Chapter 20

We figure out Earth

When: Day 247

Where: A city street

I stood stock still on the side of the city street, waiting for the screams or at least some funny looks. I heard and saw neither. The people walking by seemed unconcerned by my presence there, and seemed to avoid the gaping door to the afterlife as though there was something physical there they didn't want to run into but otherwise didn't think twice about. I was just congratulating myself for not exploding or being thrown through time when I turned to see an old man I had never seen step out of nowhere. He looked around and caught sight of me.

"Ah, we made it," he said.

"Who are you?" I blurted.

"Denice, it's me, Stefan," he said. "Why do you look so old? And did you get shorter?"

"Stefan?" This old man? Oh no, don't tell me-

Two more figures stepped through the portal to the street. Siew Yan I recognized, she always looked the age she had been when she died, but following her was another old man I hardly recognized. "What a trip," he said as the doorway vanished behind him. "Now, where did Denice go? Do you see Stefan anywhere?"

"I'm right here," Stafan insisted. "What are you all-" He brought his hands up and looked at them in horror. "What's happened to me?"

We were now starting to get some funny looks, as the two old men were standing there in what looked like their pajamas. Siew Yan was wearing a very short dress, something you might to go to a nightclub in, and I was just wearing jeans and a t-shirt. The same jeans and t-shirt I was wearing "I just remembered how I died!" I blurted. Yes, I even had my purse, where had that come from? Siew Yan wasn't carrying anything.

"Me too," Siew Yan remarked, a dark look on her face. "They didn't say that would happen. Didn't really need to relive that moment, thank you very much."

"I died in a fire," said Ramesh. "I was in bed, is that why I'm wearing this?"

"Come on, we need to get off the street," I told them. "Work out what to do next."

I dragged the two old men with me, heading for a starbucks. "You can go sit down and hopefully not attract so much attention. I'll get us a coffee." If I have my purse my wallet must be in there. I doubt my credit cards will work but I always have emergency cash as well.

"Not so fast," complained Stefan. "I'm not as young as I used to be." Of course he was looking around at the city instead of paying attention to where he was going, which wasn't helping.

How I am supposed to find four celestials and drag them home when two of my party just got aged into oblivion? This is not going well. And the noise! After being in Midveil for so long I have to wonder how people put up with it. Look at that traffic, I almost forgot what a car looked like. And so many people, where and when are we?

But it got worse. We entered the starbucks and I went up to the counter. "Can I get four medium coffees, or whatever you call medium size around here?" I reached into my purse hoping everything really was still in there. If it wasn't this was going to be a short transaction.

The woman behind the counter stared at me like I had just come back from the afterlife. "Garble garble garble?" she asked me.

"What did you say?" I blurted.

"Garble?"

"Oh, I'm going to kill Michael when we get back." I held up four fingers and pointed to the middle size of cup they had on display. She nodded, understanding this much, and rang me up. I found my wallet, wondered when the heck the price of coffee had gone up so much, and managed to pay without further incident. At least numbers and math still made sense to me, and she accepted my bills. So that hadn't gone crazy since I was last, you know, alive. I carried the coffee to the others and sat down.

"Don't burn yourself, old man," I couldn't help but saying as I handed one over to Stefan.

"I'm not that old," he replied. "I'm only eighty four."

"Coffee!" exclaimed Siew Yan. "I've missed you!"

"Is it just me or is everyone around here speaking gibberish?" Ramesh asked, taking his.

"I couldn't understand the barista, something weird is going on," I told him. "I mean, apart from the obvious." I indicated us in a general way.

"Seems clear enough to me," he said, sipping his coffee. "We're back in the real world, and that means physical law rears her ugly head once again. No offense, physical law. Midveil allows us to change our appearance, but this world doesn't. We're back to being how we left this place."

"Not exactly," Stafan told him. "I was bedridden before my passing. I can at least walk around now. I feel, okay not exactly young but at least better than I was before I died."

"My eyes are up here, by the way," I told him icily. He jerked them up to my face.

"Sorry, it's just..."

"I know you've seen them before on others, people were walking around naked back home. Why the sudden interest?"

"You don't feel it?"

