Welcome to the World of Litcraft and Mathemagic
Henry Burns ('18)
“Ha. Haha. This can’t be real.” The spectators watched closely, especially my friends, whom I could hear yelling my name and wishing me luck from the stands. I was already in the losers bracket, and I couldn’t afford to lose my second battle.
Dr. Dennis’ voice echoed throughout the stadium. “The match between Henry Burns and Sam Techotsky will now begin.”
As soon as I heard those words I started sprinting away as fast as my goddamn legs could carry me. I was against Ben Crane in the first round while Sam was against Atom. Regardless of whether I won or lost my first round, I would have had to face either Sam or Atom, two of the most powerful kids in the whole school. Talk about unlucky.
As I exposed my backside, Sam knelt down beside a piece of paper and started furiously scribbling using the reinforced concrete floor as a writing surface. Each stroke of the pen burned a hole through the increasingly incandescent paper, transforming the two dimensional object. He finished the equation in mere moments, put the pen back into his pocket, and opened his right hand above, parallel to the paper. The crowd silenced. He chanted, “X squared plus Y squared equals R squared!” The paper crumpled into a dimensionless point centered at the palm of Sam’s right hand, and casting the spell caused a faint blue light to emanate. The crowd burst into a frenzy.
“Oh no. Not circle magic. Trig was enough for me.” As I jerked my body nearly one hundred and eighty degrees, my gaze was met with Sam’s. He was looking at me, yet I was seeing into the abyss. His brown eyes turned black and pierced my soul. He lifted his palm towards me, fingers straightened and together, and sadistic smile infected his usually empathetic face. I broke free from his gaze and looked down. My legs and arms were each surrounded by a blue ring. He twisted his hand to the right and curled the tips of his fingers inward. I had no chance.
“Limit as R approaches 0.”
When I finally came to I was attacked yet again, this time by some harmless questions.
“Why didn’t you fight back?” Nurse Rachel gave me back my corduroy pants, thankfully stitched up and repaired.
“What could I have done,” I protested. “I haven’t found my affinity yet.”
She sighed, rubbing her hands along my legs and chest to apply some ointment. “Some kids are just late bloomers.”
“Yeah I gues--ow!” I contorted backwards on the white linen bed.
“You’re still fragile. If you want to completely heal, you’ll have to apply this salve for a week or two.”
I pursed my lips and looked at my legs. A massive scar circumvallated my thighs, and my chest felt heavy. A soft buzz came out of Nurse Rachel’s earpiece.
“Oh! You have a few visitors. Would you like me to let them in?”
My eyes started to close. “Sure,” I said, secreting my agony with a hit of sarcasm. I turned to the side and saw the room between my nearly closed eyes: a gray linoleum floor, plaster ceiling, bright white lights, and just a bunch of beds.
The two visitors walked in and sat down on the bed next to me. “Who would want to see me like this anyway?” I didn’t mean to say that outloud, but I did.
I peered through the tiny opening between my eyelids and glanced to my left. Closest to the wall was Sam, dressed in a vertically split half-white half-black sweater and blue jeans. His fingers were fighting amongst themselves on his lap, and his eyes were averting me. On Sam’s left was an older man, dressed much like any headmaster would except for his pair of New Balance 990’s. His eyes swam back and forth along my body, assessing the damage. I opened my eyes.
After apologizing many, many times for absolutely destroying me, I finally had to give in to Sam’s sincerity. You can’t stay mad at a guy like that, but at the same time it’s not like I could’ve escaped him. He started to sink back into his seat, but not before being halted by Dr. Dennis’ voice. “I’d like you both to leave.” Dr. Dennis stood up and moved towards me, glancing at Sam and Nurse Rachel. “There are important matters to discuss with Mr. Burns.”
“What is it?” I looked him in the eyes. “Sir.” I quickly appended, watching my tone.
“Mr. Burns, never in my career have I seen someone fail their final exam such as you did yesterday.”
“Yesterday?” My eyes widened. Dr. Dennis’ eyes tightened.
I stared at him for a few more moments. “Why did you even have me take the exam, knowing that I can’t even use magic?”
“It’s about breaking your limits.”
