh, yeah. Yeah it is.” Gabriel glances over with the look of a grizzled veteran. “Be prepared for the same shit tomorrow. And the day after that. This is tourist season. This is war.”

“Definitely war,” Felix adds. That was practically basic training and then some. He’s not sure how people survive this kind of work — he’s already half dead on his first day back.

In comparison, that ocean-side gig was a cushy affair. It was just busywork that always showed up at the church’s doorstep with promised income in a few months. At this point, Felix is going to be rather perturbed if that job is fake. Daily expenses are starting to wear down his savings, and he’d be happy with a letter of recommendation from surviving this ordeal.

“Don’t be overdramatic.” Aniya picks herself up a bit and frowns. “We have people that would kill for our jobs. Did you see the stack of resumes in the boss’s office?”

“Those are a bunch of lambs to the slaughter. You think a bunch of soft-bellied rich kids could handle this shit?”

“Honestly? I’d like to see them try.”

“Enter the coffee thunderdome.” Gabriel sits up and snaps his fingers at Aniya. “Say, temp-boss, what’s our spoils looking like?”

“Give me a few.”

Said temp-boss shuffles over to a break table and starts punching numbers into a calculator. She takes a fat fanny pack out from underneath her blouse and dumps a mouthwatering amount of green and coins on the table. “I was roughly counting during the shift, but—”

“You were able to count during all of that?!” Felix asks.

Aniya looks at Felix and raises both her eyebrows. Like she just saw him for the very first time. “Well, yeah. Wasn’t too hard to keep a single variable in my head.”

A variable while doing backflips between customers. Maybe not actual backflips, but that’s what it looked like. She’s a red-haired, blue-eyed ninja. “That’s actually incredible. Holy damn.”

“It’s nothing special,” she says, brushing hair away from her face. “I’ve done things that would make your ears bleed.”

“Really? Like what?”

Calculator noises stop. Aniya spins a pen four times, smiles, and points it directly at Felix’s forehead. “I’d have to kill you if I told you.”

Felix is getting some severe deja vu. He raises his hands in resignation.

“Joking. Jeez.” She places the pen back down on the table and goes back to calculator and money magic. “I come from a pretty poor family, so I’ve always been taking odd jobs. Used to be part of the local clergy, but I’ve decided against that sort of life. Not exactly a pious individual, y’know?”

Church. The Order. Felix focuses on the details of Aniya’s face — the shape of her jaw and nose seem familiar. “Do you know the sister in Closure Point?”

“Mh? You mean Sister Jules? Yeah.” She looks up and taps her jaw. “She’s my blood sister.”

“Ah.”

He didn’t expect that one at all. And knowing what he knows now about this town, it seems like everybody has their dark secrets. Best not to pry. For now.

“Have you met her before?”

“Stayed at the church for a bit when I didn’t have a proper place.” He shrugs and avoids disclosing any more information. This girl might kill him instead of Marie doing the deed.

“Mhm. She’s a nice girl, but we don’t keep in touch much these days. Maybe I should try to fix that before I head out of town for uni.” She sighs, then raises the calculator. “But enough about me. I’ve got a ballpark of how much we’ve got.”

That catches Gabriel’s attention. He reanimates and stares directly at the money pile.

“After double checking the cheques we got, we’ve got… around five hundred dollars per person.” Calculator drop. Arms crossed in victory.

Five hundred dollars for three hours of work. Felix feels his wallet engorging in live time — he could buy a lot of good shit with that. This is the biggest pay he’s ever received in a single night. If he had more energy, he’d be down for a victory jig.

“This calls for a victory lap and nap,” Gabriel declares. He gets up, cheers with a pump of his fist, then finds a clean spot to lie down in. “Wake me up this time if we’re closing up. I don’t want to spend another night locked in this terrible place.”

That leaves just Aniya and Felix as the only coherent people in the room. They exchange a glance, then look away from each other. Neither of them seem to be in the chit-chat mood right now, but the silence is a little too awkward. Gabriel’s snoring, the air conditioning is blasting, some ancient pipes are rattling above.

