Learning magic is very, very hard. Some days, it seems impossible, and I almost give up. But then I remember that it's Magic, the mystical force I'm slowly realizing should have always been with me, and I somehow dredge up the energy to try again, and again, and again.

My current obstacle seems insurmountable. I can reliably call forth a bit of magical energy and then allow it to travel along any of my limbs, but once it exits my body, it collapses into a random effect. Magic does not like to be controlled. I've also come to the realisation that it was most likely never meant to be controlled either.

But, it is possible. I know. And so I keep up.

***

A month later, and I've not made any headway. I learned much about history and current events, some small gems on magical theory that are applicable to me, and I refined what I could already do. I've also begun to train with the sword, finding time between my now habitual meditation and the random work I do for Neetu. One of his friends, an overly bearded man named Daruk, shows me a few forms, corrects my stance and how I hold the blade, and then effortlessly disarms me.

I don't learn much in the area of tactics, or technique, but my arm strengthens and I learn how to swing a sword without dislocating my wrist. I also attempt to build some dexterity by twirling it around, with mixed success.

All things considered, I still preferred my staff, because it allowed me to jab Daruk in the stomach before he could slap the inside of my wrist with the flat edge of his own sword. How was I supposed to compete with him, anway? He's like three meters tall, and his sword is at least as long as my entire body.

***

One evening, just after I’ve gotten back from practice with Daruk, an Agent steps into the Inn. Its mechanical eyes glow menacingly as it sweeps the area. The moment it sets its foot through the door, all conversation stops, and all eyes turn to it.

It begins walking toward Neetu, who has paused mid-wipe, dirty rag in hand, his eye set in a very closed expression. Behind, several more Agents file through the door, and form a Phalanx against the patrons following their every move.

All of them have very sinister-looking energy weapons slung over their metallic shoulders.

The leader stops before the bar, and bends forward at the hip to loom over Neetu. It looks a little ridiculous from this angle, but I can tell what it's going for.

Its voice is very audible in the dead-silent Inn, and only holds a very slight hint of its mechanical nature.

"We have received information that you are hiding a fugitive. Do you wish to comment?"

I tried to sink deeper into my booth, and luckily, the Phalanx seems to be eyeing the more threatening-looking patrons, rather than my corner.

"Not particularly, no." was Neetu's reply. There wasn't a hint of joviality in his voice.

The Agent bends backwards, and sweeps the room once more.

"Would it change your mind to know that this fugitive is responsible for the crisis that is currently crippling Nexus operations?"

"No. And I ask you to vacate my inn."

"How disappointing. I suppose we will need to commence a search."

And then, several things happen at once.

The first is that Daruk twitches his hand toward the blade slung over his back.

In response to this, three of the Phalanx whip out their future-guns, and train them on him.

In response to that, everyone else in the common room pulls weaponry from various places.

While all that is happening, the first Agent's gaze lands in the corner I am sitting in, and it's eyes widen. It takes a step toward me, grabbing for the rifle slung over its back, only for it to explode as the metal hand closed around the grip, throwing the android to the ground and showering the room in burning green plasma.

Several of the patrons are suddenly encased in bubbles of energy, and all hell breaks loose. Daruk roars and rips the longsword from its scabbard, bringing it down on the closest Agent, cleaving it in half. He turns toward the next, only to be felled by a bolt of blue lightning to the chest. Several patrons take offense to that, and begin firing wildly at the Agents in their midst, the multicolored lights and physical projectiles glancing off their own energy shields. Then the Agents start shooting their own rifles, and a few more people fall with holes burned through their bodies.

For my part, I quickly snatch up Raven and dive under the table, bolts of light whizzing by and scorching the table above. As I look around for a better place to hide, something grabs my ankle and I look down to see the disembodied torso of the lead agent slowly pulling itself toward me, the glowing eyes burning with hatred. The sole of my boot connects to its face with a Crunch, and it is thrown backwards, one of the lights having gone out permanently.

