Chapter Four: Best of Both Worlds

Lance lay on his bed in front of his laptop, debating on what direction he wanted to go with his latest academic paper for English class. He was royally tempted to add in details about The Odyssey that were only known in the wizarding world, but he knew that wouldn't fly tech-side. After all, his teachers at St. John's had no way to verify anything from the magical world. It was a bit of shame, though…the wizarding world copies of The Odyssey were much more detailed and preserved parts of the story that the techie world had clearly lost over the centuries.

In the end, the teenager tapped out another two paragraphs, doing his best to steer clear of the more…wizardly…parts of The Odyssey as he finished up his paper. He sighed as he read it over one last time. It still wasn't up to what most of his classmates were writing, but it was much better than pretty much all of his papers from summer school. Essays he understood…it was analyzing and dissecting the stories that he was still having trouble figuring out how to do.

English paper done, he turned his attention to his family grimoire, yanking out a notebook to scrawl out his thoughts and theories. Knowing that his ancestors had once taught all they could about the Old Magic didn't make it easier to figure out how. He and 'Lanna had, in the end, asked for Merlin to help them with the preliminary lesson plans for their fellow students at Shiloh. The ancient warlock's laughter hadn't been encouraging, but, in the end, he'd pointed them in the right direction and warned them not to expect instant results. There had, after all, been a reason that the Old Religion had died out in favor of Latin magic.

The siblings hadn't held back, solemnly warning their classmates that it would be at least a year before they'd see solid results with even their first handful of Old Magic spells. Certainly some of their fellow students had lost interest at that point, but others hadn't. And, to the pair's utter, complete shock, Mr. and Mrs. Taylor had joined the lessons, determined to learn just as much as the students about Old Magic.

Greg resisted the urge to beam proudly as Principal Kahl outlined his nipotes' progress in the short time they'd been at the school. They were still behind where they should have been, but they were in much better shape than they'd been at the beginning of the summer. Oh, he still had to keep on top of them at home…they seemed to regard their mysterious research project as more important than their schoolwork for some reason…but he could do that.

"If they keep up their current progress, I don't see any reason why they couldn't graduate right on time," Principal Kahl finished. "Frankly, I wish all my students put in this kind of work and effort."

The Sergeant sobered. "They've been through quite a lot," he pointed out, silently raising the observation that his kids were more mature than most teenagers their age.

Speculation skewered Parker for an instant, then the principal moved on. "There is one thing I do need to bring to your attention."

"And that is?"

The gray-haired woman flashed an ever so brief smile. "As much as I appreciate students who take their library books seriously, we do need the books your niece has checked out in the past several weeks returned or renewed."

"I'll handle it," Greg promised. "If I could have a list…?"

Principal Kahl handed it over and the negotiator glanced over it, one eyebrow rising at the list of books…more than fifteen books on several different topics. Well…at least he knew his niece was reading.

Clark restrained a grin as he read over the sheet of math problems his 'cousin' was having trouble with. "Got your calculator?" he asked over the top of the sheet.

Lance gave him a surprised look. "I thought I was supposed to do this stuff without a calculator," he pointed out.

"Not graphing problems like this one," Clark retorted. "It'd take you forever to do 'em by hand, plus I think this chapter's more about teaching you how to use the calculator than solving the problems."

The brunet shrugged and pulled out his calculator. When Clark saw it, he groaned and went to fetch his backpack. He came back with the bag, slung it onto a chair, then pulled out his calculator. The teen tilted it towards Lance. "See the difference?"

"It's bigger?"

The older teenager handed over the calculator. "It's a graphing calculator," he explained as Lance tentatively poked and prodded at the device. "You can use mine tonight and I'll tell Mom you need one of your own ASAP. I can't believe you got through summer school without one."

"But what do I do with it?"

Clark smirked and hauled his chair over to be right next to his 'cousin'. "I'll show you," he promised.

"Uncle Wordy?" The brunet constable looked up from his book, arching a brow in both question and invitation. Alanna sidled in close, slipping her laptop onto the table in front of them. "I'm having trouble with my laptop," she explained.

Wordy winced. "That might be more a question for Spike, kiddo."

"Uncle Spike's sick today."

Good point. Wordy worked his way sideways. "Then let's go talk to Lou."

The redhead perked up and eagerly carted her laptop after Wordy as he scouted around for his teammate. When he spotted Lou, he gestured for 'Lanna to stay put, then headed for the workout room, poked his head in, and called, "Lou, you're up!"

"For what?" Lou questioned.

" 'Lanna has a tech question," Wordy reported.

The tan-skinned constable slid off his treadmill and headed over with a grin on his face. "And Spike's out with the flu," he drawled.

"Yep."

The two constables headed back to Alanna and pointed her towards a conference room since Team Two was using the briefing room. Once inside, Alanna set her laptop up. "The mouse is being funny," she explained.

