Chapter 92: Practicing Magic

I felt hands clutching my arm.

As I dragged myself to a sitting position, the ringing in my ears and the spots in my eyes cleared. I realized the agony in my shoulder was just an echo, a memory, the nerves weren’t really screaming that my arm was gone –

Lena threw her arms around my shoulders, both of which were, against all reason, intact. “Holy shit, Cam. Are you okay?”

“I’m fine.” I reached over to hug her back. My body didn’t protest compressing muscles that my brain was sure had been ripped apart. “I’m fine, Lena.”

She blinked tears out of her eyes and squeezed me. “You better be.”

“I am. Promise.” I kissed her forehead; when she looked up, I kissed her lips, too.

She sagged against me.

We stayed like that long enough for me to convince myself that I really was fine, and maybe a little longer. Maybe a lot longer. Eventually, reluctantly, I hauled us both to our feet.

“Nice hit,” Zhizhi said. “Now let’s do it again, but this time, Lena doesn’t break character.”

“Hey!” Lena glared at her. “Cam could have been legit hurt.”

“Are you?” Zhizhi asked me.

I rubbed my shoulder. “Only in my imagination.”

“Not your pride?” Her head tilted microscopically, then she shrugged. I didn’t understand her reaction, and she pushed on too quickly for me to think about it. “We don’t have to do the hat thing again. I’ll just cut around the break.”

Lena’s head drooped. “I don’t want to go that hard again.”

“I really am fine,” I said.

Her fist tapped against my arm. “I know! We shouldn’t burn through your HP, though. Anyway, I shouldn’t show that move off on camera until I’ve mastered a better one.”

I pushed past the memory of pain and thought about the technique she’d used. With the one Earth she’d picked up the day before, she’d shaped her Iron into a lance – or a missile. She’d switched to Air to give it a burst of forward momentum, then, just as it smashed into my shield, poured on the Fire.

When I scanned the ground with my phone, I saw the rubble that had been my shield. I didn’t think Iron would have allowed me to block; however much I hated it, I was going to have to learn to parry.

I bent over and gave Lena a peck on the cheek. “We should workshop how hard of a hit you want to record.”

Either to the kiss or my suggestion, she said, “Mmhm!”

Zhizhi lowered her camera. “In that case, I’m going to take five. Anybody else want Gatorade?”

Nobody did.

“Why don’t you hobble over and sit down, Cam,” Lena said. “If we’re not filming, that’s a chance for Erin and Michelle to get some practice, yeah?”

“Good call.” If Donica hadn’t been watching, I would have put on an exaggerated limp to try to make Lena laugh. Instead, I strode over to the open tailgate of the Yukon, where Donica sat and sipped water from a plastic bottle.

“Here to join the injured reserve?” she asked.

I looked away. “You know I’m not actually hurt.”

“But you are actually running out of HP.”

“Yeah.” I sank onto the tailgate beside her. Bernie pressed against my leg, so I started petting him.

Donica said nothing else, and I thought she might drop it.

I watched Erin and Michelle put on smart glasses and strap their phones to their chest harnesses. I had the harness but not the glasses. I wondered if that would come back to bite me in the ass.

Erin paced in a circle while Michelle stretched in place. Lena stood between them, not even conjuring an object, looking completely at ease. She waved to me and mimed a scratching motion. I gave Bernie another blast of attention and got a nod in return.

“I don’t think you ever explained,” Donica said, “why your HP doesn’t come back.”

“No,” I said. “I guess I didn’t.”

She eyed me. “Are you going to make me ask?”

I sighed. “I wasn’t trying to hide it, I don’t think. It just feels weird to say. I didn’t know at the time, but in retrospect, it’s like a dev gave me an unfair advantage.”

“Your HP not regenerating every night is an advantage?”

“I have ten HP,” I said.

She blinked.

“Max,” I said.

“Bullshit,” she said.

“It’s true. You can check my phone.” I leaned back into the Yukon’s trunk and rested against the PC stowed in my luggage. “Ten max HP and ten max MP.”

Donica folded her arms. I supposed she thought I was trolling her.

