Here’s the post you were perhaps expecting yesterday. (If you didn’t see what happened yesterday, go look!) Earlier on in the serial, I had a look back at the choices NOT taken by you, the audience. Let’s do that again, shall we?

Because: 1. Yes, the arc is officially over. Some loose ends remain, as in Story1… so if there were particular items that you feel require elaboration, let me know. 2. The next arc posted up here won’t have choices. It will be from my Time Travel story (“Time & Tied”), so you can’t influence it. But I hope you’ll enjoy it (particularly those of you who voted for Chartreuse - it’s her universe!). It’s coming TOMORROW! (Whoa, why so fast? I explain a bit in this post, and will elaborate later.)

Before then, here’s “Wish Fulfilment”, the last few voting options not taken. SPOILERS follow, in case you haven’t read to the ending of Story2, and want to be surprised.

BATTLE PLANS

11: FLEEING. Marginal influence. I figured: hiding in the servants’ quarters would introduce a servant character, hiding in the dungeon would introduce a prisoner character, and hiding in town would have brought the Wish Underground back. Buuuut then this was the first time a tie made it through since ‘Numbers Game’! Even after extending the vote and shouting around online. So I split the party.

12: INVOLVEMENT. Big influence. Owing to the prior tie, at this point, I wanted to know to what degree each of Joey and Iklius/Ikky should feature. (Incidentally, before now, there had been no plan to bring Iklius back.) If Joey and the Underground had gotten in, there would have been a more full frontal assault (distraction?) on the castle, less Ikky. With just Joey, he and Ikky might have traded off, or been separate distractions. As it was, with no Joey, we got Ikky.

13: RETURN. Marginal influence. If Chartreuse had been taken to Wanda, Simon would have relieved the guard who had been tasked with doing it, giving them a chance to talk. If Chartreuse had been taken to a waiting area, again she and Simon would have talked, but I likely would have introduced the King (or his personal servant?), only to have Wanda interrupt.

Perhaps 12 isn’t as “big” an influence as I state. But I really REALLY hadn’t wanted a tie there, and it had been leaning that way again. I even tweeted @ people to avoid it. (By the same logic, maybe 11 would have been “bigger” if it hadn’t resulted in a tie.) Still, it was the results of 12 that meant I had to finally work out Iklius’ power (cancellation was only decided on while writing part 13) and (even more than 13) it was part 12’s vote that set up the final battle as being face-to-face, versus some type of diversionary tactic.

FINAL FIGHT

14: CLIMAX. Big influence. Wanda completely losing it would have meant breaking out of Chartreuse’s spell only to find Azure had taken The Book, and pretty much only Ikky would have been able to shut her down - possibly with mutual annihilation. Ikky completely losing it would have meant using her cancellation to revert to Iklius - at which point he would have tried to eliminate Wanda himself. Likely not by mutual annihilation, but there would have been guilt going around at the attempt.

15: PROJECT. Negligible influence. Alison coming back would have been to talk with Chartreuse about Carrie and time travel (given the BBC issues), perhaps along with why she signed up. Alice talking about her God would have provided hints as to the personality of the character who’s running this station in the multiverse, as opposed to talking about Epsilon/Delta, which is what you got.

16: FAVE CHARACTER. I was merely curious as to which character(s) have been coming through more, and how it compared to Alijda, the favourite last time. So far, Chartreuse is in the lead! Like, OMG.

Thus the final fight resulted in the happy ending - as much as it could. Should I have expected this? Perhaps I shouldn’t have teased in my last “Paths Not Taken” post when there was a “poor” choice selected? For that matter, I recently came across another author with a “Reader Poll” in the midst of his story (zombie apocalypse scenario), and I wonder to what degree a choice there (and here) might have been influenced by the fact that we don’t want to be seen as uncaring people. Even if the whole thing is anonymous. Or, I might be reading too much into it.

APRIL FOOL

Ah yes, entry 17! I hope you enjoyed it yesterday! Rachel did really well, considering she had to write it two weeks in advance. Before I even knew that 16 would end the arc! I thought that she had a REALLY clever way of handling the uncertainty. I also like the idea of a scale difference (a la Gulliver) in some alternate worlds, and might use it when “The Epsilon Project” resumes. Again, you can check out her serial here. As for me writing someone else’s “April Fool”, I blogged about the process, if you’re curious.

From this point on, the website will redesign for “Time & Tied”, and we get a time travel story. And Chartreuse will (eventually) be in it… of all the secondary characters, she’s definitely the one I thought could handle her own spinoff. It just so happens that you got the spinoff first.

Thanks for reading, as before feel free to comment below about that which was unexpected, or anything else that jumps out at you!

WISH FULFILMENT, PART SEVENTEEN: Simon's Travels

There was a bright flash of light, and then a sudden darkness. Simon blinked open his eyes and looked around.

He was sitting in a giant cavern, much like the circular room he’d appeared in at first, but made of natural stone. Surrounding him on all sides were tiny houses and churches and citadels, with tiny people swarming out of their homes and waving and shouting excitedly in tiny high-pitched voices. Their clothes were complicated and ornate, their houses covered in detailed, tiny mosaics.

What had he been doing just before this? He searched his mind for the last thing he remembered. There had been an argument, there was always an argument, but he’d been sure it would work this time-

A tiny woman shouted something at him through a megaphone. At least he thought she was a woman, she was wearing a dress and a whole amethyst crystal on her head like a crown. He stared at her blankly, and caught sight of something on his wrist - he could call Alice!

“Alice? Do you know where I am?”

“Oh, sure. You’re at your new assignment.”

“What do you mean my new assignment?”

“This one is more important, so I reassigned you. You can come back to the other one if they don’t solve it without you.”

“Alice!”

“Ours is not to question why, ours is just to do and die.”

“That isn’t even a Hitchhiker’s Guide reference.”

“Well, you’re in the wrong book for that now, aren’t you?”

“I don’t even know what you mean.”

“Show them a card trick and try not to die. Your job is to warn them about the invasion. Have fun!”

With a scowl, Simon pulled out his deck of cards and began shuffling them. He’d known working for Alice was frustrating, but this was taking it to a whole new level. His team was back there, on that other world, and he was - he didn’t even know where he was.

There was an art to magic. It involved speedy reflexes, nimble fingers, and not having a thousand eyes focused on you with your cards being as tall as a person.

Simon heard a distinct voice yell to a friend, “Here, he’s got the card behind his hand! I seen it!”

“Everyone seen it, Joey,” retorted the friend. “You think he’s mad?”

“Has to fry your brain being that big. Why do you think he’s that big? Did he eat something wrong, like one of those little potions everyone knows not to drink?”

“Queeny’ll sort it out. That’s her job, queening.”

Simon was not incredibly sexist, but he’d recently had very firm and negative experience with a female authority figure. He eyed the stern woman in the red silk handkerchief and amethyst crown more warily. Her shouting was becoming harder and harder to understand, along the lines of ‘if you yell very fast at someone who doesn’t speak your language, they’ll definitely understand you.’

It was at this point that someone shot him with a miniature grappling gun. Simon hoped everyone else was having better luck than he was today.

TO BE CONTINUED?

APRIL FOOLS!

The crazy, zany, and completely NOT CANON! interlude you’ve just read is part of the Serial Fiction April Fool’s Day Swap, 2015 Edition.  The mindblowing gag post you’ve just read was written by Lucy Weaver, who normally writes the story Tapestry, found at: http://www.wysteriaclimbing.com/tapestry.

Gregory Taylor,  who normally writes this story, today has created their own piece of tomfoolery for Legion of Nothing found at: http://inmydaydreams.com/.

For a full list of all our April Fool’s Swappers and their stories, as well as dozens of other serial novels that will tickle your fancy, check out The Web Fiction Guide at:

http://forums.webfictionguide.com/topic/2015-april-fools-master-list

WISH FULFILMENT, PART SIXTEEN: Alternative Reality

As soon as Chartreuse collapsed, Simon ran over to her. He felt for a pulse, relieved to find that she still had one. They’d been pretty sure that she would end up in Wanda’s vision once the field was activated, so presumably (hopefully) that was the case. Having verified that Chartreuse might have a mild burn, but was otherwise okay, Simon looked up at Ikky. She’d followed over after him. “Keep an eye on her?” he requested, before heading to where Azure and Pelinelneth were standing by Wanda.

Azure held up a necklace, with what looked like a tiny book on it. “The elf says this is the evil thing,” she remarked.

Simon nodded, noticing that her arm was shaking. “Are you okay?”

“Hell no!” Azure shot back, pulling her arm back down as her look became a glare. “I got FIRED at. Literally! What’s my hazard pay?” Simon barely had time to shrug, before she continued with, “And what about my sister??” She thrust her arm out again, pointing towards Chartreuse.

“She seemed okay - how long does a vision usually last?”

Azure snorted. “Time dilates. You might as well ask what number I’d roll on a die. So, pay?”

“Ahem. Wanda’s safety is still guaranteed, right?” Pelinelneth asked, breaking back in.

Simon turned to the elf, deciding he had a better chance with that conversation. “Yes. As long as she acts reasonably once she regains consciousness.”

Pelinelneth nodded. Her eyes tracked to the pendant. “And once you take that away… do I disappear?”

Simon found he could only shrug again. “Let me call Alice,” he decided. When in doubt, consult one’s superiors? He tapped at his watch.

Before there was any response, Wanda stirred, and from near Chartreuse, Ikky called out, “She’s awake!” Azure reflexively took several steps backwards. Simon held his ground, warily watching Wanda. The Royal Wizard didn’t make any immediately aggressive moves. She almost seemed to be… crying? Pelinelneth bent down, putting an arm around the brunette.

“No killing!” Chartreuse called out. Simon turned, in time to see Ikky help his partner off the ground. “Wanda’s gonna, you know, work with us!”

“Killing?” Simon asked. That had only been their last resort, after bargaining, physical restraint, and for that matter, somehow using a wish themselves. Chartreuse and Ikky approached, the younger girl pointedly glancing from him to the blonde woman and back.

It clicked. Ikky, formerly Iklius, had a vendetta against Wanda. They had said that Wanda might get hurt. Ikky could have been hoping for that. For that matter, if all the wishes here reverted, would Iklius revert? As a male, with a renewed spirit, would he then make good on his desire for vengeance? Chartreuse had sensed something with Ikky. She hadn’t been able to put it into words. That could have been it.

At a loss for what to say for a third time, Simon was glad to hear Alice respond. He became less glad at what she said. “If someone’s dead, don’t tell me much!” came the voice from his watch. “Better chance of me fixing it that way!”

“We’re not dead. In fact, we’ve got the artifact,” Simon reported. “It’s a book.”

There was a breath of relief. “Awesomesauce! I’ll open up a portal.”

“Wait - what happens here when we remove the artifact?” Simon asked. “Do the wish results remain?”

“Sure, why wouldn’t they?”

“Well then, that leaves their town in a bit of a state.” For that matter, even if the wishes WERE cancelled, it would be an issue.

“Not our problem!” Alice said, her tone far too chipper. “Their world, let them deal.”

“They can’t!” Simon objected. “We’ve put their Royal Wizard into withdrawal, we had a hand in turning their former Wizard into a statue, and the only local left who knows what’s going on is technically an escaped prisoner.” He glanced at Ikky out of the corner of his eye.

“Oh.” Alice paused. “Can you get your team somewhere private? I don’t feel like explaining myself multiple times.” Simon frowned.

They helped Pelinelneth bring Wanda back to the Wizard Sanctuary. The elf said she’d keep an eye on Ikky while Snowball (Wanda’s pink unicorn) monitored the Wizard’s condition - they couldn’t yet tell if Wanda’s presently withdrawn emotional state was solely due to the future vision, or if it was the onset of withdrawal after being separated from The Book.

Simon, Chartreuse and Azure then relocated to a small room next door.

“The Epsilon Project,” Alice explained, her voice coming through on Simon’s communicator watch. “Our last, best place for hope. This Hub is a self-regulating station, tracking right and wrong, located in neutral–"

“If it’s self-regulating, why do you have to stay there?” Azure demanded.

A pause. “Okay, the system’s not perfect,” Alice admitted. “It’s self-regulating in the sense that it can identify it’s own errors and tell me about them. Usually.”

“Also, where was our backup? My sister’s burned! And are we getting paid?”

“Azure,” Chartreuse said reproachfully. “I’m okay, and Alice and her crew were trying to, you know, help people!”

“Yeah, but it’s people who weren’t US,” the younger Vermilion shot back.

A sigh came over the communications link. “Fine,” Alice said. “You want me to admit that I’ve screwed up? Then yes, I’ve screwed up. Perhaps we should have pulled your team out, once it became obvious that this wasn’t a simple search and extract mission. Certainly we should have gotten better data on Chartreuse’s sister, as she asks too many questions. Though I guess she’s not as bad as the gaffe made last mission.”

“Why, what happened then?” Simon asked, speaking up to prevent Azure from doing so. Plus, he was curious. Also worried.

“Oh, one of their team was copyright of the BBC in the universe they went to. We should have screened for that better, so now on top of everything, we have to avoid getting sued. Two missions in, and it’s like Terminator 2 - I need a vacation.”

“You don’t sound bothered,” Azure grumbled.

“You don’t know me,” Alice said, her normally carefree tones immediately becoming more subdued.

“We’re straying from the point,” Simon decided. He glanced at Chartreuse. “Uh, what was the point?”

“MY point,” Alice cut back in, spirits seemingly restored. “Is that MY job is to react to dimensional anomalies. That’s the whole reason for the Epsilon Project. But at the same time, it’s the EPSILON Project! Making next to zero alterations! Not the Delta Project, which would be all about incremental change.”

“Wait, dimensional anomalies?” Chartreuse asked.

“Supernatural bleed through. Stuff that’s not where it’s supposed to be. For instance, in our first case, someone named Lissa Jous was influencing another dimension through someone’s dreams. In your case, the wishing artifact doesn’t belong in that fantasy dimension, it came from… well, I don’t know exactly. Likely one of the worlds adjacent to Death Note Central. We’ll do some resonance scans to pinpoint it.”

“Oh! So your Project is trying to, like, keep one type of Alternate Earth from affecting another,” Chartreuse decided.

“But,” Simon objected, “you can’t simply remove something like the Wish Book from here and expect that doing so will have a negligible impact. Not once it’s been around for months!”

“Contrarily, if it had been there for less time, it wouldn’t have registered with us,” Alice stated. “Sometimes, you can’t get around paradox. But now that you’ve GOT it, you all need to GO. Like I said to Simon earlier today, we have to trust that things will naturally get back on track!”

Simon looked at the Vermilion sisters. “It feels wrong,” he said, suspecting that his own expression was a mirror to theirs.

“I get that,” Alice answered. “Look, how about this. I’ll open a portal - send Azure through to me, with the artifact. You and Chartreuse can stay until midnight. In the meantime, I’ll consult with God, to see if there’s anything here I’m missing. We DO hope you’ll be willing to sign up with us on a more permanent basis, after all.”

She continued without waiting for acknowledgement. “All I ask is, please, PLEASE, don’t start any revolutions, and for goodness sakes, don’t make any promises we can’t keep!!” The connection clicked off. Just as well, because Simon wasn’t sure what more he could have said.

“Hello!” Ikky said brightly as Simon and Chartreuse walked back into the Sanctuary. “Have we met?”

Simon blinked in surprise. “Met? You don’t rem–"

“Ikli,” Pelinelneth said. “Could you alphabetize the lower bookshelf for me? Me and Snowball need to have a word with our guests.” Ikky (Ikli?) nodded, Pelinelneth guiding Simon and Chartreuse away from her, with Snowball trotting over to join them. Wanda, Simon noticed, had moved up to the bed. She now looked to be asleep.

“We’ve totally missed something,” Chartreuse observed.

“Yeah. Us, fixing things,” Snowball stated. “It seemed like you were going to leave. Or did you have some plan? Where’s the blue haired girl anyway?”

“She’s returning the artifact,” Simon said. “As to a plan…" He exchanged an uneasy glance with Chartreuse before shaking his head. “No.”

“Good. I’d be suspicious of one anyway,” Snowball admitted. “Even if you did fix the wish thing, you’re obviously not locals.”

“So what did you do?” Simon asked.

“We got Wanda to give Iklius a memory wipe,” Pelinelneth murmured. She seemed troubled, but whether it was from that spell occurring, or merely from admitting it to them, Simon couldn’t say. “Because of Ikli’s natural resistance, it knocked Wanda out completely, but it worked. We’ve told Ikli that she lost her memory due to being hit on the head.”

Chartreuse’s eyes widened. “That’s horrible!”

“No, no, it’s the same spell that I had, back when I told Wanda I wanted to be let out of the castle,” Pelinelneth added. “Harmless, really.”

“But her MEMORIES!”

“Keep your voice down,” Snowball snapped. “Look. We need Ikli’s help. She’s one of the few who can use her power to easily cancel out the more severe wishes, yet she didn’t seem inclined to help us willingly. Besides, this way she won’t remember being in prison, or the deaths of her friends. That’s good, right?”

Simon’s gaze drifted over to where the blonde woman was rearranging books. “Except won’t she simply cancel out your memory wipe?”

“That’s the sticking point,” Pelinelneth admitted. “But Wanda had already started working on the problem, while Ikky - Ikli - was in prison. She was hoping for triple redundancy, a spell, a charm and a false memory… we currently have two out of three, and it seems to be working. Besides, we told her the loss was natural causes.”

“No. I don’t like it,” Chartreuse said, biting her lip. “Are you sure you didn’t, you know, explain that–"

“Chartreuse. It’s not our call,” Simon reminded her. Though truth be told, he didn’t feel happy with this idea either. Playing with someone’s mind, without permission? Worse, Ikky wouldn’t have been subjected to this if he hadn’t taken her out of her cell! It was Qifarihm all over again! Or was it? If Wanda had already planned to do this… Simon shook his head, aware he was now rationalizing away his own involvement.

“Meanwhile,” Snowball said. “Pelinelneth has some illusion and nature magic, enough to prop Wanda up until she feels able to continue on in her role in the castle.”

“And if she doesn’t feel up to it?” Chartreuse challenged. “What if withdrawal makes her go nuts?”

“We’ll hold a Wizard trial for a replacement.” Snowball managed the horse equivalent of a shrug.

Chartreuse opened her mouth to object again, but then couldn’t seem to find any words. And Simon realized it was as Alice had said: The people of this world were picking up the pieces without their help. Had she known that would happen? Had she known HOW it would happen? He grimaced, but also said nothing as Pelinelneth turned and went back to talk with Ikli.

There were still problems here. But what could they do to solve them, aside from get out of the way? On the bright side, Simon supposed that the place was overall better off for their having been here. Wasn’t it? He glanced at Chartreuse, wondering what had been in her future vision… then wondering if she should do another one. They had changed things for the better here, right?

Right?

-END?-

There is one more entry, though as we wrap up, please consider giving a star ranking at WebFictionGuide. Thanks for reading! Another poll follows…

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WISH FULFILMENT, PART FIFTEEN: Future Tents

The fireball flew straight for Azure’s face. And Chartreuse felt her heart jump into her throat. Perversely, the first thought that came to mind was: How exactly does one explain to one’s parents that their youngest daughter got killed on some alternate world? Worse, got killed because of a plan that you came up with?

Even though she was several metres away, hiding behind one of the statues in the castle courtyard, Chartreuse reached out her arm, as if that could pull her sister back out of harm’s way…

The fireball was deflected in Chartreuse’s direction, forcing her to pull back. It exploded on the ground, starting a small fire. The pink haired teenager quickly poked her head out around the other side of her cover.

Azure stood there, right arm outstretched and shaking. She was unhurt. Thank goodness, it had worked. They’d reasoned that the younger Vermilion might be able to deflect Wanda’s attacks using the deck of playing cards. But Azure could only do that another, what, 51 times? Did the deck have Jokers?

“I’ll see if I can get Ikky to shine the light again,” Simon murmured.

“Why did she, you know, stop?!” Chartreuse said, unable to keep the desperation out of her voice. Getting Ikky to channel her cancellation power through the flashlight beam (her focus object) had been the one thing keeping Azure safe. Granted, a fireball had been sent towards Ikky too, but couldn’t she have cancelled it out?

“Startled?” Simon suggested. “Plus, merely because she can cancel, doesn’t mean things around her are naturally immune. A lot’s been thrown at her today, literally and figuratively.”

He had a point. Moreover, Chartreuse had seen inside Ikky the potential for… well, something bad. She shouldn’t push. The teenager’s hands clenched. If only Wanda would move forwards into the field of crystals, instead of standing there, seemingly re-evaluating Azure.

Then, as Chartreuse watched, two more fireballs were produced, both of them flying towards Azure at once. The blue haired girl back-pedalled, hand moving quickly to pull cards from the deck in her left hand, throwing them out to block. One ball of flame flew to the left, the other slammed into the ground in front of her. Had Azure been singed?

And still Wanda stood there, not pressing the advantage. She had to know about the danger area! So what could they do? As Chartreuse watched, the brunette wizard eyed Azure again, then turned to the elf standing next to her. “See if she can do that against an arrow.”

It was then, as Chartreuse was a step away from charging out to stand with her sister, that she realized that she was being an idiot. Simon had given her back her two crystals, in order to do the reading on Ikky. With them, she could realign the perimeter herself.

She dashed out of hiding. She didn’t try to make herself a target, but even with the fading light after sundown, Chartreuse knew she’d be hard to miss. The light from the fires wasn’t helpful either. So, she tried to make it seem like she was running for the gates, trying to get away.

“You MISSED,” Wanda said, sounding shocked.

“I think she deflected it,” Pelinelneth said in a flat tone.

They were ignoring her. Chartreuse dropped a crystal on the ground. She now had to circle back around to Wanda’s other side. She did so, trying to keep from breathing too hard. She could do it in fifteen more steps. Ten. Five. Okay, another five.

That’s when she felt the intense, burning heat coming from her right, and she heard Azure scream, “NO!”

The light nearly blinded her. But almost immediately, she realized that it wasn’t a burning light, it was light from a flashlight - yet there was burning all around her, even if the worst of it was being cancelled out, and it was so hot, and maybe she was going to die, but it didn’t matter, she dropped the crystal and clapped her hands and spun to face their adversary.

“You showed us your past!” Chartreuse screamed out. “Time for us to, you know, show you your future!”

Her crystals lit up, a pulse of rainbow light chaining between all of them, with Wanda caught in the middle.

She could remake the world. She had the power to do it. No one would have to suffer ever again. Not like her. Never like her.

Baby steps, though. For all his misogynist posturing, Qifarihm had been right about a couple of things: Trying to take on too much, too soon, would result in disaster. Wanda had experienced that firsthand. Also, belief had to come from within. Not even facts and arguments could break through a person’s beliefs, no, the individual had to discover the truth for themselves. It had to become personal.

That’s where The Book came in.

Wanda had found it out in the woods, while searching for magical herbs. At first, she hadn’t been aware of what it could do. She’d merely wanted to keep it. She also hadn’t been sure what had compelled her to write, “I wish the King would ask MY opinion for a change, instead of Qifarihm” into it.

The King had consulted with Wanda the very next day. On something she’d had no clue about, so the advice had been terrible, but in no way was that experience mere coincidence. So, Wanda had experimented further. Small scale. On other people, so that she could remain objective.