“Breaking my limits,” I scoffed. “More like breaking my neck.”
“It’s how most students find their affinity, through failure or hardship, though there are some exceptions. For example, imagine you’re a bowl filled with water and someone is dropping rocks into you. We were hoping that the heavier rocks we drop at you, namely pitting you against one of the strongest mathemagicians in your class, would cause your potential to come out like the water. When it splashes out, we’ll be able to see it, your affinity that is.”
“I want an affinity, and I understand the reasoning, but don’t you think that this was a bit too extreme?”
“The first weeks of the next year are when students are specialized: affinities determines the tutors and subjects students will study, adding a class to their schedule--”
“So basically you want to make sure I find my affinity. So what if I don’t?”
“That’s the issue.” I felt nauseous. “If you can’t discover your affinity before the specialization period, we are going to have to discharge you from the school.”
I craned my neck upwards and swallowed my saliva. “So I have the next couple of months or so to find my affinity. Great.”
“I hope you find yours. We let you into this school for a reason.” I held my breath. Dr. Dennis muttered some thermodynamic law and burst into flames, leaving an ashen shadow on the ground. For some God forsaken reason I kept holding my breath.
I heard later from the nurse that Sam’s spell crushed both the bones in my chest and thighs, causing me to immediately pass out from the pain. Turns out that craning my neck towards Dr. Dennis wasn’t too smart of an idea, as those same crushed bones, not fully healed, collapsed back towards my lungs.
My vision once again tunneled, and I faded away into the darkness.
“Beep beep.” I mocked my alarm clock, smacking it across the room. It’s seven twenty, but shouldn’t it be six twenty? I sluggishly got out of bed. When my feet hit the ground I felt a spike travel through my whole body. Not just any spike, the adrenaline kind.
“I’m going to be late on the first day of school. Truly a classic Henry move,” I said as I ate cereal, got dressed, brushed my teeth, packed my bag, and sprinted out the door.
After completing my commute and jumping out of the subway station at what felt like mach five, I sprinted towards the front door until I ran into Ethan Hotson.
“Do you know which room Nuclear Physics is in, B-than?” I guess call him that occasionally because it’s just Ethan, but with a B emoji.
“Yeah it’s to the left, up the stairs and into the science wing. F201, I think.”
Before we’ve been specialized, the first week of school is set up to be a rotation of senior-level magic classes so students can understand the magical world and see what different types of subjects are available for them to be placed in.
After being told to take our headphones off and tap in we noticed that there was one minute between being on the good or bad side of Mr. Ruch, who if one wasn’t aware, had titles such as ‘Duskbreaker’ for his incredible astromagical prowess. I heard that one year, he roasted a kid so hard in his AT Chemistry class that the kid literally vaporized. We started sprinting towards our class, like any sane person would do.
“It’s just up these last steps and through this door--”
Ethan was running too fast for him to slow down. The sound of two people crashing into each other was much like a brick hitting the concrete and shattering, especially when one of them was carrying a large diorama.
“Are you serious Ethan?” said Atom, clenching his fists. “Mr. Ruch asked me to bring that to class.” He pointed to the sun, moon, Earth, solar system, molecules--or at least that’s what they looked like before. Now they were just crushed styrofoam and paint chips.
“That’s your problem dude,” said Ethan. “We have to be on time.” He got up and started towards the door to the science wing. I looked behind me. Atom was clenching one of the styrofoam balls in his hand.
A magician like Atom, hmm. I’m really glad he beat Sam in the first round so I didn’t have to fight him last year, I thought. I turned back towards Ethan, who had his hand on the door handle.
“Collapse. R is less than the Schwarzschild radius.” Atom commanded.
Dust bounced off the ground and froze in the air. Instead of illuminating the walls, streams of seemingly yellow liquid seeped out of the fixtures and into Atom’s fist. I tried moving my body. It was as if we were suspended in liquid: resistance and pressure pushed against my body at every point, restricting my movements. It was like I was stuck in a pool of molasses. I managed to shift my gaze towards Ethan, who was practically frozen in place.
“Good luck making it to class,” Atom said. He slumped his shoulders and looked down at his hand. He opened his fist. “I’m going to turn you into a black hole, kid.”
