#41 part 2

"That's not your wand," I said sternly as I stepped toward him, hand outstretched. With my other hand I motioned to the chaos around us, the growing destruction and death, the fear on everyone's faces. "That's not your wand. You might believe that it is, but do you know it is, feel it is? Does it call to you, sing to you, promise you anything and everything? A pen might be your wand, but not that particular pen."

He paused and stared at the plastic pen, the reverence he formerly held for the object slowly disappeared from his eyes. He dropped to his knees and tossed the pen aside, sending it clattering down the asphalt. "So what's happening to me?" he said, "I've never felt anything like this before, never had anything like this happen before. I'd always known I had magic, tingling just below the surface, but I'd never tapped into it until now. And now, I can't turn it off."

It was my turn now to shrug my shoulders. "That's magic," I said, "Most folks are just Tier 1 or 2, magical powers nowhere near as strong as yours. Hell, some Tier 1 don't even use their power because it's more draining than just doing the task manually. They can channel their power through random, everyday objects. At Tier 3 and 4 though, the 'wand' you need to channel your power needs to be a specific object, something you are drawn to or might hold a certain sentimental value. At Tier 5, the highest and most powerful magic users need a very, very specific object to channel their power, something like a family heirloom, passed from one generation to the next."

Slowly, I reached behind my back to reveal an old Colt revolver. Immediately, I felt the man's magic start to swirl faster, hostile. "Easy now. Let's take it easy," I said, holding the gun by it's barrel. "Do you have anything like this? I'm a Tier Five. This gun has been in my family for generations. It's my great, great, great grandfather's. He was an officer, too. Whenever they would talk about him, they would say that he served his entire career without firing a single shot. That his focus was on protecting everyone, that everyone could be saved." I felt the magic around us start to slow as he relaxed a little. I let out a short laugh, "I can only use it to control my power as long as the gun remains intact, bullets and all. I can't even shoot with it or it becomes useless."

The man stared at the gun, then shook his head. "We came here when I was three, my family and I. My mother brought us over to escape the war. I barely remember what home was like, or even where it was. We were refugees. We were poor. Moved around a lot. We didn't keep anything that we couldn't carry, couldn't help us to survive."

I let out a sigh. Without a wand, there was no way to control his power, to keep it from lashing out of control whenever he was tempted to use it, or whenever it might accidentally get away from him. I took a quick glance at my wrist and saw the screen was bright red, "Tier Five" printed in bold black.

Shit, I thought as I looked back to the man. His eyes reflected the fear that was growing in me. I put the gun back behind my back and quickly grabbed his shoulders, staring into his watery eyes. "Let's relax, we just need to figure out what your wand might be and where to find it and we can put this whole mess behind us. I want you think back on a happy memory, a memory that resonates strongly with you. The object is has to be hidden within that memory, I guarantee it."

Lies. All of it lies as I watched him hesitantly shut his eyes, his magic the encircled us starting to settle into a still haze. I almost didn't go through with it. I watched a smile spread on his face, the swirling magic slowing, almost disappearing. He opened his mouth, probably to describe what he was seeing. At least that's what the other one did, and I hesitated back then. But I learned my lesson from the last time. With 30,000 dead at my feet, I promised I wouldn't hesitate again. Before he could speak, I tapped the back of his neck twice and then dove to the side. With my revolver in hand, I unleashed my power in a wave, a torrent of red rising out of me and suppressing the remaining blue magic still in the air. I could feel his magic react defensively, attempting to rise back up to protect him from an unknown threat. I forced it back down, giving Lee a clean line of sight through my rifle's scope. The man opened his eyes just as the bullet passed through the base of his neck and the crack! of the gun echoed through the empty street. He was dead before he hit the ground.

I pulled my service pistol and pointed it at the dead man, waiting for the slightest twitch. A couple seconds passed before I got the courage to tap his feet with my boot. Limp. "Good kill, Lee," I said in the walkie as I holstered my weapon and motioned for the rest of the team to move in to contain the scene. Officers, paramedics, and other personnel flooded onto the scene as I stepped out of the way.

"Looks like that bastard got exactly what he deserved." I turned to find Officer Grant standing next to me, a bag of ice on his shoulder.

