Tommy considered lying and denying it, anyway, for a moment, but he realized he wouldn’t be able to hide it from Micah, so instead he said, “I think it’s kind of like… a roaring, or a rushing… or maybe a chime sound, like one of those metal things musicians use to make a certain note?” Tommy scratched his head in confusion. Why was it so hard to put a label on the sound?
“A tuning fork? I suppose it can be like that, in some ways,” the mage said, a queer sort of half-smile on his face. “It is all those things, and none of them at all, of course. Because, as you realized when I first asked the question, a sunset doesn’t actually make a sound. No video camera or recorder would register a thing. The sound is only there for those who are sensitive to it, Tommy. For those who can hear. Because what you are hearing is a change in the energies of the world; the bright, frenetic energy of the day giving way to the calm, peaceful strength of the night. That is the sound you think you hear but can’t quite put a name to, and if you asked someone who isn’t sensitive to those energies, who can’t hear the sound… well, they’d probably think you were crazy and send you to a psychologist.” Micah flashed a wry grin at him. “But I assure you, you are as sane as anybody.”
Tommy thought on this for several moments. Could it be true? It didn’t seem possible. The prospect seemed both terrible and horrifying. “I don’t want any of that,” Tommy said. “I just want to go home to my parents.”
“If you decide you really want to go home, I won’t stop you. I’ll even take you there myself. But... Tommy, I don’t think it’s a good idea.”
“What? Why not?” Tommy asked, puzzled.
“Think about it. You didn’t come home last night. Your parents are surely worried about you, and without a doubt they called the police.”
Tommy’s stomach clenched, and he felt like he was going to throw up. Here he was sitting and talking while his parents were worried to death! “They must be so scared, I should get home to them, tell them everything is okay.”
“And where are you going to tell them you’ve been, Tommy?”
The question seemed obtuse to Tommy. “I’ll tell them a mage grabbed me, but that I got away. I won’t tell them about you.”
Micah sighed. “Do you think they are stupid, Tommy? They know there is no way you are going to get away from a mage without help. At the very least, they are going to wonder what interest a mage would have had in you. The minute you mention that, the very second they suspect that you’ve had dealings with someone who uses magic, they are going to whisk you off to be tested... and you will fail the test.”
Tommy shook his head. “I’ll tell them I don’t want to be a mage. I’ll tell them I don’t know how to do any magic, and I’ll promise to never learn.”
That seemed to upset Micah. “Tommy, use your head. Do you think they care? When you’ve seen friends at school get dragged off in chains, did the men dragging them away listen to them? They won’t even give you a chance to tell them anything, and they wouldn’t care if you did. They’ll clap you in chains and haul you off to prison. You’ll go away, and none of your friends or your family will ever see you again.”
Tommy got scared and started to cry again. Everything the mage was saying was true, and he knew it, but he didn’t want to admit it. It was too scary, too terrible to be possible.
Micah got down off the cot and sat cross-legged on the floor next to Tommy. “A lot of people think badly of mages. They wonder why we have to use our powers, why we can’t be content with normal lives like everyone else. The truth is, Tommy, that most of us would love to live normal lives. We’d like nothing more than to put this all behind us and be just like everyone else. But the government has forced this upon us. They want to chain us and cage us, take away our lives and our freedoms and everything that we love, just because of what we are. People like you and me... normal lives are denied to us, Tommy. We can’t even refuse to use our powers – we can’t have normal jobs and normal homes, so we have to use our powers just to survive.”
“So it’s true, then.” Tommy said. “What they say about mages. That you all steal and kill.”
Micah shook his head emphatically. “Absolutely not. There are other ways to put food on the table than stealing, and usually, mages only kill each other, and only when we must, like I had to do with Jordan last night. I won’t lie to you, Tommy. I actively work against the government that would imprison me, and I have a group of cohorts, both mages and not, that support me in that endeavor. I have destroyed their prisons, and I have freed the people they have captured. But let me be very clear on one thing: I am in no way asking you to help with all of that. If, when you are older and more experienced, you decide that you want to be a part of our movement... well, we’ll talk about it, then. What I am asking you to do is to come away with me. I’ll give you a new home. I’ll give you new friends and family. And I will teach you to use and control the gift that you have.”
“What if I go home and don’t say anything about mages? What if I just say I ran away, but decided to come back?”
“That might work, for a little while, assuming that the police believed you. They might decide to test you just to be sure, and it is entirely likely that they might link you to Jordan when they find him - a suspected mage that burned to death near your school. But even if they don’t, how long would it last? How long before you they performed a random test at your school, or before you walked too close to another mage like Jordan who can sense your ability?” Micah gave Tommy that same sad smile he seemed fond of. “I’m sorry, Tommy, but there is no other way. If you go home, you end up in prison or worse, and I can’t promise that I’ll be able to be there to save you a second time. If you go with me... well, you get your life and your freedom, eventually, after you learn some things. You may even get to see your family again some day. That’s all I can offer you, but it’s better than the alternatives.”