The light, previously a stream, became a torrent and rushed into the infinity of Atom’s gravity well. The styrofoam ball was now an infinitely small point. My field of vision was restricted to the shape of a football: if I was one tip, the newly formed black hole in Atom’s hand was the other tip, I could only see the inside of the ball. Light rushed around the edges of my footballish field of view from behind me and into the void.
He let go of the singularity, which is the infinitely small point at the center of a black hole, and directed it at the two of us. This wouldn’t be the first time Atom killed someone in school, nor would it be the second.
“Atom! Stop this,” I cried, but my sounds had no medium to travel through. Was this going to be it? Was it all going to end here, with Ethan by my side? I remembered ninth grade, coming to Packer for the first time.
I came from a religious school. We prayed every Friday during the Sabbath services, blessing those around us with fortune and health. Packer was different. There weren’t miracle users, there were magicians. Even though I was a bit odd and couldn’t use magic, Ethan still stuck by my side. I had to repay him, somehow, at least in our final moments together. I came back to reality.
I closed my eyes and remembered my Jewish education: “בָּרוּךְ אַתָּה ה' אֱ-לֹהֵינוּ, מֶלֶךְ הָעוֹלָם. Oh please God, save us.” I opened back up my eyes. The black hole was still getting closer. And just as I thought all hope was lost, I felt as if I was put inside of a toaster oven on maximum power. I looked towards Ethan, who, despite the suffocating pressure, was about to retaliate with another fallen styrofoam ball. He’s a ‘Hotson’ for a reason, and still a really cool guy.
“Phase change: absolute zero!” Ethan directed at the ball. By forcing the ball to reach a state of zero energy, Ethan had drawn out the heat and controlled the resulting energy. The ball atomized in Ethan’s hand, and a red swirl of plasma engulfed his fingertips.
“Try this!” Ethan released the plasma from his fingers. As they traveled through the air, the ions attracted to one another, forming dense spheres. When the mobile singularity and the plasma collided, I knew it was over. The singularity merely phased through the balls of plasma, leaving perfectly round holes, and dissipating the plasma.
“Pathetic,” said Atom, admiring his power.
I looked towards Ethan. His composure started to dwindle. I could see some of the tears forming in his eyes.With his feet planted firmly on the ground and his body locked in place, he looked at me and opened his mouth.
“Guess we’re going to die virgins, eh?” He looked at the floor, collapsed on to his knees, and his head fell into his chest. He was ready to accept his fate. For someone to sink to that level of despair, I couldn’t allow it.
It took all my might to move one step. Then the next step. Then the next step, until I was standing in front of Ethan.
“This is taking too long,” said Atom. “It’s time to get to class, right? Spin times two.” By increasing the rotational velocity of the singularity, its attraction increased exponentially as it drew near. My skin started to peel and old scars were torn from my face. A mixture of blood and skin trailed from my face into the black hole.
Ah shoot man. Why’d you have to screw up the first day of classes, I thought. I maintained my position in front of Ethan. I went down on one knee. I put my arms in front of me like a little kid learning how to catch a ball: unsure and afraid. Layers upon layers of the skin on my hands were disintegrating.
The torrents of light ceased to flow from the fixtures and were like strings caught in the wind, until they disappeared completely moments later. Everything was black around me, but I didn’t move my arms. All sound around me slowed to a muffled buzz. My life was being absorbed. I became dizzy, and my head slacked forward towards the ground, though my heart was still beating.
I was standing face to face with a shadow. “Why didn’t you fight back?” I remember Nurse Rachel asking me. I thought to myself as if to find an answer.
“I have no magical potential. I don’t have an affinity,” I responded.
“Ah, but you do,” said another voice. It was distant and powerful, yet soothing.
