I took a shower and when I came out, Ida was trying to give Bogo some beef jerky with no success. Bogo turned pleading eyes to me as he shied away from the dried meat.

“Bogo only eats when the job’s done,” I said as I ran a thick comb through my unruly hair, pulling out the snarls with little regard for my scalp.

“What?” Ida asked as she straightened from her crouch.

“Boof!”

“He doesn’t need food, specifically,” I explained, my voice straining as a particular bit of hair refused to un-knot. “He gets sustenance from—and I’m mostly guessing here, it’s not like he could explain the particulars—the payment, and the actual chase.” The knot finally untangled.

“Boof!”

Ida looked from me to Bogo, shrugged and plopped the jerky in her mouth, and began chewing loudly. She stood and went to go take her own shower. I was getting antsy for a smoke, so I decided to take Bogo for a walk. I also wanted to be around when Alice left her room so I could pester her for the laundry spell because I hadn’t suddenly remembered it overnight.

I was worried I wouldn’t get my memories back completely. It wasn’t terrible, but not being able to remember the majority of the beginning of Ida’s and my relationship bothered me. Almost as much as losing memories that could help in tracking down Conner.

I tugged on my spare clothes and opened the door, cocking my head outside for Bogo’s sake. The smart not-dog hopped up excitedly and went outside with a happy trot, before waiting just outside for me. I followed him, closing the door behind me. I lit up a cigarette and took a long drag with closed eyes, some anxiety melting from my shoulders.

I opened my eyes to find Bogo giving me an expression I could only describe as disgust.

“Yeah, they stink,” I said, patting his head. “But you’ve smelled worse.”

Bogo huffed but came along happily enough as I started walking the length of the parking lot. I pulled out my phone with my free hand and checked the time. A little after eight. I called my mom and she picked up after the second ring.

“Liam?”

“Hey Mom,” I said with a slightly distracted air. I was scanning what I could see of the road and the motel for any potential problems. “Sorry, I missed your calls. We ran into some problems and I—well, an evil magic dude cursed me with forgetfulness.”

“Please tell me you aren’t being serious.” I could tell she was rubbing her forehead.

“I wish I wasn't,” I replied, a small, rueful smile on my lips. “But it’s good news.”

“How is being cursed good news?”

I had been thinking about it a lot in the shower. I hadn’t spent much time thinking since the attack, because I’d been mind-scrambled and just trying to keep my panic from taking over. But last night’s meditation had done wonders to center me and organize my thoughts. I felt… Capable. In a way I haven’t felt in a long time.

“Because there’d be no reason to attack us if we weren’t a threat,” I said. “If we weren’t making progress, they would just let us go about making wrong moves.”

There was also the possibility that we had just pissed off one of the country’s only magical biker gangs and they had hunted us down in revenge for attacking their bar. But I doubt it.

Also, how the fuck were people finding me all the time?

My mom was silent for several moments as she processed this.

“That’s… good, I think. Just—just be careful, alright?”

I paused my walk to wait up for Bogo, who had stopped to sniff at the back of an old Buick. I felt around inside the chassis with my telekinesis, curious as to what had distracted Bogo. A moment of feeling around revealed a couple of desiccated mouse corpses. At least, I think that’s what they were. I felt some old fur and brittle bones, but couldn’t tell much more than that without breaking into the car and looking with my eyes.

“I’ll do my best,” I said, flicking away the mostly finished cig. “Can’t make any promises.”

We said our goodbyes and I dialed the doctor's office. The receptionist put me on hold. Even in a magical shadow society, doctors' offices were all the same. I decided to bug Alice while I waited.

I walked up to her door and tried to unlock it with my TK the way I had at Conner’s apartment. I was just going to crack the door so I wouldn’t have to yell to get her attention and wake up the late risers at the motel. Unfortunately, Alice had warded the door and my magic couldn’t get through.

It was a wise decision and something I should have done last night to my own door. I contributed the oversight to my muddled mindset and promised myself to do better in the future. In fact…

I turned and regarded my car. Specifically, the trunk, thinking about the armored case in the hidden compartment that had my arsenal. There were a few items in there I had made (well, I commissioned them from people who knew what they were doing, and then did the enchanting myself) that might make life easier.

The only reason I wasn’t using them was that it’d be the magical equivalent of walking around in full combat gear with an RPG held casually on my shoulder. To the non-magical, it’d look like I was cosplaying, which was also attention-grabbing.

The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation.

Not the correct solution, I decided. I needed to find out how people were finding me. I could always create an incognito amulet as I had on the ship, but that came with its own problems. With my expanded education and Alice’s help, I had finally figured out how it worked. It basically cut you off from the astral, the plane of thought that mirrored and somewhat supported this universe. One can exist without contact with the astral, as I had demonstrated with my prolonged use of the ward, but it left you vulnerable to outside influences. Now that I thought about it, the accelerated transformations I had been exhibiting towards the end of that conflict could be contributed to the fact that I didn’t have the insulating protection of the astral. Hmm. Something to bring up with the doc.

Bogo nudged my leg. I looked down and he cocked his head at me. I glanced around and realized I had been staring into space for a few minutes. I turned back to Alice’s door. I couldn’t hear anything through it, which was surprising. I had enhanced my hearing a good bit. I leaned against it and pressed my ear to it. Nothing. Did she ward against sound, too?

I took a step to the side and put my ear against the wall. Though it was fuzzy and indistinct, I think I heard water running. I dipped my phone away from my other ear so the hold music wouldn’t compete for my attention, and reaffirmed my opinion. Alice was in the shower. I lifted the phone back up to my ear and backed away.