“Guess that takes care of the bills for a while,” Felix says.

“You could say that again,” Aniya says.

“Guess that takes care of the bills for a while,” Felix says. Again.

She looks at him with a slightly amused frown. “Could doesn’t mean should.”

“My brain is broken.”

“...Point taken.”

She starts sorting the tip money for equal distribution. Felix watches bills fly through her hands, sorted into neat stacks in a matter of seconds. Perfectly arranged. Then, about halfway through the process, her delicate pale fingers suddenly crinkle a twenty dollar bill. The sound is like glass breaking in the otherwise eerily silent room.

Aniya looks at the gently snoring Gabriel, then back at Felix. Then she asks a question that causes his mind to stutter and cough up smoke:

“Are you dating Marie?”

I never liked the townhomes. Yet here I am, marching down the rows of completely identical houses during sunset. Not even the beauty of the setting sun can freshen up these blank canvas housing units. Goes to show you how things you don’t like will always come around and taunt you someway, somehow.

My investigation took a grand total of five minutes of paging through a phone book for a certain Noah Elliot Pelchat. The rest was walking and bussing the entire way over.

Like many others, Pelchat cannot actually afford to live in the city he works in. Sapphire Isle is the domain of tourists with too much money on their hands — the real estate value of a shack with a nice view is somewhere in the millions. This funnels all of the locals across the bridge to the swamp mainland, where they use their shack money to construct new homes for themselves.

But wait! This is the part where the contractors that lord over Sapphire Isle set their eyes on an opportunity for profit. So riddle me this. What do you get when you cross money-hungry landlords with an influx of gullible residents?

The answer: the Townhome Row of Sapphire Isle, located across the main bridge and past two swamps. The exact same four-window, picket-fence, white-walled house, copy and pasted, partitioned into two or three sections for renting purposes. Wander around here for long enough and you’ll go mad from the labyrinth of mortgage-induced civilization.

I avert my gaze from the mind-numbing architecture and walk towards the address I saw in the phonebook.

Pelchat’s place is like all the others. House #1932, but this one’s got an New York Yankees flag flying underneath the american one. Never quite took him for a Brooklyn transplant — he never had any sort of accent. None of the lights are on. Nobody’s home, it seems.

His front door is a big red rectangle, a bad practical joke in the whitewash. I brush away the evening shadows licking at the porch with a flashlight and put two knocks on crimson. And because I’m not entirely a savage, I wait for a little while.

Somewhere, the shivering buzz of cicadas. The sound of summer.

Never liked the summers. Besides being too hot and humid, they were always just too wet around here. June and July are the peak of the monsoon season, and — ironically enough — April is the driest season. If it’s already raining every other day around here, I don’t want to imagine how bad it’s going to be this year.

Those damned bugs are the herald of the storm. What I wouldn’t do to just go around and shut each of them up.

I place two more knocks, hard and firm. When nobody answers, I back up to the porch and yell at where the bedrooms should be.

“Oi. Oooooi! Anybody home?” No response. “Didn’t we have an agreement, Noah? You said you’d help me pass if I came to your house today! I’m all ready!”

Still no response. I can feel the neighbors looking at me funny through their window slits, but I was almost certain that his wife would’ve thrown a fit upon hearing something like that from a slightly-unattractive teen.

“Huh. Guess nobody’s home. Hmph.” I roll my shoulders and pull a pair of high abrasion gloves from my pockets. Like a little trespassing, cat burglary, or assault ever stopped me from getting what I want.

Aniya’s demeanor undergoes a sudden shift — she’s on the edge of her seat, trying to strangle Felix with her gaze. She’s riding a second wind of pure emotion; he’s forced to avert his gaze a little. But only a little. Compared to Marie, this girl isn’t that scary. She doesn’t even have glowing green murderer eyes.

“Where’s this coming from?” It’s the only question on Felix’s mind, and the only one he manages to say.

“I’ve heard a few things,” she says, occasionally inspecting her nails. She picks up a letter opener Felix was not previously aware of and begins removing the gunk from her red nails.