My eyes started to itch. I rubbed my eyes a little bit, yet they still ached. I rubbed harder, faster, and harder again, desperately trying to rid myself of this feeling. When I opened my eyes, I was met with a series of sparkles and flashing lights. I blinked my eyes a few times, but the flashing lights wouldn’t fade, they were getting brighter. As if a light switch was flipped on above me, the whole world illuminated. I was looking at someone in the mirror. They had short dark brown hair, parted somewhere in the middle, bagged eyes, a few bloodied scars, and a set of furrowed brows. They looked confused. I looked confused. Then I looked them in the eyes. Inside the sockets were explosive white and blue waves, swirling and sparkling around each other. It was akin to looking up at the night sky in the middle of nowhere, with stars dancing across the sky. The doppelganger transcended the confines of the mirror and whispered into my ear in that very voice I heard before.
“Who said you needed to fight back?”
My consciousness returned and I felt the massive force of the black hole once again drawing me in. Though, this time, the pull of the singularity wasn’t increasing. I felt warmer than before. Did Ethan save me? I opened my eyes to see the wooden floor, lit by a yellowish white glow. “Where is this light coming from?” I questioned.
My peripheral vision returned and I was dazzled by bright yellow white streams of color, some of which turned blue and purple. I tilted my head up and focused my eyes. There was light flowing, but not from the fixtures. Like an electrical current would, flashes and undulating waves of light and electricity emanated from within my chest and wrapped my body in energy. I looked towards my hands and felt a strange force pushing against me rather than pulling like before. It was the black hole. I was holding a mother fucking black hole!
My palms cupped the black hole and constantly zapped it like a Van der Graaf generator, creating a massive positive pressure zone.
“Holy shit Henry, you’ve actually done it. You’re using magic,” exclaimed Ethan. “We’re not dead!”
Whether my prayers were answered just then or right now I never knew, but out of the corner of my eye I saw a slightly chubby, gray haired, lab coat wearing, caffeine addicted magician sprinting towards us.
“Solar mass expansion!” Mr. Ruch said, casting his hands towards the black hole. A fiery flash of light appeared from his palm and hit the singularity and before I could react, the black hole expanded and dissipated across the infinite fabric of space-time. My light-filled aura faded before anyone but Ethan had time to examine me, and I collapsed on the ground next to my friend.
“I thought we were the ones who were supposed to be dead,” Ethan muttered, pointing covertly at Atom. Mr. Ruch walked over to Atom, grabbed his shoulder, and shot a sidelong glance at Ethan and I.
“Class is canceled today.”
Dr. Dennis’ voice echoed throughout the stadium. “The match between Henry Burns and Sam Techotsky will now begin.”
As soon as I heard those words I started sprinting away as fast as my goddamn legs could carry me. I was against Ben Crane in the first round while Sam was against Atom. Regardless of whether I won or lost my first round, I would have had to face either Sam or Atom, two of the most powerful kids in the whole school. Talk about unlucky.
As I exposed my backside, Sam knelt down beside a piece of paper and started furiously scribbling using the reinforced concrete floor as a writing surface. Each stroke of the pen burned a hole through the increasingly incandescent paper, transforming the two dimensional object. He finished the equation in mere moments, put the pen back into his pocket, and opened his right hand above, parallel to the paper. The crowd silenced. He chanted, “X squared plus Y squared equals R squared!” The paper crumpled into a dimensionless point centered at the palm of Sam’s right hand, and casting the spell caused a faint blue light to emanate. The crowd burst into a frenzy.
“Oh no. Not circle magic. Trig was enough for me.” As I jerked my body nearly one hundred and eighty degrees, my gaze was met with Sam’s. He was looking at me, yet I was seeing into the abyss. His brown eyes turned black and pierced my soul. He lifted his palm towards me, fingers straightened and together, and sadistic smile infected his usually empathetic face. I broke free from his gaze and looked down. My legs and arms were each surrounded by a blue ring. He twisted his hand to the right and curled the tips of his fingers inward. I had no chance.
“Limit as R approaches 0.”
When I finally came to I was attacked yet again, this time by some harmless questions.
“Why didn’t you fight back?” Nurse Rachel gave me back my corduroy pants, thankfully stitched up and repaired.
“What could I have done,” I protested. “I haven’t found my affinity yet.”
She sighed, rubbing her hands along my legs and chest to apply some ointment. “Some kids are just late bloomers.”
“Yeah I gues--ow!” I contorted backwards on the white linen bed.
