A lot of strange things had happened to Kyle since he found Jenny's lamp in the antique shop, between efreet attacks and ghosts haunting the mall. Not to mention the things that were strange and new to him, like actually having a girlfriend, and Jenny's casual and innocent promiscuity. He'd run out of ways to try and compare them all. How common was this magic stuff anyway? Was an efreet attack less common than Kyle getting a girlfriend? He bet there had been more efreet attacks than he'd had girlfriends. What about finding a genie in the first place? It was hard to measure it all on a scale.

But he was pretty sure fighting a giant magical ghost duck for the second time in less than a day was pretty high up there.

It dominated the training space, towering over him and Jenny in the basement training room.

“Feel free to go at full power,” Dr. Myrden said. “This room can take it. It's sturdier than it looks.”

“It doesn't look big enough for us to go all out,” Kyle said.

The old man clapped his hands and the walls of the basement spread out, disappearing into the distance until they might as well have been standing in an open field.

“Well never mind I guess,” Kyle sighed.

“Come on don't be so down!” The old wizard laughed. “It should be easier this time. Now you're just battling waterfowl, and not an old man with a cane too.”

“You're trying to annoy me,” Kyle said. “But I've seen enough anime to appreciate a training arc.”

“I haven't but I get you're trying to help!” Jenny said cheerfully. “Plus I wanna see how much power I can use now!”

“Well good,” Dr. Myrden said. “Philbin could use the exercise.”

“His name is Philbin?” Kyle asked, staring up at the duck looming above him.

“Focus,” Dr. Myrden warned, just before Philbin pecked Kyle into the dirt. “Or that'll happen. Well it's too late now, but maybe it's too early for you to fight my duck. Maybe I should have started you off with the hamster.”

Evan had memorized the training notes from Dr. Myrden in less than a minute. He loved his mental enhancement, it had so many uses. He was kind of disappointed he didn't get to go off and train with the mysterious old man, it was kind of a childhood dream, but he'd only just started this whole magical adventure thing, and Kyle had gotten there first. There would be time for that. Magic had opened up a whole new world of opportunities.

One of which was sitting cross legged next to him, trying to focus on her small latent nodes. Evan didn't even have the urge to make a dirty joke about the word nodes right now, that was how thoughtful he was being. He'd really matured since this whole thing had started. Although now that it had occurred to him...

Heh, he thought. Nodes.

Okay, so he hadn't matured that much. Still.

“How's it going?” He asked Goldie.

“I have....no idea,” Goldie said. “I mean learning magic sounded fun, at first, but this is...pretty frustrating. Especially when I'm looking at that.”

She gestured across the room to where Ammeline and Trevor were in the middle of a sparring session. Trevor's body was wrapped in a glowing suit of armor, while Ammeline danced around him like a humming bird, darting in and pecking him with her rapier every time she ducked under his guard.

“Yeah,” he sighed. “It's pretty intimidating.”

“You were backflipping off the ceiling yesterday,” she grumbled. “Don't give me that.”

“No seriously,” Evan said. “Think about it. I can backflip off the ceiling, and I've got the super mind thing, but it's a little weak compared to everyone else. For now. I'll work on it. And weall got our powers from Kyle's wish...probably. I'm almost certain of it. And I do have an enhanced brain, so I'm super smart.”

“Tanya keeps saying that's not how your powers actually work,” Goldie pointed out.

“Yeah but what does she know? Her brain isn't nearly as enhanced as mine.”

Goldie gave him a weak smile.

“But my point is we're all cheating,” Evan shrugged. “Tanya complains about it all the time. When you do learn magic, you'll have done it the hard way. The right way. You'll have a better foundation than an of us.”

“Thanks,” Goldie said. “That actually helps.”

“I stole it all from anime and kung fu movies,” Evan laughed. “But speeches like that get put in all that stuff for a reason.”

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“Mmm,” Goldie said, closing her eyes and putting her hands together. There was a spark and a flash of golden light between her palms. “Ah! Hey! I did it! Look! I did it!”

“Good!” Evan said. “You know what that was, don't you?”

“Really weird and kind of tingly,” Goldie said, shaking out her hands.

“No no no,” Even shook her hands. “Obviously it was true love.”

“Oh really,” Goldie rolled her eyes.

“Definitely. We should make out.”

“Never,” Goldie said.

“Never?” Evan raised an eyebrow.

“Well...” she looked at him. “No yeah, definitely never.”

Evan smiled, but before he could think of a comeback Tanya's shadow fell over the both of them.

“Was that a spark of power?” She asked.

“YEAH it was!” Evan leered.

“Don't say it like that!” Goldie glared at him. “Hold on, let me see if I can do it again.”

He held her palms together, and a few moments later there was another spark of golden light.

“Alright!” Tanya said. “Good. Now I'd say...well, check my father's training plan but when I was learning, the next step was to try and hold that spark steady between my hands for as long as I could.”

“Let me check,” Goldie leaned over and looked at the pages of Dr. Myrden's training plan. “Yeah, yeah that looks like what it says here.”