She had quickly realized that, with The Book, she COULD change people’s beliefs. About themselves, about others - about reality itself! As a bonus, she got a nice little head rush whenever a wish was granted. Finally, she had it. A way to change their world for the better.

Sure, there had been hurdles, and glitches, but she had overcome them. She had even found a spell to miniaturize The Book and wear it as a pendant whenever it wasn’t in use, so that she could keep it safe. Because she knew that once the townspeople realized what she was capable of, and once they really understood the reasoning behind all of her efforts, it could only lead to one inevitable outcome.

A dragon, razing the city, burning it with fire.

“NO!” Wanda screamed. She tried to make a fireball, to shoot it up into the air, to fight back - but she had no cards, she had no magic, and then she realized that the fires burning around her threw off no heat.

“We’re kinda insubstantial,” came a voice. “That’s how my visions work.”

Wanda screamed again, and jumped for the pink haired girl, her hands reaching out for the teenager’s neck. She passed right through, falling onto the ground.

“Um, we’re even, like, insubstantial to each other. Sorry. I’m Chartreuse, by the way.”

Wanda scrambled back to her feet, fingers twitching, lips quivering, lost in a sea of emotion. “Why do you look like an elf? Why do you look like my Pelinelneth?!” she shouted.

Chartreuse reached up to touch her ears, seeming surprised. “Huh. Dunno. Holdover from your spell? Magic on this world is, you know, weird. My future visions don’t tend to be this vivid.”

“This is NOT the future!!”

Chartreuse lowered her arm. “It’s the most probable one. Again, sorry.”

“Then you have to CHANGE it,” Wanda demanded. “Give me more artifacts! Once I have them in other cities, once the people there learn, as we did, that that it’s their own beliefs which hold them back and cause society’s problems, we can fix this.”

The girl sighed. “Even if I could, you know, I wouldn’t.”

“Then this, ALL of this is on YOUR conscience!” Wanda shrieked, gesturing out at the flames surrounding them.

Chartreuse didn’t speak for a moment. When she did, it was only to say quietly, “No, Wanda. You’re the only one who can, like, change this.”

Wanda made a fist, then realized she couldn’t even punch the girl in the face. Seething, the brunette wizard turned her attention back to the images around them. “Do you even know WHY this is happening?” she asked.

“Fear.” This time, the response was immediate. “Can’t you sense it? I don’t know if it’s fear over the wishing in this place, fear over your growing power, fear over women finally being regarded as equals - maybe it’s pieces of all three. But your city is scared, your WORLD is scared, and they’re all fighting back. Innocents are getting hurt.”

Wanda COULD sense it. She’d been trying to block it out. “No. This is not what I wanted. Not like this.”

“Maybe it’s what your book wanted. Wanda, part of you knows it’s evil.”

She spun back to face her companion. “NO! The Book is a thing. Things are not good or evil. The Book can’t want this any more than a slice of bread wants cheese!”

The elf-like girl pursed her lips, and Wanda sensed what she was thinking. “And I am not evil either! I’m not! I’ve made mistakes, but I’ve been working to FIX them! I’m not inhumane! I’ve been selective about the wishes I write, I’ve tried to confiscate people’s weapons, I’ve been working to give the Queen more power - I didn’t even kill Qifarihm! I only need more time! More artifacts! You have to give them to me!!”

“All I was going to say is, you know, this particular book might be more than a mere thing.”

There was a moment, a very brief moment where Wanda felt like blasting away at the scene around her with every fibre of her being, doing whatever she could to escape this hideous lie, so that she could get back to making her world a better, safer place to live in. A place that would ultimately benefit everyone, once they stopped believing that things were inherent to gender, money, magic capability, or lineage.

But she didn’t do it. Instead, she fell to her knees.

“The Book is all I have left,” she stated. “You can’t take it. I’ve killed people, innocent people, and using The Book is the only way I can atone for it.” She felt a wetness slide down her cheek. Disgusted by the show of weakness, she pounded her fist into the ground.

“Oh, like, hell,” Chartreuse shot back. Wanda jerked her gaze back up in surprise. “There’s people out there who dream of having your strength of character! The fact that this book is evil, and magic can corrupt, and yet even after all you’ve experienced, you’re still upset over what’s happening? That’s a sign that bad stuff is, you know, having a hell of a time getting it’s hooks into you!”

Wanda shook her head, awareness dawning. “Yet I’ve changed people, I’ve manipulated them, I’ve–”

“Stop.” Chartreuse crouched down. “It’s possible to do the wrong thing for the right reason.” She frowned. “Maybe that’s from, like, a fortune cookie. My point is, it’s not too late to, you know, do the right thing!” She took a deep breath. “There is still time to prevent this future. That much I know.”

Wanda cast her gaze up to the sky. A sky filled with cinders and dark smoke, smoke which was billowing out over a land that she now realized wasn’t capable of - or perhaps simply wasn’t ready for - the vision she had in her head.

Not even facts and arguments could break through a person’s beliefs, no, the individual had to discover the truth for themselves. It had to become personal.

“Take The Book away, and help me fix this,” Wanda pleaded, her tears now flowing freely.

Chartreuse snapped back into her body. When her eyes opened, she realized that she was lying on the ground. Right - she’d collapsed upon being pulled into the vision with Wanda. She tried to prop herself up on one arm, and winced. She pulled the arm up to stare at it. Her shirt sleeve had been burned away, and her skin had what looked like a sunburn. Peachy.

“She’s awake!” a female voice called out, and Chartreuse realized it was Ikky. Even as she struggled to sit up again, the blonde woman moved into her field of vision. With a tentative smile, Ikky asked, “Do we get to kill Wanda now?”

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WISH FULFILMENT, PART FOURTEEN: Into Fire

Chartreuse was in the dungeon less than ten minutes after arriving at the castle. Simon came into her cell as soon as the guard who’d brought her there had departed. “That could have gone better,” he remarked. “I was kind of hoping you’d get to talk to the King.”

“It could have, you know, gone worse,” Chartreuse countered. “They might have taken me directly to Wanda.”

Fair point. “She’ll find out soon enough. Hopefully not until after dinner.” He glanced towards the cell door. “Where’s Azure?”

“Getting things into position. She was able to walk right past me and the guards, what with her magic card and me being distracting.”

Simon shifted his gaze down to the card pinned on his front, the one reading ‘Guard’. “I trust she’s being careful. I did say these cards don’t work once a person is concentrating directly on you, right?”

“I’m surprised they work at ALL,” Chartreuse admitted. She pulled her’s back out, which said ‘Ignore’, and pinned it in place. “It’s, you know, atypical on our world. But we’re aware. We even dealt with Joey, once he, like, saw through it at Pelinelneth’s place.”

Simon nodded. Time then to talk about what they hadn’t discussed over the comms. “So. Do you know what the artifact is?”

“A book,” Chartreuse said. “I can’t be more specific. I don’t know how Wanda can always have it on her person. Or how it’s granting the wishes of others if she’s always got it.” The pink haired teenager wrung her hands a little. “I’m sorry.”

Simon scratched his chin. “No, that’s okay. I can answer one of those. After getting a sense of Wanda’s daily routine, I crept back into her Sanctuary yesterday evening and found her crystal ball. There was a page of notes next to it - people’s wishes. She must be scrying and jotting them down, or recording them magically for later use or something.”

“Yeah? I’m surprised people are still, like, wishing at all, given the consequences.”

“I don’t know how old the list was. A wish is also the sort of thing one can blurt out accidentally. Though I wonder, perhaps Wanda’s removing weapons from the city so that there aren’t fatal consequences from some wishes? She doesn’t seem completely without a conscience.”

“Wanda’s not totally stable either,” Chartreuse countered. She then filled in a few gaps based on her journal reading.

Simon ultimately cut her off. “Sorry, but we’re short on time, and there’s one more thing I need you to do before the confrontation.” He glanced towards the wall of the cell, thinking about who was on the other side. “I need you to divine Ikky’s intentions.”

Chartreuse pursed her lips. “I’d, you know, wondered if you went to her again.”

“I did more than that. I showed her how to access her magic again.”

Chartreuse’s eyes went wide. “That seems REAL stupid. Uh, no offence. But when Ikky was Iklius he had, like, a total vendetta against Wanda! And we told Pel–”

“I know!” Simon extended his arms, palms up. He lowered his voice. “I know. But I have no magic. The magic that you and your sister have is primarily passive. I thought we’d need more, and I gambled that Wanda put Ikky down here for more than mere revenge.”

Chartreuse didn’t look happy. “And?”

“And Ikky’s magic is… useful.” Simon drew his hands back, putting them into his pockets. “She thought she’d lost it by becoming female. She didn’t realize that females needed a focus object to control their first spells.”

“Ikky’s not the smartest then?”

“It wasn’t relevant to her. Him. Her, when she was a him. Look, speaking as a man, we are occasionally oblivious. Except he had even more cause not to care.”

“Why?”

“Iklius had - has - cancellation magic. The ability to negate other spells. Meaning he couldn’t be magically harmed. And when one is verging on invulnerable, who cares what others are doing?”

“Wow.” Chartreuse turned to look at the wall of the cell now too. “So that’s why he was the least hurt at the incident that, you know, killed other people.”

“Probably. I suspect he was only hurt at all because he was caught off guard. It’s also why he could be a thorn in Wanda’s side afterwards, though I’m not sure to what extent she knows of his abilities. Moreover, it explains the sense of entitlement Iklius displayed, back in our replay of Wanda’s history.” Simon hesitated. “The ego that resulted might even be the reason for his rather disgusting treatment of… Simone.” He almost said ‘of me’, but in the end, felt like he had to displace the experience.

“That doesn’t excuse it.”

“No. No, it doesn’t. But his magic upbringing could explain it.” Simon rubbed his forehead. “At any rate, I didn’t tell Ikky that a woman’s focus object could be anything. I gave her my flashlight to attune herself to. It’s not like the technology exists on this world, so if it turns out she’s been lying to me, we take it away.”

“Like, lying to you about what?”

“About reforming.” Simon couldn’t help it, he began to pace back and forth. “Ikky says she’s gained a new appreciation for the struggle of others, particularly women, after this gender switching experience.”

“You bought that line?”

Simon stopped in place. “I don’t know. But she’s been locked in the dungeon for months! Even had to deal with Qifarihm talking down to her. When I found her, she seemed completely demoralized, and she’s seemed sincere about turning over a new leaf.” He resumed his pacing. “Hence why I want you to read her aura, or whatever it is you do. Please. If she DOES have her own agenda, we’ll leave her. It’s just - cancellation magic would be nice to have against Wanda.”

Chartreuse tugged at the large bow in her hair. “Fine. But Azure has most of my, you know, crystals, and a guard took the last two away.”

Simon nodded, and instead of pacing back this time, continued to walk all the way to the door. “Then I’ll get them.”

The castle courtyard had been decided on as the battle ground. For one thing, it was a fairly public space, so there were liable to be witnesses, meaning Wanda wouldn’t be able to spin the outcome later. For another, the open space meant there would probably be less collateral damage to the castle walls themselves, while the few statues and shrubs could still allow for cover.

Of course, Wanda didn’t know it would be the battle ground. But she would know soon enough. Azure laid down the last of the crystals, then went to one of the nearby trees. She jumped up, grabbed a branch, and hauled herself up into a sitting position. Sure, no one had spotted her yet, but that was no reason to stand out in the open.

Her eyes went to the wall, and the location of the secret door. She hoped that Simon or Chartreuse would emerge. She’d have to start soon, as the sun had nearly set, and backup would be really REALLY nice. Particularly in light of how Chartreuse had a better grasp of what needed to be done.

Not for the first time, Azure wondered about Alice. Sure, sending in people with primarily defensive or investigative capabilities made sense for a low key search and recover mission - but now that they were going up against a Royal Wizard, wasn’t it time to bring in the offensive team? Surely her sister’s firsthand experience wasn’t enough to keep her in command?

Yet here they were. Azure kicked her legs back and forth. She really hoped she’d be alive later, so that she could shout at someone about how screwed up this was.

Minutes past. Dusk fell. If it got much darker, fighting could be problematic. She should set off the signal. It was as Azure jumped back down out of the tree that she saw the secret door open, and two figures emerge. Her feeling of relief was momentarily arrested, as she realized there were actually three figures. Hopefully that was part of the plan?

Anyway, it was time. At some point over the last couple days, Chartreuse (coordinating with Simon via Alice) had soaked some pages in ammonium nitrate, or this world’s equivalent, and wrapped them up. (Yeah, so much for only paying attention to her sister’s sickness!) This meant that setting them alight would, in theory, produce a lot of smoke. Time to test that theory.

Azure made sure that the papers weren’t on the grass as she took a match to them. The result was hardly the smoke screen that she’d envisioned, but from the large plumes of smoke produced, it was obvious that something was going on. The few servants in the area were turning to look.

The younger Vermilion removed the ‘Ignore’ card from her pocket, and ripped it in two. Whatever “card magic” might have been protecting her from Wanda’s sights, that had, well, torn it. “Wanda!” Azure called out. “We need to talk!”

The servants ran off. Then the beam of a flashlight was trained onto her. Azure raised her hand to her forehead, squinting to see why Simon was blinding her, only able to discern that it was apparently the third (female?) figure from earlier who was doing it. “I don’t need the spotlight!” she protested.

“You totally do!” her sister called back from somewhere.

Fine, whatever. Azure crossed her arms, peering through the smoke, hoping they’d get through this before the sky had gone completely dark. Wanda seemed to be taking longer to get here than they’d planned for.

Azure never heard the approach. A voice behind her simply said, “I could have thrown a fireball at you just now.”

She spun. A woman dressed all in pink stood about five metres away. Her arms were crossed, and she did not look happy. Worse, next to her was that silver haired elf, who had an arrow pulled back, ready to fly from her bow. Were they working together again?

Her heart hammering in her chest, Azure heard herself say, “You also could have told your elf friend to fire her arrow, I guess I should be happy you’re on a non-violence kick?” One of these days, she’d find a better defensive mechanism than snide remarks.

Wanda smirked. “Don’t get the wrong idea. I could still banish you. ALL of you,” she added, glancing to the side, where the flashlight beam was coming from. “But doing so means you might not be the last visitors. I’m also curious as to what cancelled out my attempts to teleport you out of here.”

Azure’s stomach started twisting in knots. This woman had tried to abduct her? Had Chartreuse managed to foresee that?? Is THAT why they were shining a flashlight at her? No, how did that even make sense?? Azure forced herself to calm down. Whatever it was, it hadn’t worked. “Come over here and ask that,” she challenged.

Which wasn’t merely bravado. She really did want Wanda to come closer, on account of the way she’d aligned Chartreuse’s crystals earlier. The “Royal Wizard” was currently slightly out of range. Unfortunately, Wanda seemed perfectly content to stay there; Azure hoped it was coincidental.

“Never mind,” Wanda said dismissively. “Of more interest to me is the fact that you first showed up when your friends were in trouble. It’s occurred to me since then that I have an entire kingdom on my side. What do you have that could possibly compete?”

She was fishing. A fishing called Wanda. Azure fought the urge to giggle hysterically, and instead shifted gears. “Look, you showed my friends your past for a reason. Right? It was so that they could understand you. Help you. Yeah?” She took a step forwards, in the hope that Wanda would do the same. Again, no such luck.

“Actually,” Wanda admitted, “in light of what I had to go through, I expected your friends to die. And death in that vision would have killed them here too.”

The more Wanda spoke in controlled, measured tones, the more Azure wanted to scream, or run away. Having the bow and arrow pointed at her didn’t help matters. “Ouch. Well, how about we shake hands and call it even?” she asked, extending her arm invitingly.

Wanda chuckled. “No.” Her smile became twisted. “At this point, I’m satisfied. Whoever you are, you are no match for me.”

Her wrists flicked, and in the time it took to blink, two fireballs had formed above the cards that she held. One was fired off towards the source of the flashlight beam. The other was thrown directly at Azure’s face.

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WISH FULFILMENT, PART THIRTEEN: Out of Frying Pan

Chartreuse exchanged a glance with her younger sister. Then she looked back across the room to Joey Frankson, the teenager who had, moments ago, burst into Pelinelneth’s home. And pointed a crossbow at the two of them.

Chartreuse supposed Joey had cause to do it. After all, Pelinelneth had told them that a “Joey” was part of her town’s underground, a group of individuals with no memory of the time before the wishes had become common knowledge. This had to be the same person, now wondering about the new people in Pelinelneth’s home. But Chartreuse knew she and Simon were juggling enough balls in the air - better to get rid of Joey. But how?

“I’m, you know, Pelinelneth!” Chartreuse called out to him. “Like, put that away!”

The dark haired boy blinked. “You’re no elf!”

“Right, I, you know, got tired of the Santa connection, and accidentally wished I could be more like the pretty new girl who came into town, and so now I look like her.”

He frowned, and his crossbow dipped a little. “Seriously? Then what’s my last name?”

Chartreuse wondered if that was a trick question. “Frankson.”

“And who brought the snacks to our last gathering?”

That question was harder. “Louie the Leprechaun,” Azure stated. Chartreuse turned to look at her sister again, and saw that Azure had grabbed the deck of cards sitting on the floor, and performed what could only be termed as a hasty reading. She seemed to have cut the deck, turned up the jack of clubs, and divined the name from that. Though her shrug implied she wasn’t sure.

Chartreuse looked back at Joey. His crossbow was now pointed at the floor. “Fine,” he said, seemingly convinced. “So is she one of us too?” He motioned at Azure. “And are you bringing her to tonight’s meeting?”

“Like, sure,” Chartreuse said, amiably. “See you there, okay?”

“Okay,” Joey concluded. He turned and walked back up the stairs. Maybe the underground wouldn’t have been too hard to infiltrate.

“Nice work,” Azure said. Then she made a face. “Except now the song ‘Louie Louie’ is stuck in my head! What do these lyrics even MEAN?”

“I don’t know, but we do gotta go,” Chartreuse said. “After I, you know, tell Alice to tell Simon that you’re doing better.”

Simon had been able to consider their next move for a couple of days now. Doing so while hiding out in the dungeon hadn’t even been as bad as he’d thought. True, it wasn’t great for comfort, particularly at night - but there was a small washroom down the hall, presumably for guards, which he’d been able to sneak into. Actually, he’d been surprised to find that, despite the fantasy setting, certain scientific style advances did exist.

For instance, along with the makings of indoor plumbing, the couple times Simon had gone through the kitchen, they’d seemed to have devices capable of mixing that ran on - magical batteries? He hadn’t really been in a position to ask. And as Chartreuse had pointed out at some point, Wanda’s journal had been pencil to paper, not ink to parchment. There had to be a magical reason for these sorts of advancements, right?

Simon had asked Alice, but she seemed to know even less about this world than they did. “You’re there to identify - and ideally recover - an evil artifact,” she had stated yesterday. “Don’t make that more complicated than it needs to be.”

Alice didn’t seem to realize that it was already complicated. If they recovered (or destroyed) the artifact, would all the wishes simply revert? What about things like Qifarihm becoming a statue? That hadn’t been a wish, that had been a spell. So if Wanda’s wish to be the Royal Wizard was undone, who would take her place, if not him? Conversely, if some wishes were not undone, might Wanda remain in a position of power - suffering from withdrawal? What orders might she give in that state?

No, it was no longer a matter of taking the artifact and leaving. Simon was pretty sure a new spell or - dare he consider it - a wish would be necessary to put the town back on track. He said as much to Alice, when she called to tell him that Azure had made a full recovery.

At first, there was only silence on the line. “Look,” Alice finally said. “You may think it’s a long way down the road to the chemist’s, but that’s just peanuts to space.”

Simon frowned. “What?”

“Oh, right. Seriously, read the book!” Alice accused. “What I mean is, you’re one guy, in one town, on one continent, on one world, in one universe, out of an entire multiverse. Nothing you do there will cause Federations to collapse or galaxies to explode. To be blunt, you’re not that important.”

“I don’t believe that,” Simon fired back. “Otherwise you wouldn’t have sent us down here in the first place!”

Another pause. “Touche. But up here,” Alice said. “THIS is where we’re making a difference. Patching up the cracks, so that one little town can flourish, and not end up getting bombed into oblivion by a neighbour state, scared by the whole wish thing.”

Simon allowed himself a moment to digest that scenario. “Is that seriously what would happen without us?”

“I don’t know. God doesn’t give me all those details.”

Simon did a double take, wondering if he’d misheard. “God?”

Alice’s tone became wistful for a moment. “Well, that’s how I think of her.” She cleared her throat. “My point being, short of staying there on a permanent basis and starting a movement, you can’t put the town on track. We have to trust that it will happen naturally, once we remove the offending element.”

Simon shook his head. “That’s a lot to accept on faith.”

“It is. Would it help if I told you that everything worked out well the last time, after we recovered Lissa Jous?”

“Not really, because I don’t know what that means.”

“Nor do you know what it means when I quote Hitchhikers at you. But on some level, it’s reassuring, right?”

“Uh. I guess?” Simon wondered when he’d lost control of the conversation.

“Awesome sauce. So, any message to send back to Chartreuse?”

Simon thought about that. All of their communications had to be routed through Alice - if there was a way to use his communicator to contact Chartreuse directly, he didn’t know of it. Which meant that their separate discoveries were being transmitted through Alice’s pop culture filter. More to the point, it meant that Alice knew everything they shared. Which is why he hadn’t shared everything. He suspected the same of Chartreuse.

It wasn’t that he felt Alice to be untrustworthy. It was that, even after this latest discussion, he still wasn’t certain about her agenda.

“Tell Chartreuse to arrive before sundown. I’ll be watching,” Simon concluded. Then, once the communication channel had been closed, he left the hiding place of his cell, crossing the dungeon in order to speak with Ikky again.

Chartreuse glanced around the corner. She was in was the same alley that she and Pelinelneth had used for a hiding place, thirty paces away from the castle archway. Now she was here with her sister. And without a frying pan. Chartreuse chewed on her lower lip for a moment.

“Time to storm the castle?” Azure asked.

She couldn’t put it off any longer. “You need to, like, know a few other things first,” Chartreuse said. “In particular, the contents of Wanda’s journal.” She took in a deep breath. “Even the parts I, like, don’t want to tell you about.”

“Finally!” Azure smiled. “Or should I act surprised? It’s just you’ve had that look ever since I woke up.”

Chartreuse frowned. “What look?”

“The one you get after you’ve visioned into the future and seen something you wish you hadn’t seen.”

“Ah. Um, maybe, but this is, like, the past…" A thought struck her. “Do you ever, you know, see something in someone’s past that you wish you hadn’t?”

The side of Azure’s mouth twitched. “Seriously, sis? Only ALL THE DAMN TIME. Why the heck do you think I avoid using my ability? Only to seem ‘normal’?” As she spoke, she did the air quotes. “That said, when I do see something, and it looks bad, I just have to think - someone who’s been through that is still alive! Focus on the positive, you know?” She crossed her arms. “Now hurry up and tell me about this Wanda, or I’ll read your history and get it that way.”

Chartreuse blinked at Azure’s abrupt manner. But then, she’d always been the more direct one, out of the two of them. So, with a nod, Chartreuse told her.