“You’re still fragile. If you want to completely heal, you’ll have to apply this salve for a week or two.”
I pursed my lips and looked at my legs. A massive scar circumvallated my thighs, and my chest felt heavy. A soft buzz came out of Nurse Rachel’s earpiece.
“Oh! You have a few visitors. Would you like me to let them in?”
My eyes started to close. “Sure,” I said, secreting my agony with a hit of sarcasm. I turned to the side and saw the room between my nearly closed eyes: a gray linoleum floor, plaster ceiling, bright white lights, and just a bunch of beds.
The two visitors walked in and sat down on the bed next to me. “Who would want to see me like this anyway?” I didn’t mean to say that outloud, but I did.
I peered through the tiny opening between my eyelids and glanced to my left. Closest to the wall was Sam, dressed in a vertically split half-white half-black sweater and blue jeans. His fingers were fighting amongst themselves on his lap, and his eyes were averting me. On Sam’s left was an older man, dressed much like any headmaster would except for his pair of New Balance 990’s. His eyes swam back and forth along my body, assessing the damage. I opened my eyes.
After apologizing many, many times for absolutely destroying me, I finally had to give in to Sam’s sincerity. You can’t stay mad at a guy like that, but at the same time it’s not like I could’ve escaped him. He started to sink back into his seat, but not before being halted by Dr. Dennis’ voice. “I’d like you both to leave.” Dr. Dennis stood up and moved towards me, glancing at Sam and Nurse Rachel. “There are important matters to discuss with Mr. Burns.”
“What is it?” I looked him in the eyes. “Sir.” I quickly appended, watching my tone.
“Mr. Burns, never in my career have I seen someone fail their final exam such as you did yesterday.”
“Yesterday?” My eyes widened. Dr. Dennis’ eyes tightened.
I stared at him for a few more moments. “Why did you even have me take the exam, knowing that I can’t even use magic?”
“It’s about breaking your limits.”
“Breaking my limits,” I scoffed. “More like breaking my neck.”
“It’s how most students find their affinity, through failure or hardship, though there are some exceptions. For example, imagine you’re a bowl filled with water and someone is dropping rocks into you. We were hoping that the heavier rocks we drop at you, namely pitting you against one of the strongest mathemagicians in your class, would cause your potential to come out like the water. When it splashes out, we’ll be able to see it, your affinity that is.”
“I want an affinity, and I understand the reasoning, but don’t you think that this was a bit too extreme?”
“The first weeks of the next year are when students are specialized: affinities determines the tutors and subjects students will study, adding a class to their schedule--”
“So basically you want to make sure I find my affinity. So what if I don’t?”
“That’s the issue.” I felt nauseous. “If you can’t discover your affinity before the specialization period, we are going to have to discharge you from the school.”
I craned my neck upwards and swallowed my saliva. “So I have the next couple of months or so to find my affinity. Great.”
“I hope you find yours. We let you into this school for a reason.” I held my breath. Dr. Dennis muttered some thermodynamic law and burst into flames, leaving an ashen shadow on the ground. For some God forsaken reason I kept holding my breath.
I heard later from the nurse that Sam’s spell crushed both the bones in my chest and thighs, causing me to immediately pass out from the pain. Turns out that craning my neck towards Dr. Dennis wasn’t too smart of an idea, as those same crushed bones, not fully healed, collapsed back towards my lungs.
My vision once again tunneled, and I faded away into the darkness.
“Beep beep.” I mocked my alarm clock, smacking it across the room. It’s seven twenty, but shouldn’t it be six twenty? I sluggishly got out of bed. When my feet hit the ground I felt a spike travel through my whole body. Not just any spike, the adrenaline kind.
“I’m going to be late on the first day of school. Truly a classic Henry move,” I said as I ate cereal, got dressed, brushed my teeth, packed my bag, and sprinted out the door.
After completing my commute and jumping out of the subway station at what felt like mach five, I sprinted towards the front door until I ran into Ethan Hotson.
“Do you know which room Nuclear Physics is in, B-than?” I guess call him that occasionally because it’s just Ethan, but with a B emoji.