I punched him in the stomach, hard, doubling him over. I debated putting my boot to the side of his head, but I wanted him awake for this next part. "Don't be an asshole. It's not his fault that he turned out to be a Tier Five, especially in his situation. But the law is clear, especially after The Hobbs Incident: A Tier Five without a wand, without control, is a threat on the scale of mass destruction." I turned and walked away, furious at that asshole Grant, but mostly at myself, thinking about my heirloom and the legacy I wanted so much to follow. That next time, I hoped I would find a way.



Thanks to Reddit Writing Prompts: "Magic is available to everyone, and everyone has their own unique magical signature... The issue comes in finding the correct tool to channel it" Originally, this was just an action story, where the main character would somehow loose his tool to control magic, only to unleash it wildly and defeat his enemies. Then I got bored of that idea and started to think about what if you weren't able to find your tool to channel magic, what would life be like then? This is actually a lot longer than what I'm allowed to post on Reddit, and even that one needed to be shortened due to length. I went over it another time, making it more of what I wanted before deciding to split it into 2 parts so it's easier to digest. As for the title, "#41", after writing it, it reminded me of an X-Men story I'd heard about, where Wolverine kills a kid because he's too dangerous (I think you could probably Google "Wolverine kills kid"). Turns out its Issue 41 of Ultimate X-Men, so I thought I'd just use that as the title (plus I couldn't think of one).

#41 part 1

I set up the rifle on the ledge of the roof, seven stories above the street below. Next to me, Officer Lee set up with his binoculars. Up there, everything seemed normal: the air was still as a flock of birds flew by, people in floors above went about their business. Down below though, that was a different matter entirely.

"So what's the word, boss? Looks like terrorists, though I thought they said this was a bank robbery or something. Not much of a robbery if the guy doesn't take any money," said Lee as he looked through the binoculars at the street below, sweeping the street with his eyes to get a sense of what was going on down there.

I flipped open the caps on the rifle's scope and took in the street seven floors above it all. Cars parked along the sidewalk, at least 7 with some damage. An abandoned bicycle lying in the road, groceries scattered next to it. A city bus flipped on its side. I counted 17 people lying in the street, 3 possibly dead, the rest were at least still moving to some degree, though for how long I couldn't tell from my vantage point. And there was the one man standing in the middle of the street, blue magic leaking out of him like a cloud of blue dust in all directions, an aura of magic surrounding him. Most of it was just harmless light, passing and phasing through the rest of the world. The other ones, the rogue ones, those were the ones that did interact: swirling in tendrils around him like eels caught in an invisible current around him as it pushed objects out of its path, or sometimes just tore through them. "Might've started as a robbery, but it's something much worse now."

"Gotta be at least a Tier 3 magic user, with his power being visible and all," said Lee. He put down his binoculars and turned to me. "You ever see magic act like that? Streaking around as if it might be alive or something?"

"A couple of times. Unstable magic. We might have a potential Hobbs Incident down there," I replied. I turned my scope to the circle of officers enclosing on the man. Officer Grant stepped forward from the group, gun drawn. "Dumbass, put that thing away," I said to myself as I turned the scope to the man in the middle of the street. I watched him flinch, then whip his hand wildly through the air, as if trying to swat away a swarm of bees. Taking my eye out from behind the scope, I watched as blue magic lashed out like a whip, striking Grant and sending him flying through the air, landing hard on the pavement. A second later, a barrage of gunfire erupted from the street below as the officers fired on the male. The magic came to life and swirled faster than I could track, knocking aside every bullet and leaving the man unharmed.

"Dammit," I said as I fumbled for my walkie. "Everyone hold your fire! Hold your fire dammit!" When the bullets stopped, I handed the rifle over to Lee. "I'm going down there. Keep your eyes on me," I emphasized, staring him in the eyes as I handed over the rifle. He nodded as he took it. I headed toward the staircase and began my descent. In the building lobby, I paused for a second and looked at the device on my wrist. "Definitely a Tier 3, at least," I said to myself based on the readings the device was picking up. I pulled my old revolver from its holster behind my back, a relic from generations before, and gave the wheel a spin before tucking it back. Then I stepped through the doorway and into chaos.

I could feel the magical forces as soon as I stepped outside the building - it pushed at irregular intervals, sometimes as light as a breeze, sometimes as strong as a shove - the magic was a blue eddy swirling all around him. Immediately, I raised my hands above my head. "Sir, I'm a police officer. I'm coming over to talk. I can help you," I said, taking a tentative step forward. The man in the street turned his gaze upon me. Tears ran down his face as he gazed at me for a second. Two seconds. Three seconds. Finally, he nodded and I started forward to the middle of the street.

