Mage Catalyst (4 page)

I gasped for breath. I was pretty sure I had cracked some ribs, as every time I inhaled pain lanced across my chest. I made it to my knees as black spots began dancing across my vision. Each breath I took was a harsh lesson in further pain.
“What’s happening to me?” I moaned as I collapsed back to the ground. My vision was going blurry and I felt like I was going to throw up.
“Shit,” I heard her say as the darkness set in.

* * * *

When I came around my chest still hurt and each breath felt like I was breathing fire. My wrist was throbbing painfully too; I must have sprained it in the fall. It took me several seconds as it all came flooding back – the woman, the lights in her chest, the alley, the flick of her wrist, the pain. And now here we were, seated together back in the club.
“I wanted to make sure you were okay,” she murmured. “I thought you might have a concussion.”
I couldn’t find a suitable response. She looked even more beautiful than before and my eyes were dazzled, although that may have been the concussion’s influence.
“…How?” I simply mumbled.
”Well, doctors say that when you hit your head…” she began dryly.
“No, not how do you get a concussion. How did you do that to me?”
“You really don’t know?” she asked, her expression going from guilty to horrified and then back to irritated. Her eyes bore into me imperiously. “Look, I’m sorry I hit you so hard. I thought you’d be able to defend yourself.”
“How do you defend yourself against that?” I grunted, remembering the particle whip lashing against me and lifting me into the air. She didn’t answer my question.
“If it’s any consolation it probably saved your life. The build-up of energy you were displaying could have been life threatening.”
This wasn’t exactly the answer I was looking for. I looked down at the particles of light pulsing throughout my skin and noticed that they had lessened. Before they were very bright and jittery, but now they were lighter and sluggishly pulsated across my skin.
“You absorbed the worst of my attack,” she commented. “How long you have been a…?”
“I’ve been seeing blue lights all week if that’s what you’re asking,” I answered, holding my head back in my hands. I had a pounding headache again – though that probably had more to do with the concussion.
“A week? One week!” she said.
“Keep your voice down,” I grumbled as her shrill voice rang through my throbbing skull.
“One week,” she finished glumly.
“Is that bad?”
“No, not bad, just unusual, you’re what… seventeen, sixteen?”

“No, I’m eighteen,” I corrected somewhat defensively.
“I was five when it first happened to me. Fortunately my grandfather was there to tell me what was going on.”
“Your grandfather?”
“Yeah, he’s like us too.”

I could tell she was choosing her words carefully. There was something she wasn’t telling me. What does that mean?

