Magicians game, p.2
Magician's Game, page 2
"I'm not sure I understand."
"I don't either. Not yet. There are rumors of different magics popping up these days. Things that weren't cataloged by the Magical Parliament. I know of a few they're calling Cyber Sorcerers. People who can attach themselves to computer networks without terminals."
Camila's jaw dropped. "Without terminals?"
"Sounds impossible, doesn't it? Especially since none of them have survived past their early twenties. They've all been found dead at their computers with no apparent cause of death, other than starvation. They just stopped eating. There was a local case a few months ago, of a young man found dead at his computer. Interesting, isn't it? Especially when I learned that particular story was covered up by Parliament. There's a reason Samantha protects him. I can't believe he's just a Dianic Witch with no real power. She already protects Kyle Kendrick, but he comes from an impressive lineage."
"He's part of the Vervain clan," Camila swallowed. Everyone knew about the Vervains. The largest, oldest family of Witches in New Orleans. The fact Kyle Kendrick was born to Arden's sister as a Hedge Witch, and the only male one in two hundred years, wasn't lost on the magical community. Even though she'd heard Kendrick's magic wasn't nearly as powerful as Arden's and her coven.
"That protects him from me. Arden's not someone I want to tangle with. Not yet, anyway." He slapped his hand flat on the table. Camila jumped. "I want you to investigate Ivan Westerfield. I want to know his history, who he is. Where he came from. And I want to know the first moment the code you created is awakened."
"So…I'm not suspended?"
"Oh, at this job you are. I have to have a scapegoat to keep the others in line. And if you find out what Ivan Westerfield is, what I suspect he is, you'll be back at work before you know it."
"But wait," Camila put her hand on the table. "I—I can't live without my salary. I have to be able to buy new equipment. Keep my network at home up to date."
"You'll still be paid. Double what you're making." He stood. "Stay here and finish your tea. Don't leave until your team does. I'll handle everything else. And don't fail me, Camila. I want to get your mama out of the slums as much as you do."
She watched him leave through the side door, stop at the corner, take a deep breath, and put on an angry face. He strode toward the group and she could hear him barking at them. They all looked toward that corner and then followed him into the crowds of onlookers.
Camila slumped over onto the table and let her emotional storm pass. Everything about this, from the moment he'd come to her and told her to build magic code for the file's metadata to her research on what the magic code really was, felt wrong. It was like biting into tinfoil with silver fillings.
The magic code she'd infused into that file would bring down any computer system if the file was played, and it would do it in a spectacularly terrible way. What if the idea of Cyber Sorcerers was a real one? Would they be susceptible to malicious code the same way a computer was?
After a half hour or so, when she was sure she could stand and not fall over from fright, Camila tossed her half-empty chai and headed out the side door to her car. "I left the normalcy of the FBI cyber division for Cyber Sorcerers and magic code." She rubbed at her face as she crossed the street. "What was I thinking?"
THREE
Dharma
"You know…" Ivan stepped out of the bathroom of our shared apartment, a towel draped over his head from shoulder to shoulder. I moved about the kitchen while I made him his favorite chicken salad. Stealing secret files was hungry work!
Luckily, I'd grown a bit used to his love of walking around in just a towel. This time I didn't slice my finger as I cut up a cucumber. I couldn't help but admire his swimmer's physique and winged back tattoo. Beads of water slid down his pale skin to the kitchen floor. "Know what?" I prompted when he didn't continue his vocal thought.
"It was just like I assumed it would be. The file was just sitting there on a server not connected to the mainframe or any other terminal." He rubbed the towel around his head for a few seconds before he lowered it. This made his hair stick up at odd angles.
"You look, and sound, surprised."
"It's not surprise, but more of…" He frowned at me. "That was just too easy, you know? I figured a guy like Blackwood would have that file better protected."
"Ivan, we had to flood out a floor so you could get to a server which you just said wasn't connected to any wired or wireless network. I'd call that well protected." I offered him a sliced piece of cucumber. "Ready to eat?"