Not sure I agreed with warding for sound, unless it was one-way. Maybe I—

The hold music ended.

“Colm?” Said a voice I vaguely recognized.

“Doc?”

“Hello, Colm,” she said. “We have the cage prepared. I can give you the news about your tests when you come by.”

I sucked in air between my teeth. “Yeah, that’s not going to happen anytime soon,” I said. “Kind of in a family emergency.”

I could tell the doc wasn’t thrilled. “Is it important? Your ailments might not be immediately life-threatening, but we can’t afford to—“

“My brother was kidnapped,” I said. “By someone from our side of the street.”

“Oh,” her tone changed. “I see.” I heard some papers being moved around. “In that case, I should probably give you your results now. Do you have a few minutes?”

I nodded and walked over to a bench by the motel office, then remembered I was on the phone. “Hit me,” I said as I sat down.

“How nuanced do you want this?” She asked.

“Explain like I’m five,” I said. “I got a D- in biology.”

“Well,” she drew the word out, likely arranging her thoughts. “Your new cell structure—that is, the cells from your non-mutated limbs, is very robust. I hit them a wide range of poisons and radiation and they held up remarkably well. You aren’t immune—“ she was quick to clarify. “But whatever effects a normal person would experience would be reduced in you.

“The other good news is I could find no trace of the mutated cells in your blood, saliva, urine, or stool,” she said. “Without further tests, I can’t say for sure, but I think the method of spreading is likely that when a non-mutated cell dies, a mutated cell takes its place. Which is why the skin is the part of you changing the fastest. This is just a hypothesis that may very well be wrong, but I think it’s likely.”

She paused and waited for me to interject. I didn’t.

“As for any sexual activity,” she went on after a moment. “We didn’t grab a semen sample, so I can’t recommend it. Judging from the samples we did get, however, I can’t imagine it’d be any different. So if you DO engage in sexual activity, I HIGHLY advise—“

“Wear a rubber,” I interrupted, my face heating. “Yeah, got it.”

“I can tell this makes you uncomfortable, so I’ll move on,” she said. “As for the composition of the mutated cells… I haven’t the foggiest. We can’t tell what they are made up of.”

“You don’t know anything about them?” I asked.

“Oh, we know plenty,” she said with a sigh. “They are even tougher than your improved cells, but we knew that already.” I had a brief recollection of what I did to her sink. “They also absorb several forms of radiation and ambient energy without changing temperature or showing damage. In shape, they mimic your hexagonal cell structure, but if enough stress is applied to them they adapt to a more advantageous configuration. It’s baffling.”

There was a tense pause. “Which is probably something you didn’t want to hear from your doctor,” she said. “But that’s just the mundane side of things. Magically… it’s worse.”

I sighed. “Of course. You can’t sense anything magical.”

“No, we can sense some magic,” she corrected. “We just can’t determine what kind it is. Hell, Mark—who ran the tests—is half convinced the energy we’re reading isn’t magical at all.”

Alice exited her room and spotted me. She began to approach but I waved her off gently, pointing at the phone. She nodded and went to find Ida, I presumed.

“The silver lining, if you can call it that, is that the energy has nothing in common with other malignant curses or magical transformation magic. It’s not increasing, or getting more powerful. It just… It just is, as far as we can tell. It’s almost as if the magic, or energy, is leaking into you, a steady trickle from somewhere.”

My mind suddenly latched onto the muted presence in the back of my mind—or, perhaps, the back of my “being” would be a better word. It felt my attention and regarded me back.

I wrestled my attention back on the conversation. “I—I’ll have to come in for additional tests when I… When I’m done with this emergency. Also, I wanna run an idea by you.”

I gave her my theory on disconnecting from the astral.

“Hmm,” she said, and I imagined her leaning back and stroking her chin in thought. “That could have definite consequences. How long did you have this spell in effect?”

“About two weeks?” I said.

She muttered something I didn’t catch. “We’ll definitely need to test that. If we can determine the magic has no presence in the astral, and is in fact enabled by your absence from it—it’d narrow down the field of inquiry. Greatly.”

I sighed. “I’ll come in as soon as I can.”

We went over some other incidentals, (apparently, I wasn’t drinking enough water) covering some general health things. After a bit we wrapped up, I thanked her and ended the call.

“Fuck,” I said quietly.

Bogo nudged my leg, making small huffing noises. I idly rubbed his head.

I shook myself out of my funk and walked over to Alice, who was leaning against the door to my room. “Hey,” I said. “Was your ward—“

The world flashed and I found myself in a giant amphitheater… except it had a roof. What do you call that? A stadium? Amphitheater still felt right. The floor was a mix of black and white marble, with sharp, angular designs that I recognized as disruptive to magic to anyone standing in the center. Right where I was.

The walls were so far and the light so dim I could barely make them out. Someone without my night vision wouldn't be able to see them at all, I bet. In fact, where was the light coming from? I could see no obvious sources of illumination, but the room didn’t have that grainy quality I associated with my vision having to piece a lack of light. There were thousands of seats, all empty. The only other occupant of the room was an absolutely huge man in a business suit, sitting behind a desk. Propped up next to the desk was a hilt of some implement. I couldn’t tell what it was, but it gave off the vibe of an ax.

I took a moment to examine the man, as he was doing to me in turn. His face was weathered but not old, covered in a neat beard that was a few days late for a trim. His eyes were a piercing gray, almost luminescent. His black hair was slicked back, his hairline interrupted by a thick scar that went down to just above his left eyebrow. His suit was navy blue and tailored to fit, and he sat with the easy confidence I associated with someone who knew they could kill everyone in the room or a billionaire.

After a tense moment, the man spoke.

“You didn’t read the letter, did you?”