“It happened while Lena and I were trying to film our first video.” I closed my eyes. A smile spread across my face as I remembered cooler, crisper air, the snow on the ground, Lena’s first take as The Magnificent Ashbird. And, of course, what happened next. “This is back when we were worried about Third Eye getting canceled over PVP. Back when Erin and I were the only people in our group with Reactants. If I didn’t get a workable video out of my ten MP, we’d have to wait a day to film it.”

Donica tapped her foot.

“While we were recording in the park, Albie –”

“The little girl you believe is one of Third Eye’s developers,” Donica said.

Stolen novel; please report.

I nodded. “– she came up and wanted to play with us. Honestly, I was gonna be a dick about it and try to let her down easily, but Lena convinced me. I ended up learning more about Air in a half hour playing catch with that little girl than I would have in a month of practice.”

Donica kicked at the asphalt. With her good leg, thankfully. “I saw what she could do. I don’t doubt it.”

“Since you saw, I’m sure you won’t be surprised that I lost the game of catch.”

“That wouldn’t have surprised me anyway.”

Now it was my turn to eye Donica. She was smiling, though, maybe the gentlest smile I’d ever seen on her face.

She nudged my arm. “Finish your story before I get bored.”

“Right,” I said. “The long and short of it is, it took one clean hit from Albie to drop my HP. When she realized I had so little and she’d ruined our video shoot, she got really upset. She insisted I accept a Potion, which not only got me back in the game, it overhealed me. HP and MP both.”

“By how much?”

“9,999,” I said.

“Jesus. How much have you got left?”

I checked my phone.

I winced.

I showed her.

She took a long time looking at the numbers. In fairness, they were displayed in awful neon green against the Third Eye app’s gray background.

8,825/10 MP, still by far the most of anyone we knew.

917/10 HP. Second most on the team, but mine weren’t coming back. Lena’s regenerated to more than that every day.

Donica said, “Fuck.”

I nodded.

“Your plan is terrible, Cameron,” she said.

“My plan doesn’t require me to win a fight.”

“Are you sure? Do you realize how much better at this you and Lena are than Erin and Michelle?”

“We’re not that far ahead.” I shrugged. “Anyway, that’s why they need the practice.”

Donica scowled. I realized she wasn’t reacting to what I’d said when I followed her gaze.

Lena stood between Erin and Michelle on the dry grass. She was, in theory, on the defensive, flanked. What did they call it in basketball? Double teamed.

If this was a double team, it was a couple of amateurs failing miserably to contain a pro.

Michelle had more Air than Lena. Erin had all four Reactants to draw upon.

It didn’t matter.

Lena danced between half hearted attacks, her Stone shield ping ponging back and forth seemingly more so she could practice moving it than because she had any need to block.

She feinted a strike at Michelle, and the latter cried out and scrambled backwards, her own Stone deselected and lost. Erin gasped and lunged with Stone made red-hot by Fire, but see “feinted” above; Lena had never committed to an attack, so it was simplicity itself for her to flick the object she’d manifested backwards to serve as a shield. Smoothly, she turned the tumbling Stone into an attack that bowled Erin to the ground.

I couldn’t help but beam at the way Lena fought now.

Air helped, of course, but a lot of it came down to her skill. She moved with an easy confidence she hadn’t shown in her match with Matt, or even when we fought Mask together.

How did she compare to those two now? Like this, she would’ve crushed Matt, even with the rules of their match compensating for his lower HP total. I suspected she could’ve beaten Mask as he was that first night we fought him, but of course, I knew all too well he was growing stronger every day, too.

How did Lena compare to me? I hadn’t exactly covered myself in glory so far today, and I couldn’t match her attacks for raw power, but I knew I could keep up with her speed and then some. If we fought seriously, I suspected the match would hinge on whether I could pressure her too much for her to build up to an attack like the one she’d dropped me with. I didn’t dare engage in a war of attrition when it came to HP, with her or anyone else, but MP? I still had tons to burn, whereas Lena’s total was struggling to keep up with the costs of her stronger techniques.

One thing was for sure. We both looked like we were playing a different game from Erin and Michelle.

They stood up and dusted themselves off. They glanced at the Yukon. They averted their eyes.