Tommy hung his head in his hands and wept. He sobbed huge, hitching sobs and sputtered when his nose started to run. He bawled until there were no more tears left. Micah let him cry the whole time, without speaking a word or attempting to comfort him. Finally, what seemed like hours later, Tommy looked up at the older man and said simply, “Okay.”
“Okay, what?” Micah asked.
“Okay,” Tommy replied. “I’ll come with you.”
Chapter Four
Micah reflected on the early days of the Return. He wasn’t really sure if magic had ever truly been gone, or if people had just forgotten how to tap into it. He didn’t know, and he didn’t think anyone ever would. All that truly mattered was that it was here, now, and had to be dealt with.
When people spoke of the days following the Return, they usually talked about government officials, law enforcement officers, and other community leaders struggling to retain some semblance of control in a world turned upside down. People sympathized with the harsh treatment that the world’s governments handed mages, under the thin justification that it was the only way to keep civilization from tumbling into anarchy. The police tried to arrest mages who broke the law, but how could you arrest someone who could melt handcuffs or explode a hole in the wall of a prison cell? Knowing that they’d be completely unable to restrain dangerous and volatile mages, governments resorted to a “shoot first” mentality. Many mages were killed, and those that remained responded in the only way they could – they met violence with violence, and began using their powers to actively target anyone they deemed as a threat.
Some mages sided with the government, of course. Micah himself had tried to be one of those, although he had an innate distrust of the government. He tried to work against the violent mages, to help and protect police officers, and to consult and advise government officials whenever possible.
What nobody mentioned, of course, was that it was no picnic for the mages, either. Labeled as pariah by most of their fellow citizens, many mages soon found themselves alone in the world, betrayed by friends, family, and lovers. Micah remembered
a single mother who was a mage and was turned in by her own children, who then ended up in a foster home because there was no one to raise them.
But even worse than that was learning how to deal with and even use the powers they had discovered. There was no one to instruct them, no one to tell them what was and was not possible. The structured classes that the few mage schools offered these days would have been a godsend back then, but even now they were still learning, experimenting, and discovering. Even now, men and women were still getting injured or even dying trying to learn more about the power they’d been given. But the problems of today were nothing compared to the days following the Return. Some men and women simply went insane from the new stresses on their senses. They heard things that shouldn’t be audible, and failed to cope with the changes. Others committed suicide rather than face the backlash from their friends and families. Many, many others tried to race too fast and too far, and expended their very life’s energies trying to do the impossible.
In fact, sometimes Micah thought that it was only the extremely high mortality rate among mages that allowed the governments to get a handle on the situation in the first place. That, of course, and the discovery that the mineral tungsten seemed to inhibit and block an individual’s access to magic. Micah wished he knew who discovered that, so he could thank the man or woman with a fist to the face. At first, it was the tungsten injections that attempted to “cure” mages but instead left them thrashing in seizures until they mercifully passed into a coma and died. Then, it became tungsten bullets and, later, tungsten powder sprays to render a mage “inert” for capture. The fact that the bullets often killed the hapless mages long before the tungsten could enter their system seemed to be conveniently missed by advocates of their use. By comparison, the tungsten infused prison cells and tungsten bindings of today were extraordinarily humane. China, being the world’s foremost producer of tungsten, was consequently the first major government to bring it’s “mage problem” under control and to restore some sense of normalcy, but the other major world powers soon fell into step, as well.
“Whatcha thinkin’ about?” Tommy asked, breaking Micah out of his reverie.
Micah shook his head. “Nothing important. Just the old days, when I was new to magic, like you.”
“It wasn’t that long ago,” Tommy replied. “It was before I started high school, but still not that long ago.”
Micah favored Tommy with a sad but wry grin. “Sometimes, it feels like ages ago, Tommy. So much has changed.”
Tommy sat in the booth across from Micah, gobbling french fries. The older man had such a pensive look on his face that Tommy had been worried. “Did someone help you, like you are helping me?”
“No. There was nobody to help me. I had to figure it out myself.”
“Was it hard?” Tommy asked around a mouthful of fries. He had missed dinner last night and breakfast this morning, and found that he was ravenous.
Micah couldn’t help but chuckle. “Yes, it was very hard. It still is very hard, as you will soon discover.”
“When do we start?” Tommy asked.
Micah smiled at the boy, amazed at the resilience of youth. The boy had had his world turned upside down in less than twenty-four hours, and here he was, anxious to start learning. “The next class doesn’t begin for a few more days,” Micah answered. “We’ll spend a day or two together, then I’ll give you a day or two to get settled in.”
Tommy frowned, puzzled. “Class? What class? Aren’t you going to teach me?”
“Maybe sometimes, but probably not very often. I’m very busy, Tommy, and I don’t often have time to teach anymore. But not to worry, I’ll be taking you to my school. You’ll have classes there just like your old school, only some of them will teach you how to use your new gifts. You’ll have classmates, friends, and teachers, just like in a normal school.”
Tommy had a panicked look on his face. “You aren’t going to abandon me, are you?”
Micah reached across the table and patted Tommy on the back of the hand. “No, Tommy, I won’t abandon you. I’ll check in on you from time to time, and you can always come see if me if you need to. Don’t be afraid. It’ll be fun, I promise.”