There’s no way rumors travel that fast. They can’t. No way.

Felix senses that his life is at risk. He inhales sharply and clenches his throat — every single girl he’s met in this town is terrifying. “I’m staying at her place, but that’s out of extraordinary circumstances — there’s been nothing going on, I swear—”

“You’re lucky that I’m very tolerant. If you like pretending to be a dog, rolling around with a collar, and wearing a ‘tail,’ you have my support. But you stop paying Marie for it. Or else.”

What.

Felix feels his mind do a double-take. His body does a triple take, where in his eyeballs temporarily leave his head for several microseconds from the speed at which he gives himself whiplash with. Brain screams.

Aniya is staring at him with a sober look, completely serious. There is no hint in her face that she’s joking. Eyes firm, mouth creased in a mixture of pity and disdain.

A bad, terrible, godforsaken game of telephone. Felix chokes on his own spit as his mind races to formulate some sort of response.

“Well?”

She spins the miniature dagger in her fingers, catches it in her palm, then rests her chin against her fist, expecting a response.

Much like resolve, loyalty is a fickle thing. The sting of betrayal wraps around his heart as his gaze is dragged towards Gabriel’s snoring body. He feels the brief urge to commit violence, but relents. Barely.

Seeing as words won’t work, he merely points towards the sleeping jock and nods. The effect is instantaneous: Aniya relents, lowering the dagger to the table. Her eyes glaze over as she regards the man on the ground — a single “oh” escapes from her lips, a sigh of shame and disappointment.

The tension in the room evaporates. What remains is two very embarrassed teenagers and one sleeping asshole among the clutter of lockers and supply crates.

“...This kind of thing happen often?” Felix offers.

Aniya holds her head apologetically and groans. “Too often. My apologies.”

Felix grows aware of why there’s so many ridiculous rumors surrounding Marie. He should’ve seen it earlier when Gabriel told him about the time he took down half a football team without her powers. It was only a matter of time before he fell victim to exaggeration — and whatever horrifying process that allowed an accusation of fornication to spiral into utter depravity.

But the confrontation by Aniya is weird. He had scarcely interacted with her before outside of mandatory small talk. Is she really that worried about him?

“I’m not involved romantically with her. Staying at her place, but that’s because she caused me to get evicted.”

This is the cover story he and Marie agreed upon earlier in the day. Whether or not someone will buy it depends on how much they know about Felix — it should arguably be extraordinarily hard to get evicted from a church.

“R-Right.” Aniya is too busy being flustered over her outburst notice the inconsistency. This is both good and bad.

As still-maturing youth, this will be a moment that scars their psyches for the rest of their lives. It will keep them up in the dead of night. Upon their death bed, they will remember this incident and suffer a premature aneurysm before natural causes can take them. Felix sets upon a plan to immediately overwrite this to-be horror with conversation — awkward silence will only make things worse. If all goes well, then maybe they can forget about this incident and never speak of it again.

“So, uh,” he starts, “how’s life?”

“Kill me,” she immediately replies. “Just do it.”

Mission failed. That could have certainly gone better — he runs back to topics they could talk about. Sports? No, she looks too fancy for that. He doesn’t know enough about high school politics to talk about anything, and he doubts she cares about his rather nerdy hobbies.

Marie. That’s it — this girl is Marie’s friend. Once again, she inadvertently saves him from himself. “Say, you’ve known Marie for a while, right? Was she always like this?”

A mention of the name dispels the mental fog clouding Aniya. She shakes herself out of the despair and takes an unsteady breath. “Her? I’ve known her since we were both little. Hasn’t changed much since then.” She winces. “At least, not after the first time she changed.”

Change. Personality shift. Psychosis stems from a young age — Felix scratches the back of his head. “How so?”

“It’s a long story. You sure you want to hear it?”

She seems to be comfortable talking about Marie. They might be close friends.

Felix looks at the clock. Fifteen minutes left in break. “We’ve got time. Touch and go.”