About how Wanda had gone into magic despite her mother’s protests. How constant reading had led to Wanda adopting paper as her focus point. How she’d invented an imaginary elf friend for encouragement. How she’d decided to demonstrate her potential by mastering one of the Elemental Powers - fire. How she’d come to town, to try and become the Wizard’s Apprentice, as soon as she’d heard about the opening. Perhaps too soon in her self-training.

Since that was how she’d killed two people when a bunch of boys had ganged up on her after the trials.

It hadn’t been intentional. She’d lost control. Qifarihm had then taken her in - which Wanda thought was more to keep an eye on her than for her actually winning the competition - which kept her from ending up in prison. And he’d then given her meaningless jobs to perform, to prevent further magical outbursts, while simultaneously trying to convince her that she wasn’t up to the task of doing more.

And after five years of that, Wanda had wondered if jail might have been preferable.

“Or that’s, you know, the vibe I got,” Chartreuse noted. “Her entries became less frequent, and she seemed to be trying to, like, generalize. To figure out how to make people believe in the ability of ALL females to do powerful magic.”

“She didn’t want anyone else to have to go through a history like hers.”

“Essentially.” And then one day, out in the woods, she’d found the artifact. A book. A book that made wishes come true.

“What, you write something in this book and it becomes reality?” Azure asked.

“Probably?” Chartreuse mused. “Except you can’t, like, erase the wish after it’s written. It wasn’t really clear. Maybe Wanda was, you know, losing her grip on reality too. She wrote hardly anything in the journal after that discovery. The last entry was about her becoming, like, Royal Wizard.”

“Huh.” Azure looked towards the castle. “So that’s who I’m up against.”

“Who WE’RE up against.”

“Your magic plan has me in a starring role.”

“I wish it didn’t.”

“Thanks for the vote of confidence!”

“You know what I mean,” Chartreuse snapped. She winced at her tone. “Sorry. I’m just worried. Though, I got the vibe that Simon has, like, another possibility, but he didn’t want to say it through Alice. So the first thing we have to do is reunite with him.”

“Meaning NOW we storm the castle?”

“Yeah. Kinda. Put on your cowl and, you know, follow me.” They hadn’t wanted to waste Alice’s power reserves sending in new clothing for Azure; the robe Chartreuse had found in Pelinelneth’s closet helped to hide not only Azure’s outfit, but also her outward appearance.

Chartreuse stepped out of the alleyway. She walked purposefully up to the guards on duty, not attempting to disguise her approach, and only glancing back once to make sure Azure was still following. One of the guards levelled a sword at her as she approached, the other one stepping back, presumably so that he might call for backup.

“Hi!” Chartreuse said brightly. “I’m a mystical girl from a foreign land, come to fix your wishing problem. Can I please speak with your, you know, King?”

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WISH FULFILMENT, PART TWELVE: Reversal

“Splitting the party has to be one of the stupidest ideas you’ve ever had.”

“Glad you’re, you know, feeling better.”

Chartreuse sounded tired. Azure frowned. She didn’t sit up again though - that had hurt. Instead, the blue haired girl decided to stop ragging on her sister and actually take stock of what had been happening around them lately. This was surprisingly harder to do than she’d initially anticipated, so she decided to return to her first really solid memories.

She had survived her first year of high school. Yay. It was now - or had been - summer vacation. The Vermilion family hadn’t been called upon to do any summer missions, and to her delight, her parents hadn’t insisted on doing any family bonding exercises in July either. Well, they hadn’t yet.

Then, that afternoon, Chartreuse had phoned for advice about seeing the past. Then, someone named Alice had phoned, saying that Chartreuse was in trouble. Although she’d wondered if it was a prank call, Azure had answered truthfully - she would help her sister, if she was seriously the only one who could.

She’d then found herself in a cylindrical room, feeling dizzy.

“You’ll need to break her out of a spell,” came a woman’s voice. Azure recognized the sound as being ‘Alice’ from the phone, and tracked the noise to a pair of legs sticking out from an open computer panel against the side wall. Alice was wearing jeans and running shoes.

“Who?” Azure wondered, dazedly. She took a step, but nearly fell over, so decided to just stand there and regain her equilibrium.

“Chartreuse. And Simon,” the legs explained. “I’m modifying this up to ‘port you in next to them. I think. Yeah, this should work. But! It means I won’t have the power to do much afterwards. So don’t expect any more backup for a while.”

“Backup?”

“Can’t back up, only moving forwards,” Alice countered, finally shoving herself out from underneath the bank of computers. She was a brunette. She stood and hit enter on a keyboard. There was a rumble, the room began to vibrate somehow, and moments later a chevron lit up on the floor. There was a huge ring device there, which Azure hadn’t noticed.

“Wait, what spell?”

“Beats me,” Alice said. “Tenuous mental connection. But breaking it should be obvious. Just be FAST, I don’t know how much time you’ll have.” She walked over and held out some sort of watch device.

A second chevron lit up, then a third. Azure narrowed her eyes. “Did our mom put you up to this?”

Alice’s smile was quirky. “No, Luke. I am not your mother.”

Things got much more jumbled after that. Azure remembered going through the portal, seeing a surprised elf girl, saving her sister and some older guy, seeing a magical pony, learning about a dangerous witch, activating her magic, and nearly throwing up in a corridor. Her stomach gurgled a bit at that last memory.

Except she wasn’t in a corridor now, she was in a bed.

A bed in what had looked like a kitchen. Though Azure granted that she might have misinterpreted the scene when she’d decided to sit up. In fact the only thing about the room that she’d been sure of, is that Chartreuse had been the only other person there. Yet when she’d asked about the other guy, Simon, her sister had said they’d left him behind in the castle.

Seriously, when you’re up against a hostile witch, why would you split the party?

Having decided that this was as much as she’d get from her memories, Azure spoke up again. “How long have I NOT been feeling better?”

“Three days.”

Azure sat bolt upright at that, ignoring the pangs in her temples. “Three DAYS?”

“It’s my fault,” Chartreuse said quietly. “I’m sorry.”

Azure squeezed her eyes shut, then opened them again. Okay, they weren’t quite in a kitchen, it was more like an all purpose room of some sort. In, seemingly, a basement. “Don’t be sorry, be… explainy,” Azure requested.

Chartreuse let out a breath, standing up from her chair. “When I first came to this world, it, like, took me a full day to align my aura to… you know, wherever this is. I didn’t try major crystal divinations in that time.” She began to pace, not meeting her sister’s gaze. “Yet within moments of arriving, you had to, like, disrupt powerful magic, then create an image to allow us to hide from Wanda. Your body couldn’t take it.” She sniffled. “I should have realized. I’m–”

“If you say sorry, I WILL slap you,” Azure cut in. She hated when Chartreuse got upset. Not only was it out of character for the older girl, it meant that Azure couldn’t simply snipe at her without feeling guilty. “You’re not psychic, only semi-clairvoyant.”

“Which wasn’t good enough. It’s, you know, why you had to be brought here.”

Azure grabbed her pillow and heaved it at her sister. She smiled as it scored a direct hit on the back of Chartreuse’s head, forcing the other girl to look at her. “Stop it! Explainy. Here is where?”

“I don’t really know. Like, an alternate Earth?”

Azure rolled her eyes. She’d presumed as much. “Here this ROOM is where?”

“Oh. Pelinelneth’s place in town. Didn’t seem like she’d be, you know, using it.”

“P-line-L-nith?”

“Elf girl. Wanda’s imaginary friend, made real by a wish. Shot at Simon with an arrow.”

“Right.” Azure thought back over the last few remarks. It helped that her headache was disappearing. “You said you were on this Earth for a full day to align your aura? But I saw you this morning. That is, the same morning you and Alice phoned me.”

Chartreuse picked up the pillow from the floor and came back to sit in the chair. “Possibly time passes here at a different, you know, rate? All I know is Alice initially told me that I could be back home in time for, like, supper.”

Azure mused again. She decided to be blunt. “If Alice knew you’d need time to adjust, she’d have known it for me. In fact, she told me I’d have to be fast, and in retrospect, I don’t think she said it because of Peleline– Pelnino– the elf’s immobilization field.” She crossed her arms. “I don’t trust this Alice. How long have you known her?”

“Not long. Only since I was, you know, first brought here.”

“THAT’S reassuring.”

“She needed help! Our family provides help! Besides, Alice’s, you know, aura seemed a lot better than some of the guys from the Canadian government we’ve dealt with in the past.” She sighed. “Anyway, moot point. We’re here now, and we need Alice’s help to communicate back with Simon.”

“Oh yeah. Remind me why leaving him behind was a good idea?”

“You needed to be cared for. I didn’t, like, think that would be possible in the castle. But we, you know, needed to keep someone on the inside, since we’ll have to get back in. To get the evil artifact away from Wanda.”

“Evil artifact. Check. Did we get an artifact too? Is this like high stakes ‘Capture the Flag’?”

To Azure’s relief, Chartreuse half smiled. “No.”

“Too bad.” The younger Vermilion swung her legs over the edge of the bed. “So what’s happened the last three days?”

“I’ve, like, read through Wanda’s journal.”

“And?”

“Been very, um, unsettled.”

“You’ve done nothing else??”

“I’ve cared for you. I’ve cooked badly.”

Azure made a dismissive gesture. “No news there. What about from this Simon, what have you heard?”

Chartreuse hesitated. “That’s where things get a bit more, you know, interesting.”

In fleeing from the Wizard’s Sanctuary, Simon recalled that, in the dungeon, three cell doors had been closed - and he’d only investigated the cell with Chartreuse. Whatever the other two cells were being used for, they’d probably make for a good hiding place. After all, he still had the keys to get into them, and it was probably the last place Wanda would look.

Once he’d found his way to the dungeon through conventional corridors, he’d discovered that the first locked room was a storage area of some sort. There were some sacks of flour and other foods - as well as a few bladed weapons. He wondered whether it was smart keeping a small armoury so close to actual prisoners. Then he remembered that Wanda had been removing weapons from the town, so maybe some guards were concealing the items down here. It made him feel better about his choice of hiding places.

The second room contained a person.

It caught Simon by surprise, as with all the noise they’d made in their earlier jailbreak, he’d have thought any other prisoners would have spoken up. But when he swung open the door, there she was, curled up in the corner. Her head rested against the wall, knees drawn in to her chest. Her long, dirty blonde hair was tangled about her shoulders, and she was wearing a faded dress. She seemed to be about his age, maybe older.

She looked up at him with blue eyes. For some reason, she seemed vaguely familiar. “You’re not the usual guard,” she murmured.

“I’m… not a guard,” was all Simon could think to say.

“You look like a guard.”

Simon looked down at his outfit, which definitely did not look like an official uniform - allowing him to spot the card that Azure had pinned onto his chest. The one that had the word ‘Guard’ scribbled onto it.

“Wait, no you don’t. Who are you?” She slightly uncurled. Simon made a mental note to not allow anyone to get more than a brief look at him.

“I’m the nephew of a guard,” Simon hedged, trying to figure out why she seemed familiar. “Who are you?”

She blinked back at him. “Iklius,” she answered. She curled back up. “Or call me Ikky, like the others. I don’t care any more.”

Simon felt like a hand was simultaneously squeezing at his heart while punching him in the gut. For a moment, he couldn’t move. Because her features were JUST similar enough for it to be true. For this to be the same boy who had tried to tear at his clothing, and later punch him in the face. When he’d been in Wanda’s spell. When he’d been a girl. Now Iklius was the girl - woman - while he was the man. Simon frowned. Gender was confusing.

“I… I’ve heard of you,” Simon managed. “Wanda turned you into a woman?”

“I turned MYSELF into one,” Ikky said bitterly. “A few months ago, when I wished I could understand Wanda better. It was supposed to show me how I could come after her, to avenge my friends! Not turn me into this!”

“Oh,” Simon said. His lips pursed. He couldn’t resist asking, “Do you at least understand Wanda better?”

“I’m just glad I can’t be put in the same cell as that Qifarihm any more! And if you’re here asking about his escape, I don’t know anything!”

“I’m not here about his escape. He’s a statue now anyway.”

“Oh. Well good,” Ikky said. There was a pause. “So why ARE you here? You do sound kind of familiar.”

“Just checking on you,” Simon said. And he’d closed the cell door again.

“He left her in JAIL?” Azure said, aghast. “Okay, I don’t think I trust your Simon either.”

“First, he’s not my Simon,” Chartreuse said in mild irritation. “Second, it’s not that simple. You don’t, like, know what this woman did when she was a man - I do. I’ve read the journal. And we promised Pelinelneth that we’d minimize Wanda’s suffering, so, like, releasing someone who’s got a vendetta against her didn’t seem wise.” She paused. “Particularly given how badly that went the first time.”

Well, Azure thought, the final remark saved her from bringing up whatever had happened with Qifarihm. So she decided to drop it. For now. “Has Simon passed on any other info through Alice?”

“He’s mapped out the castle a little better,” Chartreuse said. “And he has a sense of when Wanda’s got, you know, duties and stuff. We think our next step is–"

She didn’t get a chance to complete her thought, because there was the sound of a door being smashed open. Almost immediately there were footsteps, and a boy came into view, running down the stairs. He was a dark haired teenager, and as he saw Azure and her sister, he levelled a crossbow across the room at them. “All right!” he shouted. “You’re going to tell me what you’ve done to Pelinelneth, or my name’s not Joey Frankson!”

WHAT’S NEXT?

Options: [polldaddy poll=8691065]

VOTING WILL IDEALLY CLOSE TUESDAY MAR 3 EST

Next ->

WISH FULFILMENT, PART ELEVEN: Hard Truths

“Azure?!” Chartreuse gasped.

“No duh!” the blue haired girl fired back at her sister.

Simon registered what they were saying, but he was rather more preoccupied with patting himself down to verify that yes, he was again back in his more familiar male body. As opposed to the female one he’d inhabited for the duration of Wanda’s spell. Unfortunately, this meant he only registered the presence of the fourth person in the room after the immobilization field hit.

It then took a moment for Simon to realize it wasn’t complete immobilization. While it felt like he couldn’t move in the wash of deep pink (even more pink than the room had been previously), it was possible to counter the effect. But it was slow, and hurt. A lot. Still, he grit his teeth and turned his head to get a better sense of what they were up against.

He was kneeling less than an arm’s length away from Chartreuse, her sister Azure crouched in front of them. Azure was holding two index cards in her hands. All of them were closer to Qifarihm’s statue than Simon remembered - allowing him to realize that the wash of pink came from the magic circle that they were currently inside, the circumference glowing red. Peering out, he recognized the fourth individual. And he realized they had a chance.

“Pelinelneth,” he rasped. “Help us.”

“Help?! She’s doing this!” Azure countered, grimacing with the effort of speaking. “If you two weren’t so slow…"

“How are you here?” Chartreuse demanded.

“Double duh. Your friend Alice,” Azure stated.

“But this circle, it isn’t elf magic,” Simon protested.

“You’re right,” came a voice from somewhere behind him. It took a moment for Simon to place the speaker as Snowball, Qifarihm’s former cat - who had been turned into a small pink unicorn. “But Wanda left Pel with the ability to switch the field on, should anything happen,” the female voice continued. “Which it has. In the form of a young girl appearing out of a blue whirlpool. That was new.”

“Meaning Wanda was right,” Pelinelneth remarked. “Other world people are coming to take the artifact away from her.”

“So maybe they should.”

Simon saw Pelinelneth turn an accusing gaze towards the unicorn’s position. “So you ARE a traitor!”

“This from the elf who left us for town.”

“Azure! You’ve, like, gotta get out of here!” Chartreuse said, aghast.

“Gee, I would, but I’m kind of immobile after SAVING YOUR LIFE,” Azure shot back.

“WHOA!” Simon shouted out, realizing from the cacophony of voices that he was now the only male in the room. An odd reversal. “Let’s all talk for a moment. Maybe without this pain field?”

“I have nothing to say to you,” Pelinelneth shot back.

“Not even about being Wanda’s imaginary friend?” he countered. The elf flinched at the reference, but pursed her lips closed.

“Who is Wanda anyway?” Azure asked.

“Alice didn’t even, you know, EXPLAIN her?!” Chartreuse shrieked.

“Explanations actually sound like a good plan,” Snowball stated. Abruptly Simon felt the ability to move without pain once again - but the blood red circle still surrounded them, glowing menacingly. He cautiously rose to his feet, as Snowball continued with, “So I’m lessening the field. Meaning I get to dictate the rules.”

“Who IS saying th– O. M. G, UNICORN,” Azure gasped, as she also stood up and apparently got her first good look at Snowball.

Chartreuse reached for Azure’s arm, where Simon noticed a communicator watch. “No! It’s not safe! Call Alice back, you’re, like, leaving!”

“Since when has life been SAFE?” Azure retorted. “Also, Alice doesn’t have the power! Also, how dare you run off to Equestria without telling me! I’m the reason you know about the show in the first place!” Chartreuse face palmed.

Pelinelneth crossed her arms, her eyes practically shooting daggers at Snowball. “If they escape, it’s on your head.”

Escape didn’t seem that likely - when Simon edged further from the centre of the circle, he was met with both a force of active resistance, and a burning sensation on his skin. He edged back.

“Here’s the rules,” Snowball continued doggedly, ignoring the outbursts. “Any one of us can ask a question of any of the others. That person then gets to ask something of someone else, which continues in a chain. The chain will break as soon as someone lies, or refuses to answer, meaning they don’t get to ask anything. I’m gambling that we’re all reasonably honourable individuals - with questions. Satisfactory?”

It sounded quite sensible, actually. Simon nodded back towards the small animal. After a momentary hesitation, the Vermilion sisters also nodded. Pelinelneth merely flicked at the bangs of her hair, which Snowball seemed to take as an assent. The unicorn turned to look at Azure. “You, in the weird clothes,” she began, causing Simon to realize that the blue haired girl’s orange T-shirt and pants were rather out of place, “Are people from your world going to keep coming here, no matter what, until you retrieve the artifact?”

Azure glanced sidelong at her sister before raising her shoulders in a shrug. “Probably not?” she answered. “I mean, I wouldn’t have come, except for my sister Clueless being in trouble. Also, the person running the station out there is having power issues, and told me not to expect further backup for a while.”

“Oh, great!” Chartreuse sighed. “THAT knowledge will intimidate our enemies.”

“The unicorn said not to lie!” Azure shot back. “And if there was a cover story, someone shoulda told me!”

“Interesting. I appreciate the candour,” Snowball acknowledged. “Your question next.”

Azure frowned, Simon noticing how her eyes flickered around to everyone else in the room. In the end, they alighted on Chartreuse, and when Azure spoke, her tone was less brash, and more muted. “Why do you say it’s not safe for me here?”

“Because there’s a Royal Wizard out there named Wanda, who, you know, has an evil artifact that can rewrite reality by granting wishes,” Chartreuse explained, now also sounding more subdued. “She’s fighting for women’s rights, which is good, but in her past she killed and injured people, which is not so good. Plus, even without wishing, she, you know, put me and Simon under a spell. After turning the former Royal Wizard into, like, that.” She jerked her thumb over towards the Qifarihm statue.

Azure’s eyes widened. “Holy…" She didn’t complete the statement. She did start to look uncomfortable as she stared at the statue.

Chartreuse looked away from her sister, and back to Simon. He inclined his head slightly towards Pelinelneth, hoping that she would speak to the elf - he doubted that he would have much luck asking the woman a question himself. Chartreuse took the hint.

“Pelinelneth,” she began. “I must say, you’re looking as pretty as I remember. Which makes some sense, if you were originally wished up or transformed by Wanda in some way. And that stands to reason, since then the wish, you know, could turn against her in the form of your desire to go off on your own. To, like, explore the world, learn about romance, and technology, and all that. Leaving her alone.” Chartreuse nodded slowly, as if piecing it all together in her mind. “Then, to twist the knife, as a condition of going, the artifact took away your own past. Which served to bring you back. But not quite as the same person who left. Still, you’re now trapped here once again with Wanda, the only person you inherently trust, even though you’re afraid that–"

“Is there a question in all this?” Pelinelneth snapped.

Chartreuse nodded. “Same question I asked you last night. In the end, do you want Wanda’s artifact to undo everything, or to lock your existence in place?”

Pelinelneth visibly flinched, and turned away from the group, staring towards the bookshelves. Simon slumped at that, figuring they’d lost their chance to learn anything. Until he saw Chartreuse raise her index finger, shaking her head slightly and giving him an expectant look. Simon turned back towards the elf.

When she spoke, her voice was shaky. “I don’t know any more,” the silver haired woman admitted. “My sense of self preservation is now at war with my… my love for Wanda. Seeing her again… this has all been so hard on the poor woman! I want her to finally be at peace, whatever the cost…" She spun back towards them, tears glistening in the corners of her eyes. Her gaze went right to Simon. “Can you guarantee Wanda’s safety, after removing the artifact from her possession??”

Simon felt a lump grow in his throat. He wanted to give her the answer she desired. But he had his own question to consider, and Snowball had called for the truth. “No,” he responded. “In fact, the wishing might be like an addiction, and as such we have no idea how removing the artifact will affect… your friend. But,” he put in, “we WILL do our best to minimize any suffering. I’ll guarantee that much.”

Pelinelneth held his gaze for another moment before turning away again. “Damn,” she whispered. “You should have lied.”

“Okay then. I’m guessing you’re asking me next,” Snowball concluded, flicking her tail back and forth.

Simon nodded. And frowned. It was tempting to ask why the unicorn had thought that people from another world would eventually be coming here. It held the implication that the ‘artifact’, whatever it was, wasn’t native to this place. There was also the fact that Snowball had claimed to be isolated from any changes by wishes, and thus might have some insight into how things could be reset. But none of that knowledge would necessarily help them now.

He cleared his throat. “How can we get out of here, and to someplace that Wanda can’t immediately find us?”

The pony nickered, and Simon had the impression that Snowball was laughing. “I could refuse to answer that,” she said after a moment. “Thus ending the chain. But I won’t. In part because the only way for you to get out, short of us allowing it, is for you to invoke card magic. The thing that trapped you in there originally. It’s also the only way you could remain undetected, since Wanda would be looking for foreign magic, not something of her own type.”

“Oh,” Simon said. Recalling Chartreuse’s efforts in the dungeon, he turned to look at her. Her gaze went to Azure. Azure’s gaze went down to the card stock she was holding in her hands. The same two cards that Wanda had placed on his and Chartreuse’s foreheads, to trap them in the history spell.

“Dispellere!” Azure shouted, whipping one card, edge first, towards the edge of the circle. It embedded itself into empty space, the magical symbols around the circumference briefly flared red - and then the magic light shut off, and the card floated down to the ground. Simon quickly stepped towards where the circle’s glow had been. This time, he felt no resistance or burning sensation… and then he was out.

The unicorn let out a noise that Simon couldn’t identify. “I revise my earlier opinion,” Snowball said. “Maybe you do have a chance of winning.”

“I totes did not think that would work,” Azure gasped, so dumbfounded that Chartreuse had to practically drag her sister out of the danger zone, lest the field re-establish itself.

“Stop!” Pelinelneth shouted. She ran for the weapons chest, pulling out the bow and arrow on top before Simon could move to stop her. With practiced ease, she nocked an arrow, and Simon froze, his arm outstretched towards her.

