The wave inside chapter 2
Chapter 2 "Roll with the changes"
**
(After the Pulse, society has collapsed and technology is gone. Magic vanished from the world a century ago, but Pascal (a college student) thinks he can bring it back. He's teamed up with Luke, a grad student (and a Ram), Luke's friend Danny, and Danny's friend Jack. They are heading to Detroit.)
**
There were four soldiers and four of us. The soldiers were about to give us a ride as far north as they could - at the moment, we were all standing around, not talking much, waiting for the driver to get his shit together. I guess I was more nervous, more apprehensive, than I thought I'd be. One of the soldiers noticed, and gave me a quick wink and a thumbs up. I winked back, returned the thumbs up gesture. He was a young Husky - he looked too young to be a soldier. His helmet was too large, and he didn't seem comfortable in his fatigues. He was also pretty cute. If we'd met under other circumstances . . . say, if we'd met before the Pulse, in a bar, before everything got all crazy . . . Ah. Well. No point thinking about that, right?
My friend Danny was standing right next to me. He was a young Rottweiler, stocky and handsome. We'd been coworkers before the world fell. Earlier that morning, Danny had said goodbye to his apartment. Maybe it was a goodbye forever, maybe it was a temporary - see you later - goodbye. Who knew?
"So," Danny had told me, as I'd watched him pack. "My landlord says he'll keep an eye on the place. He's staying. He'll watch out for looters and stuff."
"Cool," I'd replied.
"It's funny," Danny said, sitting on the bed. "This place is - was - the first thing that was mine. You know? That shoe store was the first job I got serious about, it was the first job where I worked full time. And I used the money to rent this place. It's - it was, I guess - the first thing that was all mine. Sure, I had roomies from time to time, I rented out that other bedroom once in a while. But I didn't need their help to pay rent. I didn't need anyone's help. It's dumb, I guess, to get so attached, But, I dunno . . . it just feels weird. Leaving. You know?"
"I know," I replied. "Dude, it makes sense. Trust me. It makes sense to feel proud of what you have here, it's normal to get so attached."
"And then some terrorists had to blow up the world," Danny smiled. He was trying to keep the mood light.
"Fucking terrorists," I grinned back.
**
I'd been saying goodbye to things and people since the Pulse. My job, for one. Also, my own apartment, plus my roomies (who'd all left town to find their families). I'd said goodbye to my dad, his new wife, and my sister - they'd all gone to Florida, to check on the rest of the family. I'd left behind most of my stuff, in my apartment. It is normal to get attached, right? To things, to stuff. For me, it was books, mostly. Not sure what this says about me, but leaving behind my huge collection of books had hurt almost as much as watching my dad and my sister (and, okay, yes, my new stepmom) get in the car and drive away.
**
Danny and I were heading to Detroit. At least, that was the plan. It wasn't our plan. We were just going along because of . . . because why, exactly? Lack of something else to do? Or because we wanted to help? I was pretty sure that Danny was going because he believed in Pascal, and his crazy (or sane) idea. Much, much later I would find out that I'd been exactly right about that.
Waiting for the driver, waiting for the trip to begin, I looked at Pascal, standing a few feet away from Danny. As usual, the young Lion had pulled his mane back into a loose tail. He wore new-looking boots and faded jeans, along with a hooded sweatshirt from his college. He was anxious for the trip to begin. He was so sure that the answer he needed was in Detroit . . .
I thought about what had happened a few days ago, when Pascal had made a pencil float through the air. So. There was at least one magician left in the world, it seemed. Magic had vanished so long ago, and there'd been no magicians for ages. No practicing magicians, anyway. Some still studied the theory of magic, or the history of it. But no one did it, not anymore. Except for Pascal.
Waiting for the trip to begin, waiting for the driver, I realized something obvious - only the four of us knew Pascal could do magic. He'd told Luke - and then, later, he'd told Danny and myself. The soldiers clustered around the truck had no idea why we were heading north. They probably assumed we had family up there somewhere.
"Why Detroit?" I had asked Pascal the day he'd floated the pencil.