“Why did you attack me?” I asked, not quite sure I wanted to know the answer.
“I wasn’t sure what you were doing and our kind don’t normally get along too well.” Her face went dark. “I thought it might have been an attack,” she confessed.
“You thought I was going to attack you?” I pressed, confused.
I’d never been called threatening in my life. It was a complete shock that anyone would consider me dangerous. I didn’t know how to respond.
“I didn’t realise you were simply out of control,” she said sharply, as if in some form of reprimand.
I didn’t have an answer to that either. I wasn’t even sure what it meant. How was I not in control? I wasn’t surprised by the accusation, I’d been accused of being out of control by a string of high school teachers for years.
I was pondering the implications of this when I had a sudden feeling that someone was standing right behind me. I’ve always had a nervous twitch in my shoulders, especially when someone is standing behind me. My nervous shudder was unusually strong this time, causing my whole body to jump, which in turn caused me to shudder in pain as my ribs shrieked in complaint.
The person turned out to be a busboy who just wanted to collect the empties.
“Smooth,” the girl said, once the guy had left. “What’s with the twitch?”
“Always had it,” I replied. “Dunno why.”
“My name is Renee by the way,” she said, offering a handshake across the table.
“Devon,” I replied, flipping her hand over and kissing it lightly. I did this gingerly as every movement on my left side felt like a knife in my ribs.
“Wow! You are a smooth one, aren’t you?” Her eyes softened for the first time since we’d met. The change made a huge difference to her whole face. If I thought she was beautiful when she was mad – well, when she was smiling she was breathtaking.
“It’s a pity you’re not older,” Renee continued.
Renee was twenty-four, had her own apartment in the city and was studying Film Studies at Melbourne University. Her grandfather apparently came in from time to time to check on her, but other than that she was pretty much her own boss. I learnt all this by asking direct questions and receiving very short answers. Renee wasn’t exactly forthcoming with information. She was really making me work for any personal information. I had the feeling that she walked away knowing a lot more about me than I did about her.
I could feel her eyes drilling into me during our conversation. It was like she was taking me apart and learning how I worked – taking my secrets and making them hers. It wasn’t an unpleasant feeling as such but it was a little confronting. Most of her questions seemed related to the blue particles and how I’d come to possess them. At first she had seemed angry at my vague answers, but she soon obviously came to the conclusion that I was too witless to lie and genuinely didn’t know more than I was saying.
There was urgency in her questions and a brisk harshness. She was desperately trying to find something out about me and I could tell she was getting more frantic the longer our conversation went. I wasn’t quite sure how to broach the subject so I just went for plain brutal honesty.
“So can you teach me to use this… thing?“ I gestured with my hand causing a flash of particles to spark. “You obviously know how to use it.”
“I could.” She smiled devilishly. The smile never reached her eyes though. There was fear in her eyes – I’ve never seen fear like that. It was quickly replaced with her twisted grin, but I saw enough to recognise it for what it was – terrified fear. Renee was desperately afraid of something and didn’t want anyone to know about it.
“…but I’m not going to,” Renee finished lightly.
“I thought your grandfather taught you!” I complained.
“Yeah, he did,” she said disarmingly, “…but we don’t really have time and besides your friends have found us.” Tony and Sarah had just walked through the doorway from the stage area, heading our way. I cursed under my breath.
“Dude! Do you have any idea how long we’ve been looking for you?” Tony boomed as he walked towards us. “You totally ditched on us.”
I mentally tried to tell Tony to take a hike.

“Yeah, sorry,” I grumbled. “I got... distracted.”
Renee’s eyebrows shot up in response. I desperately wanted to ask Renee more questions, but I couldn’t with Sarah and Tony around. I think Renee knew that too; in fact I’m pretty sure she was counting on it. She didn’t look at Tony or Sarah.

“Well, if you’ll excuse me, I’ve got an early start tomorrow,” she said. “It was nice to meet you, Devon.” She smiled as she rose to leave. “I’ll just leave you here with your friends.”
“Okay… See you,” I said sullenly.
Renee gave me a piercing look, grabbed her bag and headed for the door. I sat there in stunned silence for a few seconds before I leapt out of my chair after Renee.
I wasn’t going to let this opportunity get away from me.
I caught her by the time she’d reached the street. In a daze of teenage hormones I caught up to her and pulled her to me, pressing her against my chest as I pulled her in close, she wrapped her body around mine and I felt her hands wrap around my neck and pulled against me in turn.
Our lips met with stunning force and I could feel the blue halo particles in our bodies collide. My breath disappeared in an instant as I was sucked into the oblivion that was our kiss. Intention, thought, desire were all swept away with the single fact of our lips pressed firmly against each other’s.
I could almost feel the blue particles in our bodies entwine and form a pattern around our bodies, joining us, binding us, and jumping from body to body in pattern. I could feel our bodies unite in a single purpose, I could feel her under my skin through the blue lights and I knew she could feel me too. She was inside me now and I was inside her and there was nothing that I wanted more. When we broke, there was a dull silence. The loss of the connection to her filled my soul and I was weakened by it, my essence drained – incomplete.
“You’re cute, but you’re much too young and you’re really not my type,” she whispered, her eyes twinkling with mirth.
She was trying hard to keep things light-hearted, but I could see the loss reflected in her eyes too. She covered it up well but I noticed that she hadn’t let me go yet.
“Can I at least have your number?” I pleaded shamelessly. I breathed a sigh of relief as she disengaged from my arms to draw a pen from her purse and scrawled down a number on an old receipt.
“See you, Renee,” I murmured as I watched her turn to leave.
“See you, Twitch,” she called back, and then she was gone.