I quickly sprint across the floor and towards the bar, dodging the occasional shot by the five remaining agents entrenched at the center of the room. Flinging myself behind it, I'm unsurprised to find Neetu, slightly squished against the floor but occasionally peeking up with a pistol of his own and firing slugs at the entrenched agents.

"You alright there?" He asks between shots.

"Had to kick a guy in the face, but I'm alright. What the hell do we do though!?"

A stray bolt of energy hits the bottles above, causing a small explosion and throwing the two of us to the floor.

"I have an idea," he shouts over the sound of clashing swords, "but I need to access the console on my bar for that!"

"That's suicide! They'll get you for sure!"

"Not if there's a distraction, like some of that weird chaos magic Ska says you can do!"

My eyes widen, and I grin.

"Alright, give me a second!"

I focus a little, the process harder than usual because of the noisy environment, but manage to call forth a steady stream of the mystical energy.

"Alright, NOW!"

And then I stand up, thrusting my arm in the general direction of the entrenched Agents, and let loose with a shout of "FRY, YOU FUCKERS!"

The Magic shoots through my arm, burning along the faded scar, then into my hand, and with a crack of thunder and a flash of light, lightning arcs from my fingertips. It jumps towards every metal object in the room, and some of the patrons have to drop their weapons to avoid being shocked.

However, most of the metal in the room isn't in them, but in the Agents. The electricity crashes against their energy barrier, reflecting off but then looping back around, attracted to their bodies themselves. It batters the barrier until one segment collapses, and the bulk of the energy jumps through the gap directly into their metal frames. The overload sends most of them sparking and twitching to the floor.

Neetu, meanwhile, whirls his appendages across the keyboard embedded in the wooden counter next to me. Somewhere below us, there is a mechanical Clang, and then a wave of energy floods through the room, carrying four of the remaining Agents, including the disembodied torso of the lead one, through the door.

I lower my arm, a few arcs of electricity jumping across my fingertips and to the counter, and feel an exhaustion deeper than any I'd never felt before. The last thing I hear before I topple over is the cheer of the crowd, and then rushing air as I fall backwards into unconsciousness.

***

"...almost completely drained!"

"It'll hold for a while still. We just need to figure out a way to access the Gateway."

The words filtered through the bone-deep exhaustion that had apparently fallen over me.

"Here, drink this, it'll help," rumbled a deep voice, and a cup of something was pressed to my lips. I took a sip, and immediately felt energy course through me. A few more, I could hold the cup on my own.

"Keep drinking the restorative, and you'll be on your feet in a minute." Said the same voice, which I now saw was coming from a patron I'd seen in the inn before. Not very talkative, but studied in various healing arts. Solomon? Salomon? Something like that.

"Thank you."

Sitting up, I winced through the spike of migraine, and looked around. I was situated on top of one of the tables, the rest of them stacked in one of the corners. The other corner held a pile of scrap that had apparently been swept there. By the door, which was filled with a green-blue wall of light, stood Neetu and a patron I didn't recognize. They were prodding at the barrier, occasionally hissing at each other.

The rest of the Patrons were in various states of gear, some of them had donned their personal combat armor, others had discarded it on the floor and were nursing drinks and/or attending to various injuries. Speaking of injuries, I looked at my organic arm, and immediately had to look away. The faded, leidenfrost-like scar had become prominent once again, and apparently branched out slightly. Looking in morbid fascination, I could see the vivid, scorched-black skin slowly fade back into a normal color.

That was probably a little too much magic.

There was a slight tremor, and a bit of dust came down from the ceiling, hitting my leg.

"What was that?" I asked, brushing at it.

"That, my dear, is our current problem." rumbled the same voice from next to me.

"Amelia! You're awake! Gave us quite a scare back there. We owe you thanks. The Agents aren't to be trifled with."

Many of the patrons nodded, and one of them nodded toward a row of shapes in the corner, covered in sheets of linen.

The dead.