“Yeah it’s to the left, up the stairs and into the science wing. F201, I think.”
Before we’ve been specialized, the first week of school is set up to be a rotation of senior-level magic classes so students can understand the magical world and see what different types of subjects are available for them to be placed in.
After being told to take our headphones off and tap in we noticed that there was one minute between being on the good or bad side of Mr. Ruch, who if one wasn’t aware, had titles such as ‘Duskbreaker’ for his incredible astromagical prowess. I heard that one year, he roasted a kid so hard in his AT Chemistry class that the kid literally vaporized. We started sprinting towards our class, like any sane person would do.
“It’s just up these last steps and through this door--”
Ethan was running too fast for him to slow down. The sound of two people crashing into each other was much like a brick hitting the concrete and shattering, especially when one of them was carrying a large diorama.
“Are you serious Ethan?” said Atom, clenching his fists. “Mr. Ruch asked me to bring that to class.” He pointed to the sun, moon, Earth, solar system, molecules--or at least that’s what they looked like before. Now they were just crushed styrofoam and paint chips.
“That’s your problem dude,” said Ethan. “We have to be on time.” He got up and started towards the door to the science wing. I looked behind me. Atom was clenching one of the styrofoam balls in his hand.
A magician like Atom, hmm. I’m really glad he beat Sam in the first round so I didn’t have to fight him last year, I thought. I turned back towards Ethan, who had his hand on the door handle.
“Collapse. R is less than the Schwarzschild radius.” Atom commanded.
Dust bounced off the ground and froze in the air. Instead of illuminating the walls, streams of seemingly yellow liquid seeped out of the fixtures and into Atom’s fist. I tried moving my body. It was as if we were suspended in liquid: resistance and pressure pushed against my body at every point, restricting my movements. It was like I was stuck in a pool of molasses. I managed to shift my gaze towards Ethan, who was practically frozen in place.
“Good luck making it to class,” Atom said. He slumped his shoulders and looked down at his hand. He opened his fist. “I’m going to turn you into a black hole, kid.”
The light, previously a stream, became a torrent and rushed into the infinity of Atom’s gravity well. The styrofoam ball was now an infinitely small point. My field of vision was restricted to the shape of a football: if I was one tip, the newly formed black hole in Atom’s hand was the other tip, I could only see the inside of the ball. Light rushed around the edges of my footballish field of view from behind me and into the void.
He let go of the singularity, which is the infinitely small point at the center of a black hole, and directed it at the two of us. This wouldn’t be the first time Atom killed someone in school, nor would it be the second.
“Atom! Stop this,” I cried, but my sounds had no medium to travel through. Was this going to be it? Was it all going to end here, with Ethan by my side? I remembered ninth grade, coming to Packer for the first time.
I came from a religious school. We prayed every Friday during the Sabbath services, blessing those around us with fortune and health. Packer was different. There weren’t miracle users, there were magicians. Even though I was a bit odd and couldn’t use magic, Ethan still stuck by my side. I had to repay him, somehow, at least in our final moments together. I came back to reality.
I closed my eyes and remembered my Jewish education: “בָּרוּךְ אַתָּה ה' אֱ-לֹהֵינוּ, מֶלֶךְ הָעוֹלָם. Oh please God, save us.” I opened back up my eyes. The black hole was still getting closer. And just as I thought all hope was lost, I felt as if I was put inside of a toaster oven on maximum power. I looked towards Ethan, who, despite the suffocating pressure, was about to retaliate with another fallen styrofoam ball. He’s a ‘Hotson’ for a reason, and still a really cool guy.
“Phase change: absolute zero!” Ethan directed at the ball. By forcing the ball to reach a state of zero energy, Ethan had drawn out the heat and controlled the resulting energy. The ball atomized in Ethan’s hand, and a red swirl of plasma engulfed his fingertips.
“Try this!” Ethan released the plasma from his fingers. As they traveled through the air, the ions attracted to one another, forming dense spheres. When the mobile singularity and the plasma collided, I knew it was over. The singularity merely phased through the balls of plasma, leaving perfectly round holes, and dissipating the plasma.
“Pathetic,” said Atom, admiring his power.
