Chapter 102

Johanne had an idea. Michael had been rather irritated with what had happened to him in the dungeon and was looking quite irritable still. So, she thought, perhaps she could work on some of the things he had asked her to do in passing but never got done, to soothe his mind. She was after all, Silver-rank now, and with the new rank came all sorts of new powers. Her magic had soared, and she had begun to master some of the esoteric elements, forgoing integration within her aura—which was what Michael did instead—because she knew her limits. In the process, she enjoyed access to many more elements than Michael did, but unlike him, she would always have to go to element-rich areas to restock on them once she ran out.

The plan was simple in principle but hard in execution. Her goal was to make a healing potion. But she and the Science Division as a whole, not to mention Candle Light and the others… none of them had any knowledge of how to produce one, and no examples of magically enhanced consumables besides what the crazy Doctor Kavins was concocting back at Saint Hernest. She wanted no part in that. Instead, her approach would be to use creativity to go around the shortcomings of Site 00’s stock of magic materials and lack of knowledge.

She punched the code for the little safe where they held the smallest, least valuable mana crystals. She then took said crystals to a special lab, rush-built just for her, where she could experiment with spells without causing much damage. There was lab equipment there too, the cornerstone of knowledge being proof by experiment and attempted falsification, but they were the more sturdy kind that perhaps didn’t mind too much if there was the occasional explosion nearby.

The next step was to force the mana crystals to dissolve in water. Johanne knew that mana couldn’t change state, of course, but she hoped for the crystals to at least lose their sharp edges as they got smaller in the water; otherwise, the healing potion’s effect would all have to go towards healing the destroyed throats and stomachs of whoever drank the concoction. After some time, she managed to coax the arcane material into doing what she wished.

It was time for the next step. Proof of concept. Could she stabilize the mana by using the Time element in a spell? A form of basic chronomancy, freezing the mana and water in time. If she could, then things would be looking rather good.

Of course, to do so, she needed a lot of Time element. And what better place than the dungeon, where the Time element always gathered like a vortex to support the time dilation function? She spotted Travis Tyrell on the way there. He was talking on the phone, animatedly.

“Technomancer, come here!” he bellowed.

A scrawny-looking man approached, his movements oozing like those of a slime. Johanne stared a bit too much perhaps, for the man saw her—using his preternatural ability to tap into any digital device and know everything within—and upon seeing her he seemed to shrink on himself like a cornered wolf. At least he didn’t lash out, she thought. That would have ended badly for him.

Travis barked some orders at the slimy low-Copper tier man and then made him leave.

“Connection is secure now, speak.” Travis said.

“There’s something you should know,” Johanne heard the voice at the other end of the phone say. She had no idea who it was. “Before that: you said you have ways to grow powerful…”

“We do,” Travis said.

The other man shuffled something, like papers. “If you promise me I'll go first and get more power than what you will give to the others, I can give you information. Stuff the OA will never share with you.”

“No.”

A pause.

“Excuse me, what? Did you say no?”

“I said, no.”

“What if I told you that the chest operation is a trap?”

“I would still say no.”

“You aren't surprised at all,” said the other man.

“Goodbye, doctor Kavanaugh. We’re picking you up at rendezvous point in three hours.”

Shrugging, Johanne resumed her trek toward the dungeon. On the way there, she examined a strange tree that glowed with a rudimentary magic network, the only tree unbothered by the strange beings that dwelled within the mana. She might have to do something about it eventually. Not now though.

***

Three black SUVs tore through the narrow, winding roads. The roar of their engines ruined the tranquility of a summer afternoon, earning many curses from people who had never seen such activity around these parts. Behind darkened windows, Travis and Michael watched the ramshackle house grow bigger as they got closer.

“Yeah, there is something magical in there alright,” Michael confirmed.

They weren’t alone. With them in the car was Doctor Kavanaugh, and accompanying them in other cars were several operatives of the OA with various levels of clearance. Kavanaugh was, surprisingly, not the highest in command. Rather, it was a stern old general with graying hair who would be in charge of the OA’s troops, who looked more like army than actual magical soldiers.

There was no mistaking their auras, though. Ancestral magic clung to them in a diffuse cloud, as if being pulled by weak gravity, but the clouds were misshapen and barely cohesive. The will behind them was weak, and the magic making up their composition even weaker. The general, who had the strongest aura of them all, was looking a bit green in the face.

The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

“Feeling the lack of magic, General Blackwood?” Travis inquired.

General Silas Blackwood’s real name was a supposed mystery, although Michael had no doubts that Travis knew it.

“It is… bearable,” Blackwood admitted.

“Your troops must be feeling it, though.” Travis continued, drilling deeper into the matter. “I know ours are.”

Indeed, this had been the first time that Operators with magical power had ever left Site 00 and its ambient magic. Before today, only Michael and his close aides had ever left the place. All of them reported varying degrees of discomfort when exposed to the lack of mana in the air outside, like they walked into a vacuum. But all of them had had time to get used to it, getting in and out of the dungeon’s Area of Influence several times as their power grew.

The same couldn’t be said for the Operators, who hadn’t even been warned of the effects the lack of ambient mana would have on them. It made them look at the Secure Containment Unit Travis was carrying like it was water in the desert. The OA men were even worse off, their auras leaky and weak. Being out in the mana wasteland that was most of the planet was like being fish out of water, oppressive and draining. And they lacked even the most basic techniques to make sure they wouldn’t leak all their power into the air.