“Good,” Tanya said. “That's....good. Do that.”

Betty's training instructions were similar to what Tanya had her doing, but more focused.

Her training regimen said that, before anything else, she should link all of her nodes to the central node. It also came with instructions on how to do that, most visualization and meditation. Both of which she was either very good at or very terrible at that. She could visualize the power inside of her alright, and move it around, but her mind kept wandering.

Unusually for her, it wandered to Tanya. Even more unusually for her, it wandered to how Tanya might be feeling.

“Mrow,” Moonlight called up from her lap.

“Are you sure I should?” Betty asked. “I am not normally considered the correct person for a heart to heart talk.”

“Mrow.”

“Jenny is better suited for this kind of...”

“MROW!”

“That is true, Jenny is not here. Alright.”

Moonlight hopped off her lap and Betty stood up, walking over to where Tanya was looking through her own training plan.

“What's up?” Tanya asked. “Need help with something?”

“I was intending to ask you the very same question,” Betty said.

“I'm fine,” Tanya said. “It's...it's stupid.”

Betty stared at her for a second. Then another second. Then a moment, then for a second again, then for too long.

“Uhm...” Tanya said looking up again. “Yes?”

“I am very bad at this kind of conversation,” Betty said. “But it seems to me you need to have one, and all of our other friends are otherwise engaged.”

Now it was Tanya's turn to stare at Betty for a second, but to minimize awkwardness she left it there.

“Goldie just manifested magical energy,” Tanya said. “Less than three hours after I handed her my dad's lesson plan.”

“Is that not good news?” Betty asked.

“I mean it's amazing,” Tanya laughed. “Of course it is. But he just...he's so much better at this than I am. But he wasn't here when you all awakened your powers, you know? He's never here. And then he just shows up for ten minutes, beats up Kyle, drops all this advice I really could have used over the past couple of months and then he leaves!” Tanya threw her hands up in frustration. “He just...just leaves again!”

Betty cocked her head thoughtfully to the side.

“Once again I am very bad at this kind of conversation,” Betty said. “But it seems to me that you are most focused on the fact that he left.

Tanya glared at her for a moment, but then her face softened.

“I'm bad at this kind of conversation too,” Tanya sighed. “You're right. I'm a lot more upset that he came back for ten minutes and then just left again.”

“Is there any reason we could not go to where he is?” Betty asked.

“What do you mean?” Tanya said.

“It seems to me the logical next step is to tell your father how you feel,” Betty said, looking over at Evan and Goldie laughing together as she tried to control her magic. “I have recently been given ample evidence that failing to express your feelings in a timely manner has noticeable consequences, even if it did work out quite well for me in the end. And, no offense, it seems like we could all use training from your father directly. You as well. Does it not make sense then for us to go where your father is?”

Tanya stared at her for a second.

“You know what?” Tanya shot out of her chair. “You're right!” She stormed over to a cabinet and came out with a large wooden duck.

“Hey everybody!” Tanya called out, waving the wooden duck above her head. “I've just decided we need a field trip. Make any arrangements you need to to explain to your family's why you're away for a couple of days. If I have to I'll get the spooks to help out. But we're about to take a flight up north.”

“A plane?” Trevor asked, letting his armor fade.

“Don't be ridiculous,” Tanya said. “We're going by duck.”

Meanwhile, Kyle was having duck issues of his own.

Jenny had started out the fight showing off her new powers. She could fly now, and toss bolts of magical power around like tennis balls. At first Kyle had thought Jenny being so powered up would make the fight easy. But Philbin the Giant Magical Duck—not something he would have ever thought would become a significant factor in his life—had shrugged off the bolts like...ugh. Like water off a duck's back.

His world was turning into duck metaphors, and he was hating himself for it.

Kyle had a little more luck with his super strength. He could punch the duck around, at least, that was something. But nothing he'd done had been able to put the enormous bird down, and he'd been slapped around by it's wings dozens of times and pecked with it's huge bill more times than he could count.

“So is this where we're stuck forever?” Kyle asked, catching the huge duck's enormous bill in both hands to fend it off. “Stalemated with your giant duck forever?”

“Is that what you think?” The old wizard arched an eyebrow. “Stalemated, are we? Don't be ridiculous, boy. You're losing.”

Kyle punched the duck away.

“Doesn't look like it to me,” he said.

“Then try this,” Dr. Myrden said. The massive duck stood up again...and charged towards Jenny. Her bolts bounced off it ineffectually as it barreled down on her. Kyle shoulder tackled it away. The duck stood up...and charged at Jenny again.

And again. And again.

For the next hour the duck did nothing but try and attack Jenny, and Kyle did nothing but try and stop it. It went on for so long he wasn't read when the Duck turned around, it's eyes glowing with light. Its enormous bill opened up and a beam of energy fired from it's mouth.

Kyle stopped, the entire world seeming to go distant and still. Jenny's panicked scream sounded like it was coming from a million miles away.

Huh, Kyle thought. I didn't know it could do that.

And then he fell to the ground, clutching a bleeding hole through his stomach that Jenny could see daylight through.