“Pelinelneth,” Chartreuse murmured. “We might be Wanda’s best chance.”

The bow and arrow shook slightly, making Simon uncomfortable. “Wanda put me in charge of monitoring you,” the elf said, her voice catching. “While she’s off explaining about Qifarihm’s escape. I cannot simply let you walk out.”

The bow string was released, and the arrow flew through the air. Simon felt his breath catch as the weapon whistled past his side, and as he turned his head, he saw the arrow had embedded itself deeply into the pink-purple couch behind him. “I have to at least put up token resistance,” she finished.

“Yeah, well, giving me a heart attack would serve to keep me here,” Simon wheezed.

Another arrow was nocked. “I rarely miss twice.”

“We’re out,” Chartreuse assured, heading for the door. Azure shook free from her sister’s grip to travel under her own power.

Simon grabbed their gear and hurried to catch up. “One last question,” Snowball called out. “What exactly is your motivation for doing this?”

Simon looked back over his shoulder. It occurred to him that there were two answers for that question, so he gave both. “On the small scale, because we’re good people,” he stated. “On a larger scale, you’d have to ask our boss, Alice.”

WHAT’S NEXT?

Options: [polldaddy poll=8673287]

VOTING WILL CLOSE THURSDAY FEB 26 EST (Delayed because…. two isn’t enough this time… no? really? no one else?)

Next ->

In my last serial story (“Numbers Game”) I did a couple of “Behind the Scenes” posts for how I managed to write 2,000 words every week for 12 weeks. In this story, I’ve decided to do something different.

I’m going to have a quick look at the choices NOT taken by you, the audience.

This after seeing how a few other “Choose Your Own Adventure” stories have gone, notably: -The Pen and Cape Society (vote for the next power and an author) -Drew Hayes’ Halloween Adventure (a part every day for 13 days) -Terence Eden’s Twitter Story (accounts are the entries)

In particular, the idea that “Dead Ends” are possible is interesting (and prevalent in Terence’s), much like in the original stories. While such a conclusion is unlikely for me (though technically no character has immunity), I do have a possible arc in my head for every choice I offer up. Meaning some paths are better, and the story could have been different in a few places. So let’s take a look back, shall we?

SPOILERS follow, in case you haven’t read, and want to be surprised by previous parts.

PRE-CASTLE

When I started, I really didn’t know any more than what the selected plot said - there’s an evil artifact granting wishes. I felt like it would be something traveling from house to house, but controlled by a person. Probably controlled by someone in the central castle, but not necessarily. Hence, the plan of getting to the castle. The polls went thusly:

1: LOCATION. Negligible influence. If they’d gone to the inn, or blended in, they would have overheard a conversation instead of being directly involved, probably leading to a choice of talking to an NPC or not. The next poll would have been similar.

2: TALES. Marginal influence. If they’d gone to the library, I would have taken time to flesh out the history of the town pre-wishes. If they’d gone to the underground, I would have created more NPCs. As the focus was for Pelinelneth, we got more on her, and through her, I realized the misogyny issue. While the next poll might have been similar, the world had taken a particular shape.

3: GUARDS. Big influence. Chartreuse would have been successful. Joey’s idea would have been either a tunnel, or a catapult, which might have worked. Simon was the “poor” choice (he said it could go badly!) so I decided the consequence of his “failure” would be splitting the party. The part was running long; Chartreuse being incarcerated was moved to Part 4.

4: INSIDE. Big influence. If Simon had lost track of Pelinelneth, he would have run into Wanda (though she hadn’t been named at that point). I don’t know how that would have played out. If they had investigated instead, I would have worked out more about the royalty, perhaps had someone pose as a servant. As they went after Chartreuse, to keep the plot from stalling, I introduced Qifarihm.

POST-CASTLE

As they were now inside, I decided that Pelinelneth had a history with Wanda. Also that Wanda would be the antagonist… either willingly or unwillingly. Which meant Qifarihm had to be a bit shady - did he drive Wanda to her fate? Also, for the first time, I determined what the evil artifact was.

5: IMPRESSION. Marginal influence. If Chartreuse had seen someone’s future, it would have been Pelinelneth, related to her uncertain allegiances. If she had seen the artifact, you’d now know what it was. As the vote was for her to see Qifarihm’s past, backstory was done with spontaneous Azure cameo. But all paths led out of the dungeon.

6: PLAN. Marginal influence. Trying to recruit more help would have put them in the servants’ quarters. Releasing Qifarihm’s powers would have attracted Wanda’s attention early, but with a chance for Simon to escape. As it was, tracking Pelinelneth put them in the Wizard’s Sanctuary. Snowball had not been planned until their arrival.

7: SANCTUARY. Big influence. Trying to recruit more help would have routed back to the servants (as in 6). Learning what the artifact was would have led to a fruitless search, maybe to Pelinelneth. Learning only the location was again the “poor” choice, in that only Wanda knew it - so she arrived, and took out Qifarihm. So yeah. Good job, readers! ;)

8: CONSEQUENCE. Big influence. Becoming Pelinelneth’s servants would have brought her back into the picture, and they’d have been monitoring Wanda. Alternatively, Wanda wasn’t bluffing - she would have used a wish to catapult them back to Alice on The Hub, leading to secondary character recruitment (like in 10, below). But to get Wanda’s story, we saw her use her own magic.

SPELL CHECK

The characters were now trapped in a spell. If I were filling in the prior choices, some of the history here is probably the information that would have been found in the library from back at Choice 2. Which isn’t to say they’d have had all the backstory so soon, but they would have known more about how the magic worked, only first revealed here (and only pondered by me back at Choice 6).

9: BACKSTORY. Marginal influence. Sticking to Wanda’s story would have been the “poor” choice, sending them down a darker path, though they might have learned to manipulate real magic. Deviating would have meant using their own brand of magic, seen a bit by Simon at the end of part 10. But the vote was for trying to escape, which is why there was a connection back to Alice and a secondary character.

10: SECONDARY. Big influence. Given that Keith was a technology expert, Carrie was a temporal expert, and Azure has knowledge of card magic, I realized this had to be setting up the end game. Do we meet Wanda with something wholly unfamiliar? With some tricks up our sleeves? Or on her own terms?

Which is where we are now. I was wondering if this story would go longer than 12 parts, as that’s where I ended the previous story, and suspect it might. But time will tell.

Thanks for reading, feel free to comment on anything about that which was unexpected, or that jumps out at you!

WISH FULFILMENT, PART TEN: Magical Girl

“Okay, this is not, like, an encyclopedia,” Chartreuse said, shaking the journal at Simone. “I can’t simply look up ‘escape from spells’.” She paused. “Though that would be handy.”

Simone turned away from the wall. The wizard crossed her arms over her chest - though in making the movement, she ended up looking down, apparently still adjusting to her new female form. “We have to get out somehow. Do you really think we have the capability to play out Wanda’s history?”

“Maybe?” Chartreuse offered. Simone glared. The teenage elf-girl slumped a little. “Maybe not. It did look like Wanda was gaining control over fire. No clue how we’d, you know, fake that.” She opened the journal up again, running her finger down the handwritten pages.

“See if Wanda had to break a spell herself at some point,” Simone suggested. “Then we can duplicate it.” She began to pace a few steps, forward and back, at the T-junction of the castle corridor. Chartreuse turned a little to keep from getting distracted by the movement. She quickly confirmed that the start of the journal was only basic magical information which Wanda had recorded, and flipped further ahead. In doing so, she realized that the book had a tendency to want to open towards a certain area of pages about three quarters of the way through.

Which is where she’d first started reading, upon picking the journal up. And she remembered having seen Qifarihm’s name. On a hunch, she checked the corners of the pages there, and saw that one of them was dog eared. More, there was a star after one of the paragraphs. She began to read in earnest.

“You seem excited,” Simone observed. “What have you got?”

“It’s BELIEF,” Chartreuse stated. She began to read aloud. “Today, Qifarihm told me that a large part of why magic works is the belief that it can. Actual truth must be more than that, since not everyone can perform magic, while it can work on non-believers. Yet I think this is why wizardry is a male dominated profession - they don’t believe women can do it as well, which helps that belief to become reality. Meaning all I need to do is change their wizardly beliefs. The same way I changed the beliefs of those boys I burned when they –"

Chartreuse stopped reading aloud. Her stomach wrenched a little, and she snapped the spine of the journal shut. Simone raised a questioning eyebrow. “Dare I ask?”

“No,” Chartreuse said, drawing a quick breath. “You don’t. Suffice to say, I’m not sure if I’m on side with Wanda any more. I, like, REALLY hope she already had the evil artifact by then.”

“Oh kay,” Simone said slowly. “So, do we simply need to ‘believe’ we’re not under a spell? Because I’m now believing I’m a man again, but I’m not feeling it.”

“There must be, you know, limits.” Chartreuse bit down on her lower lip. Then she reached out to shove Simone, her hand merely passing through her companion’s shoulder. So she lifted her foot, preparing to give the other girl a kick.

Simone back-pedalled. “Okay, whoa, what?”

“I, like, didn’t think my hands could affect anyone,” she explained. “But when I believed my feet could, I got to go Wizard kicking.” She hopped forwards and tapped at Simone with the sole of her boot. Successfully.

“Huh. Interesting.” Simone frowned, as she stared at Chartreuse’s foot. “So to what extent is this reality defined by Wanda, and to what extent are we defining it?”

“Dunno. Might explain why I kept the journal coming in. I believed I could, and nothing, you know, prevented that belief. Maybe you should have believed that you still had all our gear.” She nearly lost her balance then, so returned both feet to the ground.

“Okay, let’s extrapolate,” Simone mused. “Anything Wanda can’t account for COULD be used to get us out. Like the journal. Or, um, technology.” She made a face. “Too bad my friend Keith didn’t come along with us.”

“Why? Is he some crazy techno mad scientist?” Chartreuse wondered.

Simone shook her head. “Not as such, but he doesn’t share my opinions, and would probably have an app for this.” Her eyes brightened, and she pointed at Chartreuse’s wrist. “Oh! We don’t need him, you’re still wearing your watch! We can talk to Alice!”

Chartreuse blinked in surprise, and pulled back the sleeve of her top. “You’re right! How did you know?”

“I believed,” Simone said, with a smirk.

Chartreuse paused, briefly wondering if she’d really had the watch all along - but she quickly decided such thoughts would only get them in trouble. She punched in the necessary code to activate it. “Alice! Chartreuse to Alice!” she called out.

Seconds ticked by. When she’d used the device last time, to contact her sister Azure, it had taken close to a minute before Alice had responded. So this time, she waited patiently rather than immediately trying twice more. But she only had so much patience. “Hellooo? Alice? Alison?”

“The device may not work in the spell,” Simone yielded. She began to pace again. “I’ll try to think of something else. Take another look back at Wanda’s earlier stuff.”

Chartreuse reopened the book closer to the middle, and began scanning anew. This section seemed closer in time frame to where they were now - Wanda was talking about having been chosen as the new Apprentice. How she was going to have to work even harder now, in order to counter the prejudices of those around her. Of people like…

“What the hell did you do to the Wizard panel?!”

Simone turned, spotting the boy who had been scheduled after her. The one who had pinched her bottom. He was striding purposefully down the corridor. Simone raised her hands defensively. “I did magic?”

Upon reaching her, he shoved her back into the wall, resting his hands on her shoulders to keep her there. “They sounded almost BORED by my act,” he accused. “Me! Iklius, wizard extraordinaire! So I ask again. What. Did. You. Do?”

“Get. Your. Hands. Off,” Simone countered.

“The delusional elf talk, was that all an act? I bet you’d already paid off the Wizards, so this whole trial didn’t matter! That’s why you ran off, so as to not betray yourself to us afterwards, huh?”

“That’s crazy.”

“You’re not going to get away with this.” Iklius paused, then shifted his gaze down from Simone’s face. “Unless you make it worth my while not to stir up trouble.”

Simone frowned. “That’s crazy AND disgusting.”

With a snarl, Iklius reached up to tear at Simone’s blouse. Yet with his hand having moved off her shoulder, she managed to block him with her arm, while lashing out a kick at his legs. Iklius jumped back, she twisted to duck under his arm, and she ran. He shoved her from behind, and she went sprawling. “Chartreuse!” Simone gasped out, spinning her body so that she was face up.

Iklius cracked his knuckles, then took a step closer - then jerked to the side, off Chartreuse’s kick at his hip. “The hell?” he said, turning to look at the empty space. The pink haired elf girl took the opportunity to move around to the front and plant her boot into his midsection. He stumbled back with a wheeze. Simone scrambled to her feet.

“We’re running,” Chartreuse said, turning to look at Simone. For some reason, she looked scared.

“He can’t hurt you,” Simone reminded.

Chartreuse held up the journal, as if it was enough explanation. “Run,” she said, like it was the most important thing ever.

Simone ran. But as soon as she turned the nearest corner, she suddenly found herself out in a courtyard. She blinked at the sunlight, though the sun almost immediately retreated behind a cloud. Turning around, Simone saw no passage - she was in town. The nearby fountain looked familiar, though here it didn’t contain the statue of a naiad. The castle wall loomed behind a number of buildings.

“Oh no,” Chartreuse breathed. “Her spell brought us here anyway.”

“Where?” Simone said in frustration. She realized belatedly that she was wearing a different outfit now, still in a dark shirt, but now with a pair of trousers.

“Wanda’s, like, major life event,” Chartreuse said. “I read it while you were fighting. The earlier stuff was only context. We need to get out of here!”

“Why?”

“Because…" Chartreuse stopped, as a group of six boys stepped out of a nearby building. “Them.”

Simone recognized one of them as Iklius, and another two as wizard hopefuls who had been in the waiting room. “So you came,” one of them said, his face carefully neutral. The boys began to fan out. “Well, we’re not letting you get away with this.”

Simone spread her arms out to the sides. “Guys! I didn’t rig the Wizard trial!” She glanced sidelong at Chartreuse, muttering out of the corner of her mouth, “…did Wanda?”

“It doesn’t matter,” Chartreuse said quietly. “Wanda’s going to attack them here. With fire. It won’t end well.”

“I don’t have fire!” Simone hissed.

“Oh, right!” Chartreuse frowned. “I’m not sure if that, like, makes it better or worse.”

The boys had now encircled the two of them, Simone in the middle. They stood a little ways beyond arm’s reach. “So what do we do?” Simone murmured.

“We finish this,” Iklius answered.

“I don’t know,” Chartreuse said at the same time. “I only know…” She stopped, snapping her head to the side. “Yes, I hear you!!”

“Can you hear me now?”

It was Alice’s voice. Wonderful, magical Alice. Chartreuse snapped her head to the side. “Yes, I hear you!!”

“Hear who?” Simone asked, looking around.

“Alice,” Chartreuse explained, even as Iklius stated, “Acting insane won’t save you, girlie.”

“Good!” came Alice’s voice again. The bright and cheery sound was totally at odds with the atmosphere around them. “If at first you don’t succeed, try, try… try try try try again.”

“We, like, need to break out of a spell! Pronto!” Chartreuse shouted at the sky.

“Ah! That would explain why you’re unconscious,” Alice mused. “As it is, I’ve had to attune myself to your alpha waves - say, have you ever seen that movie Frequency? Where the guy in the future can talk to the guy in the past using the same ham radio? Because this isn’t really like that, but it was a pretty cool movie…"

“I can’t hear her!” Simone said. “What should I do?”

“Don’t fight back,” one boy advised, as he thrust both his hands out.

“Believe in… something!” Chartreuse suggested. She looked back at the sky. If only Carrie were here with them, her girlfriend might have been able to stop time. “Alice! Alice, we need you to come down to the Wizard’s Sanctuary and, like, physically pull some cards off our heads!”

“I can’t leave the station,” Alice countered. “You MAY recall this is why I recruited the both of you? What is even going on??”

“If we fight, they’re dead, if we don’t, we’re dead, we, you know, need an abort option! PLEASE!”

She heard Alice sigh. “Fine. Please hold, your call is important to us.”

“Hold? Hold what??”

“It didn’t have to be this way,” another of the boys remarked. Chartreuse looked back at Simone. She realized that the guy with his arms out had to be using some sort of holding magic, as Simone couldn’t seem to move her feet. She HAD managed to pull a card out of her pouch, but she didn’t seem to be sure what to do with it.

“You could have left town. Instead you came here,“ agreed the guy with outstretched arms.

“Where else was I supposed to go?” Simone challenged.

“Away,” Iklius said. “Because I hate the fact that I’m going to have to punch a girl. Kinda.” He pulled his fist back. Chartreuse lifted her foot to kick. Simone reached back into her pouch and pulled out a small key.

“This key, which hides powers of the dark, show your true form before me! I, Simone, command you! Release!” A glowing pink circle exploded into view on the ground around her, and as the boys looked on with a mixture of shock and confusion, the key expanded out into the form of a staff. Simone grabbed it with one hand, tossing her card up into the air with the other. “Fly card! Release and dispel!”

Twirling her staff, Simone brought it down onto the card. Wind swirled around, the card vanished, wings sprouted off the end of the staff… and the female wizard was pulled airborne. The gazes of the males tracked up, and it occurred to Chartreuse that not wearing a skirt here had been a good plan.

“WHAT just happened?!” one of the boys demanded.

“Oh, I’ve seen this one!” Chartreuse breathed. “It’s… um…"

“Magical girl anime,” Simone admitted, as she floated in the air, out of reach. “I do believe in the characters. And it occurs to me that Wanda’s spell could not have anticipated this.”

“Whatever, girlie,” Iklius snorted. “You have to come down eventually, and when you do…"

Simone disappeared. Chartreuse barely had time to register the event, before she felt the scene around her snap out of existence. She gasped at the person she was now staring at.

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WISH FULFILMENT, PART NINE: Trial and Error

Chartreuse sensed that Simon was looking at her, probably trying to get a vibe as to which of Wanda’s choices they should select: servitude or banishment. But she didn’t meet his gaze. She couldn’t look away from Wanda. For even as a part of her knew the pain of being denigrated for her gender, another part knew that here, she didn’t really know. “We DO want to help you,” she insisted to the Royal Wizard. “Don’t shut us out.”

Wanda’s lips thinned. “Interesting choice. Lesson time.”

“Whoa! Wait! We pick the servant thing!” Simon broke in. Wanda flicked her wrists, two more cards appearing in each of her hands. “Bring in Pelinelneth! We’ll do whatever she wants!” Symbols began to form on the cards. “We’re not from here! Whatever you’re doing is not a good idea!!”

“Simon,” Chartreuse said quietly, dropping her frying pan in order to discretely slide the book she had taken off the bookshelf under her opposite arm. “Let’s, you know, KNOW.” She finally turned to look at him, reaching to touch his arm.

He turned to look back at her. She saw the card smack him in the forehead a split second before her own gaze went dark, and she felt her body slump down onto the ground. There was a momentary sense of panic, as her spirit no longer seemed to be tethered to anything. Then there was the sound of a great wind rushing by.

Then everything changed.

“Wha- What just happened?” Simone gasped. She then blinked, and raised her hands to her throat, then brought them to her chest, then thrust her arms out to the sides as she looked down at herself. “WHAT?! Why am I a woman??”

“Don’t know,” Chartreuse mused, after taking a second to catch her breath. She decided to take stock of herself first. “I don’t seem to be a man. Though I, like, feel rather… etherial.” She glanced around the torchlit corridor they were in, then experimentally reached out to touch the wall. Her hand passed right through the stone. Worse, for a second it felt like her hand didn’t exist at all, until she yanked her arm back. “Okay, that’s not good.”

Simone reached out to touch the same spot, and successfully leaned into it. She then reached out to touch Chartreuse - and her hand passed right through the teenager’s shoulder. “You’re not really here,” Simone deduced. She then reached up to touch her own throat again. “Can I not really be here too? Why do YOU get to keep your clothes and… everything else?!”

Indeed, Chartreuse realized she was still wearing the same white shirt, pink bodice, and skirt as before, though her shoes had graduated to ankle boots. Her hair also flowed long, rather than being done up in bows. Finally shifting attention to her companion, Chartreuse noticed that he - she - was now wearing some sort of dark blouse and skirt ensemble. She also looked younger than Simon had, early twenties at best.

Chartreuse wondered fleetingly whether her own mixup at the very start of the adventure had been due to some tangential future premonition of Simon - Simone? - while attuning her senses to this world. At least Simone wasn’t a blonde, so there was no immediate romantic consideration. As Chartreuse wondered how she might best respond, a boy about her age came around the corner, offering, “You wanna take your clothes off, girlie, be my guest.” He grinned.

Simone turned and attempted a glare.

“Aw, how cute. What are you doing hanging back here anyway, Simone? Talking with that invisible elf girlfriend of yours again?”

Chartreuse blinked, reaching up to touch her ears. She felt them rising to a point. Interesting. In the process, she also realized that she was somehow still holding the book she’d taken off Wanda’s bookshelf. Thank goodness.

“None of your business,” Simone shot back.

The youth made a face. “Hmph. I’ve half a mind not to tell you you’re up next. But seeing as I’m after you, and I’m SURE to look good after whatever YOU do…" He jerked his thumb down the passage. “You’re up next.”

Simone offered another glare, then headed past the boy to see what it was he’d been indicating. Trailing along after, Chartreuse saw the guy reach out and pinch Simone’s bottom. Simone whirled, raising a hand as if to slap back. “Don’t!” Chartreuse blurted. “I have a theory! Do that, we could be, like, screwed!”

Even as the boy flinched away, Simone used her raised hand to rake her fingers through her hair. “Better be a hell of a theory,” she muttered. She turned away again, rounding the corner.

Following after, Chartreuse saw the passage almost immediately widened out into a larger room - a waiting area of sorts, as there were benches out, and five other boys were sitting upon them. Two looked up with interest at Simone’s presence, one looked with disinterest, and the other two boys didn’t look up. One of them seemed to be practicing hand gestures. Chartreuse nodded.

“Theory,” she began. “To learn what Wanda went through, we’ve been put in her past, or, like, a variant thereof. You got her role, I’m likely Pelinelneth. Meaning, we play this right, you become a Wizard’s apprentice, like Wanda did, and maybe we even, you know, learn how she got the artifact.” She cleared her throat. “But we play this wrong, you could end up thrown in a dungeon and/or… or…" She stopped, unable to verbalize the image that had just surfaced.

“Or?” Simone said out of the corner of her mouth.

Chartreuse swallowed. “Hurt and stuff.” Did Simone even realize how attractive she might be?

Chartreuse watched as Simone eyed the closed door across the room from the passage they’d just used. It presumably led to some testing chamber. The boy had said Simone was next, but then was someone else still inside? Simone crossed her arms, electing to wait. “So, you think the real Pelinelneth was some imaginary ghost too?” she mumbled.

“Dunno,” Chartreuse answered. “I’ll see if I can, you know, find out!”

The dark haired girl turned her head. “How?”

Chartreuse held up her book. “Wanda’s diary.”

Simone’s eyes widened. “Her DIARY?”

Six sets of eyes turned towards Simone at the loud exclamation. “Uh, is the girl sane?” one of the guys on the bench said, leaning towards his neighbour.