Normally, the stronger someone was, the more pronounced the effect would be. A stronger gradient and all that. But a stronger mage would also have a stronger and tighter aura capable of keeping the mana inside rather than it leaking out. This meant that, in this case, it was the OA goons who were suffering the most, followed by the Candle Light Operators who had yet to be taught the more advanced aura techniques. This was both to motivate them and to make them realize just how different they were now compared to before. They were no longer humans, and while they wouldn’t die out there in the world if left alone, the world itself was no longer a welcoming place for them. It just didn’t have what they needed to thrive.

Travis claimed to have plans, hence why he made sure to maximize the shock factor for the involved Operators. Michael worried that perhaps this would reduce their effectiveness during the upcoming operation, but he had been ensured it wouldn’t be the case. In fact, there would be incentives in place to make sure they worked well.

“What’s in there?” the general asked, pointing at the SCU. “Your men have been looking at it the whole time.”

Travis shrugged. “Just a solution to our problem.”

He slipped a key into the SCU’s lock—which wasn’t digital now that they were aware of the vulnerabilities of digital devices to people like the Technomancer, whom he still didn’t trust—and opened the case. A wave of mana washed over them. Michael recognized it: trash-tier Copper and a modicum of Silver-tier magic, of the synthetic flavor he had come to associate with coins. He said nothing, playing the part of the expert yet subordinate to Travis. The man had asked him to stay back and keep playing the part like when they went to the OA to meet them for the first time, letting him and the two squads they brought with them handle it.

It would also be a good opportunity to see how the operators handled themselves.

“Here.” Travis flipped a Copper coin at the general, then gave two to each Operator.

The general eyed the coin, clearly feeling the mana. He watched the Operators absorb it and, after a couple of tries, managed to do so himself. He sighed in relief and was about to ask something when the SUV suddenly stopped.

“We’re here,” Travis announced, a twinkle in his eyes telling Michael that the man had timed the whole interaction. The SCU’s lid snapped close with a hissing sound, and he lifted the case and took it with him as he dismounted the SUV.

The other cars circled theirs as they approached the abandoned building. Kavanaugh was still eerily silent, Michael noted, while the general, having recovered from earlier, assumed an air of importance. The coin had soothed most of his withdrawal symptoms, and he was the only one not of Candle Light who looked 100%.

“The house was vacated after we identified the—as you call it—anomaly,” the general stated.

There were snorts of derision. Travis looked around, and as he did so, Michael flared his aura for a moment. The soldiers, already looking uncomfortable but still quite used to the lack of mana, turned green.

“Now,” the general continued. “Show us how you work. Let’s see if you manage to secure the thing. If you do, then color me impressed.”

With a nod from Travis, the team leaders of Team Welles and Team Locke sprung to action. At once, they surrounded the building, taking out strange instruments and taking measurements. Only after several long minutes did they begin to advance, ever cautious. The situation, tense at the beginning, soon turned boring for the watchers. By the time they reached the dusty basement of the building, securing the last room before the presumed location of the anomaly, the OA’s soldiers were utterly out of control.

They mocked the Operators, interfering with their work and asking questions. Some of them tried to probe the SCU case Travis was carrying, discovering only too late that upon touching the case, their auras would destabilize and begin to lose mana at an even faster rate. The general was suspiciously silent through all of this, while Kavanaugh looked like he was about to pass out, and not due to the low levels of mana.

“Perimeter is secure,” Val Thorne, leader of Team Welles reported. “We are ready to move in and assess.”

Travis nodded at the woman, and then at the other man, who in turn nodded. “Team Locke will assist, this time,” the man confirmed, somewhat meekly.

As they prepared to move in, past the shoddy wooden door leading to the last room of the basement, Michael heard the soldiers watching them snicker. “Not even a proper weapon?” one of them scoffed. “What are they thinking, going in with knives?”

“Watch as they all die,” another sneered with a laugh.

Michael turned around and stared at him, but the soldier wasn’t intimidated. In fact, he smiled at Michael and traced the line of his rifle with his thumb.

Michael clenched his teeth and took a deep breath. The dangerous looking rifle would probably fail to even tickle his skin.

Through all of this, Travis acted as if all was right in the world. He nodded back to the team leaders and put the locked case on a dusty wooden table. “Top up before you go in,” he instructed.

He opened it again, this time in front of everyone. It had the effect a treasure chest would have on a pirate crew, immediately drawing all eyes to it. Greed and desire were evident on many faces. Even the general inched closer, struggling to maintain a stoic expression.

Inside the case, row upon row of coins shone with light and magic. There were dozens of Silver coins and hundreds of Copper ones, neatly stacked and organized like countless pills ready to be taken to fix all ailments.

“Portable, stabilized magic,” Travis stated with a grin, looking at the general over his shoulder as he distributed the coins to the Operators. When the case was locked shut, the sudden lack of magic was noticeable to all, and the atmosphere was tense.

With a smile, Travis disarmed them all. “We are willing to share this resource, if you are willing to talk prices,” he offered.

The general grunted, and the action seemed to defuse the soldiers. But there was still tension in his face, as if he had just been made to swallow a sour lemon. Conflicting emotions played out, which Michael somehow picked up even though he had never been good at reading subtle cues, while a sense of wrongness began to overtake him. It grew when the general conceded, “We might be. But first, show me that you aren’t all empty words.”

Travis smiled. With a nod, he gave the two teams the go signal.