He snatched up the cucumber and ate it in a single bite. "Oh…you Goddess you. I'm starved." He stepped further into the kitchen, snagged another slice of cucumber before he pressed warm lips to my cheek and I placed my hand against his back.
When he pulled back to look into my face, I marveled at the color of those eyes. "You worried me."
"No sweat." Ivan kissed the tip of my nose and straightened as he ate his second cucumber slice. "I'm pretty careful. And it's impossible to trace a bio-footprint like mine in a ones–and-ohs environment. I've told you that before." He raked his fingers through his hair, taming it a little. Usually it flopped forward onto his forehead and some days obscured his face. I liked it brushed away like this. "But this is new, this thing I did. I usually have to log into a network to gain access into the root directory. But since this server didn't have that capability, and I was getting frustrated," he held out his hands. "I grabbed the side of it."
I finished the cucumber and sliced tomatoes. "I'm not following. It's new that you touched the server? Did you leave fingerprints?"
"Dharma, that's how I got in. I just touched it. Shocked the hell out of me when I found myself inside the server. So I found the file, downloaded it, and did something else new."
Now I stopped cutting. "What do you mean you just touched it and you were inside?"
"That's it. I didn't have to go through wired or wireless connection. I touched it," and as if to show, he touched the refrigerator with his index finger. "And boom. I was in. And then get this—I thought about how it would be easy if I had some kind of trojan ready, you know? A kind of wyrm I could upload that would destroy the server and the file in one foul swoop but specific to eradicating any trace of that file. And guess what happened?"
I wasn't sure I believed what he was telling me. He touched this mechanical thing and instantly linked with it?
"That very trojan appeared. At first, I thought I was hallucinating because I saw a wooden horse and—" He looked at me and then grinned. "I'm boring you, aren't I?"
"No. You're scaring me. Ivan, you're talking about doing new things. Your magic's branching out and developing, and I really think you need to tell someone besides me. If you won't talk to Dryden, then you should call Sam."
"Call Sam while she's doing happy things with Crwys?" He shook his head as he pursed his lips. "No way. I like living, and I don't want that man roasting me. Even if we share blood, he deserves time alone with her. And as for Cromwell Dryden?" Here's where his expression changed from happy-as-a-clam Ivan to seriously scary. I knew he wasn't mad at me for suggesting it—it takes a lot to trigger his anger. I'd only seen it once while we were in the French Quarter one night and a group of tourists called him names as they hit on me. Boy did they get a surprise when he took two of them out with a few well-executed karate moves before my Undine doused them all in cold water. "I know he's your boss, and I know he helped Sam with the whole Ina's body thing, but I don't trust him. There's something wrong about him."
I finished tossing the salad together in a large bowl with the dressing. The chicken I'd bought at the store was rotisserie, pulled from the bone and chopped up into bite-sized pieces. I dumped all of it into the salad and added croutons. "What do you mean something's wrong with him? Other than the fact he's kinda creepy. But he's always been creepy."
"It's not just creepy. There's something weird about the way he looks."
I gave him an odd look as I carried the bowl to the table and set it in the center. A Friday lunch after a morning heist. Oh…I needed forks! "The way he looks?" I moved around him again to get to the flatware. "He looks like a skinnier version of that guy from Star Wars. The one Sam compared him to."
"Peter Cushing. And yeah…he does. But I'm not talking about his physical look. I'm talking about the other stuff."
"Other stuff?"
"That stuff around his head and body. Like, when I look at you, I can see you and I can see this moving field around you. Yours has all kinds of blue colors in it."
I shut the flatware drawer with my hip. "Are you telling me you can see auras?"
"I don't know. Maybe? It started after I drank Crwys's blood for these eyes." He pointed at his face. "I mean it makes sense. Everyone's got a magnetic field around them. Ever met people who couldn't wear a watch? Or shorted out bulbs when they touched them? Those are folks with really strong fields."