"Feel what?"

"That." He pointed to my chest.

"What?" I slipped the necklace off and held it away from me. Come to think of it, I did feel something coming from it.

"I think it's magic," Siew Yan said. "I feel it too. I think we got so used to feeling it, now that it's gone that concentrated source of it is like a beacon."

"Great, one the celestials will no doubt feel coming as well." I grumped. But there was some kind of energy coming off the orb, I was pretty sure I could close my eyes and point to it. If someone else was holding it, of course. I put it away again. "So we're old again. I'm in my fifties, you two are ancient-"

"Hey!"

"Good thing Siew Yan died young. Wait, that came out wrong."

"Believe me, it was something of a relief. But I have missed my son."

"You had a son?"

She nodded sadly. "And I'm pretty sure trying to contact him would be a big no-no. Can you even imagine it?"

"Yes, let's try to stay away from anyone that knew us in life," Ramesh agreed. "But what about the language thing?"

"Near as I can tell, we came from all over the place right?" Stafan asked. "I'm from Germany, you, India, etc. But we can all understand each other. Stands to reason we're now speaking the language of the celestials. So of course no human can understand us."

"How can that be?" Ramesh asked.

He shrugged. "Ask Michael when we get back. They made us forget how we died, who knows what else they can do to us? It may just happen automatically to souls, and no one ever stopped to think about it because no one ever came back here. Man." He looked around. "I'm back in the world again. That's crazy."

"I'm surprised you're asking that question, Ramesh. After all, you had a celestial put inside you, so you should know anything is possible."

"True," he agreed. "But of the two, I would rather have not understood all of you if Denice could talk to people around here. As it is, how are we going to ask around about these celestials if we can't talk to anyone?"

Maybe this was done deliberately, to actually keep us from talking to anyone? I can't even read that sign over there, it's just gibberish and this seems to be my home country. The others may not realize it but it was more than just speech that was changed. We aren't supposed to be here, after all. "How would we 'ask around' for celestials anyway?" I asked. "They just look like humans."

"I guess," he decided. "What is our plan, anyway? We sort of rushed here but got no real assistance from Michael or Janet. And she clearly can break the rules as she gave you that magic well. She could have outfitted us a little better. I mean she claims to know everything but she didn't say a word about any of this."

"You don't think it was Michael, do you? Trying to get rid of us?" Siew Yan asked.

"But we would be back eventually, and looking for some payback," I protested. And why involve you? Wait, he didn't involve you I did. Maybe he just wanted to get rid of me? But to what end, haven't I been doing what he wanted? I even had people build him a house to live in. A place of his own. Am I never going to get over my suspicion of that guy? Kinda odd to involve celestials from Good Place too, unless they weren't. The train could have gone by, then just come from the other direction once I was there. But would Janet go along with something like that? Plus we have the door control, unless it's not going to work when I press the button because it's a fake? And how did he know I would come here? I mean yes based off past action it's in character for me to rush to do something like this but if he was trying to get me here, it was a risk. I didn't have to go, I could have stayed and ordered others to do it. So figure it isn't directed towards me or if it is, he took a risk of getting someone else and having to think of something else to get rid of me.

"Against a celestial?" Ramesh countered. "I'm half celestial and get flashes of knowledge from that side. I can't imagine what being one for a million years would be like. Besides, how do we know we won't just *poof* if we die here? Are we still souls? Is it Midveil bringing us back? Would we go back there or back home here or nowhere?"

"Let's hope we don't have to figure that out," I told him. "As for a plan, let's review the magic we know and where we might go from here. They're supposed to be close let's hope they didn't get that wrong. Heck, maybe they'll come to us to investigate this." I tapped the necklace.

So having gotten out a pen and making a list on the back of the receipt I got I looked over the list of magic we had access to; Move water, augment skill, teleportation sphere, pocket dimension, withstand weather, distant conversation, save point, illusion, elemental aura, question, measure, telekinesis, manipulate metal, plant growth, manipulate plants, healing, lighting blast, heat material, giant's soul, create fire, manipulate fire, manipulate emotion, move earth, shape stone, phase, sense spirit, and point of gravity.