“‘Course not,” retorted the boy leaning against the wall near the passageway. The one who had pinched her. “She’s trying out to be a Wizard’s Apprentice, she’s gotta be a bit nuts. It’s a hot kinda nuts though, don’t you think?”

Sitting guy seemed about to respond, so Simone interjected, “The WOMAN can hear you, I’m standing right here!” She placed her hands on her hips.

“Oooh, oh no,” the boy on the bench said mockingly, lifting his hands and waving them briefly in the air. Though he then shifted his gaze to the ground rather than verbalizing the earlier remark, and two of the other boys also resumed their own internal thoughts.

“Yeah, Simone, you might not want to talk to me,” Chartreuse observed. “Except by, you know, expressions or hand signals or something. Since they can’t, like, see or hear me.”

“Well, THANK you,” Simone said, nominally to the guys, but she then turned her gaze upon her elf companion. It was an expectant look. Which Chartreuse realized was probably something more than an attempt by Simone to avoid seeing the two guys still leering at her. What had they been talking about? Oh right.

“Well, Wanda’s journal at least. The book on the shelf that looked out of place with it’s surroundings. I, like, barely got a chance to start leafing through it, but with further study, I’m sure we can figure out what sort of Wizard trial this is!”

The door at far end of the room opened, another boy slinking through it with his head down. Then an older gentleman poked his head out. “Simone?”

Simone’s look somehow became even more expectant.

“Further FAST study,” Chartreuse realized, quickly flipping through the front of the book.

Simone approached the door. “I’ve got cards,” she realized, as she discovered a pouch on her belt, and pulled it open. She glanced sidelong at Chartreuse as she headed into the testing chamber. “So I can buy some time. But HURRY.”

“Her handwriting is not the neatest,” Chartreuse protested. She didn’t add that she wasn’t the best at speed reading either, tracing her finger down the pages as she walked right through the doorframe. The room with all the Wizards in it was darker too, that didn’t help - they seemed to be trying to cloak themselves in mystery, though you could still see their outlines at a table on a raised dais.

The door closed behind them, as if by magic. “Begin,” came a voice that sounded very much like Qifarihm.

Simone cleared her throat uncertainly. “Right, ah… behold, standard deck of cards…" She attempted to riffle them from one hand to another, but it was card stock, not playing cards, and she spilled some of them. Face flushed, she bent down to retrieve them.

“Okay, looks like Wanda’s recording some early efforts at magic,” Chartreuse said. “Apparently, females need focus objects to control their spells - oh! Hence the cards! Wanda used them, we, you know, saw that.”

“Now, control IS important,” Simone said pointedly, attempting to perform some slight of hand as she readjusted her deck.

“Actually, I wonder why this book, and your cards, are paper. Parchment was, you know, made from animal skins. Wasn’t it?”

“SO important.”

“I’m still looking!” Chartreuse insisted, off the glare. “Seems like Wanda was, um, gunning for an Elemental Power. But I don’t know to, you know, manifest it. Can you, like, identify a symbol for fire on your cards?”

“I said BEGIN,” came the voice from the raised table once again, a bit irritated.

Simone rolled her eyes heavenwards. “And by control, I mean I am going to temporarily control YOU,” she continued, fanning out the cards. “Almost as if I had an invisible assistant. Heading over NOW to manipulate you five.”

Chartreuse frowned. “Euh, no, we’ve seen I can’t, you know, affect any–"

“Try!” Simone hissed. Then, louder, “Pick a card, any card?” The cards were all emblazoned with symbols of some sort, which she kept turned away from herself. She then carefully nudged one of them higher. “You have chosen this!” She pulled it out, and tried to make it vanish up her sleeve, while waving the deck in her other hand.

For her part, Chartreuse closed the book and walked over to the table of Wizards. She waved her hand in front of the nearest, to see if maybe they were more in tune to her presence than the guys in the hall had been. There was no reaction. She tried to tap him on the shoulder. Her hand passed right through him, and he didn’t even flinch.

“Okay, ah, I’m a bit intimidated, that’s all,” Simone said quickly. “But I’m done warming up. So, here WE go.”

Chartreuse looked down at her feet. Which were connected to the floor, not sinking through it. So she lifted her leg, and attempted to plant the sole of her boot against the side of that same Wizard.

And she connected. Quite solidly.

Simone hurried out of the room, face red. She didn’t look at the boys still waiting, hurrying back into the far passage, and only stopping at the nearest T-junction to rest her forehead against the wall, pressing her hand to her mouth. She remained that way until she heard Chartreuse remark, “Well, they said we’d hear back tomorrow. So maybe we got in.”

“ALL of them? Did you have to kick ALL of them?”

“Eh, they seemed so, you know, full of themselves and disbelieving of each other. Anyway, you laughed!”

“I know! Then I cried! Then I ran! I’m pretty sure we’re not on script with Wanda’s history any more!”

Chartreuse pursed her lips. “You don’t know that. And now that we have some time, I can cross reference, try to get us back on track.”

“To what end?” Simone protested, turning back to her companion. “I am NOT going to be a successful magical girl here. I’m not even really a girl!! We’ve seen enough. You should look for something in that book to give us a way to break out of this - wherever we are. Before something terrible happens.”

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WISH FULFILMENT, PART EIGHT: Evil Wins

“We can’t leave now, we just got here,” Qifarihm grumbled in response to the small unicorn’s comment. The wizard then went to peek at the shelves behind the pink curtains in his former sanctuary. A couple of days ago, Simon would have thought this to be a rather nonsensical sequence of events, but that was before he’d been brought to this fantasy world along with Chartreuse.

“So, Snowball, can you, like, direct us to a crystal ball?” Chartreuse asked, clasping her hands together pleadingly.

“No,” the pink unicorn retorted. “If you can’t find it yourself, you’re not worthy of me shifting my allegiances.”

Simon walked over to a large purple trunk. “Hey, Qifarihm, is this safe to open?” he asked.

The wizard glanced back over his shoulder. “Probably.”

Simon frowned. But rather than ask for clarification, as Qifarihm seemed to be busy with his own investigation, Simon simply took care to only manipulate the catch on the trunk with his foot. He was pleased when it proved to be unlocked, and the lid flipped up without setting off an alarm or releasing poisonous gas. He became less pleased once he noticed what was inside. “Okay, Wanda has… a lot of weapons,” he observed.

Some were bladed, others were more for blunt force, like mallets, and there was even a bow with a quiver of arrows sitting on the top. The pink motif continued for all of them. “Should we arm ourselves with some of these?” he wondered aloud. “For protection?”

“Risky,” Chartreuse countered. Simon noticed that she’d gone to the bookshelves, pulling down a book to leaf through. “I mean, there’s probably some moral code against fighting an unarmed person, right? Whereas if you, you know, hold an axe, you become fair game.”

“It’s strange though,” Qifarihm remarked, approaching to have a look himself. “As wizards, we use magic. Not military items such as these.”

“Wanda’s been trying to clean up the town,” Snowball observed, trotting back towards the nearby platform housing the bed. “She’s encouraging a more pacifist way of life.”

Qifarihm threw his hands up into the air, or did as best as he could given the magical shackles he still wore. “This is why women aren’t allowed to be Royal Wizards!”

Chartreuse extended the arm that was not holding her book - the one that still held her frying pan. She waggled it at Qifarihm. “Okay, that’s, like, the second time you’ve belittled my gender. Don’t make me regret rescuing you.”

“Indeed, you have to admit Chartreuse’s unconventional approach has worked out so far,” Simon noted. “And she’s a woman.”

The wizard let out a grunt. “Well then, does she have an unconventional way of figuring out the location of this artifact granting wishes?”

Chartreuse opened her mouth as if to reply, but the teenager didn’t speak. Instead, her jaw fully dropped and her eyes got wider. Simon almost asked what the problem was, when a feminine voice behind him said, “If THAT’S why you’re here, you’d have to ask me.”

Simon froze. The remark hadn’t come from Snowball. Chartreuse’s nod confirmed there was someone new in the room. As such, when Simon turned, he made a point of stepping forwards, to slightly block Qifarihm - and he took the key to the wizard’s shackles from his pocket. Palming it, he extended both his hands nonchalantly out behind him.

“What is the location of the… artifact… granting… wishes…” Simon asked, despite his breath getting slightly caught in his throat as he saw her. Wanda was actually quite pretty. Perhaps a few years younger than he was, the Royal Wizard (Wizardess?) had light brown hair extending down past her shoulders, piercing green eyes which were staring out from behind a pair of spectacles, and, well, a nice body by most people’s standards. Including his.

Weirdly enough, despite the decor of the room in which they found themselves, Simon had been expecting their adversary to be a witch cloaked all in black with a pointed hat, but her outfit was anything but that. For some reason, Simon found himself making a mental link to “pink power ranger”. Granted, the clothes were not as form fitting, and she wore no helmet. There was also the fact that, unlike a power ranger, she was evil, and the way her arms were crossed implied that all of them were in serious trouble.

On the bright side, it looked like Wanda had walked in through the room’s only door, so it wasn’t a case of her arriving by teleport due to something stupid that they’d done.

“The artifact,” Wanda retorted. “Is on my person. Always. Also, fun fact, since I’m one of the only people who even KNOW about it, I’m guessing you’ve come to take it back. I CANNOT allow that.” Then she smiled. “But if you tell me how to get more like it, I won’t hurt you. Okay?”

Simon felt Qifarihm take the key for the shackles out of his hand. “Wanda,” the wizard remarked, presumably hoping that speaking would divert her attention from him trying to free himself, “you’ve de-aged yourself a bit, haven’t you? Should vanity really be your primary concern these days? What about advising the monarchy?”

Wanda’s hands slid to her hips. “Oooh, Qifarihm. You sanctimonious ass. I can’t believe I was nicer to you after the reality rewrite than you EVER were to me! Even kept you on as my apprentice, much longer than I should have!”

“Yet part of me knew something was wrong. That’s why you had to throw me in the dungeon.”

“Hah!” she countered. “I threw you in the dungeon because even as an apprentice you couldn’t stop talking down to me. If I’d had a magical means of dealing with you then, I would have!” She adjusted her glasses, causing them to flash in the light of the room. “Which, by the way, I now DO have. So please. Turn that key."

Simon heard the click behind him, Wanda threw a card into the air (where had that come from?) and abruptly the room went pitch black. In retrospect, it had to have been lit by magical origin, owing to the lack of any windows. Though rather than stand there pondering the original source of the light, Simon decided it was better to flatten himself down onto the ground. Which was fortunate.

Red electricity crackled through the air around him, which seemed to be coming from Wanda’s position. For a moment, the bolts hit a shield, sparks rebounding crazily about the room, and then the initial barrage became countered with a whiter lightning from where Qifarihm stood. Simon crawled desperately away from the two wizards, heading back towards Chartreuse and the secret escape passage, wondering if the best plan might be a quick exit.

“Give up, Wanda,” Qifarihm shouted. “You know no mere female can best my wizardly powers!”

“Keep talking, Qi,” Wanda shot back. “Your misogyny gives me strength!!” She seemed to be circling to the side, the red and white sparkler show rotating with her, each side of the battle briefly flaring up, then down in strength.

“You know,” Chartreuse muttered, her voice close enough in the dark to make Simon gasp in surprise, “kinda seeing why Pelinelneth wanted that guy kept locked up. You know?”

“What??”

Chartreuse interpreted his befuddlement at her choice of topic to be an invitation to expand on her reasoning. “Qifarihm. He’s a real charmer at first, but I think that’s, like, to draw women in. In the end, putting him in a position of power. So while he doesn’t mean any personal harm, his personality could be why the, you know, palace guards liked throwing women into his cell.” She let out a sigh. “You know, you shouldn’t have, like, let us out after all. I don’t think I’m rooting for him any more.”

A fireball suddenly lit up the area, and Simon jerked his gaze over to see it balanced on the tip of another piece of card stock which Wanda held in her left hand. Her right still creating the electrical sparks. She flicked the card, tossing the fire towards the elder wizard, Qifarihm stumbling back. He was barely able to extinguish it with a gout of water before it could strike him. As he did so, the red lightning nearly won out, before the set of sparks between the two combatants re-stabilized.

“Are you rooting for Wanda then?” Simon sniped at Chartreuse.

“Yeah.”

She’d said it without hesitation. Simon gave her a look, but owing to the darkness, added the reminder, “Women’s rights or not, Wanda’s EVIL.”

“Nope. The artifact is. The one that’s, you know, always on her person.”

Simon almost countered that it was still Wanda’s fault then, for picking up the thing or getting duped by it in the first place, but he held his tongue. Because firstly, assigning blame was really pointless at this stage, and secondly - Chartreuse’s remark had pointed out a serious flaw in this battle.

Wanda wasn’t wishing.

“Meaning,” Simon said, dropping his voice even more, “she has it now. But she isn’t wishing for Qifarihm or us to be incapacitated or anything. Why not?”

A pause. “Huh,” Chartreuse remarked. “Maybe so she can play fair?”

“Or she can’t use wishes directly.”

“Or her artifact’s, like, out of magical batteries or something.”

“Either way, this means we have a chance of taking it away from her!” And if his addiction-withdrawal theory was correct, her magical powers wouldn’t be as potent against them afterwards.

“You know, maybe once we explain what’s been happening in town, she’ll, like, hand it over nicely?”

There was a flare of white from the continuing battle, causing Simon to look back towards it. The male wizard seemed to be gaining the upper hand, the red electricity on Wanda’s side was fading. “Or maybe Qifarihm will win, saving us the trouble.”

“Hmph. I wouldn’t put that to a vote,” Snowball nickered, having approached the two of them. “She’s toying with him. Positioning him.”

“Oh? Positioning him for what?” Chartreuse asked.

The unicorn didn’t answer. Simon squinted at the two wizards in the flickering electrical light… and he could see what Snowball meant. Despite the fact that Qifarihm was starting to overwhelm the female wizard with his sheer power, by having alternately pressed her attack on the left or the right, Wanda had been able to steer Qifarihm back towards the middle of the room. Keeping herself out on the periphery. But what was the point of herding him to the centre of the–

Qifarihm took a step forwards, to press his advantage, and a blood red circle blazed into view, magical symbols running around the circumference. He was standing dead centre. Red cards rained down from the ceiling. In an instant, it grew so bright that Simon was forced to blink and look away. When he looked back, there were spots on his vision, and all was darkness. Even the lightning had ceased. The ensuing silence was incredibly eerie.

A pair of fingers snapped. Light was restored. Meaning Simon could now see how Qifarihm had been turned into a statue - pink, naturally - in the middle of the room. A card fell from off his face, revealing a rather surprised look. Other pieces of red paper littered the ground. Simon shifted his gaze over towards Wanda. She was breathing heavily, face flushed, glasses slightly askew, droplets of sweat trickling down her face… yet her look was determined, and despite her obvious fatigue, she kept her arm raised, snapped fingers held high.

Simon’s gaze automatically tracked back to the trunk containing the weapons. “Oh, PLEASE,” Wanda rasped. “Be my guest!”

Simon didn’t move. He stayed on the ground as Wanda slowly approached them, the heels of her pink boots clicking rather deliberately on the floor.

“Okay, so, the wishes you’ve been granting, they–"

“Shut up,” Wanda snapped at Chartreuse, eyes blazing. “You have no idea, NO idea what I’ve been through to get here!”

Simon cleared his throat. “Be that as it may–" He didn’t get any further before Wanda’s look and hand motion told him not to say any more.

“Now, Pelinelneth said you were instrumental in getting her back here,” the brunette stated. “You’ve also helped me deal with Qifarihm. So I’m willing to give you some latitude. You can either stay, and become Pelinelneth’s personal servants. Or you can be wished away, never to return - unless you bring another wishing device.” She cracked her knuckles. “Or, you can continue to babble, meaning you WILL see what it is I went through!!”

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WISH FULFILMENT, PART SEVEN: Pink Link

“Am I dead?”

“No,” came the somewhat reassuring response to Chartreuse’s question. She even recognized that the person who had said it was Qifarihm, so her neurons couldn’t be too scrambled.

“Then why’s it so, like, dark?” Chartreuse continued.

“Simon’s used your torch to go investigate things at the top of the stairs.”

Chartreuse nodded, then realized Qifarihm wouldn’t be able to see that. “Ah,” she clarified. “Then I didn’t, you know, imagine him rescuing us.”

“Nope.”

There was a pause. “Why are there, like, stairs in the dungeon?”

“We’ve moved out of the dungeon area and into some back passages known only to me and a few select other individuals. An emergency escape route. All wizards should have one.”

“Ah!” Another pause. “How did I get here?”

“Simon carried you. Or at least pulled you along. I helped as much as I was able, but it was awkward enough to bring along your gear.”

Chartreuse winced a little. She knew she could afford to lose a few pounds. “Sorry.”

“Don’t apologize.” She heard him change position in the dark. “Your vision plan seemed to work wonders, I’ve remembered an entire past which I’d previously forgotten.”

“Oh, good!” The mild headache she had now at least meant something then. “…So what exactly did I, like, say?”

“You don’t remember?”

“Jumbled pieces. I was kind of spiralling the future back into the past, not exactly my, you know, forte.”

A faint glow appeared from above, enough to allow Chartreuse to see there was an staircase there - and to see Qifarihm shrug. “I’ll let Simon explain. He has a theory.”

The pink haired teenager looked down at the former Wizard’s manacles. “We not find the key for those yet?”

“Releasing my magic would be something of a tip off,” he explained. “Your companion thought it best to pursue Pelinelneth without resorting to magic. I granted him that point. A wizard can only cast so much before needing to recharge anyway.” He then turned to look up as Simon came into view. “She’s awake,” he noted.

Simon smiled, turning his flashlight, taking care not to shine it right in her face. “Hey! That’s good news. Beats the bad news I have - if Pelinelneth did go back out to the courtyard, she’s caught. Or being pursued. For whatever reason, there’s hardly any guards that I can see out there. And I wouldn’t have figured them to give up the search.”

“But that means they’re not after us yet,” Chartreuse reasoned. “Or they’d be, you know, searching again.”

“Well, the only other direction your Pelinelneth could have gone through these passages would be to Wanda’s - to MY sanctuary,” Qifarihm corrected.

“No choice but to do that then,” Simon yielded.

“Um, wait, so what’s your, like, theory based on whatever I said?” Chartreuse asked, standing back up by supporting herself against the wall. She managed to do it without feeling too dizzy.

Simon blinked. “What? Oh, that… well, the impression I got is that this Wanda must have been corrupted by the artifact. She seized power - and then you said addiction. Implying she’s now hooked on wishes, or granting wishes.”

“Magic can corrupt a person,” Qifarihm added. “Which is why only certain people have magic abilities in the first place.”

“So I figure,” Simon continued, “If we can prevent her from wishing, or get the evil item away from her, she may sink into some sort of withdrawal, enough to allow us to restore… whatever’s normal here.”

Chartreuse bobbed her head, then regretted the action, lifting her hand to her temple. “Makes sense,” she agreed. “So what’s this artifact?”

“We still don’t know that,” Simon conceded.

“And how do we, you know, restore what’s normal?”

“Not sure.”

“What about preventing Wanda from wishing, like, bad stuff against US even as we try to reason with her?”

“We don’t have a plan there.”

“Ah.” Chartreuse pursed her lips. “Well, it will be impossible for her to foil our plan when we don’t have one!” she offered cheerily.

The truth was, Simon hoped that Pelinelneth would have the answers to some of Chartreuse’s questions. In retrospect, perhaps they should have done one of her vision things with the crystals and the cards back when the elf girl had first told them about her missing memories. But at the time, they hadn’t known she was anything more than a transformed villager.

“I don’t know that we want to try reasoning with Wanda anyway,” Qifarihm said, as he began to move off down the passageway. Simon noticed that the wizard didn’t seem inclined to tote their supplies, now that Chartreuse didn’t need help, so he picked it up off the ground himself. “From what I remember,” the older man remarked, “the girl didn’t react well to authority.”

Simon fell into step behind Qifarihm - though noticed that Chartreuse was still a bit unsteady on her feet as she started walking. He reached out a hand for support, but she waved him off.

“What do you remember about your sanctuary layout?” he asked Qifarihm, figuring that talking might slow the wizard down a shade. Plus the information could prove useful.

“Pretty standard stuff,” Qifarihm answered. “Big library area against one wall. Shelves on another with ingredients for potions. Raised area off to one side with my bed. No windows. A bit gloomy, but I liked it.”

“Alarm system?” Simon wondered.

“On a few key items, not on the room itself. Though it might be best not to touch anything without checking with me first.”

“Fridge?” Chartreuse asked.

“What?” Qifarihm said absently. Simon shone his light back at her. Chartreuse shrugged.

“Just, you know, we haven’t had anything since breakfast.”

There was a soft click, and a section of the bookshelf swung forwards for the second time that day. She’d been interested the first time, when the elf had edged in. This time, since the activity was a rerun, she was less intrigued - until she saw the man in the ragged clothes stride in, arms outstretched.

Qifarihm. She hadn’t seen him in months! He was followed by a younger man, who had a key out, presumably to unlock the manacles on the wizard’s wrists. And then an even younger girl, with hair that matched the room’s decor, who seemed to be brandishing a frying pan.

The three of them looked around cautiously. She decided the best course of action would be to wait and see what they did.

“It’s very pink,” Chartreuse said at last, feeling like someone should speak. Even if it was to state the obvious. Seeing as the floor of the Wizard’s Sanctuary was dark pink, the walls a light pink - and there was a large pink-purple couch adjacent to the bookshelf area. The room wasn’t all pink, to be sure. The books were various colours, the few paintings on the walls also incorporated yellows and red, and although a shelving unit seemed to be behind pink curtains, the contents of the jars behind looked to be a variety of colours again. But pink was definitely the dominant theme.

“Yes,” Qifarihm said, disgust in his tone. “Typical female.”

“Excuse me?” Chartreuse countered, frowning as she turned to point her frying pan back at the wizard.

“She was always on me about my drab colour scheme, so obviously redecorated the first chance she got,” he said, unfazed by Chartreuse’s look. “This sort of atmosphere is NOT conducive to doing magic.”

“Not, like, YOUR magic maybe, but I’d have thought you’d appreciate some colour after that dark cell!”

“Well, at least Wanda doesn’t seem to be here,” Simon cut in, before Qifarihm could speak. “We should quickly scour for clues about Pelinelneth or the artifact.”

Qifarihm seemed to change his mind about what he’d been about to say. “Right. Keep an eye out for a magic mirror or a crystal ball, we could use those to get a sense of what’s happened the last hour or so.”

“Alternatively,” came a new voice, causing Chartreuse to jerk her gaze up. “You could ask me.” There was an elevated platform off to one side of the room, which Qifarihm had said was where he slept. Standing there in front of the bed, looking down at them, was a small pink unicorn.

Chartreuse blinked, and briefly rubbed her eyes, then looked again. The unicorn was still there, looking to be a bit larger than a house cat. It jumped down onto the ground, bypassing the few steps that would otherwise have been necessary. “Okay,” Simon remarked, sounding rather nonplussed. “Thought that was a statue.”

“Oh. My. God,” Chartreuse blurted, barely able to keep herself from running over and hugging the creature. “Friendship is magic!”

“What’s magic?” Simon said, glancing sidelong at her.