Even though he agreed to the meeting, it still didn't stop the constant swirling of magic around him, magic moving out of control, strong and oppressive it filled the air. At times, the force grew so strong that I needed to use my own power to press against it, repelling it as softly as possible as not to trigger another attack, like a bug trying to walk across a spider's web. I put a hand on the gun behind my back and my own magic, its signature red color slowly manifested around me, helping me to navigate my way to the man in the street, a barrier between his power and me. For the most part I kept it as a thin film, just strong enough to push my way slowly through the radiating magic. At times I did need to strengthen it, especially against the tendrils, pure magic pressed together and let loose. The trick was to not let out too much power to trigger his defenses.

He was just a kid, maybe a couple years out of high school, early twenties at the most. But no where near old enough to be letting loose with this kind of power. His clothes were frayed at the edges, holes in his jeans and jacket, hair disheveled and caked with dirt. Actually, it didn't look like there was an inch of him that wasn't covered in dirt. And, he was crying, tears running down his face, cutting streaks in the the dirt on his face. "I don't understand," he said when I'd gotten within arm's length, "I don't know why this is happening. I finally found my wand, I found it. Why won't it obey me?" He raised his right hand toward the sky and stared at it with reverence, as if it were the most sacred artifact ever discovered.

I stared at his hand, at the pen: a simple, black ballpoint with part of a silver chain still attached. The item stolen from the bank. Magic continued to swirl uncontrollably around us, lashing out at odd intervals, physically striking out at buildings, smashing windows, one tendril of power whipped at a fire hydrant and sent it flying into a brick wall and water spraying into the air. Out of control, unstable.


part 2... I don't know, probably tomorrow, I'm almost done with the edit and it was getting long

Books of 2018: Quarter 1

Another 3 months, another set of books. I do find myself reading less (or maybe just slower) these days, especially after Monster Hunter World was released (I'm still trying to catch-up) and just general laziness. I fell off on the writing, but I'll try to get that started back up too.


Echo Burning by Lee Child

In another Jack Reacher novel, Reacher finds himself hitchhiking through Texas where he is picked up by a woman with an interesting proposition: to kill her husband. She gives him a story that her husband was abusing her, right up until a year ago when he was sent to jail. Now that he's about to get out early, she's afraid that the beatings will start up again so she needs Reacher to kill her husband to protect her and her child. Reacher refuses and instead presents her with less drastic options, which she in turn refuses. But when her husband is killed the same night as he's released and the woman arrested for the murder, Reacher sets out to prove her innocence.

Another great Jack Reacher novel, Child keeps a good pace throughout the story, mixing together moments of action and moments of investigation (Reacher was supposed to be an investigator with the Military Police, after all). Giving the perspective of the bad guys spliced into the rest of the story was great to build the tension until they and Reacher come to a climactic gun fight, and honestly, one of the most thought-out gunfights ever put to the page. As much as I would like to see this book adapted into a movie (which, honestly, is one of the reasons I've been reading all of these books), which it probably could, I think it would lose something in terms of showing off Reacher's investigative prowess, especially in that particular scene. I'm not sure what else to write about as a review, as this is the 5th Jack Reacher book I've read (and I just finished another one), and the best part is that they are all basically the same: Reacher encounters a problem, Reacher solves a problem. Basically, if you want a mystery novel (I mean, there's a crime to solve so I guess it counts as a mystery novel) about Jack Reacher solving crimes and kicking ass, you'll like this book.


Gilded Cage by Vic James

Set in England, the Equals, armed with magical abilities known as the Skill, rule over the normal population as society's elites. To further reinforce their rule, they force the rest of the population to serve 10 years of slave labor, known as Slave Days. The story follows the Hadley family as they serve their Slave Days together at the Kyneston family estate, elite amongst elites. A clever idea set up by their eldest daughter, Abigail, to keep the family together as an individual can't serve their years until 18 years old, unless they are part of a family unit. Except the estate doesn't have need for Luke, their middle child, who is thus sent away instead to a slave town to serve out his 10 years doing manual labor, though he is still a minor. The story follows Abigail as she works at the estate amongst the Equals while trying to find a way to get her brother back to their family; as well as Luke as he struggles to survive, and keep from being broken, in the slave town.