"Twenty seven in all," I counted. "That's not nothing."

"You know twice as many as us," Stefan complained. "What, do you do nothing but study magic?"

"What else am I supposed to do all night?"

"Maybe have some fun? I mean even I've found someone that doesn't mind that I look like a teenager."

What does that say about them, though? "Studying magic is fun." Wait, if an actual teenager came here and he got together with them… What's the age of consent in the afterlife? How does it interact with the One Law?

"Not as fun as what I'm thinking of."

"Oh, let her spend her time as she wants," Siew Yan said in my defense. "But let's go over these spells, some of them aren't obvious to me. What's a pocket dimension?"

"Hey, that's right!" I snapped my fingers. "If it even works, I've got some books of magic in there. Basically Michael gave me some books on time magic and I put them into a space only I can access. Let's hope I can get them out. Let's further hope I don't have to invoke time magic while we're down here. There's warnings all over that stuff."

"Time magic, huh?" Stefan asked shrewdly. "Is that what the save point thing is all about? There's more spells like that?"

"Yes, it's what you think. But it's a high level spell, I don't want to push it given how little magic is around here. I don't know how long the well will last." But maybe doing it once, now at the start, can save us later? But I would hate to have to relive say two hours if it takes that long for us to mess this up. But then couldn't we just skip those two hours and go directly to whatever caused the issue?

"That's fair."

"Don't go telling anyone time magic exists, by the way. Most with water affinity don't even know. Michael wasn't even going to tell us about it, but wanted a backup when we went to rescue you, Ramesh. I'm not sure who I'm sharing it with at the moment. I need to be able to trust them with it."

"Okay," they all agreed.

"What's this aura all about?" Ramesh asked.

I colored. "Ah, that was just something I was fooling around with. It basically creates an energy field around me that, uh, looks cool. I guess it's water type and would destroy things if I punched them with it going? I never did that, of course."

"I need to get that spell!" Stefan announced. "I guess I do need to spend more time in the library. Denice, you're 20% cooler than I thought, aren't you?"

"Clearly! So what's giant's soul?" I asked, changing the subject.

"That's one of mine," Stefan said proudly. "It makes you stronger and lets you lift more but doesn't change your size. I use it in construction because I'm smaller than anybody and want it to stay that way."

"I see. You learned a spell to manipulate people's emotions?"

"I only use it with consent," he assured us. "Sometimes people get sad, and I help them feel better."

"I see."

"What's sensing spirits?" Siew Yan asked.

"It gives me an extra sense, sort of?" Ramesh answered. "Using it I can tell how energetic someone is. I walked around with it once, Stefan here actually has the most inner power of anyone in Midveil at the moment."

"I always was active as a child," Stefan admitted. "Most kids stop running around like crazy at a certain point but I never did. I was on so many sports teams. Ah, good times."

"And that gravity spell?" I asked.

"Just what it sounds like. I can manipulate gravity, not as good as a wood nature's telekinesis spell mind you. But again used in construction to help lift things into place it's ideal. Basically a zero g spell but on a planet. Actually I would usually work with a wood user because it made their job easier, lifting something in zero gravity instead of one gravity."

Right, all the magic we learned apart from anything we just wanted to fool around with was geared towards helping us make things back home. Metal manipulation to make metal things, earth moving to make foundations or move bricks around, that sort of thing. At least I did pick up the easiest divination spell, even if it only gives yes/no answers. But of course I'm the most handicapped if you will because I will have a limited number of spells I can perform. I have the most need for magic and can do the least of it. Neat! "So does any of this help us?"

"Can you change us with illusion?" Stefan asked. "So we can walk down the street without a cop stopping us to ask what nursing home we just escaped from?"

"That's a good place to start," I decided. "Here, hold this." I handed the necklace to Siew Yan and concentrated. Almost at once as I started making the gestures for the magic I noticed something was different. Energy started building around my hands, the same type as I felt from the necklace, but I hadn't gathered nearly enough as I completed the spell. Ramesh now looked like he was wearing normal clothes, but Stefan was unchanged.

"Well, you got it half right," Ramesh decided, looking himself over.