“Friendship! And don’t tell me you’re not totally thinking it too!” Chartreuse accused. Though it occurred to her then that perhaps they didn’t have that show on whatever world Simon had come from.

“When did Wanda acquire a miniature talking pink unicorn?” Qifarihm asked of no one in particular.

The unicorn made a face. “I’m Snowball.”

Qifarihm’s eyebrows shot up. “My white CAT?”

“Formerly a cat. Now a unicorn. You seem to have regained your memories. Does this mean you’re going to reset things to the way I remember them? Because from what I’ve seen, you don’t stand a chance.”

“Wait, you remember the way things are supposed to be?” Simon asked, startled.

“Of course. First, I’m not human, and second, Wanda has been keeping me here, isolated from changes. Appearance notwithstanding.” Snowball began to trot back and forth as she spoke, almost as if she was pacing. “You see, unlike her silly elf, I’m perfectly content to remain here.”

“Right, well, we need to find whatever artifact has corrupted our dear Wanda,” Qifarihm said dismissively. “Where is it, what does it look like?”

The small pony flicked her tail. “Don’t know. Wanda locked me up after she took over, only letting me out after her elf companion didn’t work out. I guess by that point she’d decided to be more cautious. Oh, and don’t go on with the ‘dear Wanda’ nonsense either, it’s partially your condescending attitude that got us into this mess.”

Qifarihm blinked. “Was it?”

Snowball altered her tone slightly, attempting to sound male. “Don’t touch that! Only male wizards are allowed to do the deep magic! Go find me some herbs!”

The male wizard attempted to cross his arms in response, but found the action difficult with the shackles on. Putting his hands on his hips met with similar results, so he simply shook his finger in the air. “Well, now that you mention it, she WAS very full of herself! After all, it’s not like a female could ever achieve Royal Wizard status.”

“Excepting how she IS the Royal Wizard,” the mini-unicorn pointed out.

“Illegally! Using a wish!”

“Excuse me,” Simon said, breaking back in. “Not to break up this discussion of the patriarchy, but we’re on a deadline. Do we know when Wanda’s coming back?”

“No,” Snowball said, turning to look at him. “She’s off dealing with the elf I mentioned, who showed up here an hour ago. Who are you, anyway?”

“Oh, er, I’m Simon Black. This is Chartreuse,” he said, indicating her. “We’re the ones who broke your mage out of the dungeon.”

“And let Wanda’s elf into the castle!” Chartreuse added. In the end, she’d managed to keep herself from ‘squeeing’ over Snowball by trying to cross reference some of the pony’s comments in her head. Best to info dump onto Simon now, to see if it made actual sense. “Because it’s got to be, you know, Pelinelneth! Wanda wanted her as a confidant, but Pelinelneth wanted out, so that’s, like, how our friend got her memory wiped and ended up living in a basement out in town! Also, it’s why she knew about the secret passage in here and didn’t want to let Qifarihm out of the dungeon and stuff!”

“Good thinking,” Simon said, off her expectant look. He frowned. “I wonder, do you think Pelinelneth could even BE the artifact? Did wishes start getting granted in town after she showed up?”

“Find me a crystal ball and maybe I can answer that,” Qifarihm reminded them.

“I think you should all leave,” Snowball snorted. “Come back when you have a chance of winning.”

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WISH FULFILMENT, PART SIX: Passed Tents

Simon reached out to touch Pelinelneth on the shoulder as they reached a dead end. She flinched, shrugging him off. “Don’t panic," she said. “There’s a hidden door here.”

“I figured,” Simon answered. “I thought maybe we should have a plan before striding into the dungeon.”

The elf girl briefly pinched the bridge of her nose. “Nothing to plan. On the other side is the end of the corridor housing the cells. There shouldn’t be any guards there. We creep in, get Chartreuse, and creep back out.”

Simon frowned. “How do you know that’s the setup?”

“I DON’T KN–” Pelinelneth caught herself. “I don’t know. Ever since I got inside the castle, I just know things, okay?” She looked back at the blank wall. “Though I guess it’s possible the dungeon’s more heavily guarded right now. Or that some guard is holding the keys.”

Simon wondered if there was a delicate way to ask whether Pelinelneth was starting to remember things that she, herself, had wished forgotten. Because perhaps she had been at the heart of this wish situation since the beginning? But he was pretty sure ANY way of saying that might get him trapped in this corridor. So instead, he said, “Do you know any illusion magic?”

“Nothing convincing, or I’d have been able to get into this castle without your help!”

“It doesn’t need to be convincing, only distracting,” Simon pointed out. “Giving me time to steal the keys or blind a guard with my flashlight.”

“There’s that,” Pelinelneth yielded. “Okay. Give me a moment to rally my mental forces, then we’ll head in.”

As it turned out, she didn’t need to do anything - there wasn’t a visible guard. But there wasn’t a visible keyring hanging on a peg either. “There may be a guard with keys at the main entrance,” Simon reasoned quietly. He looked around. Three cell doors were closed, but there were little windows allowing him to peer into the darkness.

He determined which cell held Chartreuse almost immediately, and not merely because it was the only one where he heard noises. He knew of no one else who spoke that way. “Chartreuse!” he hissed just outside her cell. The voice stopped - he hadn’t been quite sure what she was saying, only hearing the word “like” clearly - and he heard footsteps approach from inside.

“Simon?” the girl responded.

“Yeah, we’re both here.” Simon grinned at Pelinelneth, who simply shrugged and motioned back towards the passage. He double checked that the door was locked. “Ah, any idea where they put the key?”

“Not in here!” the pink haired girl retorted. Simon rolled his yes. “Though what IS in here is, like, a Royal Wizard. So if you, you know, can get us a metal cutter, we can magic our way out.”

“What did she say?” Pelinelneth asked, taking a step back. Simon saw that her entire posture had changed. If he didn’t know better, he’d say she was afraid.

Chartreuse had apparently heard the question. “Well, this guy thinks he’s the Wizard’s apprentice,” she added. “But I, like, caught a flash of his past - unless it was, you know, his future - and he’s actually the top guy.”

“Wait - HE?” Pelinelneth said, as if to clarify the gender. She now didn’t look afraid. She looked annoyed.

“Qifarihm,” Chartreuse clarified.

“Bless you,” Simon said.

“I’m leaving,” Pelinelneth concluded.

“What?” Simon said, turning as Pelinelneth strode away, back towards the secret door. It occurred to Simon that he didn’t yet know how to open it from this direction. “But we agreed that we have to get Char–"

The silver haired elf stopped and pointed back at the cell door. “Qifarihm has to stay locked up. If getting her means getting him out too, no! Now, are you coming with me or not?”

“Go with her!” Chartreuse gasped.

“I can’t keep leaving you!” Simon objected.

Things fell silent after that, leaving Chartreuse to anxiously dance back and forth from one foot to the other. Had Simon left? On the one hand, she was still worried about the elf girl being without some sort of moral conscience. On the other, she really didn’t want to be locked up here for several more months. “Did… did you, like, leave?” she finally called out, feeling torn.

Still silence. Then, “No,” came Simon’s voice. “But I haven’t found anything I can use to force the door. Sounds like there’s only one guard out front though, he’s grumbling about the others being called away to help search. He should have the keys. I think I can blind him with my flashlight, then knock him out. Hold on.”

“Use my, you know, frying pan!” Chartreuse suggested brightly. “That is, if my stuff is still out there!”

“Uh huh.”

There was another extended silence. Finally, the sound of a keyring, and a key being tried in the lock. Chartreuse breathed a sigh of relief, and looked over at Qifarihm, who had resumed his earlier position in the corner, drawing little shapes in the air. “We’re getting out!” she said, smiling at him.

“That’s probably the guard throwing your friend in,” Qifarihm said.

“Have faith!” she countered. More jangling of keys, as a second, and then a third was tried. At which point the door swung open, and Chartreuse saw her companion, standing in the doorway with a partial smile on his own face. Without a second thought, she rushed out and gave him a hug, almost knocking him over as for some reason he hadn’t been expecting it.

“Thanks!” she added. She then looked around the dungeon area, which was pretty much as it had been when they’d tossed her in - except now with an unconscious guard in the entryway. With a familiar kitchen implement sitting on his chest. “Frying pan?” she said, her smile getting wider.

Simon didn’t meet her gaze, shifting it off to the side. “My punches may need work,” was his only remark.

Chartreuse decided not to push the point - she had bigger fish to fry. Not in the frying pan, granted, but since it was there… sure enough, hurrying over to the guard, she found a pouch containing the rest of her crystals, and the WristWatch device for contacting Alice. She immediately switched the device on.

“What are you doing?” Simon asked, following after her. “Shouldn’t we track down Pelinelneth now?”

“Heck yeah,” she agreed. “But first I need a, like, deeper scan of Qifarihm. As I said before, I saw stuff when I read him. But my specialty is, you know, the future, so I need the Epsilon Project to, like, hook me up with an expert on the past.”

Simon blinked. “Who?”

Chartreuse let out a breath. “My sister.”

Azure absently reached out to pick up the phone when it rang, since it was on the table next to her in the living room. But she continued to focus most of her attention on reading her book. “Vermilion residence.”

“Azure! Thank goodness. I, like, need your help.”

“Sure,” the blue haired girl fired back, without missing a beat. “Then I ‘like’ need twenty bucks.”

“Azure, I’m on another planet in another dimension or something and this call is being routed through, I dunno, subspace. I need to, like, do a historical reading on someone! Can you give me some tips here? Please??”

Chartreuse’s younger sister looked up from her book, then over at the phone in her hand. She pulled it back to her ear. “Is Carrie giving you drugs?” she demanded. “Because if so, that’s not a healthy relationship! We covered that kinda thing in PE class.” She smirked.

“Azure, I am being totally serious here! Stop grinning like that!”

Azure’s smile faded, and she set her book aside, switching the phone to her other ear. “Chartreuse, even assuming this isn’t some stupid prank - you read the future, I read the past. That’s how it IS. Have I ever tried to horn in on YOUR territory? No! Besides, you use crystals, I use cards. Incompatible. You’ll simply have to deal.” She frowned, realizing the inadvertent pun. “So to speak.”

“Cards is fine, Simon, like, has some of those! Also, different world, so I think different rules, in that I already picked up on something. So please, at least, you know, tell me what shape would be best for penetrating into a past that’s been, like, walled off by some magical wish granting artifact! Okay?”

Azure resisted the urge to simply hang up the phone, mainly because the question did pose an interesting challenge. Plus hanging up would give her sister the last word. So she mulled it over for a few seconds instead, wondering what sort of geometry could be used to twist over and around a mental block like that. The answer, when it occurred to her, was ridiculously simple. “Phi,” Azure said at last.

She then hung up immediately and reached back for her book. After all, if this was seriously serious, her sister would redial.

Chartreuse sat on the floor of the corridor, in her circle of crystals, with Simon’s cards making a spiral pattern out towards Qifarihm. The spiral probably wasn’t exactly golden, but she’d made a point of dealing an ace, a six, an ace and an eight out first… though she hadn’t been sure what face card to use for zero. For his part, the supposed Wizard merely sat across from her with a bemused look on his face.

“This is highly unconventional,” Qifarihm remarked, and Simon got the impression that he wasn’t entirely convinced he was even free yet. Which, in a sense, he wasn’t, as he still had on a pair of shackles.

“That’s why it will work,” Simon said, with a confidence he didn’t entirely feel.

“I love you both, but please, you know, hush,” Chartreuse interjected, before going back to quiet murmurings of “Ohm, ohm”.

Seconds stretched into minutes, and right when Simon thought maybe he should speak up again, Chartreuse gasped and looked up towards the ceiling, blinking rapidly. Then she began to speak. “Wand, a wand, a wand, ahhhh!”

“A wand?” Simon repeated.

“No, Wanda,” Qifarihm realized, sitting up straighter. “I know a Wanda. I’m her apprentice.” He frowned. “Now wait a second…"

“Wiz… you… she… wish…” Chartreuse babbled.

Simon caught on. “You said Qifarihm is the Palace Wizard. Was Wanda HIS apprentice?” he asked. “Until she wished for their roles to be reversed?” Chartreuse bobbed her head, though it was difficult to tell if she was actually nodding. “Did she create this wishing artifact then?” Simon pressed. “Or did Qifarihm?”

Simon glanced back towards the Wizard, but he seemed to be getting lost in his own recollections. So Simon returned his gaze to Chartreuse, who was now swaying her head around in what looked like a figure eight. “Artifact… unknown… found… pasta… round pasta…"

Simon adjusted her inflection, as the mage had before. “Passed around?”

More head bobbing. “Wanda… no… weevil…"

“She knows evil? Or she’s now evil?”

“She… Pel in hell in elinelinel…"

“Pelinelneth? Is she evil?”

Chartreuse started to get an annoyed look on her face, her breathing coming more rapidly. “Elinelinelinel…"

“Is she Wanda?”

“EL-IN-EL…" Chartreuse coughed, the noise sounding strangled. “First… wish… corrupt… add diction… oaf… ukkk…" And she keeled over.

Simon quickly ran to her side and felt for a pulse - it was present, and she was breathing regularly, though she had fallen unconscious. That determined, he looked back over at Qifarihm. “Could you make sense of that?” Simon demanded.

Qifarihm seemed to be gathering his thoughts before speaking. For the first time, Simon found the torchlight around them was enough to take in the Wizard’s features. Nothing really stood out - the guy was older, but taller, his shoulder length dark hair seeming white in places. He was also thin, probably due to malnourishment, his clothing little more than rags. “I was the Wizard, and Wanda my apprentice,” Qifarihm said then, attempting to rub his chin despite his metal bracelets. “Yes, I’d somehow forgotten that. Not sure why the memory was blocked, when so many other wishes are known.”

“That wish might have been one of the first,” Simon suggested. “It sounds like maybe whatever artifact is causing this, it corrupted your apprentice.” He frowned. “And Pelinelneth is somehow involved. Based on her reactions, she must be afraid of Wanda, yet also dislike you… so she has something against magic? And she’s been in the castle before, so finding her will be difficult.”

“Well, if you break me out of these,” Qifarihm said, holding up his wrists. “With a key off that keyring, I might be able to locate her for you. Of course, my use of magic will alert others who are sensitive to it.” He shrugged.

Simon nodded, glancing around. It had been at least half an hour, probably more, that they’d been down here undisturbed. It wouldn’t last. “We need to get out of here either way.”

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WISH FULFILMENT, PART FIVE: Deep Thoughts

Being a magician, Simon had a fair understanding of the art of misdirection. And while he had lost sight of the elf Pelinelneth, he could still see the guard who had been intent on pursuing her. So he made a point of looking where the guard was not looking, figuring that the silver haired girl would try draw his attention away from her.

The difficulty was, even though the castle courtyard was large, there were still statues, shrubs, and even a few trees that could be used for concealment. Simon had to duck behind a shrub himself when the guard stopped and did a full scan of the area. He only poked his head up when he heard movement again - seeing that the guard had also heard the movement. It was coming from within the leaves of a small tree. The guard marched over and looked up. “Come down out of there!” he declared. The dense leaves merely rustled again.

Simon turned his attention back to where the guard wasn’t looking - and saw a flicker of long silver hair disappearing INTO the castle wall. With the guard still ranting at the tree, he hurried over as fast as he could. Up close, he could see there was a nearly invisible door, still slightly ajar. Beyond it was a staircase leading down into utter darkness. Before heading down, Simon fumbled in his pack, finding the flashlight. He then took the stairs two at a time.

He nearly ran into Pelinelneth at the bottom, as she had stopped, staring ahead into the pitch black. “Pelinelneth!” he hissed.

She had half turned already, and now nearly bolted at the sound, but once she saw it was him, she froze instead. Her eyes widened. “You have a portable light? It doesn’t even flicker!”

“Flashlight,” Simon said. “Also known as a torch.” He smiled. “Not as impressive as you making those tree leaves move.”

Pelinelneth gestured vaguely. “Elves have a certain connection with nature. We can also see better in low light than you.” Her eyes darted down again to the flashlight, and back up. “That said…" She stepped forwards and extended her hand, obviously hoping he would hand the device over.

Simon shook his head. “You want it, you’re stuck with me too. Now, you want to tell me why you and Chartreuse didn’t stick to the plan?”

She shrugged. “You were going to fail. I didn’t want to waste the opportunity, and we had the advantage of surprise. Your friend agreed with me.”

A frown tugged at Simon’s features. “Really? Because she seemed rather concerned about leaving you alone in here. For that matter, how did you know about this passageway? It seems well concealed from the outside.”

Pelinelneth opened her mouth, only to close it again. She reached up to tug at one of her ears. “I just did.”

“Then you’ve been in this castle before.”

“No. Yes. No. Shut up.”

Simon quirked up an eyebrow. “You’re not sure?”

“I said shut up.” She turned to look back down into the darkness of the passage.

Standing there in the ensuing silence, it occurred to Simon that perhaps Pelinelneth’s uncertainty was due to the memory block she’d described. She had no memory from before the start of the year - perhaps because she had been in this castle? Could being here previously be the reason her memory had been wiped in the first place? Of course, the elf might simply be lying to him. He was finding it increasingly hard to trust her.

After counting to twenty in his head, with Pelinelneth doing nothing but staring away from him, Simon decided he might as well speak up again. “We need to rescue Chartreuse.”

Pelinelneth sniffed. “She’s a girl. She can take care of herself.”

“If you do not answer our questions, we will throw you into the dungeon.”

Chartreuse cleared her throat. “See, here’s the thing,” she said. “The questions I do know how to answer, I either, you know, won’t, or actually it’s more likely you won’t, like, understand my answers. Whereas the questions I do not know how to answer, I obviously can’t. So, you know, there’s not much point asking me anything. You follow?”

The guard stared at her. He’d managed to snatch the frying pan away from the pink haired girl after only a momentary tug of war, and he now had her standing with her hands up, facing the lowered portcullis. He would have to wait for his comrade to return and raise it before bringing her inside. That shouldn’t take too long, but he’d rather hoped to have some answers before then. Which was looking increasingly unlikely. “What is Pelinelneth’s plan?”

“Who’s Pelinelneth?”

“The elf who was with you. She ran inside.”

“See, I still think elves are the short people who work with Santa. Okay, possibly tall people if we’re talking about Buddy from that movie, which, true, tells us we shouldn’t, like, think all short people are elves, but let’s not get into Christmas in the middle of the summer. Okay? Now, what was your question again?”

The guard blinked. “I don’t remember.”

“Then can I have my frying pan back?”

“No.” The portcullis began to rise into the archway. He saw the girl tense, and reached out to grasp her by the shoulder, lest she bolt. “Forget it. You’re going to the dungeon until you learn to talk sense.”

“So your dungeon is like an English class?”

“Whether she can take care of herself or not, we’re not leaving her behind,” Simon declared. “Not this time.”

Pelinelneth blinked. “When else did you leave Chartreuse behind?”

“Not Chartreuse. Becky. I had to…" Simon made a gesture of dismissal. “Long story, not relevant to what we’re doing here. Point being, we’re going back for Chartreuse.”

The silver haired elf shook her head. “That would be really, REALLY stupid,” she countered. “Now that I’m in the castle, the place will be going on high alert. We have to locate the artifact while there’s still time!”

“Artifact?”

“Or, you know, whatever’s causing the wishing.”

Simon could tell she was verbally back-pedalling. He knew neither he nor Chartreuse had let on about there being an ‘evil object granting wishes’ - so how had Pelinelneth made that leap? He resolved to follow up. Later.

“Chartreuse could help us do that,” Simon pointed out. “She was able to get some sort of impression from the fountain area before we reached it. Same thing could happen here.”

The elf sighed. “Yeah, I’d much rather SHE be down here with me.” Pelinelneth crossed her arms. “Though I guess SHE’D be insisting on going after YOU!” She peered closer at Simon. “What IS it about you two, clinging to each other this way?”

Simon supposed that a part of it was the fact that they were facing the unknown together. In a world where they weren’t sure who else to trust. What he actually said was, “We’re a team.”

Pelinelneth continued to stare for a moment. “She said that too.” The elf turned away. “Though not like it’d be romance, you’re twice her age.”

“Not quite that old,” Simon began to protest, only to fall silent as the elf reached out and, pressing on a panel, opened another secret door in the wall. He shone the flashlight around the perimeter. “How did you even know that was there?”

The elf girl gave a resigned sigh. “The same way I know that at the end of this long passageway,” and she gestured down the original corridor, “there is someone who can help me. Or possibly destroy me.” Her hand slid down the new door and her gaze fell to the ground. “So I don’t know. And maybe I’m not ready to know yet.”

Simon tried to look at Pelinelneth’s face, but the way her long hair fell, his view now was partly obscured. “So where does this new passage go?”

There was a beat before she responded. “Ultimately? The dungeon. That’s where they’ll be taking your friend.”

Chartreuse had vaguely expected a medieval torture chamber. So when the dungeon turned out to merely be a stone cell with a heavy wooden door, she was somewhat relieved. “So, what, you, like, keep me here until I’m shouting ‘I’ll talk, I’ll talk’?” she asked.

The guard shoved her inside the room, making her stumble. “Usually,” he answered. “Except you talk too much. So we’ll only come for you if we don’t learn what we want some other way. ANY other way.”

“Well, that’s a bit–" The door slammed in her face, and she heard the sound of a keyring. “Rude,” she finished.

A chuckle came from behind her. “I’ll be glad of some company, at least.”

The pink haired teen managed to quash her urge to scream, merely turning around and stepping back until she was against the nearest wall, waiting desperately for her eyes to adjust to the low amount of light. She half expected to see a talking dragon, or a hulking man looking like he wanted to molest someone, so again, when it turned out to be a somewhat handsome looking guy wearing shackles, she felt a sense of relief. Still, she kept up her guard.

“Um, you get those bracelets for, you know, good behaviour?”

The man held his arms up. “These? No. They prevent me from doing magic. They’re carved with runes.”

“Ah. That’ll rune your day.”

He advanced on her and attempted to extend a hand, as if to shake. His shackles didn’t prevent the movement outright. “My name’s Qifarihm. I’m the wizard’s apprentice.”

Close up, Chartreuse noticed that he was probably older than Simon, with wisps of white in his darker hair. “I’m Chartreuse. Aren’t you a bit old to be, like, an apprentice?” She reached out a tentative hand to accept the handshake. His grip was surprisingly firm.

“I’ve wondered about that,” Qifarihm admitted. “But then, with the reality rewrites, perhaps I used to be a lot younger.”

The teenager let out a low whistle. “Then you’ve, like, heard about the wishing? Even deep down here?” As his grip relaxed a little, she pulled her hand free.

“Yes. It’s why I was imprisoned.” His brow furrowed. “I think.”

“You think therefore you are?”

Qifarihm smiled. “How very philosophical. No, I mean I think I was involved when this first began - but my memory has been blocked.”

Chartreuse blinked. “Oh! So do you have ANY memories from before this year? Or are you, you know, an underground person too?”

He tilted his head slightly. “I don’t quite follow what you mean. I’m not even sure where in the year we are. I’ve been down here for months. Perhaps even years.”

“Years?” Chartreuse said, eyes widening. Though that would explain the smell.

Qifarihm nodded. “Rather think the palace guards like throwing people in here with me. They hope that, in talking to me, others will lose all hope of escape.”