One of the more terrifying books involving Magical Realism I've ever read. No, it isn't a horror novel, but it is scary to see magic used to rule so completely over people. Typically, in Magical Realism, the main character either has access or will have access to magic to level the power gap between him/her and the evil-doers and thus fight back at the moment the situation looks hopeless. Instead, the reader knows that Abigail and Luke will never have access to that power, that their enemies will always be stronger. I did like the little bits provided to show the reader how the world has changed with the rise of the Equals throughout the globe: in England, the Equals took over the country through regicide; in France, the French Revolution became a battle of the commoners against the Equals in which the commoners took back power in their country; and in Japan, the Imperial Family demonstrates it's power and right to rule by blooming all of the country's cherry blossoms at once.

As the first part to a trilogy, I will spoil that it does end on a cliffhanger, one that almost got me to go out and buy the next one in hardcover (at least I didn't see it in paperback yet), especially now that the third part is coming later this month. And buying something in hardcover, to me, is a big deal ... because I'm cheap, and there are literally only 2 books I've ever bought in hardcover, ever.


Royal Assassin by Robin Hobb

First off, before I get to the plot, I do want to say this book was so, so much better than the first book. FitzChivalry, royal bastard and apprentice assassin, having recovered from his poisoning and own attempted assassination, returns to the kingdom to find things changed: King Shrewd a shadow of his former self; King-in-Waiting Verity beginning to show signs of his former self; Prince Regal schemes almost openly for the crown; Molly, the girl he though he had lost, returns a different woman; Master Assassin Chade begins to show his age. Fitz now takes a more active role in his kingdom, still assisting his king and the king-in-waiting in a role others may find dishonorable, but still very necessary. The kingdom is finally able to mount a defense against the Red Ship Raiders, but Fitz must still deal with the Forged, broken victims of the Raiders. He must use both Skill (an ability to link the minds of individuals) and Wit (a forbidden art to link the minds of a human and an animal) to fight against his enemies. And he must discover the truth behind the plot for the crown and rule of the kingdom.

As much as I liked this book more than the first, it still took me a month or so to finish (still not sure why it always takes me so long to finish high-fantasy stories). Basically, now that all of the set up was done, we are finally into the story. Fitz now takes an active role against the story's many antagonists rather than just sitting on the sidelines and learning about them. This new role finally makes him an actor in the story and not just an observer, a role that was missing in the previous book. Fitz battles physically against the Raiders, the Forged (victims of the the Raiders magic that have lost their humanity), and even his own people. He must outwit his opponents in the Kingdom's nobility, his every action and even inaction scrutinized by the rest of the court which could possibly undermine his position. Once again, the book ends in cliffhanger, but at least I'm now looking forward to reading the next one rather than just doing it out of obligation.


After a long, high-fantasy novel, I decided on some easy reading with some old comic books :

Nemesis by Mark Millar

What if Bruce Wayne decided to be a super-villain instead? That's probably the best way to describe this comic book about a bored billionaire that decides to go after a local police chief out of revenge for his parents. He's just as rich and brilliant as Batman, creating riddles to his next crime only for the police to figure them out after he's already carried out his mission. Unlike Batman though, he's lethal, killing anyone who gets in his way. Can the police chief catch him before he's completed his plan? Can anyone stop him?


Wanted by Mark Millar

What if all the superheroes were dead, and the super-villains controlled the world? Yeah, a lot different from the movie. Like the movie though, Wesley Gibson inherits his father's position in The Fraternity after his father's assassination: his wealth, weapons, and status within the group. Before he gets it all though, he must complete a training exercise to unlock his potential and change him from just another worthless human being into the greatest killer on the planet. Because, that, after all, is Wesley's superpower: the power to kill people.

So, just to get this out of the way, I've read this one many, many times before. I even delivered the final, 4th-wall-breaking monologue of the comic in English class one year (I mostly remember getting a lot of odd looks from the older people in the class). I think this was one of the first comic books I ever bought with my own money and it definitely changed my perspective of what the genre could be, not just stories about superheroes saving the day, but a re-imagining of a world with superpowers, and the consequences of it. Definitely an inspiration to any of the superpower stories I've ever written.