"Show me," Lou urged.

Wordy peeked over his teammate and his niece's shoulders as Alanna brought up her web browser and clicked on a button to scroll through the browser's many, many tabs. Wordy's eyebrows arched as, instead of scrolling, the tabs 'shuddered' for an instant, then went still again. Alanna switched to the laptop's trackpad and succeeded in scrolling through the tabs, but as soon as she touched her wireless mouse, the tabs flew all the way to the left and utterly refused to move right again.

Lou took over, playing with various settings, frowning deeper and deeper the longer he couldn't solve the mystery. Finally, he shut the little computer down and pulled out the USB dongle for the mouse before starting the computer up again. When the computer came up, he slid it over to Alanna so she could type in her password, then reclaimed the machine. Gingerly, he plugged the USB dongle back in; all three of them stared when the computer promptly reported that it was installing drivers.

"Wasn't it already installed?" Wordy questioned.

"Yeah, man," Lou confirmed as he opened up the browser. Cautiously, he clicked his way through the multitude of tabs, shaking his head in bemusement when the mouse behaved perfectly.

"You fixed it!" Alanna cried in delight; she hugged Lou enthusiastically.

Lou's bemusement was clear. "I think it fixed itself," he corrected. "But you're welcome, Alanna." He nudged the laptop towards Alanna. "Let me know if anything starts acting up again."

"Copy," Alanna agreed at once, her eyes shining.

Once she was gone, Wordy and Lou regarded each other; Wordy smirked and deliberately ruffled his teammate's fuzzy, buzzcutted hair. "Attaboy, backup genius," he teased.

"I'm gonna tell Spike you said that," Lou threatened.

Wordy laughed outright. "I'll just distract him," he retorted. "I heard a few interesting stories from Sam the other day. Something about all his characters dying of scurvy in Oregon Trail."

Lou snickered. "Man, if anyone was ever able to beat that game, it'd be news to me."

"I was more of a Pong guy myself," Wordy admitted cheerfully.

"Talk about old-school," Lou immediately retorted.

"Yep, that's me," Wordy confessed at once. "I'm so old-school I barely know how to work those newfangled smart things."

The less-lethal specialist's smirk grew. "So…did they have game controllers in your day or did you just twitch wires to make the games work?"

"Hey," Wordy mock-objected, "I'm good at twitching wires!"

"More like cutting them," Sam interjected from the doorway. His teammates looked up at the sniper's Cheshire Cat grin. "Come on, we got a warrant."

"Yes!" Wordy cheered.

"Brady, take a look at this," Grant instructed, tossing a small booklet down in front of his employee.

Brady picked up the slim volume. "What's this, Grant?"

"The official rules for the dueling circuit," Grant replied, plunking himself down in the seat opposite Brady's. "I've already been through it twice."

"For?"

Grant huffed, but explained. "Trying to see if Wild Mages are allowed to compete."

Brady's eyes widened. "And?"

A shrug. "I don't see anything about it at all. Just some rules about what kinds of magic can be used in the actual duels."

"But you want me to take a look?"

"Yeah." Grant sighed. "I want to be one-hundred percent sure before I tell them."

Brady flipped the book open. "I'll let you know," he promised.

"Would you go back?" Alanna asked her brother as they tucked their homework away one evening.

"To where?" Lance counter-inquired, cocking his head to the side.

"Magic school."

Lance considered, debating the pros and cons. "You mean…if our magic weren't an issue any more?"

"Yeah."

For several more seconds, Lance thought hard. Then he shook his head.

"Why not?"

"Because…" Lance hesitated, uncertainty filtering in. Then his jaw firmed. "Because I want to be a cop. I want to be the first wizard in history to be a cop and then an Auror." Sapphire shimmered with determination. "I want to be the first magical SRU Auror, sis."

"The best of both worlds," Alanna murmured, earning a sharp nod. "We couldn't have that before, could we?"

Lance shook his head again. "But now we can," he pointed out. He looked his sister over. "What about you?"

It was Alanna's turn to think hard and her words were just as soft and hesitant. "I…I want to be an inventor. I want to help create the runic technology; I want to make it better."

"One step at a time, sis."

The younger girl sniffled. "Do you…remember what Mom told us?"

Lance stilled. "Always," he whispered.

And as the moon rose, its light shining through the windows of the small apartment, the words their mother had spoken seemed to swirl around the room, full of promise.

If you cannot be safe, my own, be magnificent!

~ Fin

Author note: From the Year of Our Lord 2019, Happy Easter, ya'll! Christ is Risen; He is Risen, indeed!

I hope everyone enjoyed this look at how Lance and Alanna found a new school and started really learning how to live tech-side. After all, when you've hit the bottom, the only direction left is up.

Happy Easter and Keep the Peace!