Jackpot. I find an entrance willing to play ball with me, the second story bathroom window. Standing on the windowsill, my fingers find a particular nook in the unlocked window — it slides open an inch, just enough for my hand to get through. But from the next rooftop over, an equally particular raven whispers a caw in my direction.

“Yes, I know,” I whisper, trying my best to ignore the thing, “I made sure there were no witnesses this time. Get off my ass.”

Caw. Caw caw. Caaaaw.

“Yes, yes, I know. Go away already. I’m working.”

But that doesn’t get said raven off my ass — the lecture delivered in caw only grows more insistent. Upon being reminded of the dangerous our mystery mage possesses for the fourth time, I dig a pebble from my pocket, imbue it with a dribble of ether, and flick it; the shot goes wide, a little blue comet. It’s enough to startle the raven — it frantically hops side to side, flapping its wings in distress. Then, when I raise a second pebble, it finally flaps away into the evening.

If that damned bird didn’t belong to Erika, I would’ve plucked it raw and turned it into fucking crow pie. But as it said, I don’t have time to waste on mundanity. I open up the window, push aside pink shades, and slip into Pelchat’s house.

Leaky faucet. Limescale on steel. White tiles. Faint smell of mildew. Over a dozen assorted hair products above the toilet. I double check that nobody is hiding in the shower before daring to enter the hallway.

Two doors on left, one on right. Staircase leading to a living room. Pelchat went funky with his interior design — checkerboard tapestries, old records hung up like paintings, and vinyl cabinets. Seems like he’s one of those people who never got over the death of disco.

None of the lights are on; I make sure to direct my flashlight away from any doorways. Would be a shame to give myself away as am amatuer rogue this early into my career.

I suppose if I were actually on a house robbery gig, I’d be laughing all the way to the pawn shop. Nobody’s home, which means I could steal everything here and probably get away with it. I’ve got all the bells and whistles for an infiltration job. Hair tied back, hood up to prevent leaving hair, gloves, a new pair of shoes; I highly doubt anybody could trace me.

Of course, this is highly illegal, but if I could have just asked for help, I would. Mages are expected to settle their scores without outside interference — what I wouldn’t do to just pawn off the whole ‘enemy mage’ situation to somebody I don’t care about. Hells, I’m already an unrepentant murderer. Like a single charge of trespassing matters compared to that.

But what I’m after is not worldly goods, but just a mere checkup on Pelchat himself. He must know something about Felix — he was the asshole who dumped the guy in my lap in the first place. Something must be up with him.

I step closer to the leftmost set of doors and dim my flashlight to a trickle. The eggwhite doors have two sets of faux-brass rounded door knobs. I tiptoe a few steps closer, then stop — a twang of pain enters the right side of my head.

Another vague premonition. I grit my teeth and focus.

The left door is scratched raw. The flashlight highlights flecks of fallen white paint; there’s a strange, almost hill-shaped pattern leading up to the doorknob. My intuition stabs me again, screaming a very clear message.

Something was trying to get into that room. Vertigo embraces me as I activate a part of my Sigil — I flip the flashlight into an icepick grip and brace my right arm on top of it. A simple circle projects from my palm. A variation of my Gale. Closer quarters, low penetration. Equal firepower to a 9mm x 19 cartridge.

Sweep and clear. I abandon the pretense of stealth and check every corner. I didn’t notice it before, but there are holes and pieces taken out of the carpet and walls. A thousand little knives. Their trail goes down the staircase and leads to a kitchen. Mildew stench grows stronger.

Said kitchen looks like a bomb went off inside. Broken glass, cabinets open. A refrigerator spills white light, revealing smashed open jars of jam. Empty pantry. Shutters are down — tables and broken light bulbs. Headache worsens — I add another amplification ring to my spell.

An assassination. Somebody got here before me and silenced Pelchat before I could get anything out of him. I should’ve expected something like this: whenever mages get involved with each other, death follows. If my enemy has no qualms against involving incidents, then things are about to get real messy.