"And you're saying that Cromwell's field…" I leaned toward him. "Is wrong?"
"There's a disruption about it. I can't tell you what that means; I just know he gives me the creeps. So as long as we keep what I can do a secret from him and stay the hell away from him, I'm good."
"And you don't want to tell Sam and Crwys about this?"
"When they get back to work."
Crwys was a cop in the NOPD homicide division and Sam owned a magic shop just inside the French Quarter called Bell, Book and Candle. Sam was the reason I met Ivan because he worked for her and he's a member of her tiny coven. She took him in and accepted the weird things he did when no one else would, or I should say, when he believed no one else would. Cyber Magic, as Sam called it, isn't really a thing, you know? At least…not a well-known thing in the eyes of the Witch's Parliament, the governing body of Witches in the US. My boss, Cromwell Dryden, the Grand High Master of this area of the country, doesn't even know what Ivan can do. He and others in Parliament believe Ivan's a Dianic Witch, which means he has Gifts from Diana, but no ties to Elementals. It hurts that the old farts in Parliament look down on Dianic Gifts because they're just as rare and powerful as Elemental ones.
Many Witches have Dianic Gifts. I don't know if Sam does because she never uses them. I have one I know of, but I never exercise it.
"For right now, we can handle this. I'll destroy the file after we check to make sure it's the right one, and then you can tell creepy guy you did your job. Kudos and pizza for everyone." He held his hands up in front of him and I could see the green glow in his eyes as he connected to the neighbor's local network. Ghostly images moved between his hands and around him, swipes of green and red and blue and white. Information moving back and forth along the highway of the Internet. Ivan saw a world I couldn't see.
"I guess if someone besides us ever sees you doing that…"
"I'll disappear." The ominousness of the statement wasn't lost on me. Jack had been the first to warn us to keep Ivan's ability secret. Every time I said it, I knew it was true. I felt it inside. This kind of power in the information age was dangerous. If they ever discovered Ivan's ability, he would cease to exist in the public consciousness and all of us who knew him would.
"Go get dressed so we can eat."
He blinked a few times and saw I was at the table. Ivan rushed to the bedroom as I ladled salad on plates. He returned in shorts, t-shirt and combed hair. "Sorry… I was looking up news on the flood downtown."
"And?"
"It's hilarious. They're speculating all kinds of disasters, even terrorism, but that last one's being torn apart by the local media." He dug into his salad with gusto for a few minutes before he picked up an old laptop from the chair to his left and set it on the table. I watched him open it, watched it boot up and smiled when several windows opened without Ivan touching a single key. "This computer's securely off the grid. It's like that server I touched. See how I'm touching it now?"
"You do that at Bell, Book and Candle all the time."
"Ah, but I'm on the network when I do. This computer isn't connected to any Wi-Fi. No one can access it. So I'll show you how neat this trick is. Watch, no wires or network and I will download the file to this hard drive…"
I watched the screen for a few seconds, but when nothing happened I looked back at Ivan. His expression was blank, so I touched his arm. "Ivan?"
"It's…" he began and blinked rapidly. I'd never seen him do that. His eyes glowed green again as he looked into realms I couldn't see. "I can't access it."
"What do you mean by that?" I dropped my fork on the plate with a clack. "It's in your mind, right? You uploaded it."
"Yeah and I can see it, but I can't get to it to download it. It's like grabbing at a hologram. But it's not imaginary. It has weight. I can feel it there, all three megs of it. But I can't…" he reached out with his hand and grabbed at the air in front of the laptop. "I can't get to it."
"Has this happened before?"
"No. And I've got a lot of things stored there. They're compressed but I can access them and reconstitute them. But this…" He refocused on me. "Dharma, I can't get it out of my head."
"Can you delete it? That's what we're supposed to do, right? Destroy it."
"I'm trying." Ivan gripped the side of the table as he stared forward into that place I couldn't see. The look on his face worried me, so I put my hand on his shoulder—
The kitchen and apartment disappeared as the floor fell away from my feet. My hand clutched Ivan's shoulder as the table disappeared as well and I faced a colorful, misty expanse. I was pretty sure this was what the world looked like from an airplane.