***

The tremors steadily grew in intensity and frequency. The barrier was set up to completely block three things - physical matter, energy and magic. However, this also had the function of blocking any form of detection, so we didn't know for sure what was going on outside. Neetu's best guess were siege weapons, and if he was right, then we were in deep shit.

"The barrier normally draws energy from the gateway, same as everything else here. We're technically stealing power, but that's a moot point, because the Nexus has a virtually infinite supply. Seriously, they can synthesize matter and not break a sweat. It's curious that we're still bleeding energy. Either the barrier is damaged, their weapons are insanely powerful, or someone has put a stopper into our supply."

We were currently in the deepest basement, a rough chamber hewn from the undefinable rock of the platform. At its center, there was a stalagmite, upon which a cube was balanced on one corner. The cube was covered in concentric circles of runes, arrayed in clusters of three. It was also pulsing softly in concert with every tremor.

"You know, I never thought this would happen when you stumbled into my inn. I'd set you up, and then you'd be out of my hair, and I could return to my vaguely criminal ways. And now, I'm facing the destruction of my Inn."

"Do you regret it? Taking us in, I mean?"

"No. Although the inn is old, probably older than you can imagine, in the end, it's just a building. I knew this would happen eventually. If it has to happen now, then it has to happen now."

"For what it's worth, I'm sorry for dragging you into my wake. My mother always called it a family curse, we always seemed to be caught up in one catastrophe or the other."

"Eh, as I said, in the end, it's just a building. I can lay low for a while, and then rebuild. Time's not really a problem after all."

"What do you mean?"

He chuckled.

"I guess nobody told you? A free mind is ageless."

And he swept out of the room.

I stared after him for a minute.

***

"What do we do, Neetu?"

Back in the common room, I was unsurprised to find the same people. Really, what would have changed? We were trapped in here, the barrier slowly chipping away outside.

I'd found Raven somewhere, she'd been dragging my old pack after her. Inside was everything I couldn't do without. My staff was also still strapped to it. She'd crawed at me, so I'd shouldered it and placed her on my shoulder, laughing at the put-upon expression on her avian face. Funny how that works.

"I don't know, Solomon. I just don't know."

Everyone was arrayed in a circle, brainstorming. There were suggestions of running out, screaming. Intimidation. One guy wanted to surrender, but was quickly shouted down.

I got an idea.

"Hey Neetu, how does the barrier work?"

A few heads turned, and Neetu went over to me.

"Why do you ask?"

"Just an idea, but I don't know if it could work."

"Run it by me, please. We're getting a little desperate." he pleaded, and as if to accentuate his point, the room shook from the siege attack outside.

"Well... I can see that the Barrier isn't just a bubble around everything, right? I mean, it seems to be more of a membrane over everything. If that is so, could you theoretically modify it to protect only this room? That may buy us some time."

"That... that might just work. Hold on a second."

He stalked over to a small group of patrons, and they spoke in hushed tones. One by one, they lit up, and then walked over to me.

"Human, you're a genius! We were so concentrated on increasing the energy supply that we didn't consider the field shape itself! Come with us, we have to move the barrier stone up here, but I believe you've just bought us a few more hours." Said one of them, a feeble-looking person with autumn leaves for hair.

We quickly rushed back into the sub-basement, and our small group got to work extracting the barrier stone.

Once that was done, it was deposited in my arms with the instruction "don't drop it".

Rushing back upstairs into the common room, the small group of what I now assumed were alien-nerds quickly got to work with the scrap left over from the destroyed agents, and placed the barrier stone inside its new harness just as the wall of light began flickering. Once it floated serenely above the repurposed claw-like end piece of one of their rifles, the barrier blazed to life once again, and the tremors stopped.

"There, that should hold for a while longer. We're trapped in here now, though." Said Neetu to the room at large, and a few sparse cheers went up. Morale wasn't so low anymore. One or two more days, enough to plan.

Enough to survive.

***

It was Reyl, the leaf-man, who eventually came up with a viable plan to get us out.

