[TheFightingSpirit]

Bit longer than usual this time, but that's only because it's an important moment in the story...

Aaaaaand I feel bad for not posting this on Saturday like I was supposed to. Truth is I went away for the weekend and it totally slipped my mind.

So here you go. Two whole days of newie newness. Starting with a double length Magi Short.

Magi Short #3: Catherine's Story

A six-year-old Catherine rubbed the tiredness from her eyes as she shuffled downstairs. She couldn’t sleep.

A light was on in the study. “Daddy?”

Her father was always working on something. He’d spend months away from home, and, when he finally did get back, he never seemed to have any time for her. He’d told her stories about it, fun stories involving really old wizards and monsters, good guys versus bad guys. She couldn't understand why he was always away working on things like that when her mother insisted wizards and monsters didn't exist.

Catherine grabbed hold of the frame of the study door and blinked in the light of a single bright lamp. Her dad sat at the tall desk poring over something she couldn't see.

“Dad?” she said once more.

He put down what he was working on and turned to her, smiling. “What is it, darling? Can’t you sleep?”

She sniffed and shook her head.

“Oh, well,” he reached down and lifted her up onto his knee with a grunt of effort. “Phew, you’re getting big, aren’t you.”

“Why aren’t you asleep, daddy?”

“You see, your father has some important things to work on.” He pointed first to a scrap of old paper written in a strange language and then to a stone with pretty carvings on it. “Do you still remember the stories I told you? About the magi?”

Catherine nodded. Her father continued: “This piece of paper is really old and it confirms daddy’s ideas about those stories. Except they’re not really stories any more, they’re real. The magi actually existed.”

“Mummy says magic is just make believe.”

He smiled. “Does she now? Well that’s because your mum hasn't seen what I have. A lot of people around the world think I’m telling lies, but that’s only because they find it hard to believe in things they can’t see.”

“But the tooth fairy is real, and nobody sees her...”

“Ah, but the tooth fairy leaves money under the pillows of good children like you, doesn’t she. That’s how we know she exists. In a similar way, the Magi have left daddy things too.” He picked up the carved stone and let Catherine hold it. “Be careful Katy, okay? That’s the only one of those in the world.”

“W-what is it?” The stone was quite heavy, but Catherine was determined to keep hold of it. She didn’t want to disappoint her dad.

“I told you once that the Magi got their special powers from a load of magical stones that the wisest of their leaders made for them. What you’re holding is one of those stones. We call them runes.”

“If you and your friends have found the …” she frowned and turned the word over in her young mind, “rune then why don’t people believe you?”

“I don’t know, sweetie. That’s one of the reasons why daddy has to go away for a little while longer.”

“But… but you just got back…” she said with a whimper.

“I know. I wish I could stay home with you, Katy, but it’s important for me to make those people believe. If I can prove that the Magi existed, then maybe I can find their descendents.”

Catherine didn’t know what a descendent was but whatever it was she wanted them to stay hidden so her father could be around more. Why would he want the wizards to exist? Surely there would need to be bad guys for that to happen, right? That’s the way it was in cartoons.

o0o
Present day

Catherine and Maria met at the apartment while the rangers were out dealing with a small infection of Black Water just outside of town.

They’d gone over the plan to infiltrate Agency HQ a dozen times at least, and both agreed they needed more than just five Cross Rangers to pull this off. Catherine had never let up on her search for other new Magi. Only, she seemed to have hit a slump as of late. Perhaps then it was time to do things the old fashioned way. Time to put together a task force and tackle the problem like the trained military officers they were. Time to get some outside help.

They stepped out of the apartment, went downstairs to flat one and knocked on the door.

Only once Robert and Ken had confirmed the landlady was no longer working for the Agency did the plan really come together.

She came to the door and stared them down. “Hello?”

“We need to talk,” said Catherine. It pained her to ask for help from someone who’d once agreed to flat out spy on the rangers in hope of furthering her career, but she knew it had to be done.

“I assume this is about a certain acquaintance we share.”

Maria nodded, and folded her arms. “You’d be correct.”

“You better come in then,” the landlady said.

o0o
The Past

Catherine, now seventeen, sighed, stared once at the landline then sunk back into the sofa.