I applauded.

“Keep it up, ladies,” I called. “That’s the spirit. You’ve got to commit to your attacks, though, really go for it. Your HP mean the worst that’s going to happen is it hurts for a minute, right?”

Lena put a hand on her hip, though she kept waving her other finger to keep her Stone selected. “Hey! Whose side are you on, Cam?”

I grinned. “The side of everybody getting better at Third Eye.”

She flashed a thumbs up. “You’re giving the right advice, then. The best thing you can do in any game is whole-ass it!”

The way she said it made me laugh, but where Third Eye was concerned, she’d hit the nail on the head. The difference in her motion – and, I hoped, mine – was that we’d been forced to learn to be decisive with our every move.

“A little pain and losing some HP is not even close to the worst thing that could happen,” Michelle muttered.

“Against Mask, no,” I said. “Lena’s not going to hit you when you’re down.”

“Not unless you really piss me off,” Lena said.

Michelle flinched.

Lena rolled her eyes, but then her smile softened and she trudged over to pat Michelle’s arm. “I’m kidding, okay? Let’s go another round.”

Michelle gave a ragged nod. “I’ll try.”

I clapped again. “You’ve got as much Air as me. You saw how fast I was whipping my shield around. The only thing stopping you from doing that is the fact you don’t realize you can yet. If you attack that quickly, Lena literally can’t get her shield in place fast enough to stop you. Neither can Mask, for what it’s worth.”

“You didn’t get any hits in,” Michelle said.

“That wasn’t the story we were telling with the video.” I hated having to attack Lena, to give her even momentary pain, but I understood our need to practice enough that I would push past that, same as she had. “I’ll get my licks in when we film the second half in a few minutes. You want me to tag in now and show you?”

She shook her head. “No, I understand. I’ll go again.”

“You got this,” I said.

“You do,” Lena said.

Erin had returned to her position and stood with one hand clasping her other wrist. Her fingers drummed against her denim skirt – outside of Third Eye – or her cream-colored imperial dress – through its filter –, keeping her Stone selected. I noticed that she’d swapped it to a different Reactant during the lull to keep it from getting damaged by continuous Fire.

Smart, but her whole posture seemed wrong to me. She looked like she was trying to disappear, not trying to win. Unfortunately, Third Eye hadn’t offered us invisibility.

“Erin,” I said.

She fidgeted.

I scratched the back of my neck. I felt an urge to glance at Donica, but I didn’t dare. I lowered my voice. “Listen, if I’m being a dick, saying this stuff, let me know, okay?”

“No,” Erin said. “You’ve done more PVP than us, you’ve faced that creature, and you’ve played with Miss Albie. If you see something I’m doing wrong, please, tell me.”

I nodded, but hesitated. “It’s tougher, because you don’t have as much Air as I do. The things we attempt are going to be different. I guess it’s probably not going to work to tell you to have fun with it?”

“I’m trying to enjoy the practice, at least.” She shrank further in on herself. “It just isn’t my thing, though.”

“Fair.” I chewed my lip. “Even if you can’t have fun with it, I think the best advice I can give you is, ‘be creative.’ You’ve got all four Reactants, and you’ve studied the mechanics of this game more than maybe any other player. You can do things nobody else we know would even think to attempt, and that’s going to be your superpower.”

Erin touched the bridge of her glasses. After a moment, she nodded. “I have a few ideas I should test.”

“Can’t wait to see,” I said.

I sat again as the practice session resumed. I felt a weight settle onto my lap and glanced down to see Bernie’s plushie form.

A minute passed. Bernie’s contented murmur and the ringing of Stone against Stone seemed like the only sounds for miles.

I almost jumped when Donica spoke, even though her voice was softer than I was used to. “You wouldn’t be an awful coach, Cameron.”

For some reason, praise from her, especially about something I had to assume she knew a lot about, made me shrink in on myself. I stroked Bernie’s back and mumbled, “Thanks.”

Of course, Donica had to go and ruin the moment.

As Lena smashed aside Erin’s conjured net and pivoted to dump Michelle on her ass, Donica added, “Trouble is, you can’t scout players for shit.”