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Chapter 1
The engines of the Witchcraft roared to life, sending vibrations through everyone in the hangar, making any last minute checks of the ship's vital systems.
'Alright, that's enough.' called a bespectacled young man calmly, not looking up from the floating holo-screens that displayed the ship's diagnostics. The engines died down and the ship dropped slowly back to the hangar floor. It was an impressive ship, to be sure. From above, it looked like a horseshoe, with a circular bulge at the deepest part. This was the cockpit, where the pilot sat and controlled everything. The engines were at the ends of both the horseshoe's arms and hung to the ground. The actual thrusters were at the back of the engine pods, allowing the Witchcraft to move forward.
Alexander McCoy, a middle aged man with piercing blue eyes and dark hair flecked with grey, watched in satisfaction as the ship was looked over.
Everything they'd work for had built up to this.
It had been years since the Earth race team had been invited to compete in the Grand Prix on the far-off world of Gaia. But after that fantastic win on Jupiter, they were a shoe in. He looked over the shoulder of the kid behind the screens. This kid, even though he was scrawny and small, was the best mechanic the Earth team had, which was surprising since he was only sixteen. He also happened to be Alexander's Son, Felix McCoy.
'How's it looking, 'lix?' asked his father, peering at the screens.
'Everything's ship shape, dad.' Felix swiveled around in his chair. 'From Rush Drive to navigation is in perfect working order.'
His father straightened up. 'How 'bout weapons?' he asked.
Felix looked over at the screens. 'Blasters seem fine, but you'd better get a second opinion. Alastair, Ben! Howzit?' he shouted up at the ship.
Felix knew the Witchcraft inside and out, port to starboard. But his knowledge of weapons was a bit...lacking. That's why they had Alastair and Benjamin Reed. Not only could they calibrate a set of blasters in under a minute, but the two of them were the most deadly gunners the Sol racing circuit had seen in a while, never mind the fact that they were only thirteen. But the Earth team was damned lucky to have them.
The blaster chambers were rotating glass domes built into the outside curves of the ship on either side. The chamber nearest them, the port side one, opened flush and the bright face of Ben poked out , brushing a strand of curly yellow hair from his face.
'Hullo!' he said happily, smiling widely and speaking in perfect unison with another voice on the other side of the ship. 'What can we do for you...'
'...Felix and his father?' completed Alastair, already striding around the curve of the ship, climbing over the cockpit. Being twins, Alastair and Ben had a habit of completing each other sentences.
'How're the weapons, you two?' called Alexander.
Alastair sat just above the chamber were Ben was and you could tell they were twins. Both had a mop of curly blond hair and and pale green eyes. The onyl way to tell them apart was that Alastair had a thin pink scar under his right eye, an injury he received nearly three years back when he and his brother started with the Earth team.
'We're low on laser clips...' started Ben.
'...and Gyro Fluid,' put in Alastair.
'Coolant too...'
Alexander raised his hands in surrender. 'Alright, alright! We can get everything once we reach the Prix. I'm pretty sure there'll be a parts dealer there.'
The Reed twins nodded. The parts weren't a big importance right now, so they could wait.
Felix turned back to his father. 'So aside from a few parts of the cannons, she's in perfect order.'
Alexander pursed his lips in thought. 'Not quite. There's still one more thing,' he said, treading carefully. 'Magical reservoirs?'
If there was something Felix didn't know more about then weapons, it was magic. Every race team in existence had either used tech (lasers, missiles) or magic (spells, curses) as weapons and a way of powering their ships. But Earth had decided to use both. And there was only one person who knew who anything about magic.
Felix sighed in exasperation and got up from his chair. 'I guess I should go fetch her, huh?' he asked, already knowing the answer.
'Might be good. Everyone has something to do.'
Felix nodded. 'Fine, where is she?'
Alexander shrugged. 'Haven't a clue. Probably in one of those hide-aways of yours.'
Felix laughed lightly and smiled. 'You're probably right. I'll be back.' he said and headed off for the open hangar doors, leading out into the airfield where the hangar was built. He had a good idea where he'd find their resident magic expect.
* * *
Felix practically grew up in his family's air hangar and the field around it, so he knew the area pretty well. During the first few years after his mother's death he spent a lot of time out in a nearby forest, goofing off with his friend, Amy Montgomery.
Whom he was looking for right now.