A scowl crossed Tommy’s face. “I hate school. It’s so boring.”
That caused Micah to laugh. “Never fear about that, my little friend. This won’t be like normal school, I can tell you that much. For one thing, you aren’t stuck learning at the pace of your classmates. When you prove that you’ve learned all there is to learn in one class, you move on to the next whether your classmates are ready to move or not.”
The thought intrigued Tommy. “Like skipping a grade? Moving up with older kids?”
Micah nodded to him. “Yes, although you’ll find that you’ll often be in classes with people of all ages. Sometimes, you might be learning the same thing as an old grandfather. Other times, you might be with children much younger than you. It all depends on how fast you learn.”
“Oh,” said Tommy. He felt like he needed some time to digest that concept, but it did sound better than his old school. He reached into his basket of fries, only to find that he’d eaten them all. “Could I have some more fries, please?” he asked.
Micah nodded to him and rose to his feet. “Of course. I figured you’d be hungry. Wait here and I’ll go get you some more. In the meantime... think about what you want to do for the next couple days.”
“Do?” Tommy asked. “What do you mean?”
Micah put his hands on the table and leaned in close to Tommy. “I won’t lie to you, Tommy. Once you start learning, you aren’t going to be allowed to stop. Not for a while, at least. It’s far too dangerous, both for yourself and for others. For awhile, you are going to be on a tight, regimented schedule. You won’t be permitted to leave a fairly small section of the facility. But for you, that part will be over quickly, I think. You’ll soon move up and be granted more privileges.” Micah stood and stretched his arms. “So, think about what you want to do before you start.”
“What can we do?” Tommy asked as Micah headed toward the counter to order more fries.
The man grinned at Tommy over his shoulder. “Just about anything you want.”
Tommy sat and thought about that while Micah was at the counter ordering more food. When he and Micah had left the door-less warehouse room, Micah had taken his hand and... stepped. They didn’t move, but there was a brief moment of vertigo, and then they were somewhere else. Suddenly, they were outside in a parking lot, next to this fast food restaurant. Micah told him that they weren’t even in the same state anymore, and Tommy had goggled. He’d asked Micah if he would learn how to do that, and Micah had said that it was incredibly difficult to do, but that he felt confident that Tommy would one day be able to manage the feat. Tommy had gotten excited at that; it certainly hadn’t looked difficult when Micah had done it, but if he could learn to move around like Micah did, it would be a tremendous gift indeed.
By the time Micah returned with the fries, Tommy had a couple of ideas. When the man sat down, Tommy asked him, “Micah, what is your real name?”
The smile disappeared from Micah’s face. “I’m sorry Tommy, but I can’t tell you that.”
“Why not? Aren’t I one of you, now?” Tommy asked.
Micah sighed. “Yes, you are, after a fashion. But one thing you have to understand, Tommy, is that the government’s mage hunters are actively looking for me. I’ve foiled their plans too many times, and they bear me a deep grudge. They would like nothing more than to track down my old friends and family, and use them to try to get at me. My family doesn’t deserve that. They haven’t done anything wrong, they haven’t committed any crimes, and they don’t deserve to be imprisoned or tortured just because they happened to once have known me.”
A hurt look crossed Tommy’s face. “I’d never tell them. I’d never tell anyone.”
Micah’s voice suddenly took on a very sympathetic tone. “I know you wouldn’t, Tommy.
That’s why you are here, right now. But the only way to keep a secret safe is to tell no one. What happens if, God forbid, some day you get captured by the mage hunters? They would do whatever it took to get you to tell, and although you are a strong boy, they would eventually break you down. Or... heck, you and I may have a falling out, some day.” Micah shook his head. “It’s nothing against you, but I just can’t tell you. My family doesn’t deserve that.”
Tommy thought about that for a few moments, and decided that it didn’t matter. He wouldn’t want someone hurting his parents because of him. If the man wanted to keep his secrets, Tommy decided that he should let him. Instead, Tommy asked, “Can we go anywhere? Anywhere at all?”
The grin returned to the older man’s face. “Well, just about anywhere. Within reason, that is. If you wanted to go to the bottom of the ocean, that might be a problem – we could go there, but we’d quickly drown or be crushed by the pressure. We probably couldn’t go visit the Oval Office in the White House without being arrested or worse. But if it’s not overly dangerous, I’ll take you there.”
Tommy smiled at the thought of them popping in on the President. Boy, wouldn’t that cause some waves? He hadn’t thought of things like the bottom of the ocean or the oval office, however. He had other ideas, and said “I’ve always wanted to see the pyramids.”
But Micah shook his head. “Sorry Charlie. No can do, there. The pyramids are in Egypt, Egypt is in Africa, and in case you hadn’t heard, Africa is a war zone. Some dark mages have taken control of much of the continent. Men much like the greasy man, Jordan, that you met, only much, much more dangerous. The only way we can go to Africa is if we’re prepared to fight, and I couldn’t guarantee your safety. Maybe someday, once you’ve learned a little bit. Then I’ll take you to Africa.”
The Channeler Page 3