“OR you’ve been planted down here BY the guards to, like, learn stuff about the underground from me that they otherwise couldn’t,” Chartreuse realized. She narrowed her eyes and crossed her arms over her chest. “I’m not stupid, you know. Granted, kinda unfocussed, but then, aren’t we all, sometimes?”

He managed to lift his hand to rub his chin. “That’s actually a good point. And I can’t think of anything I might say to convince you I’m sincere.” He stepped back. “As such, I’ll just hang back in the corner then, in the hopes you decide to trust me.”

Chartreuse nodded curtly, turning her attention back to the door. She swiftly determined that it was indeed locked, and seemed quite solid. There was a small barred window, which let in very little light, and it was a bit higher than Chartreuse could reach to see out. Listening, she couldn’t hear anyone - though if she was in here with a collaborator, why would they need anyone outside?

She looked back over her shoulder at Qifarihm, who seemed to be drawing little shapes in the air, to no effect. Perhaps Simon’s paranoia had rubbed off on her. Was there any reason NOT to trust this so-called wizard?

The female mystic frowned. They had taken away her frying pan, and her WristWatch device, and the crystals she’d been carrying - except for the one she’d managed to secrete away before they’d frisked her. She searched for it now, pulling it out before walking back to her fellow prisoner. “Here, let me check your aura,” she decided, holding the crystal up. “That will give me some sense of you at least.”

“All right,” he said, a bit bemused.

She circled the crystal around his head, closing her eyes, trying to allow herself to be receptive to any vibes he might be putting out. Almost immediately, she sensed that he meant her no harm. But there was something else there… something that she sensed she might be able to access, if only she could go a little deeper…

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WISH FULFILMENT, PART FOUR: Pan Handling

Simon was going to die. Or at least be seriously hurt. Chartreuse had received that impression from touching his shoulder, not long after Pelinelneth had decided that the magician would be the one to use his hypnosis to get past the castle guards.

Regrettably, she didn’t know any more than that. Impressions weren’t like her visions, they were random flashes she received, usually through touch. Telling him “Don’t do it,” had been her first reaction.

“What? Why?”

“The hypnosis will, like, go badly.” She sometimes hated how she couldn’t articulate her concerns.

“How do you know?”

“I just, you know, do,” Chartreuse said, trying to keep her frustration from bleeding into her tone. “But you could, like, take me on as your magic assistant!” Because staying close to Simon, she could react more easily once she recognized the actual danger.

Simon sighed, pulling free of her grip. “That again? I said I work alone.”

“But you could DIE,” she protested.

“Don’t be silly, I’ll be more careful than I was at the fountain,” he countered. He looked towards the silver haired elf girl. “Pelinelneth, am I liable to die merely for approaching the guards?”

“No way! They generally like hearing about what’s happening in town. Moreover, you’re not on a wanted list or anything. Like I am.” She smiled fleetingly.

Simon looked back to Chartreuse. “Satisfied?”

“No,” the pink haired teenager retorted. She found she was unable to keep the pouty expression off her face. “These feelings, when I get them, are rarely, you know, wrong.”

He sighed. “I’m sorry I hurt your feelings. But I’m not accustomed to having an assistant. Let’s just have some breakfast, get changed, and head out. Okay?”

It wasn’t okay, but what else could Chartreuse say about it?

She had at least insisted upon bringing Pelinelneth’s cast iron frying pan along, despite the bizarre looks the others gave her. But she’d seen Rapunzel. She knew what she was doing. Though at present, what she was doing amounted to hiding in the shadow of an alley, a good twenty or thirty paces from the archway and portcullis that barred the way into the castle grounds. The place which Simon was approaching.

Chartreuse looked to the elf. “Why does the castle even have guards? I mean, the palace could, you know, keep that gate with the iron bars down, staying safely locked away.”

Pelinelneth smirked a bit. “First of all, the royalty don’t want to look like they’re distancing themselves, otherwise people will start wishing things against them. Secondly, if there was no external presence at all, we in the underground would have found a way to batter our way inside by now. And finally - this is all an experiment on their part anyway.”

The teenager blinked. “Experiment? What?”

“Well, it has to be, right? Obviously their court magician is running some sort of horrible test on the general populous, demonstrating to the king how granting the wishes of the poor public will destroy society or something.”

The elf girl took a deep breath. “Which is why, for instance, the guards are now giving Simon the benefit of the doubt as he walks up. They want more data. They need the information about how their little experiment is going down in town. And they can’t get it through interrogation alone.” She frowned in irritation as she flicked some strands of silver hair back behind her ear.

Not for the first time, Chartreuse wished Pelinelneth wasn’t so good looking. She couldn’t seem to keep her attention from wandering over the elf’s form when she spoke for long periods of time. Chartreuse bit down on her lip. She wasn’t normally this distractible, was she? No, it was probably something in the water. Or Pelinelneth being an elf. Yes.

That decided, she turned to focus on Simon instead, while lightly spinning the frying pan in her hand. Somehow, she had to keep him out of danger!

“I am here to entertain,” Simon said, in answer to the guard’s question. “By what name shall I call you?”

“Nothing,” the guard said. “Why are you really here?”

“Okay, I’ll call you Nothing, while your partner here is Nobody,” Simon declared. He fanned out the cards in his hand. “Now, pick a card, any card.” Doing a few warm up tricks seemed sensible, otherwise the hypnosis might be too obvious.

Nothing exchanged a glance with his partner. Nobody scratched his head. “Gives us something to report,” he remarked.

“Mmm,” Nothing said, more warily. Even so, he chose a card, and then replaced it when asked. By shuffling carefully, Simon was able to deal the cards back out into Nothing’s hands until he got to the one that had been drawn.

“Pretty good,” Nobody yielded. “You wish for magical powers or something, stranger?”

“More like ‘or something’,” Simon answered, to try to keep them guessing. He didn’t recover his cards, figuring it was better that the guard’s hands were full. “Now, check this out. Small red ball in my right hand. Except now it’s in my left hand. Or not there at all. Look, it’s here in my pocket.” As he spoke, he continued to palm the object and misdirect their attention.

“Don’t gawk. He’s got more than one of those,” Nothing the guard said to Nobody.

“I do,” Simon admitted, revealing two balls. “Or possibly none.” They were gone. “But now, here’s something else, keep your eye on this.”

He held up the pocket watch and began to swing it back and forth. “Watch it carefully, don’t let it disappear like the balls, breathe slowly, deeply…" The difficulty was, while he had Nobody’s attention, Nothing was a bit more cynical. And he only had the one pocket watch. And he was an amateur. Could he pull this off?

“I’m not sure his trick is, like, working,” Chartreuse worried, trying to keep from fidgeting.

“Even if he fails, we should still be able to make a run for it before the guards can get that gate closed,” Pelinelneth observed.

Chartreuse turned to the elf. “What?” she found herself saying again.

“We can run inside while they’re dealing with Simon,” Pelinelneth elaborated. “Arresting him or whatever. Who cares? He’s the more expendable one, right?”

“What??”

“Your Simon was fooled by Sirene, he doesn’t have special powers, he’s not very outgoing, and he seems to take things WAY too seriously. I know that if I, in fact, wished the two of you up, you’re the one I’d want to keep. Hmm?” She winked, and again flicked at the bangs of her hair.

Chartreuse felt a flush in her cheeks, but the effects of the flattery were quickly overridden by concern. “Simon’s not, like, expendable,” she insisted.

Pelinelneth arced an eyebrow. “No? In talking last night, I got the impression you two didn’t know each other that well.”

“True. I only met him yesterday,” Chartreuse admitted. “But that’s not, you know, the point. We’re a team!”

“A team? He doesn’t let you act as an assistant. He even sticks to his whole ‘I’m a man, I don’t need help from girls’ deal when cooking. Probably only sees us as sex objects!”

“I let him cook last night because I don’t, like, do it well.” Chartreuse clutched harder at the pan in her hands. “I-Is this why you picked Simon to handle the guards? Because you don’t, like, care if he’s injured?”

Pelinelneth didn’t answer, simply looking back towards the gateway. Chartreuse now felt extra anxious. “And why didn’t we wait to get more help here? Why not try this trick along with, you know, more of your friends from the underground?”

Another flicker of a smile. “Because they know me too well.”

Chartreuse swallowed hard. “Pelinelneth,” she began softly, not sure what she could say to guide the elf’s moral compass. But that’s all she had time for.

“It’s not working. Come, NOW,” Pelinelneth hissed. She grabbed for Chartreuse’s arm, pulling the girl along for two steps, before breaking out into a sprint for the castle gate.

Chartreuse knew she wasn’t the most physically fit person in the world, but she desperately tried to keep pace. As she ran, she looked ahead at what Simon was doing. He still had his pocket watch out, and one of the guards before him, the one closer to the interior of the archway, seemed to be in a bit of a daze - perhaps the hypnosis HAD worked? But the other guard was reaching out for his companion. He almost made contact, only to spot Pelinelneth sprinting their way. At which point he rushed to get inside the archway. Inside to where, Chartreuse realized, the mechanisms for lowering the portcullis must be. Something clicked in her mind, and she tried to run faster.

Simon was now sure he couldn’t get both guards under at once. But he nearly had Nobody, so with a subtle suggestion, he could perhaps get the two of them to play against each other… except now Nothing was pushing past, trying to head inside. “Hey, wait!” he objected, reaching out for the guard’s shoulder. “The show’s not–"

He was shoved back HARD against the archway wall, enough to momentarily knock the breath out of him. Which is when he saw Pelinelneth sprinting madly for the entrance, Chartreuse charging up behind. Had their hiding place been discovered? Were they in trouble? He had to run interference. He charged for Nothing again, grabbing the guard’s arm. “Hey, stop, you can’t, ungh–"

Again he was shoved, and this time with no wall, he stumbled back, off balance with his arms pinwheeling through the air. The guard reached the mechanism for the portcullis, releasing the gate. Simon saw Pelinelneth dash past in a blur of silver hair. He stumbled back another foot - and then with a WHANG, something very hard hit him in the ass, causing him to stumble forwards instead, and fall on the ground. The sensation was almost immediately followed by a clatter, and then the sound of the portcullis spikes crashing into their resting place on the ground.

Simon flipped his body over so that he was sitting face up, throwing his arms back as much for stability as to keep his bottom from completely touching the ground.

He saw Chartreuse, still on the other side of the heavy iron gate, in a very similar position. She was breathing hard, the frying pan on the ground next to her. Simon frowned. “Did you just hit me in the–" He stopped, as he realized how close to the gate Chartreuse was. So close as to have the end of her dress caught beneath one of the spikes. Which meant that a few seconds ago, he must have been…

He swallowed, making a mental note to take the pink-haired girl’s feelings more seriously from now on.

She’d managed to save him. She’d even managed to save herself, by allowing the recoil force of her swing to propel herself back onto her own ass - it had seemed more sensible than trusting her tackling abilities. Though it now occurred to her that this put her on the wrong side of the castle gate. The side without Simon and Pelinelneth.

“Simon, go,” she wheezed, reaching out for her frying pan. “Pelin… can’t, like, leave… her alone!”

“But–"

“GO!” Chartreuse repeated forcefully. The guard beside her, who had seemingly emerged from whatever trace he might have been in, now reached out to grab the teenager. She jabbed back at him with her trusty kitchen implement, while looking pointedly at Simon, trying to get across that she could take care of herself. In fact, the other guard, the one who had lowered the gate, had already dashed off after Pelinelneth - and after what sounded like a mumbled apology, Simon gave chase as well.

Chartreuse let out a long breath of relief… then a few more breaths for good measure. She wondered where Simon would end up.

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WISH FULFILMENT, PART THREE: Elf Help

“Let’s go back to your place!” Chartreuse said brightly. The elf girl nodded, and after gesturing, started to move off.

Simon frowned, but didn’t object. For while he wasn’t sure that implicit trust of this silver haired elf was necessarily the best plan, he didn’t have any better ideas. And they probably would learn more from a person than at a library - right? Still, after losing control over his mental faculties with that naiad at the fountain moments ago, he resolved to be more alert as to possible dangers in his surroundings.

“What should we call you?” he asked the elf as he fell into step behind Chartreuse.

“Pelinelneth,” the elf replied, looking over her shoulder. She smiled again.

They reached her place just before the first drops of rain started to fall. Simon noticed that Pelinelneth immediately took them down to the basement, which seemed to consist of two rooms - a walled off bathroom in one corner, and everything else. Kitchen and bedroom included.

“Do you only live down here? Do you ever go upstairs?” he wondered.

“Can’t go up,” she retorted, gesturing to a couple chairs at a table. “Don’t own it.” She shrugged upon seeing his expression. “You take what you can get in this town. Particularly if you’re an elf.”

Something about that didn’t sound right. “But aren’t elves beautiful and beloved and that sort of thing?” Simon questioned.

Pelinelneth laughed. “Seriously? Everybody hates elves.”

“Ooh, yeah, I can understand that,” Chartreuse said, sitting down and crossing her arms. “Particularly if there’s, you know, an elf on a shelf. That’s not unlike drone surveillance.”

Their hostess paused, then shrugged again. “I can see why Sirene had trouble getting a bead on you,” she remarked. “Your manner of thinking isn’t quite like that of our regular visitors.”

Simon decided to seize that possible conversation opener. “Have you met many other visitors then?” he asked. He elected not to sit down, in case he had to make a quick exit. Though he did put down their gear next to the stairs.

Pelinelneth shook her head. “Not really. See, I hang out at the local inn, in hopes that maybe some treasure seekers will come by, who might be of use to me. But for the last month it’s only been locals. Well, not counting folks like the guy visiting his mother, or idiots like the two who got duped at the fountain last week. Pity really. I was hoping that the whole ‘wishes granted’ thing would be more of a draw to the town. After all, I’m guessing that’s why you came?”

“Totally,” Chartreuse agreed, even as Simon hesitated. “Though it’s not so much to get our own wishes granted as to, like, figure out what’s causing your problem.”

“When did the wish granting start?” Simon pressed, not wanting to give Pelinelneth time to probe further. He felt better about asking questions, versus answering them.

Pelinelneth reached up to scratch her head. “Hard to say. We became aware of it a couple of months ago. Joey thinks that’s because someone wished for it. The self-awareness, that is. Another good idea that backfired, because there’s nothing more freaky than seeing reality shift around you, with you having no control over it. That’s part of the reason people have taken to staying indoors.”

“Oh!” Chartreuse gasped. “But then do only bad wishes get, you know, granted?”

“Good, bad, it’s all perspective, right?” the elf girl answered, her tone light and almost playful. “Like, getting a bigger house would be good for me, but sucks if I take your property to do it. Being able to go without sleep might seem like a good idea at first, but it could make a person irritable over the long term. The big problem is that, when you make a wish, you tend to do so in the moment.” She leaned in a little closer to Chartreuse. “For instance, if YOU could wish for anything, right NOW, what would you wish for?” Her eyes brightened slightly.

“Back up,” Simon said, before his companion could speak. “Who was this Joey?”

Chartreuse opened her mouth, then closed it, and looked towards Simon. After a moment, Pelinelneth’s gaze followed, and she resumed a more neutral posture.

“Joey, he’s part of the underground. Meaning a bunch of us who’ve been trying to analyze the whole situation. But you said you didn’t want to meet them,” she reminded, shaking a finger his way. “Too late to change your mind now!”

“We merely wanted to talk to you first,” Simon countered.

“Mmmm. Then you only want to talk?” The elf girl now leaned back against her stove, sliding her hands out to the sides. Simon found his gaze slipping down over her form, and he quickly pulled it back up to her face. He wasn’t going to be caught that way twice!

“Yes, just talk,” Simon reiterated. He glanced at Chartreuse - and discovered she apparently did not have the same reservations he did. “Chartreuse,” he said, coughing. “Our hostess here is probably a hundred years old. Elves are very long lived.”

“Don’t be ageist. Twenty, a hundred, a girl is still free to, like, admire another pretty girl,” the teenager retorted defensively.

Pelinelneth let out another little laugh. “I thank you for the compliment.” She glanced back to Simon. “Interesting thing about my age though. I’m not sure how old I am. Because I have no memory from before the start of this year.”

Simon was caught off guard by the frank statement. “What?”

“You mean, like, a wish removed your memory?” Chartreuse said, gasping again.

“Maybe.” The elf arced an eyebrow, still staring at Simon. “What do YOU think?”

He knew what his first thought had been, and searching her expression, he realized that’s what she was alluding to. He might as well say it. “You believe you could have been wished into existence.”

Pelinelneth pulled an arm back to tap at her nose. “You got it. After all, wishing pretty girls into existence, that’s what you men DO, right?”

“That’s not what I would do,” Simon protested. Though his tone didn’t seem to have the force behind it that he’d hoped for.

“But wait, maybe you’re like that Sirene?” Chartreuse piped up. “It could be you were, you know, someone else? Who got transformed? And, like, don’t remember your old life?”

“Maybe,” Pelinelneth repeated. “Maybe not. I know Joey’s sticking with that as his story.”

Simon made another connection. “Then this underground you spoke of, it’s people with missing memories. Ones who fear their existence could have been wish generated.”

“Maybe.” Frowning now, Pelinelneth pushed off from her stove. “Enough talking. If you don’t want romance, how about we have some dinner,” she proposed, clapping her hands together.

“No, wait,” Chartreuse protested. “If what Simon said is true, and your underground is trying to, like, figure out what’s causing all the wishing, the same way as we are… are you doing it to undo the situation? Or to, you know, ensure you lock your existence in place?”

The elf girl spun back to face Chartreuse so fast that hair cascaded over her shoulder. “Well, which would YOU do?” she demanded.

“I’d do the right thing,” the pink haired girl responded, without hesitation. “As I’m sure you would too.”

They continued to stare at each other for a few more seconds. “You’re more trusting than your male companion, I’ll say that,” Pelinelneth concluded. “But I DON’T want to talk any more. Let’s get back to dinner. What are you two going to make for me?”

Caught off guard again, Simon exchanged a glance with Chartreuse. As she seemed just as confused, he looked back to Pelinelneth. “You invited us here,” he reminded.

“Yes. I’ve offered you shelter from the rain, and answered a lot of your questions,” she countered. “The least you humans could do in return is use the ingredients I have on hand to cook me a nice dinner, hmmm?” A smile played at the corners of her lips. “Besides, if you cook it yourselves, you won’t be worried that I’m trying to poison you.”

Simon was a pretty good cook, partly because of how his mother had died when he was young. Granted, he wasn’t quite sure what some of the tins in Pelinelneth’s cupboards consisted of, but there were enough recognizable spices, enabling him to work reasonably well with the items that Chartreuse opted to randomly open. Plus, even though this was a fantasy world, it seemed to be one with noodles. And a measure of indoor plumbing. As soon as she made THAT discovery, Chartreuse asked if she could use Pelinelneth’s bath - and the elf agreed, provided they first stay the night with her. She then set out some blankets on the floor next to her bed. And yet again, Simon couldn’t think of any better alternative to staying over.

Even though Simon wasn’t sure he’d be able to sleep, all the walking of the day had tired him out more than he’d realized. The next thing he knew, it was morning, and Pelinelneth was lying on her bed, staring over at him and Chartreuse.

Staring intently. Too intently. “Um, what’s wrong?” he asked, pulling the sheet higher, suddenly self-conscious. This despite the fact that he’d elected to wear all his clothing to bed, while the girls had changed into something lighter.

“I was just thinking,” the elf said slowly. “Perhaps you’re something I wished up. Maybe you don’t really exist either. Meaning maybe I shouldn’t let you out of my sight. EVER.”

“Uh…" Simon cleared his throat uncertainly. “For now, perhaps we can just focus on the origin of these wishes? Can we finally talk about that again?”

Pelinelneth had categorically refused to discuss the matter any more the previous evening. Instead, she’d demanded to know where they were from, and while Simon and Chartreuse had managed to avoid any discussion of the Epsilon Project, they’d eventually had to admit to being travellers from a “more science-based region” of the world.

Much to Simon’s chagrin, the concept of a “computer” had fascinated the silver haired girl. Though he had been pleased to learn that Chartreuse wasn’t too fond of technology either, as it could interfere with her “mystic” vibe.

Now that it was the morning though, Pelinelneth didn’t immediately cut Simon off at the question. Instead, after another bit of slightly uncomfortable staring, the girl grabbed her pillow and threw it at Chartreuse.

“Buh? Wha?” the pink haired teenager garbled, voice muffled due to the pillow on her face.

“I need your help to get into the castle grounds,” Pelinelneth stated, now seemingly all business. “The answers are there. But they’ve got guards at every entrance. I’ve had no luck seducing them. We can’t figure out how they decide to change shifts. When they send people into the town for provisions, there’s a special return code that we don’t know.”

As she continued to speak, she sat up straighter on her bed, finally clasping her hands together. “Somehow, you have to get us inside. Can you use one of your computing devices for this?”

“No,” Simon said. “Though I doubt one would work here anyway.” He sat up himself, rubbing the back of his head. Should he ask why the castle? Maybe not yet, lest the elf shut down again. “I also can’t imagine my magic trickery would sway a guard… I MIGHT try hypnosis though? I’ve done some reading on it. But no guarantees. It could go badly.”

“Ah cuh dewf isin tuh eee entu sniq pash?” Chartreuse hadn’t expended the effort to remove the pillow from her face.

“What, Chartreuse?” he asked, holding back a sigh.

The girl moaned, then lifted the pillow up. “I could do a vision to see when to sneak past? Once I’m, you know, actually conscious?”

Simon nodded. “I suppose you have more experience with your abilities than I do with hypnosis,” he yielded. “But what if you don’t see an opportunity for more than twenty four hours?”

“Uhn, I dunno, what timizit now?”

“Time for me to tell you what I’ve decided,” Pelinelneth declared.

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WISH FULFILMENT, PART TWO: Nobody Home

“We don’t seem to be, you know, blending in too well.”

Chartreuse decided to simply say that out loud, because it felt like something they should talk about. Yet her companion, Simon Black, didn’t respond. The teenage girl pursed her lips. She pretended to adjust the bright pink bodice she was wearing. She cleared her throat. “I said we don’t–"

“I heard,” he answered her.

“Oh. Because you didn’t, like, say anything.”

“Sorry,” he apologized. “But what was I supposed to say? After all, you can’t blend in to a place where there’s no other people. I’ve been trying to figure out why they’re not around.”

Chartreuse turned her attention back to the area in which they found themselves. They’d been walking towards the distant castle all afternoon, the houses around them becoming more frequent, the streets becoming set with cobblestones, local businesses becoming more evident. They were now in what could definitively be termed part of a city, with the castle at the centre. Yet despite it being late afternoon, they had seen very few actual people about, and the few they had run into had merely looked their way with an uncertain gaze, and hurried off.

“Big tournament at that castle?” Chartreuse hypothesized. “Or maybe it’s vacation time due to the rainy season.” It was becoming a bit overcast.

“Maybe,” Simon said, unconvinced. “But I sense that a number of these homes have people in them, they’re just staying inside. Watching us from behind shuttered windows.” He stopped walking. It took Chartreuse a few more steps to realize this, after which she turned around.

“Is our gear getting too, you know, heavy? Need a hand?”