"Extrapolating from your idea, human," he nodded toward me over the table, "perhaps it would be possible to move the barrier again. By locking its position in space to the barrier stone, we could in theory move the new harness and with it, the barrier. If we walk it outside, and manage to encompass the gateway, one of us could get to work either fixing the barrier's energy supply, or just dialling us out if there isn't a lockdown on it."

Quickly, heads were nodding, hands were gesturing and diagrams were drawn; One of the group dug through his pockets and emerged with a chisel, and the painstaking work of altering the barrier stone's enchantment began.

During Ska'an's tutoring, they sometimes took a bit of time for magical theory. Of course, they knew most about their own magic, as well as Neetu's (and wasn't that a surprise! Apparently, while unable to cast active magic, Neetu's homeworld had specialized in object enchanting. I tried asking him, but he locked up and wouldn't tell me anything. Eventually, I left it be), and one rule always popped up - never, ever, ever attempt to alter, change or calibrate something magical while it's on. Logical, right? Turn things off when you tinker.

However, we couldn't exactly disable the barrier while there were siege weapons outside, so we had to make do. A set of plastic tongs and welding goggles, as well as a large barrier of tables would shield everyone in the room, while Reyl would attempt to engrave a new set of runes. Luckily, the alteration was small, and wouldn't dig too deeply into the enchantment's main function.

Still, all of us waited with bated breath.

Then, a shout of victory, and we slowly raised our heads above the makeshift barrier.

Reyl was there, sitting on a bench. Upon the stone, there was now a small marring, one of the corners had been completely etched out, glowing from within in vivid orange.

We cheered.

***

"Alright, everyone ready?"

All of us gave affirmative.

"Then let's move out!" Shouted Neetu, and I slowly inched forward, the small harness holding the barrier stone balanced in my hands. All of us let out a breath once the wall of light began moving with me, and we slowly made our way out of the door, the barrier slowly forming a cube around us.

I could feel the impacts on the stone, it wobbled and pulsed, but the wall of light seemed to hold.

After several minutes, we finally reached the Gateway, the large orb laying dormant before us. Not even the slight glow when it was inactive shone from within, it was just... dead.

"Alright Reyl, Ze, Ger, get to work! We don't have all day" Barks Neetu, and the three swarm around the Gateway, prodding and twisting at it.

My arms ache. This thing is fucking HEAVY.

I still feel the bone-deep exhaustion from before, but it was contained within said bones.

Feels a lot like when you're dead tired and then drink a cup of coffee.

The Gateway sparks to life, but then fades again. All around, faces fall.

The impacts from outside increase in frequency, and the barrier stone begins to wobble.

It sparks, and the barrier becomes transparent for a mere instant.

Shouts of alarm break out amongst the crowd, and I almost fall in shock - there were a lot of things out there.

Large guns, a crowd of those fucking Agent robots. Jesus.

The Gateway makes a low humming sound, and its inner light begins to shine.

"Alright, lads! We've managed to connect to a subnetwork, so no nexus adresses! Just follow the guy before you, and keep moving on the other side!"

Everyone begins filing through the thrumming gateway, whose noise slowly increases in pitch.

Me and Neetu are the last on the platform.

"Alright, Amelia, just set down the stone and then jump through after me."

He walks into the orb, and I take a breath.

The harness sparks again, and falls apart in my hands.

Scrambling wildly, I manage to grab the carved stone and the weird claw thing, but the rest of the device returns to being scrap.

The barrier fades.

I start running, sprinting at the orb.

Behind me, I feel rather than hear a massive impact, and am thrown forward, curling into a protective ball around Raven.

Just as I pass through the jelly-like surface, I feel a crackle on the back of my neck, and the Gateway collapses with me inside.

The ride feels more bumpy than usual, and I am intimately and horrifyingly aware of the collapsing passage behind me as my currently-an-energy-charge body is hurled through it.

I emerge in an explosion, and am sent flying. Did this end collapse too?

The impact into a hard surface drives all the air from my lungs. I have one last thought before blacking out.

This happens way too fucking often.