Whatever happens, I’m not going to call him. I’m not. I don’t need his help.

Why was it that whenever you actually needed their meddling, for once, your parents were no where to be seen? She expected as much from her father and his obsession, but her mother? She could have gone to her friends but they’d only laugh at her for thinking such uncool thoughts. It totally wasn’t normal for seventeen year old girls to be interested in joining the military, she knew that as well as the next person, but what if that was what she wanted?

Catherine looked back at the phone, and yelled in frustration. Off went the television. She rolled trudged around the end of the sofa, picked up the phone and dialled her dad’s new number.

It rang almost seven times before he picked up.

“Hello?”

“Dad. It’s me.”

“Oh hi darling. Look I’m pretty busy right now, is this urgent?”

“I didn’t know who else to talk to…”

She heard him sigh. A great whump of papers flopping against a worktop told her she had his undivided attention.. “What is it, Katy?”

“Remember when we were talking about what I wanted to do after high school.”

“Yeah.”

“Well I think I’ve decided.” She paused. It seemed impossible to gather enough courage to just come out and say it. “And…”

“Whatever it is, you have my support. I know I’m not around much and I know you don’t exactly approve of my reasons why-”

She scoffed. “Got that right.”

“That’s enough, Catherine. Just listen for a moment.”

“No one ever has anytime for me, though. Sometimes I want to be the one who everyone has to listen to!”

“Think about what you’re doing here, Katy. Why call me while I’m working, ask for my advice, then complain when I give it to you?”

“I don’t know, alright! Perhaps if you were around like a real dad, and not off chasing some weird old cult then-”

“The Magi are not a cult. There are others in the world looking for them like I am.”

“Sounds like a cult to me,” she mumbled.

“Excuse me?”

“You heard me.”

“Okay, Catherine, maybe one day you’ll understand why I’m doing this, maybe one day someone in our family will turn out to be a magi as the science suggests is possible, but until then I need you to trust me. Understood?”

“No.”

“Don’t be so childish.” He snapped. “Now… What did you want to talk to me about?”

“I... think I want to join the army...”

For a while, silence reigned. Eventually her father spoke in measured tones. “How did you come to that conclusion?”

“I know, I know. It’s a weird thing for a girl like me to be considering, isn’t it.”

“Not at all. Plenty of women sign-up now days. It’s a profession like any other.”

“What do you think I should do, daddy?”

“I think that, now you’re seventeen, you’re big enough to make your own decisions. You know your mum and I will try and get you to see how dangerous such a job can be, but that’s only because we love you and want you to be safe. At the end of the day, it’s your life to live. I’d love it if you were as interested in my work as I am, but I know that’s not going to happen. All I can do is give you advice, provide you with the knowledge to make educated decisions. You have to be the one go for it.”

“You know… That’s about the most honest reply I’ve gotten yet. Thanks, dad.”

“Don’t worry about it.”

“No, really, I mean it. I know I give you a hard time about your fairy tal- uh, research, but you’re still my daddy.”

“I love you too, Katy.”

o0o
The Present

Maria rushed back into the apartment and slapped a post-it note down in front of Catherine. “Looks like she came through for us after all.”

Catherine scanned the note, then turned to Maria. “And her contact will definitely fly us up there?”

“I trust her,” Maria said.

“Good, well…” She bit her lip and went back to reading over the plan. “I sure hope this works.”

“Eh, whether it does or not the main thing is we stood up to Bryant’s oppression, right?”

“Yeah I suppose. I just can’t shake the thought that we’d both still be under his thumb if it wasn’t for Robert and the others.”

The irony that it took Magi, people, as a teenager, she thought could never exist, wasn’t lost on her. Her dad, for all his quirks, had been right all along. She had come to understand why he spent all that time away from his family all those years ago. It was for the very same reason that her and Maria had ruined their careers and dropped their lives to fight for freedom with the Cross Rangers.

There came a time in one’s life when all roads point to one conclusion, to one future, and if you didn’t seize such opportunities by the neck, then you’d forever be doubting yourself.

Either they could sit back and let General Bryant run the country into the ground, or they could take back what’s theirs, and look to the future on their own terms.

Catherine smiled to herself. You’d laugh if you were alive, dad. I’m fighting a real cultist this time.