Ivan squatted down in a runner’s stance and sprinted forward out of my hand. Before him was a floating silver box, spinning as light reflected off its sides. He tried to tackle it and moved through it.
What…what the hell's going on? Ivan ran at it again, and again traveled through it. He turned into a bulldozer and went at it full throttle, and still, the spinning box remained intact.
"Ivan?" I called out to him, but he didn't hear me. I wasn't sure he could see me either as he transformed back into himself and stood in front of the box. Finally, he reached out with a swipe of his hand as windows appeared along a menu bar. Submenus flowed into more submenus until he reached a red button, and a green one. I couldn't see what they said, but his finger hesitated over the green button a few seconds before he pressed it.
The box stopped spinning, unfolded like some weird origami creation, and flattened out into a movie screen. I could see images of Samantha Hawthorne and Ivan's friend Kyle Kendrick beside Sam's Rubicon Jeep.
A huge arrow appeared on the screen and Ivan said, "Play."
I stood still as I watched the scene. It was filmed from a distance, though the camera was zoomed in as far as it can go. I watched a battle take place between Sam, Kyle, her wolf Grey and an assortment of odd-looking creatures. Fetches. Things cobbled together by what's handy. A Ceremonial Magician's trick to create spies and soldiers.
It looked like the Fetches were winning through several close calls until Sam's image turned a sparkling red, and I saw the reason no one wanted this short film released as Samantha Hawthorne used the forbidden magic of Arcane to destroy the Fetches. Seconds before the image cut off, I heard a man say, "Shit!" as a spiraling stream of red glitter light came hurling at the camera lens.
There it was—the film Edmund Blackwood threatened to expose to the Parliament about the forbidden use of Arcane. This was what Dryden wanted destroyed. I thought if I didn't know Sam, if I didn't trust her and if I hadn't seen her wield that magic with care and control, my reaction to the film would be farther down the path of the reaction those in charge fear.
Rejection.
Isolation.
Warlock. And this time, the High Master wanted none of that happening.
I watched as Ivan retrieved the menu again and the theatre screen faded. The whole vision disappeared as I fell backward in my chair. Ivan stood and I could see my connection to him disappear. He looked down at me and touched my arm. "Hey… you okay?"
"I—" What do I say? I think I just saw what you see when you're in cyber space? It's obvious he didn't know I was there. Do I tell him? Do I explain what I saw? And if he insists that's not what it was, then what does this say about me and my own state of mind? "I'm okay. You just moved fast."
"I had to play the damn thing to get hold of it." He looked down at the computer and the windows on the screen moved. A message of a downloading file appeared.
Ivan sat back down in the chair and put his hands to his head. "There it is, if you want to see it. It's pretty damning, but it's also a great clip of the power of Blackwood's fetches."
I stared at him. That's exactly what I saw in that place that wasn't a place. Then he made a sound and pushed the plates and food away before he put his head down. "Oh…wow, my head hurts."
"You think it's the file? Something wrong with it?"
"It had some odd coding attached to the metadata. But I deleted it before I played it. At least I think I did." He sat up, his eyes still glowed green and his skin looked pale. "I'm gonna take a nap. You okay with that?"
"Yeah, sure. I'll clean up."
He stood, leaned in to kiss me and missed my cheek. He kissed air instead. "Oh… I'm off balance."
I watched him stumble to the bedroom and stood to follow him. He fell asleep as soon he lay down. His pallor worried me. I returned to the table to clear it away. I thought I should call Kyle and tell him everything that's happened since Ivan didn't want to confide in Sam or Dryden. But what do I say about what just happened to me? Had I connected with Ivan to the computer? Wasn't that impossible? To merge with someone and share a file? It might not be impossible for Ivan, but for me?
The laptop screen flickered and a new icon appeared in the middle of it.
A spinning silver box.