He ducked under the branches and stepping over the fallen logs in the local forest. He and Amy had grown up together, the best of friends. But her life had jsut been as difficult as his; at the age of ten, her magical abilities had been realized. Most families consider having a Magik in their family as a point of pride and honour. Amy's family wasn't those type of people. She had been disowned, Felix's father had always considered her to be the daughter he never had, and so had unofficially adopted her. Besides, she was friends with Felix and Alexander McCoy didn't want to see his son unhappy
'Slag,' cursed Felix presently as he stumbled over a particularly knobbly root in the ground. 'Ams, where are you?' he called, cupping his hand around his mouth. He already had an idea of where she'd be; he just wanted his thoughts confirmed.
A few seconds later the reply of 'Over here!' came and Felix rolled his in a somewhat amused fashion.
He came to a thick curtain of vines, shielding the place where her voice had come from. Ah, the Hollow. He so called it.
He pushed through the vines, poking his head inside the little clearing. The Hollow was a fantastic place. Birds always seemed to chirp for endless periods, flitting around the clearing merrily. Ethereal Celtic music would've fit perfectly here. IN the dead center was a huge willow tree, the trunk thicker then three grown men. Fungus and mushrooms grew around the trunk like a staircase, leading up the boughs and branches of the tree.
Sitting at the base of the monstrous plant was a girl with her legs crossed underneath her, Indian style and with an old leather bound book in her lap. Her big brown eyes were half-hooded, calmly flickering across the parchment, taking in everything. She pulled a lock of orange hair behind her ear and turned the page.
Felix sat down next to her, peering over her shoulder at what she was reading. 'Ah yes, the wonderful story of total gibberish.' he teased, trying futilely to make sense of all the runes, sigils, symbols and other glyphs scattered about the page seemingly at random in a hundred different languages.
Amy looked up and punched Felix in the arm, making him wince. She smiled brightly. 'The reason you think it's gibberish is 'coz you can't read Magician Text, ya twit.' she replied.
Magician Text was a special kind of writing that only incantations and other magical rituals can be written in. If you used normal writing to create a spell, it would just be a bunch of words that meant squat, even to a Magik. Other Magiks like Amy could make heads or tails of it. It vexed Felix to the bone that it was a gap in his knowledge that he'd never be able to fill. His lack of know-how about weapons could be changed if he took the initiative to ask Alastair and Ben to teach him. But because he couldn't read Magician Text, he'd never know magic.
He glanced wistfully around the Hollow, up at the strands that the willow's leaves hung on. 'So what're you doing here? Been whole since we've set foot inside.'
She simply shrugged her shoulders and closed her book. 'Just getting a bit more reading and a last look before we leave for the Grand Prix. We might not see this place a long time.'
Felix stuck out his lower lip and nodded in agreement, sitting back and enjoying the natural beauty of the Hollow.
Then he remembered that he needed to bring Amy back to the hangar.
Slag, what a way to ruin the moment.
he stood up and offered her a hand up. 'C'mon, we need to get back to the hangar. Dad needs you to check the reservoirs.'
Amy took his hand and stood, brushing grass off her pants. 'Why can't you do it?' she asked as she tucked the book under her arm and followed him out of the Hollow.
Felix raked his fingers though his hair. 'Because magic can't be monitored by any kind of tech, you that know.'
Okay, Felix knew one thing about magic and that was it. Magic can't be monitored by non-magical means (ie, scans of any kind). Technology doesn't recognize magic as existing or being there at all, therefore it ignores it. Only Magiks, like Amy, can sense the energy and gauge how much there was and its strength. Magic, however, can be used along side tech. Rumours about anything with a magical charge or field messing with electronic equipment were debunked years back.
They walked through the forest in silence and didn't start talking until they were back into the field.
'So what do you think Gaia will be like?' asked Amy, dawdling along side Felix with one hand in her pocket and the other holding her Magician Book. She was a couple inches short then Felix, but most people never noticed. She looked at him, peering at him with her brown eyes that seemed to swirl with magic themselves.
Just thinking about Gaia and the Grand Prix gave Felix shivers of excitement.
'I dunno,' he said with a cheery grin. 'I hear there's some pretty weird types there. People who have molten rock or platinum for skin. Some are just aliens, right out. Grey, clammy skin and big black almond-shaped eyes.' he replied, making rings around his eyes with his fingers. Amy laughed at that.
So they continued to wander across the field, laughing and joking about the strange things that see on Gaia.
 Pamplemousse Grenouille · Sun Nov 18, 2007 @ 03:23pm · 4 Comments |
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