I returned to the table with a look of pure ecstasy mixed with stunned shock on my face to apologise to my friends. Sarah and Tony glanced nervously as I approached the table. It had been obvious that I was limping slightly. I sat down on the table with a noticeable exclamation. Sarah’s face immediately crinkled in concern.
“Are you okay?” Sarah asked gently.
“What? Oh? Yeah, I just fell down earlier,” I replied quickly.
“Oh.”
Tony and Sarah exchanged glances again. I didn’t take much notice though, I was too lost in my own thoughts of Renee. I wondered if it would be too soon to call her tomorrow morning or if I had to wait the whole three days after the date thing?

* * * *

“Ullo, is Giuseppe’s Pizza! Can I take your order?” A fake Italian accent boomed down the line with startling volume.
“Uhh… hello... is Renee there?“ I hesitantly asked, already knowing that the answer would be no.
“No, is no Renee here, only pizza!” the voice returned. “You order now, no?”
I switched off my phone in disgust. She had given me a fake number. Who does that? And a pizza place? If I wasn’t so invested in this woman I’d have been howling with laughter.
I had woken up about twenty minutes before and tentatively inspected myself in the mirror. I hadn’t had time to do it properly last night when we had returned home. I’d definitely sprained my wrist. It was horribly swollen and was starting to throb uncomfortably. Complete with the wrist I also had bruising all down my left side – deep purple bruises that started on my chest and spread around my lower back.
It hadn’t looked like it was this bad last night. On the upside it didn’t appear that I had actually cracked any ribs – they were just bruised. Painfully bruised, but not broken. That was lucky at least. It was no longer painful to breathe, only slightly uncomfortable.
The smell of cooking bacon slowly wafted into my room and brought me staggering out into the living room. I hurriedly threw on a T-shirt to cover the bruising. I was greeted by the sight of my dad standing over the stove with Tony sitting on the table next to him, chatting amicably. Tony and Dad had always gotten along famously.
“Morning Dad.” I groaned as I limped over to a chair and tentatively sat down.
“Rough night?” he inquired, looking me in the eyes.
“Yeah, I fell down a flight of stairs,” I lied quickly, nodding to Tony to collaborate in the lie.
“Stupid bugger, he saw some chick he fancied,” he said.
I gave him a sharp warning look.
My dad smiled as he began dishing up. “I always had a soft spot for ladies I shouldn’t have.”
I said nothing in response. I wondered if he was referring to Mum.
“So what do you boys have planned for the day?” Dad asked.

“I’ve got to be home relatively early in the afternoon,” Tony stated in between mouthfuls. “Got this family thing this evening, I’ve got to look my best.”
“That’ll take some doing,” I muttered under my breath, although of course everyone heard.
“What about you, Devon?” Dad turned to me.
“Nothing much, Dad, just thought I’d hang out,” I replied.
“I’d like you to come to dinner tonight. There’s someone I’d like you to meet.”
Great, this meant one of two things: either Dad had another date he wanted me to meet, or he was career hunting for me again. Either way, it meant a painful night. Dad must have picked up on my lack of enthusiasm because he didn’t press the issue further.
“Well, boys, on that note, I think I’ll see you later. I just need to pop into the office for an hour or so.”
That meant Dad would be gone for the rest of the morning and probably most of the afternoon too. Tony left shortly afterwards. I offered to walk him down, but changed my mind after considering how much trouble I had getting to the door. I’d only slow him down.
“How are your ribs?” he asked. He gawked when I pulled up my shirt to show him the bruises.
“Shit,” he breathed out.
I stared at him.
“What happened?” he asked. “Did you fall down a flight of stairs like you said?”
“Yeah,” I mumbled. It was obvious I was lying.
Tony slowly nodded. It was the first time I had kept anything from him and I felt a little sick at the idea of starting now. I’d have loved to be able to tell him what was going on, but that required something I didn’t have – an understanding of what was going on.
“Well, see you, dude. I’ll see you at school.”
I’d usually go wander around the city for a while when I was bored. But I couldn’t really leave the apartment in my current condition. I’d already seen all of Dad’s movies on numerous occasions so I didn’t really feel like watching a movie.
And I was too distracted anyway to focus on a movie. I couldn’t stop thinking about Renee. Every train of thought led me back to her. I imagined her when I closed my eyes and I could almost still smell her fragrance on me. I remembered her lips on mine, the way it felt to hold her against me.
I pictured her standing there outside the club smiling at me. Then I remembered her in the alley with her hands held forth and blue particles whipping out to strike me down.