Chapter 6

I didn't have an ounce of energy to do anything other than float in wretched agony for a very long time. I was told that the water in Town Lake nearly boiled and that the steam and fog obscured the river afterwards for miles.

Some kindly firemen pulled me out of the river and wrapped me in a towel. It promptly caught on fire, so they put me back into the river to chill down for another hour. I had never wanted a Sandy's Frozen Custard so bad in my entire life before!

I spent the night in the hospital melting down ice packs until my proper internal temperature stabilized early the next morning. I didn't have a single physical injury other than being slightly toasted red all over, but I soon returned a normal fish belly white and pink once more a few days later.

My right bracer was now also gone, but in its place was a plasma burned branding everywhere the bracer had been, showing off every line and detail of the original Artifacts design. Much like a tattoo the intricate skin branding captured every single feature flawlessly perfect. Just under my skin, where the remaining three Arcane Stone had been I could feel three slight bumps under my skin. My guess was that the ancient Artifact once heated into plasma had merged into my skin, becoming a part of me. I decided that this would probably not be a good fact to mention to the BMA.

I felt totally burned out, figuratively and especially mentally for much of the next week. I couldn't even sense magic now, find let alone touch a Ley line. I was all used up, much like a burned out match, but I was too spiritually and physically tired to be sad.

Over five hundred people were dead, including two BMA magicians and two police officers. Someone had to be blamed ... and I was a perfect fit for the scapegoat. The fix was in before I had even left the river.

I told my story to anyone who would listen, but BMA had already decided upon their set of 'facts' even before the fire was out. Sure, there might have been a 'bit' of a multi-dimensional leak, but 'fire crazy Zak Zyphyr' had to run in and play hero again and burned the place down to the very bedrock.

This was the story that was given up the line to Imperial BMA, and no one particularly cared to scratch below the surface to sort the facts out. A major Zoroastrian Fire Deity? A rapidly expanding uncontrolled vortex to a thousand worlds that would have devoured ours within days? Visitors feasting upon souls and changelings taking the places of mortals? Not a chance in seven hells did anyone want to believe this was even possible... especially it was true.

I could plead my innocence and the facts to the four winds, but no one was now listening. I learned real quick who my real friends were ... and it was sadly a very short list. Anyone who even remotely considered my signed statement as 'fact' was politely encouraged to find something else better to occupy their time with.

It was just mere coincidence then that the restoration work on all of the other vintage Arc Deco theaters immediately and completely stopped for good and all of their original artifices and artifacts were completely torn out to the very bare walls. Protected registered historical landmarks or not, nearly every single old theater suddenly experienced arson, accidental terminal foundation problems, or had their roofs mysteriously cave in after minor rainstorms. It seems that someone was taking absolutely no chance of another El Marvelo incident.

They gave me the standard Magical Aptitude Test, which mostly consists of placing a specially crafted artifice, a round crystal ball into your hands to see how bright it glows according to your affinity for magic. Mine stayed dead dark. The other tests that followed confirmed a big fat new BMA score of zero. My magic was gone and I was now a 'normal'. At this point the BMA had virtually no interest in dealing with me any longer. My 'Internal Review' courts-martial before a panel of Wizard judges was now deemed unnecessary and cancelled. Now useless to them I was drummed out in record speed.

My Public License to practice magic was revoked and my BMA folder was stamped 'Retired' and sent off to some warehouse for long term storage. I was still placed on every governmental watch list imaginable. What they thought I'd burn down next, I'm not sure.

Money was going to be tight, but not impossible. I'd inherited my house from my favorite Aunt free and clear. There was a small annual trust fund that paid most of my normal living expenses and I had some savings, so I wasn't desperate to find another means of earning a living.

Mostly I was just too dead tired and sad to do much of anything expect mope about at home and sleep. I slept a lot ... and thought about Harriet and what might have been.