It could’ve been anything. A swarm of bees. A killer abomination. They already managed to combine two legends into a single eldritch monstrosity. I have no doubts that they could make something small and deadly enough to sneak through a gap and turn Pelchat’s body into meat paste. I’ll have to be extra careful from now on — no telling when a beast might try taking me down in broad daylight. And the assassin may still be here, biding its time in the shadows. I step back towards the living room and search for magical signatures.

Nothing. I perform a clockwise rotation — kitchen, living room, staircase, dining room — and see no active mana. The smell grows strongest near a slightly ajar door between the staircase and living room; I stop and brace myself against the doorway. Darkness beyond.

Be prepared for anything. I take a single deep breath filled with mildew and something sicklier, immediately regret it, then shoulder the door open.

Dark room. Torn paintings, wrecked wallpapers. A scratched glass desk and disemboweled leather office chair. My aim snaps to the first signature I can sense: the north-west corner — only another jolt from my migraine prevents me from eviscerating the corner and blowing a hole through the house.

The pounding in my chest slows when I realize that nothing is moving. I blink several times to clear the adrenaline film over my eyes.

It’s just a normal corner. There’s a little bed on the corner of a fluffy white rug, two silver bowls, a bag of silvery black fur. And as I’m catching my breath, the smell hits me. It’s a very faint smell, but it reaches me through my haze of bloodlust and paranoia and takes a stranglehold on my frontal cortex.

I was wrong. The mildew was only a small part of it. It’s a bitter, cloying, rotten scent, and as I choke and cover my mouth, my brain processes something sweet. If I had to describe it out loud, I’d call it the scent of decaying summer — urine, shit, raw flesh, mustard, tar, talc, mixed in with hate, resignation, sadness, capped off with despair and a whole lot more descriptors that my kind can’t keep up with.

All too well, I can detect exactly where it’s coming from. As my hardened mind beats back the gag-reflex of the soul, I stare down and lower my palm. No need for a spell here.

Lying next to the bowls is a bag of bones and fur, an emaciated thing curled up in the dying evening light. Whatever fury, whatever injustice, whatever rage it once carried had pittered out, abandoning it to its fate. Not a mythological beast, nor an artificial assassin, but an ordinary starved cat.

“She was different, back then.” Aniya nurses a cup of instant coffee, gazing deep into the black surface. “It’s hard to believe, I know.”

Felix is almost tempted to look away from his crappy coffee. Maybe hers magically harbours a rendition of the past that’s locked in her head, a magic mirror for memories. He relents, and instead, stares at the jar of coffee granules beside the electric kettle. “How so?”

“We were just kids when we met.”

As many stories start. Not particularly good ones, most of the time. But Felix keeps that to himself.

“I met her on the first day of middle school.” Aniya sets aside her coffee and stares at the roof, glimpsing a vision he can never see. “I didn’t think much of her at the time — she was just another typical girl with sandy hair. Just like the rest of them.” She shudders. “I didn’t get along well with the other kids. Had no friends from elementary, and I was hardly outgoing — couldn’t even find the drive to make conversation. Just ended up as that one kid who read books in the corner, four eyes included.”

Glasses. She might wear contacts now.

“‘Course, this made me pretty unpopular. Since some of the girls didn’t have much else to do with their time, they started picking on me. Things got pretty bad — I came to school some days with melted lipstick all over my locker. There were lots of rumors floating around. That I was a loser and stuff.” She averts her gaze and sighs. “It seems all so silly and immature now, but back then… I guess I wasn’t really strong enough to handle that.”

A bullied girl. Nobody to turn to. There seems to be an absence of parents in her story — something is off about Aniya, too.

“One particular day, I was getting jeered at by a group of girls. They cornered me in the stairway I liked to eat lunch in — started yelling at me and calling me stupid names. I remember crying and wishing I was anywhere but there.

“But then, a strange girl I had never talked to before appeared behind me on the stairwell. Marie. She looked pretty apathetic — she just tried to walk past me and the girls. But the girls didn’t get out of her way. The leader — I think her name was Catherine — started screaming at the newcomer, too.”