I had at least a few questions, that day. Was magic back? Was Pascal the only one who could do magic? Most of all, though, I wanted to know - why Detroit? Atlanta was more or less stable, and we had a good number of soldiers down here. There were other parts of the south that we knew were more or less safe to travel to.
But we'd lost the telephones, and the radio, and telegraphs, too. We didn't have television anymore, either. What were things like in, say, California - or New York? Texas? Detroit? What was the rest of the country like, after the Pulse? The rest of the world? We had no idea. No one did. Without the phones and all that other stuff, there was no way to find out, unless you actually traveled there.
Who was still alive - out there - in the rest of the country? How were they doing? We just couldn't know.
So - why Detroit? Traveling that far north might be safe, or it might be dangerous. We just didn't know what the roads were like up there.
"Well," Pascal had begun replying to my question. He paused to gather his thoughts. "There's a library I need to get to. There was a scholar - a cranky, crazy old guy named Gustave Frohm. He was, in his day, the biggest authority on the history of magic. Well. He believed he knew why magic had gone away - he thought it was a spell that did it. He _also _believed that he knew the counterspell. Thing is, it didn't work. Other folks tried it, but it never worked. After Frohm died, his counterspell was very popular - for a little while. You know the legend of King Arthur?" Pascal looked around at all of us. "The sword in the stone?"
"He who pulls the sword from the stone shall be king," I said. I'd always loved that story.
"Exactly," Pascal's eyes lit up. "For a while, Frohm's counterspell was like the sword in the stone. Everyone thought _they _would be the one - the one who could do the counterspell, the one who could bring back magic. So everyone tried it. It was a fad, really. When no one could make it work, well, they moved on to the next fad. Back then, someone was always coming up with new ideas on how to bring back magic. Frohm died more than fifty years ago. Everyone who studies magic reads his books when they start out - um, I read them when I was ten." He actually blushed, then, as if embarrassed to admit what a bright child he'd been. "But no one's tried his counterspell in a long, long time."
"And you think you can make it work?" I asked. "Is that _your _sword in the stone?"
"Maybe?" Pascal replied, "I have . . . a theory. Everyone tried Frohm's spell, but none of them could _do _magic. You see? None of them were practicing magicians. This was, after all, after the magic was gone. So it was just . . . a bunch of theoretical magicians, and academics, and would-be magicians, trying it. Frohm himself couldn't _do _magic, he just studied it."
"Pascal thinks that someone who can actually practice magic can make the spell work," Luke jumped in to the conversation.
"Right," Pascal nodded. "I think that, but I don't know it. It's worth a shot, right? Besides, it's more than just that. Like I said - back then, a lot of folks had ideas on how to restore magic. I want to try Frohm's spell, and if it doesn't work, well, then I want to try those other ideas. There's this _huge _museum in Detroit - it has a whole wing that's just a library of books on magic. Frohm's huge library is in there, and so are all those other ideas I want to try. If Frohm's spell doesn't work."
"Okay," I said, mulling over and trying to digest all I'd just head. "And the counterspell - Frohm's idea - is only in Detroit?"
"Yeah," Pascal sighed. "One of Frohm's books isn't available anywhere else, and that's where the spell is. I've already tried a bunch of other ideas, theories - I went through all the books in the university's library. Now, I want to try Frohm. And whatever else I can find in Detroit."
**
It's been so many years since that day with the truck, and the four soldiers, and waiting for the trip to begin.
I think about Pascal, from time to time. I think about what he did.
Pascal could talk for hours about magic. When he talked about it - and when he did it - he had so much confidence, so much energy and enthusiasm. When he talked about other things, however, he seemed much less confident. He was unsure of what to say, or how to say it. He was shy. So often, he'd hide himself in a baggy hoodie, with the hood up, covering his mane. He had a hard time talking to folks, making eye contact, stuff like that. But, get him going on magic, and his eyes would light up and you'd see another Pascal - perhaps the true Pascal - emerge.
He was so certain that the answers he sought were in Detroit. He didn't know - couldn't possibly have known - that Detroit (when he finally got there) would turn out to be just the beginning.
**
{to be continued.}