“No. Well, not really,” the dark haired man yielded, shifting the pack off his back and setting it onto the ground. It contained their tent, some provisions, changes of clothing, and a few personal items. All provided by ‘The Epsilon Project’, the mystery group who had recruited them, and sent them here. “Rather, it occurred to me that perhaps I should try to start up an act. Get people to come outside, draw us a crowd.”

Chartreuse peered at him. “Because… somehow your acting will make it, like, easier to blend in?”

“No. But I don’t think that plan is happening,” Simon sighed. He adjusted the belt of his tunic. “I just thought… no. Forget it. We should track down that inn of yours.”

Chartreuse was not in the habit of letting a subject drop. The pink haired girl crossed her arms. “No. Spill. Whatcha mean act? Are you a mime or something?”

Simon made a face. “Magician,” he retorted. “And when I was putting on these clothes, I noticed that some of the things I use, like a deck of cards, are in with my gear. Maybe I’m meant to perform somehow. Maybe that’s how to draw out the people with the information we’re looking for.”

“Oh!” That made sense. “So, that’s why you asked if I was, you know, a magical girl? Like, you want to know if I do magic tricks? Enough to be your fashionable assistant?”

“No,” Simon said, seemingly becoming irritated. “In your case I meant real magic, transformation or otherwise. And I don’t need an assistant.”

“But if you aren’t going to include me in your act, what am I supposed to do?”

“Observe the crowd? Never mind, it doesn’t matter, I’m not performing.”

“So why bring it up if you’re not going to do it?”

He let out a noise of exasperation. “I thought it might show we’re not a threat. That it might allow people to let down their guards. That it might also give us more money, because we don’t seem to have been given that much! But I’ve changed my mind. Okay? You happy now?”

“Mildly?” Chartreuse mused. She decided that his performance idea was a good one. “I think I’d be happier if you, you know, let me be your assistant! Okay?”

He stared at her with wide eyes before starting to shake his head. “Chartreuse, are you in the habit of interpreting the up side to everything?”

She shook her head back in response. “Nope! Some of the visions I can get are, like, real downers. But you can’t dwell on the darkness forever, right?”

“I… guess not. Wait, visions?"

“Yep. You were given a deck of cards, I have, like, crystals to use in my meditations. To see the future. Works in moderation. I can also get, you know, flashes from people or their auras.”

His eyebrows went up. “And you’re only bringing this up now because…?"

Chartreuse frowned. “Didn’t I mention it before?” Simon shook his head.

She thought back, figuring it might have come up when they were packing up their gear, and she was explaining about the WristWatch devices they had been given. But upon reflection, she supposed it hadn’t. “Oh. Oops?”

Simon briefly rubbed his eyelids with his thumb and index finger. “So, this object we’re supposed to find, do you mean you can meditate your way into finding it?”

She shook her head again, smiling. “Nope! The experience can’t be random, needs to be focussed, and I dunno what to focus on here. Not yet.” She pointed in the direction they had been walking. “That said, there IS something tickling at the edge of my perception. Like a feather brushing at the nape of one’s neck. And it’s that way. I suppose I can, you know, go check it out while you perform here?”

“I said I’m not–" Simon stopped himself and shouldered the pack of their supplies again. “I think splitting up would be a bad idea at this point. Let’s go see if your feather brushing is relevant before I potentially embarrass myself as a magician.”

It wasn’t the town square, but it was an open area, complete with an ornate fountain. Or perhaps it was the town square, yet it was as deserted as the streets had been. “The vibe is strongest around here,” Chartreuse declared. “But I can’t, like, pin it down.”

Simon looked towards the fountain. “You think maybe that’s like a wishing well?” He approached it, Chartreuse following along.

The fountain itself had a central pillar, and either magic or technology was allowing twin jets of water to emerge from opposing sides of it. On top of the pillar there was a statue of what seemed to be a water nymph, or rather a naiad. A rather good looking one at that. With some effort, Chartreuse pulled her gaze away from the curvaceous girl, noticing Simon doing the same.

“We don’t have magic detection devices,” she observed. “This seems like an oversight.”

Simon peered into the fountain. “There are coins there. But I’m not sure I want to throw one of our limited supply in on a hunch.”

“Can’t you just, you know, take the money back out if it doesn’t work?”

“Maybe there’s a magical time delay,” Simon said, shrugging. “Maybe the nymph gets upset if you remove her coins. Who knows?” He reached out to flick a finger against the surface of the liquid. “I wish one of the locals would turn up, we could ask them!” Thunder rumbled in the distance.

“They might tell you the nymph gets upset if you DON’T give her things.”

Chartreuse snapped her gaze back up to the statue, which had just spoken. The water nymph, who was now very much flesh rather than stone, smiled down at them. She then nimbly jumped from her perch to land in the water below. In the process, her clothing, now a gauzy material, fluttered about her, hinting at… at things that Chartreuse decided she really shouldn’t be thinking about right now.

“Simon,” she murmured, reaching out blindly to try and pluck at his sleeve.

“Wow, she’s pretty,” Simon breathed.

With effort, Chartreuse pulled her gaze away from the beautiful nymph to look at him. The best words she could find to describe Simon’s expression would be “star struck”. She quickly reached up to snap her fingers twice in front of his face.

“Yo, Simon! You do NOT want to make me, like, the responsible one here,” she declared. Mainly because it was taking all of her willpower right now not to turn back to gaze upon the buxom water girl. Who had been a blonde, of course she’d been a blonde… just like Carrie, her girlfriend…

“Do you two charming wanderers have some money for me?” the nymph cooed. “I’d be ever so grateful."

“LA LA LA, WE’RE NOT LISTENING,” Chartreuse shouted.

She immediately started thinking about that annoying song from back home, and closed her eyes. Hooking her arm around Simon’s, she began to march back the way they had come, dragging him along with her and hoping that his stumbling wouldn’t cause them both to fall down onto the ground before they could get away.

“Aw… don’t you want to play with me in the water?”

Chartreuse felt her knees go weak. It was only by mentally conjuring up a disapproving look from Carrie that she managed to maintain her pace. Though the fact that she was striding about with her eyes closed did make it inevitable that she would stumble into something. Or someone.

“Eep!” was the only warning Chartreuse got from the individual in front of her before she was falling down on top of them. Still hooked onto Simon’s arm, she ended up pulling him down too, resulting in a jumble of arms and legs.

“Wait,” Chartreuse gasped. She tried to crawl free. “I’m not, you know, a virgin! You don’t want me… uh, do you?” If the naiad had information, maybe they should stop fighting fate?

“What I want is for you to get your leg off of me,” came an amused female voice. It wasn’t the water spirit. It sounded vaguely like the tinkling of bells.

Chartreuse cracked one eye open. This wasn’t a partially clad nymph that she’d walked into. Rather, it was a girl wearing a rather more practical dress of emerald green. Her hair was silvery in tone, and while it was currently splayed about on the ground, it was easily long enough to reach right down her back. She also seemed to have pointed ears. What was the name of that mythical race again? Vulcans?

“You’re an elf,” Simon said, having apparently found his voice again.

“An elf?” Chartreuse echoed. With Simon now pushing himself up, she managed to squirm free. “Hold up. Aren’t elves the really short folks who help out Santa Claus?” This girl looked to be about the same height as she was.

“Not that sort of elf,” Simon sighed. Now kneeling on the ground, he turned almost apprehensively to look behind him. Chartreuse followed his gaze back to the fountain. The statue of the nymph was back in place on the pillar. Unmoving stone, as she had been before.

“It’s fine, she’s reverted,” the silver-haired girl said, her tone still implying amusement more than anything. “I’m impressed. You spoke with Sirene and came out of it unscathed. From what I saw, I would have bet against you.”

“Sirene? You mean the statue, who is really a water nymph?” Simon asked.

The elf’s smile faded. “In fact, I think she used to be a florist. Before. It’s become a little difficult to keep track of reality, the way it now has a tendency to shift.”

“You mean what with the wish granting?” Chartreuse hypothesized.

She got a nod in response. “Then you do know. I thought as much. Maybe you can help us?”

“Maybe, but we might not know as much as you think,” Simon said guardedly. “Is there some way you could bring us up to speed?”

The girl’s head tilted. “If you mean historical context, we could go to the library. If you mean personally, I could relate my experiences back at my place. Alternatively, I can introduce you to a few other members of the underground who might know more. Did you have a preference?”

WHAT’S NEXT?

FIRSTLY, open to any names for this elf! Tweet or comment. (Warning: She may yet be good or evil. Don’t offer a name that would make you cringe later.)

SECONDLY, OPTIONS:

[polldaddy poll=8522880]

VOTING WILL CLOSE TUESDAY DEC 16 EST

Next ->

*WARNING: Chartreuse in this story comes from the end of “Time & Tied” Book 4. Nothing major is revealed here, but to totally avoid spoilers, you’ll want to read that first.

WISH FULFILMENT, PART ONE: MAGIC MAN

“Are you a magical girl?”

She didn’t answer. Again. Whatever she was doing, tapping away on the large computer system, it seemed to have her complete attention. Well, fine! Simon wasn’t big on conversation anyway. Except, he had no idea where he was, or what to do now. Had he missed a message somewhere? He had another quick look around the room.

It was large, with high ceilings, and seemed to be cylindrical in shape. That said, one part of the circular floor had been walled off - though the presence of a doorway in the wall indicated that the area behind remained accessible. From said door, looking counterclockwise around the room, Simon could see a large view screen, an area with a table and some chairs, the computer being manned by the brunette, and then back to the chord cutting through that piece of the room. Maybe he should try the door? As he took a step in that direction, the technician finally turned.

“No, I’m not Becky,” she stated with a smile. “No, I’m not Becky AGAIN, and no, I’m not a magical girl. Well, not in the sense that you understand them.”

“Oh. Who are you then?” Simon asked, momentarily taken aback as he realized she’d heard him every time he’d spoken. Did she even work here? She was dressed rather casually in a T-shirt and jeans. The same as him. Had they both been brought here?

“My name… is not important. You must listen to me, or you’ll be late.”

He frowned. “But that doesn’t make sense.”

Her smile faded. “You were supposed to say ‘late for what’, so I could make a threat.”

“What?”

“I had a whole Slartibartfast thing worked out in my mind there. You follow?”

Rather than repeat ‘What’ again, Simon merely shook his head no.

She sighed. “Fine. Then call me Alice.”

Simon decided to try a different tack. “How did we get here, Alice?”

“Interdimensional teleportation. But don’t confuse this dimension with your Earth’s pocket dimensions, or any of the other dimensional things being interpreted as magic there. Here at the Epsilon Project, we like to go one step beyond!”

So she did work here? And could teleport? Simon frowned. “Are you SURE you’re not a magical girl?”

“I suppose anything is possible. Same planet, different dimension, we’ve found the gateway, and we need your help.”

He decided to latch onto the last part of that sentence, as it was the first thing she’d said that he fully grasped. “Right… well, even assuming I’m able to help, I’m kind of caught up in something else at the moment. So could you send me back, please?”

“Don’t panic! We can return you to your Earth, at almost the exact same position in space and time relative to when you left. But in the meantime, there’s a neighbouring world which could use your assistance. An evil object is granting wishes, you see.”

Simon sighed. “What?” he elected to repeat. Well, perhaps he could clarify. “What neighbouring world?” It really wasn’t fair, the way Alice threw this stuff out so matter-of-factly, as if he was supposed to know what it meant. At least with Becky, there was the sense that you weren’t supposed to immediately understand her.

“Oh, don’t worry, we’ve got a biofilter, you won’t contaminate that world, they won’t contaminate yours, we’ve got pretty strict protocols. Also, your partner for the mission is already there, and we’ll be sending you through via our whirlpool. Takes less power. Okay? Ready to go?”

“No…! Please, what is going on??”

Alice rolled her eyes up to the ceiling. “We leave a note, they complain there isn’t enough information. We provide information first-hand, they complain anyway. Might as well go back to leaving notes.”

Simon fought down the urge to raise his voice. “Look, just… back up,” he requested. “Are you saying that you’ve abducted me from Earth? All because you want me to help stop an evil object which is running wild on some other planet?” He paused, but she didn’t respond. “Are you an alien? Is this a spaceship?”

Alice continued to stare, until she apparently decided he wasn’t going to say anything more. “Sure, let’s go with that,” she agreed.

Another sigh. He obviously hadn’t figured it out, but her tone implied this was as good as he was going to get. Maybe whatever this situation was, he could deal with it quickly? “Fine. So what is this evil object?”

“If we knew that, we wouldn’t need you,” Alice pointed out. “The majority of the wish hits are for a particular town though, so that’s where we’re sending you.”

He flinched. “Sending me with… a map? Any local currency? Any, dare I ask, technology?!” He managed to keep from throwing his arms out, but suspected some of his growing frustration was bleeding through into his voice. He hoped he didn’t have to master some foreign technological thing.

“It’s a fantasy world, not a technology world, hence why you were chosen. And your partner for the mission already has the supplies. That said…" Alice turned and reached for what looked like one of a set of watches, resting on a small ledge by the computer system. “This can be used to keep in contact with us.” She turned back. “Well, me, at least. That way we - well, I - can provide you with items as the need arises. Probably.” She held the device out to him.

Simon took it tentatively, inspecting it closely. It looked like a watch with a few buttons, whose digital readout wasn’t illuminated. On the back of the face, a small epsilon symbol had been engraved. He looked back up, managing not to grimace. “Does it have an instruction manual?”

“Your partner knows how it works. As I said earlier, she’s already there. So, can I dial it up already? I have other things that need handling.”

Simon decided that at this point, he might as well simply play along. Maybe the person he was supposed to be working with would have answers. For that matter, maybe it was Becky! “My partner… is SHE a magical girl?”

“She’s… something,” Alice yielded. She turned and tapped what Simon assumed was an ‘Enter’ key on a virtual keyboard. A rumbling noise began, and the whole room began to subtly vibrate.

A light on the floor suddenly switched on. Simon realized that the large ring in the middle of the room actually contained nine chevrons. As he stared, a second one of them lit up. Some sort of airlock? The ring was large enough to fit a small vehicle. He put on the watch device. “Do I want to know where that leads then?”

Alice finally flashed him another smile. “Down the rabbit hole.”

The trip through the whirlpool wasn’t instantaneous. It was sort of like going on a trip down a water slide. Except it wasn’t wet, and it didn’t dump him out into a body of water, but rather into a field of grass. With the wind momentarily knocked out of him, Simon rolled to the side and looked up. He was in time to see a swirling portal of blue in the air… even as it shrunk down and collapsed into nothing. He had apparently arrived.

“Hi!” came a female voice off to the side.

Simon turned, and pushed himself back up to a seated position. There was a teenager there looking at him. The first thing that leapt out about her appearance was the pink hair, with the brightly coloured bodice to match. At least the shirt she wore underneath it was a more plain white, and her skirt was black, and her shoes were sensible. In terms of her physique, she was a bit shorter than he was, and perhaps a few pounds overweight for that height. Though Simon supposed that such an opinion was relative. She also had bows fastened in her hair, which otherwise had enough length to fall about her shoulders.

“I’m, like, waiting for Simone!” the girl said brightly. “Are you her security detail, or something?”

Simon shook his head to clear it. He then turned his head to look around the area, noticing that they were in a field, not far from a roadway. Yet the teenager was the only other person within sight. There was also a small tent off to the side, which he supposed belonged to her. Or to Alice. “I’m Simon… are we supposed to be working together?”

Her eyes widened a little. “Simon! That could totally have been it. Whoops.” She frowned. “Except you’re, like, old.”

“What? I’m not even thirty!” Simon protested, now feeling defensive. “It’s you who’s young!”

“Hey! I’ve graduated high school!” she countered, her hands going to her hips. “I’m totally ‘of age’, you know! Also, age aside, I’ve saved the world from massive evil with my family, and temporal hijinks with my friends, so, like, don’t judge a book by it’s cover, and all that.”

Simon felt his eyebrow twitch. “Why are you talking that way?”

“Like, what way?”

“That way, with the likes and the… who ARE you?”

She beamed. “Oh! Sorry. Chartreuse Vermilion.” She reached out to take his hand and pump it twice before he could prevent it. “As to my speech, that’s, like, a long story, and it works better as a, you know, cautionary tale about succumbing to mystic forces and the like. Let’s not go there.”

For a moment, Simon found he could only stare as she released his hand. In the end, he supposed it couldn’t hurt to ask. “Are you a magical girl?”

“Hm?” She pursed her lips and raised a finger to them in thought. “I suppose I’m magical to my girlfriend, if that counts?” she answered. “And before you ask, I’m, like, bisexual, not strictly a lesbian. You won’t have a problem with that, will you?”

This conversation was starting to make his head hurt. “What, with you not being a lesbian?”

“No, with me, you know, playing for both teams, or whatever people on your world say.”

“No, of course not.” She smiled again off his answer, which made him realize she hadn’t even properly answered his questions yet.

He frowned. Whereas Alice had given off the vibe of knowing much more than she was telling, this Chartreuse - if that was indeed her real name - created the impression that she knew less. Maybe this whole thing was some experiment designed to drive people crazy? Simon pushed himself back up onto his feet, brushing off his jeans. “Have you been here long?”

“A day,” Chartreuse answered. “Needed time to, you know, align myself to the cosmic forces of an entirely new world. This Epsilon Project is smart for, like, realizing that! That said, I’m totally ready to go into town now, to have a shower or something.”

“Town?”

The pink haired teenager raised her finger to point. Simon turned to look in that direction. He realized that the field they were in was actually on the fringe of some sort of farming district. The nearby road led off towards a set of houses, which seemed to increase in frequency the further you went, and there was even some sort of castle visible on the horizon. This was a medieval civilization of some sort?

“I would have, like, packed up the tent already,” Chartreuse added. “Except I figured you would probably want somewhere to, you know, change out of your clothes and into something more period appropriate. Like I did. Oh!” She clapped her hands together. “Those outfits Alice gave me make so much more sense now! I thought Simone was dressing kinda butch.”

Simon decided to ignore the last part of that. “So, you were thinking of going into town? Checking into an inn?” he clarified.

She nodded back. “Don’t people in role-play games always learn the stuff they need to know at the inn?”

Simon crossed his arms, looking again towards the houses. He shook his head. “Might be better to scout about the town first,” he advised. “Maybe even try to stay with one of the locals. If we go straight to an inn, we’ll be branded as outsiders, and people might not want to tell us anything.”

WHAT’S NEXT?

OPTIONS: [polldaddy poll=8504638]

VOTING WILL CLOSE TUESDAY DEC 9 EST

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ɛ PROJECT

WB (Writing Bufferless) presents...

STORY 2: WISH FULFILMENT

SO FAR:

The Epsilon Project. A self-regulating station, tracking right and wrong, located in neutral territory - and manned by “Alice”, aka Alison Vunderlande. It assembled a group of people to deal with a Roman Numeral plot at Big Ben. Now, it has detected another problem.

This is the story of that smallest of the greek letters. The year is 2015. The name of the place, is The Hub.

STORY #2:

The Epsilon Project has determined that an evil object is granting wishes - on a fantasy world. Two people who function well without technology are sent to investigate. Can they get along with each other? Will they find the object, and is it really evil? Also, seriously, who runs this Project??

CAST:

SIMON … A Magician

CHARTREUSE … A Mystic

(For more in-depth character information, see this page.  Each instalment is roughly 2000 words.)

*WARNING: Chartreuse in this story comes from the end of “Time & Tied” Book 4. To totally avoid spoilers, you’ll want to read that first.

EPISODE INDEX:

1. Magic Man

2. Nobody Home

3. Elf Help

4. Pan Handling

5. Deep Thoughts

6. Passed Tents

7. Pink Link

8. Evil Wins

9. Trial and Error

10. Magical Girl

11. Hard Truths

12. Reversal

13. Out of Frying Pan

14. Into Fire

15. Future Tents

16. Alternative Reality

17. Simon’s Travels

STORY #2 CONCLUDED!

Last time the plot trended to science-fiction, so this time I’m leaning more towards a fantasy world. At least initially - who knows what will happen? As before, the top plot will be activated. If you missed what happened last time, the 12 part serial can be found here.

For characters this time, I’ve got two polls, so that you can also pick your runner-up choice. This will allow me to either break a tie, or include a third character, with a better sense of their popularity. (Granted, I suppose you could pick the same person twice, but why would you?)

POLLS WILL CLOSE LATE TUESDAY DECEMBER 2nd

[polldaddy poll=8482077]

CHARACTERS:

More in depth information on the characters is linked here.  You can select both a first choice and a runner-up choice.

[polldaddy poll=8482088]

[polldaddy poll=8482095]

Thanks for voting! POLLS CLOSE LATE TUES. DEC 2.

Check back for the story on Sunday, Dec 7! If you think you’ll forget, on Twitter I’m @mathtans, for this serial using the hashtag #WriteTan.

ALREADY RECRUITED:

1) ALISON “ALICE” VUNDERLANDE

Age: Late 20s (From a BuffyMUX Application)

Powers: Memory… with a tendency to quote scifi/fantasy shows.

Drawbacks: Innocent nature.

2) CHARTREUSE VERMILION

Age: High School Graduate (original character)

Powers: Mystical. She can pick up impressions from people, and using a ritual, can peer into the future.

Drawbacks: She uses her powers sparingly, as they can be addictive. She also tends to overdramatize.

3) SIMON BLACK

Age: About 30 (original character)

Powers: None. Able to perform slight of hand.

Drawbacks: He dislikes technology, more interested in magic.

4) ALIJDA VAN VLIET (ALISON VAN DER LAND)

Age: About 30. (Unisystem generation)

Powers: Teleporter. Range of about 16 km, able to carry no more than one person along. Cannot teleport blind, or risks ending up inside a solid object.

Drawbacks: Mild paranoia. On prescription medication for depression. Has her own moral code.

5) MASON (aka CHIEF)

Age: Time Lord (Unisystem generation)

Powers: Temporal. His TARDIS tends to be in the form of a vehicle. It contains a fancy wardrobe. His “Bardiche Zanber” acts as an all purpose “swiss army knife”.

Drawbacks: Not a fighter. Once a bit of a show-off, a more sobering incident in his past has made him reluctant to personally interact with other cultures, unless the situation really calls for it.

6) PARA

Age: Parabolic function, personified. Math is timeless. (original character)

Powers: Flight. Very good with calculations involving gravity.

Drawbacks: Can be overemotional, and whether her depression is at a maximum can be seen from her hairband.

NEW POTENTIALS (as yet unseen):

1) CARRIE WATERSON

Age: High School Girl, Senior Year (original character)

Powers: Temporal. She has an immunity to temporal paradox. She can also freeze people in place, push objects through short time intervals, wipe recent memories, and speed up or slow down time for herself.

Drawbacks: Once she sees an event, it tends to become a fixed point. Also, if she pushes herself too far, she can lose control and harm others around her.

2) EXPONA

Age: Exponential function, personified. Math is timeless. (original character)

Powers: Self defence techniques, working with percentages.

Drawbacks: She’s quick to anger.

3) KATHERINE “KAT” CONWAY

Age: 30s (Unisystem generation)

Powers: Pyrokinesis, knowledge of occult. Has military experience.

Drawbacks: His honourable nature, and childhood obsession.

See next post for the votes.