I looked towards Ethan. His composure started to dwindle. I could see some of the tears forming in his eyes.With his feet planted firmly on the ground and his body locked in place, he looked at me and opened his mouth.
“Guess we’re going to die virgins, eh?” He looked at the floor, collapsed on to his knees, and his head fell into his chest. He was ready to accept his fate. For someone to sink to that level of despair, I couldn’t allow it.
It took all my might to move one step. Then the next step. Then the next step, until I was standing in front of Ethan.
“This is taking too long,” said Atom. “It’s time to get to class, right? Spin times two.” By increasing the rotational velocity of the singularity, its attraction increased exponentially as it drew near. My skin started to peel and old scars were torn from my face. A mixture of blood and skin trailed from my face into the black hole.
Ah shoot man. Why’d you have to screw up the first day of classes, I thought. I maintained my position in front of Ethan. I went down on one knee. I put my arms in front of me like a little kid learning how to catch a ball: unsure and afraid. Layers upon layers of the skin on my hands were disintegrating.
The torrents of light ceased to flow from the fixtures and were like strings caught in the wind, until they disappeared completely moments later. Everything was black around me, but I didn’t move my arms. All sound around me slowed to a muffled buzz. My life was being absorbed. I became dizzy, and my head slacked forward towards the ground, though my heart was still beating.
I was standing face to face with a shadow. “Why didn’t you fight back?” I remember Nurse Rachel asking me. I thought to myself as if to find an answer.
“I have no magical potential. I don’t have an affinity,” I responded.
“Ah, but you do,” said another voice. It was distant and powerful, yet soothing.
My eyes started to itch. I rubbed my eyes a little bit, yet they still ached. I rubbed harder, faster, and harder again, desperately trying to rid myself of this feeling. When I opened my eyes, I was met with a series of sparkles and flashing lights. I blinked my eyes a few times, but the flashing lights wouldn’t fade, they were getting brighter. As if a light switch was flipped on above me, the whole world illuminated. I was looking at someone in the mirror. They had short dark brown hair, parted somewhere in the middle, bagged eyes, a few bloodied scars, and a set of furrowed brows. They looked confused. I looked confused. Then I looked them in the eyes. Inside the sockets were explosive white and blue waves, swirling and sparkling around each other. It was akin to looking up at the night sky in the middle of nowhere, with stars dancing across the sky. The doppelganger transcended the confines of the mirror and whispered into my ear in that very voice I heard before.
“Who said you needed to fight back?”
My consciousness returned and I felt the massive force of the black hole once again drawing me in. Though, this time, the pull of the singularity wasn’t increasing. I felt warmer than before. Did Ethan save me? I opened my eyes to see the wooden floor, lit by a yellowish white glow. “Where is this light coming from?” I questioned.
My peripheral vision returned and I was dazzled by bright yellow white streams of color, some of which turned blue and purple. I tilted my head up and focused my eyes. There was light flowing, but not from the fixtures. Like an electrical current would, flashes and undulating waves of light and electricity emanated from within my chest and wrapped my body in energy. I looked towards my hands and felt a strange force pushing against me rather than pulling like before. It was the black hole. I was holding a mother fucking black hole!
My palms cupped the black hole and constantly zapped it like a Van der Graaf generator, creating a massive positive pressure zone.
“Holy shit Henry, you’ve actually done it. You’re using magic,” exclaimed Ethan. “We’re not dead!”
Whether my prayers were answered just then or right now I never knew, but out of the corner of my eye I saw a slightly chubby, gray haired, lab coat wearing, caffeine addicted magician sprinting towards us.
“Solar mass expansion!” Mr. Ruch said, casting his hands towards the black hole. A fiery flash of light appeared from his palm and hit the singularity and before I could react, the black hole expanded and dissipated across the infinite fabric of space-time. My light-filled aura faded before anyone but Ethan had time to examine me, and I collapsed on the ground next to my friend.
“I thought we were the ones who were supposed to be dead,” Ethan muttered, pointing covertly at Atom. Mr. Ruch walked over to Atom, grabbed his shoulder, and shot a sidelong glance at Ethan and I.
“Class is canceled today.”
