The Wizard Magpie and the Origin Story

Wizard Magpie and the Origin Story

Growing up is hard.  
Growing up in Arkham Massachusetts is harder still.
Throw in discovering you're a mutant, waking up as a girl after a night you can't remember, how much worse can it get?

February 14, 2006

My alarm clock trilled dragging me back to the land of the awake right when Sabrina Powry was about to …  well what she was about to do in my dreams was something she was unlikely to do in real life, as she was a decedent of one of the Old Blood Families of Arkham and my family was just a Johnny-come-lately family who where cops.  Still a hetero boy could dream, and I savored every naughty thing my dream world let me do with her.

“Honey, are you moving yet?” my mom yelled as from the kitchen which was just down the hall from my room.   We lived in an old lighthouse, which consisted of a six story tower and an attached one and a half story building.  The Beacon as it was known locally had been built some time in the 1700's on the cliffs overlooking Innsmouth.  How it, and about two acres of rock ended up about seven miles south of it's original location has been a mystery since it just appeared in a field a century back.  My room and most of our living space, was in the attached building, with the tower reserved for my parents room and their work space.  It was also the home of Angus the lighthouse keeper who tended the light.

I'm making it sound like my parents are more then cops aren't I?  They are, but they are all so practitioners of the Magical Arts.  My dad is the seventh son of a seventh son and his father had been a Hunter of the things that go Bump! in the night, and had trained him to do the same.  Somewhere along the lines, he says it was in collage, Dad made a pact with Something that gave him access to semi-phenomenal, no where near cosmic powers to use in his fight.  

Mom's a bit harder to explain.  She some how had a powerful ghost become partially attached to her, Mom uses the word “infatuated” when she tells the story, and it wanted to make her it's bride as some component of a weird ritual.   In it's attempt to woo her it lent her it's powers; letting her command spirits and walk in the land of the dead...  Yeah creepy as heck.  She can't, or maybe I should say doesn't, do those things any more, though she has never explained why to me.  

As for myself, I'm nothing special, even if I have an impressive name; John Loki Stephens.  Mom jokes she was still high on her pain killers when Dad floated names for me when I was born, which is why I ended up named for John Constantine and Loki Laufeyson.  Dad also points out that Stephens could be seen as a nod to Stephen Strange.  Yup, Dad is a comic book dork besides being a wizard, and I have a big name to live up to if you believe in that kind of thing.

I dragged myself out of bed and across the hall to the bathroom to begin my morning rituals; shower, dressed, food while checking my e-mail and web comics, then off to what ever I had that day be it school or some other activity.  Today was a school day besides being Valentines day.  Maybe the later explained my dreams about Jenny...  something to think about later.  

“You got your cards to give out?” Mom asked as I scarfed down a ham and egg on a bagel breakfast sandwich while checking out what Elliot and Tedd where up to on El Goonish Shive.

Swallowing I looked over to where she was standing making hers and Dad's lunches.  My vision blurred and when it cleared she wasn't wearing the professional, form counseling white shirt and black slacks that where her usual uniform for a day as a Detective in the Arkham PD's Paranormal Crimes divisions aka “The Black Cats” which handles all cases with a supernatural or mutant bend. She was now wearing a form fitting black dress with a slit up to … Yikes!  A good boy should not be looking at his mother's chest no matter how perky it is, and a mother should not have a dress with that low a neck line.  There was a spider web fine red poncho like shaw draped over her bare shoulders, something that looked like it would tear in the slightest breeze.  A large black and silver scarab sat in the hollow of her throat like a pendent on a necklace, though there was no chain to hold it in place.

“I.. um, I'm not in elementary school any more, they don't make us do cards for everyone any more.”  I said trying to figure out what they heck I was seeing.

“Sure, sure, but I bet there are a few young ladies you wouldn't mind giving cards to.”  Mom said with a smirk.  I really didn't wanna be talking about my love life while my mom looked like a twenty something version of Winona Ryder with access to Mortica Addam's closet.  I looked away, my dream bubbling up in my memory, now with Sabrina wearing the dress Mom had on...  I must have been blushing cause Mom laughed and went to the fridge.

“You pestering him to find a date again, Love?  Give him a few years yet, there's no rush for you to have grand-kids.”  Dad asked as he padded in to the room.  To my eyes he looked changed like mom was.  Instead of one of his usual casual outfits, he looked like a beardless Gandalf the White with his robes augmented by silver plate armor.  In his belt was a silver sword, and in his hand was a staff that held a glowing white crystal.  Ok, the staff looked like it always did, it was the source of Dad's powers, but everything else about him was...  I blinked and Dad was wearing a t-shirt and jeans.  His service weapon rested on his hip where I had seen the sword.  He wiggled his eyebrows at Mom, “If you really want to hold a baby, we could...”

“I'm gonna go, bye!”  I said as I bounced out of my seat and scurried out the door.  I slid down the stair railing to the drive way, and then down to the bus stop.  The ride was mercifully short, and we where dumped out at Miskatonic high school.  The building was a brick affair with a Victorian flair that felt neglect and generally depressed even though it was in good repair.  The whole city is like that, there is just a vibe in the air that sends a shiver up a person's spine.  Some tourists can barely spend a few hours in the city limits before they're so unnerved they get back in the car and drive on.  Which they really have a good reason to as you don't want to be out to late once the sun goes down.

“Hey John,”  my best friend Rodger Richardson called from down the hall as I worked to open my locker.  I gave him a wave without taking my eyes off the dial.  He was another cop kid and we'd met at a boring policeman's dinner thing.  “So, you gonna ask her out today?”  He didn't need to say who as he was well aware of my crush on Sabrina.

“No.  And before you ask why, you know why.”  I replied as the door sprang open and I pulled the books I'd need for the first half of my day out.

“Those excuses are bull and you know it.  I hear she's going to the dance Friday alone, so there's your chance.”

“I hate dances, and I didn't buy a ...”

Rodger dropped an envelope on my stack of books.  “You can pay me back.  Bribes for Brina are your responsibility.”

“You suck.”  I growled as I slammed my locker shut.

“I get the girls.” Rodger countered with a smirk.  And I couldn't argue with that as he's had about three girlfriends since last summer.  I flipped him off and hurried to homeroom getting in just before the bell rang.  Mr Manning, my home room teacher, gave me a bug eyed look, his coke bottle glasses and thin build making the resemblance to a mantis striking, before going back to taking attendance.

Classes where the usual and relatively uneventful.  Right up until History class when we went to the computer lab and library to work on some reports we'd been assigned.  We where working in groups of four and trying to work out the effects magic and super powered being have had on world history and the path history might have taken if Heroes (and Villains) had never intervened.  My group had been assigned to look at the effects of if Karedonia had never been founded might have had on world politics.  We'd researched the region and marked out known and possible 'interference' points through it's history.  Some where easy to 'correct' for and we all agreed on them easily enough.

“Dud, no, you can't just assume that anyone else would have risen up and taken over!”  I snapped at Michael Bruno, a guy from a thick headed Humanity First indoctrinated conservative family.  We'd never gotten along, especially after his father, a pastor, had learned my father had “sold his soul” for power.  “The people where starving, they had no weapons...  hell most of them where illiterate before Gizmatic moved in and set up decent schools!  Which means that organizing a rebellion would have been next to impossible.”

“HA!!  You just said it!!  Next to Impossible, so there was a possibility!”  Michael said, his halitosis making my eyes water.