Jones clambered up onto the vehicle next to Kyle. He’d intended to try and help save Anna from the start. But the reminder that he could draw on the ambient magic to perform feats of sorcery far beyond his normal capacity had calmed his galloping heart. It was weird that it hadn’t occurred to him before Kyle had mentioned it.

Kyle turned to face the milling herd. Some were keenly watching them, looking for an opportunity to attack. Others were actively gnawing their way through the walls of buildings or widening holes where glass doors had once been. The normally goofy warlock who sang along with the jingles he used as cell phone ring tones, had narrowed his hazel eyes. The light of laughter was gone from them, replaced with keen seriousness.

“You should stay here, Jones.” Kyle was quiet enough that only Jones could hear him.

“I’m going to help you.” The Specialist insisted. He wasn’t full of bravado, just determined to do the right thing, protect the American people like he was paid to.

“Anna is my priority. If it comes down to it, I will sacrifice every single other person in that hellscape to get my baby sister out.” He turned his intense gaze to Jones who met it stoically. “Are you good with that?” Jones shrugged before replying flippantly.

“It’s what your mother would want.” His reply brought an ironic laugh from Kyle who smiled ruefully at the soldier.

“Oh, you clearly don’t know my mother very well.” As Kyle spoke, he began shrugging off his warlock’s robe dropping it to the hood of the car. Next, he took off the suit jacket that matched his slacks revealing the fitted holster for his magical tome that he wore over his dress shirt.

“No?” Jones was doubtful as he kept one eye on the monsters. They were getting riled up way down the street. There was something big moving around there. But like every other street in the city at that moment, there were abandoned vehicles lining both directions interspersed with dozens of vehicles and other things that had already transformed. Hell, there was even a little manhole cover monster sliding around on it’s back. Like a moving mouth facing upwards. It was sliding underneath other monsters as they walked and biting off feet as they came down.

“She’s not here, is she?” Kyle was fussing with his tie and lanyard, debating whether to take the lanyard off or not. It was clear that he’d made the decision not to when he dropped it and focused on taking off the tie.

“She might not know?” Jones offered. but knew it was a bad excuse even as he’d said it. Her flight should have landed by now. She would know something was seriously wrong in her city.

“Or she’s been ordered somewhere else.” Dropping his tie with the rest of his extraneous clothing, Kyle changed his focus to taking off his holster, his fingers moving with practiced ease. “Either way, it’s not a great look for a parent.” Jones acknowledged Kyle was right with a tilt of his head and a raise of his eyebrows as everything that the Wattkins boy had discarded levitated and began floating itself back to the armored vehicle behind the barricade. “Need anything from the vehicle?”

Love this novel? Read it on Royal Road to ensure the author gets credit.

“The biggest most effective weapons stored in there?” Kyle smirked at that response and nodded as he turned his back to monsters as he focused on what he was doing.

“Watch my back a minute.” Jones obliged and turned his full attention to the city street. Devoid of people. Bright and sunny with shadows between the buildings, most of which towered over them. He focused on watching the monsters, shooting off a few fireballs that glinted off the windows when he felt a nudge on his shoulder. It was a large riffle, semiautomatic, magically hardened, that shot enchanted alchemy charges with a mount for a bayonet on the muzzle. Standard Magicorps issue. It was one of the weapons that were stocked for the museum guards.

“Nice.” Then he saw a cross-shoulder double-bandolier of alchemy shots, and a bayonet to attach to the gun. “Feels like home.” He smiled ruefully at his charge.

“Be careful with the sword,” Kyle cautioned, “It’s a lot more magically conductive than standard military issue. Have you trained with the museum standard enchantments?” Jones nodded as he geared up with the new weapons in addition to his sidearm and his wand.

“I’ve been familiarized with it.” Jones assured Kyle. “You want me to take point?” He offered, because he didn’t think the nerdy young man had ever done something like this.”

“No. Stay behind me.” With nothing other than a wand in one hand and a plain leather notebook in the other hand, he hopped off the vehicle he was standing on top of into the danger zone.

Immediately, all the monsters who were focused on trying to get past the underprepared police holding down the street at the barricade zeroed in on Kyle. They hesitated, confused as to why food was coming to them. The soft squishy thing didn’t seem dangerous. Did it not know it was in danger? Had it not realized there were monsters about? So, they waited, and watched.

And gave Kyle the time he needed to prepare.

Kyle paused for a second after he’d hit the ground. Squaring his shoulders, he took a deep steadying breath. Could he do this? Maybe. Technically. Was he ready for this? Unlikely.

Despite the danger, he closed his eyes for a second and took a second breath. It was fine. He could feel the arcanes in the atmosphere. As a warlock of the Archivist, Kyle had access to the vastest collection of documented spells and magical enchantments in existence. Anything that had been scanned by the archive, his pact item could teach him how to recreate it. And he had a lot of powers granted to him from the Archivist, were primarily used for the preservation or dissemination of knowledge. Something that was exceedingly useful for someone who was also a wizard.

True, Kyle Wattkins was an average warlock.

He wasn’t super powerful; he wasn’t particularly talented. But he was also a wizard with small amounts of natural magic. He was a wizard, and wizards didn’t have large reserves of internal magic, so they specialized in using the magic from the environment around them. He was a wizard with access to the greatest library of spells to ever exist, a natural proclivity towards electricity he inherited from his father, and the ability to channel magic from the environment.

Opening his eyes again, Kyle began drawing on the seemingly limitless ambient magic with nothing more than a wand and a book, he began walking into the fray.