Marie encountered a pack of bullies. Felix can already see where this story is going.

“I can still remember what happened next. Catherine tried to grab the girl in front of me by the collar, and the girl managed to catch her by the wrist. Then she turned around and flipped her directly onto the staircase beside me — I was so shocked that I dropped my jelly sandwich on her face. They panicked and ran away, swearing to get their revenge.”

A full on judo throw. Few adults, let alone barely-teenage children, are capable of such maneuvers. But then again, Felix has already heard several stories already. He managed to survive a first-hand encounter with Marie. This seems completely reasonable in comparison.

“I guess I started following her around after that. And after a while, she started hanging out with me. We’re really good friends now.” Aniya sighs a sentimental sigh, tapping her cheek. The entire ordeal seems like a fond memory to her.

Felix can already point out several inconsistencies. Especially near the end — it sounds like Aniya badgered Marie into becoming her friend. It is very possible that Marie didn’t even notice Aniya following her around until much later, even more so when considering her unnoticed tendencies. Marie tends to mumble what’s on her mind without realizing it.

But Felix doesn’t want to ruin her rose-tinted memory. Especially when she’s got a letter opener nearby.

“Some people never change,” Felix comments, not knowing what else to say.

“Marie changed a lot between highschool and middle school. But that part of her hasn’t.” Aniya blushes, smiling faintly in his direction. “She’s a lot more reserved now, but I like her better that way.”

Aniya’s story doesn’t actually explain what happened to Marie that made her so different. Felix imagines it might be something involving magic, but he can’t be sure. There are other supernatural elements in play here, and he only has a single card of knowledge right now. Needs more to even play a hand.

Plus, Felix isn’t entirely dense about other people’s emotions. It seems like Aniya still has a lingering infatuation with Marie — he wishes her the best of luck with that venture. Although he can appreciate Marie as a friend, the idea of further getting involved with a violent, impulsive, crude, and magical girl with a murderous guardian is an absolutely terrible idea. He enjoys living, thank you very much.

He begins to ask about both topics, but the break buzzer cuts him off. Gabriel pops off the floor and lands on his knees, bewildered and wild-eyed. “Atttttteeeenetion!” he yells, a half-decent impression of a drill sergeant.

“The break’s over already?” Aniya says, glancing at the clock.

Felix merely shrugs and sets a mental reminder to investigate all of these things at a later date. He glances at his wristwatch. 8:00 PM — Second skirmish. The sounds of battle still rage on outside of the bunker door.

True to her words, the break is already over. Time can fly by you if you’re not paying attention. Felix scribes this fact and stores it in the filing cabinet of his brain, preferably to be uncovered before a period of listless procrastination.

Momo.

That’s the name etched into a little fish-shaped collar-tag on the cat’s corpse. I pull back and piece together the scene in my head.

Sometime after Pelchat called in sick, his cat stopped receiving food and water. It scoured the entire house, trying to break through windows, scratching up walls, tearing up carpets, redecorating paint jobs, all in an attempt to find something to eat or drink. It couldn’t find any water — the kitchen spout is nearly rusted shut; no way a cat could open this — so its body began shutting down. It must’ve gotten real desperate to get into the bathrooms, but the doors are completely cat proof. Specialty lock.

A victim of circumstance. Had any variable, any condition, any factor been different, it could’ve lived long enough for me to get here — and probably tear my face off. But still, I can’t help but feel a twang of pity. I cover the body with a cat-sized blanket from its bed and place a finger to my lips.

“I’ll be right back. Just wait right here,” I mutter, heading back upstairs.

What I suspect to be the bedroom door is locked. It’s one of those in-door locks that only set the knob in place, not the bolt itself. I take out Erika’s credit card and swipe it open.

Pelchat’s bedroom is a pristine grey box. Two wilted ferns sit on top of a black dresser, a shelf barely holds onto a swell of photographs and baseball memorabilia, and above a queen sized bed, an oily replica of Van Gogh’s The Starry Night practically shimmers underneath two beams of light. And on the bed itself is a scene befitting a fairy tale, rather than anything found in suburbia.

Two lovers, framed by stage light, resting hand-in-hand underneath fine silken quilts. A handsome man beside an ordinary girl, laying side-by-side, blissfully unaware of the passage of time. Between them is a decaying rose and a pristine, yet small book.

Pelchat and his wife. They seem to be sleeping — their expressions are so content, so peaceful, so euphoric that I’d feel a little bad trying to wake them up. Rather, I’d feel bad if I could actually wake them up.

I grab Pelchat by the shoulder and send a pulse of mana through his body. Not my usual anti-material technique, but a gentle dribble, an echo pulse meant to detect the presence of any magic.

There is no shortage of magic in his body.

An invisible flower has taken root in his chest. Instead of draining vitality, it amplifies and returns it tenfold to his body. Pelchat has never been healthier, and I doubt he ever will.

But there’s one problem with that. He’s fast asleep, sealed in a dream he won’t be waking from. I’m an amatuer at runecraft, but I can tell that flower is a combination of two very potent runes — a rune of joy and a rune of death.

Joy in death. In this case, joy in a dream. No doubt a kind spell, but kindness can cut like a knife. I can sense the mana generated from the Pelchat family’s dreams flowing away from them, beacons emitting signals into the lonely night. They lead out the window, twisting and coiling in barely detectable trails towards the coast. Funneled somewhere else.

I pick up the pristine white book and crack its spine open. Inside, expended runes hidden in a front cover poem:

Sleep, sleep, dreams alight,

Joy to thee tonight;

Sleep, sleep; in thy sleep

Cast waking worries deep.

Kindred soul, in thy mind,

Strange desires I can find,

Secret hopes and unfulfilled desires,

Stroke unseen sparks and fires.

Dig in towards that feel,

Unveil whatever wished real

O’er thy cheek, and o’er thy breast

Where thy heart doth rest.

O the dreadful worries that sneak

In thy heart, harrowed and bleak!

When thy heart doth seek rest,

Then dream and sleep at thou’s behest.

The rest of the book is just a howto on sleeping techniques. No ISBN or copyright page — this tome was created without consideration for the modern world. Not that poem like this would ever make money.

Pelchat willingly read this, perhaps already knowing of its effects. A quick search of the bedroom uncovers some basic esoteric (yet completely bullshit) manuals, a small bag filled with coal and chains, pointless baubles and beads. Talismans that don’t actually work and even a small vial of gecko’s blood — my hand bumps into a framed photograph. A snapshot of everyday life for Noah Elliot Pelchat; he stands beside his wife and Momo on a sunny beach day. I set it aside and pocket the gecko’s blood and white book for myself.

Somebody managed to con Pelchat into locking himself and his wife into a magical stasis, and now they serve as magical batteries for the enemy mage. Not too bad of a move, if I say so myself. I probably can’t dispel these runes without outright killing them — I’ll have to ask Erika after we trace the destination of this miniature artificial leyline. It’s a lead, but I’ve got one obligation to take care of here.

I stand in the doorway of Pelchat’s office for a while, staring at the corner. Where an unrelated, unknown cat spent its last moments.

A victim of circumstance. I can’t say I even feel remotely bad for this cat. Pets die like this all the time. A lot of them die like this — you could fill an entire mortuary of creatures, animals, all manner of beings who were merely in the wrong place at the wrong time. This cat ended up as an unintended casualty, given the preservative nature of the runes ensnaring Pelchat.

But I can feel a bit of sympathy for the poor thing. I might’ve ended up just like it, were it not for the unlikely intervention of my shadow. Death is all the same — a realm not even magic can reach. But as a soul still waiting on the docks of the Styx, a girl who lives an unlikely, improbable, and frankly impossible life, I have to pay my dues to those who end up on the same path.

I bend down and cover the departed cat, smiling gently. It might be a long night still, but I’ll do what I can.

“Momo, was it? You look tired. C’mon, I’ve got a place for you to rest.”