"There's too little magic here, all right," I told him. "I'm going to have to get you both separately. A pain, to try and concentrate on two spells at once, but I would rather do that and have more magic to draw on in an emergency."

"Better make sure you know how to use this before it gets that bad though," Siew Yan told me as I started the second casting. I nodded, but got the second spell off.

"That worked."

"Actually..." Ramesh said, looking pensive. He brought his hands up and did a spell. "Seemed perfectly normal to me." He looked around. "Yup, Stefan, as old as he is, still has the most 'ki' or whatever you want to call it. The spellbook said different cultures call it different things."

"So do we risk casting a question spell or two?" Siew Yan asked, handing me the necklace back. "Or do we come up with some other plan?"

"Let's talk about possible plans," Stefan decided. "Like, if this was a video game, what would I do? Answer, follow the waypoint." He looked around. "No such luck. Look for the foreboding building sure to house the boss? Again, probably not going to happen."

"Back in reality," Ramesh cut in, "one possibility is simply to try drawing them out. Choose this point we appeared in as the center and walk the streets. We pass by every building, the celestials are sure to notice the orb and come to investigate. After all, they might like more access to magic when they're here."

"Risky," I decided. "We wouldn't really see them coming, they would look like people until they were right on top of us. I don't want to get into a brawl on a city street." Plus they could just run the other way, because the only reason something like that would be here was to look for them. Why risk capture?

"Agreed."

"Hey Ramesh, does your spell distinguish between celestial energy and human energy?"

"It does, actually. Yeah, if I had that spell going I could probably tell."

"Could you use your spell to augment someone's skill to make him better at that? Maybe boost the range or something?" Siew Yan asked.

I shook my head. "Can't use magic to boost magic skills. I tried, didn't work. Some kind of feedback loop, I had to drop it."

"Too bad. What's the range on it?"

"Couple of meters at best."

"So if they're above the second floor in a building..."

"Yeah, not going to be able to tell. Sorry."

"We could call them out!" Stefan realized. "Illusion magic. Make an illusion in the center of town. Something huge, a kaiju like monster. Every human flees the scene while it's speaking gibberish, but you're actually calling the celestials out to give themselves up. They could understand it."

"What's to just keep them from running home after that?" Siew Yan asked. "We wouldn't know, and be stuck here now looking for celestials no longer causing problems."

"Er, nothing? I guess."

"Exactly."

"So what's your great idea to capture them?"

"Uh… similar but without so much panic in the streets. Use illusion to put a message in the sky. Like door malfunction, don't use remote could explode, must discuss immediately. And a big arrow pointing to the top of a building. Make them come to us."

"Hey, now that's not half bad!" I praised. "That's actually the best we've come up with so far."

"Thanks."

We sat and finished our coffee but didn't come up with anything better. I could ask a hundred question spells and maybe narrow down where they were if I had a map, but making them come to us seemed the best way to go. We headed out into the city. I was pretty sure it was New York, there were plenty of high buildings we could choose from, so we did. Heading around back of one and hoping no one was looking in our direction we worked to get to the top of it. Ramesh negated gravity above us and Siew Yan helped control our accent, bringing a large dumpster with her.

"If it gets nasty, I want something to throw," she explained. Once high above the city I dropped the illusion on Stefan and Ramesh and turned my attention to the sky. Another spell later and we had our glowing message hanging there, and we settled down to wait.

I just hope they don't have cell phones or some other way they've agreed to be contacted in the event something goes wrong. But they couldn't have been here long enough for that, right? Good Place would have come as soon as they discovered the rogue portal. I guess we'll just have to hope for the best. And while I see this as "English" and can understand it, I just hope it's actually a different character set altogether and looks like gibberish to those on the ground. We'll have enough panic lighting the sky up like this without people wondering which door they use next is going to explode.

We waited about three hours before the group teleported up to the top of the building with us, looking around to try and find us. Some helicopters had been by, making us hide as best we could but Siew Yan and Ramesh had basically used magic to wield the door that opened to the roof closed so while we heard pounding on it, Siew Yan's telekinesis magic and their previous efforts kept anyone from getting up there. Some people were looking at us from other buildings, nothing we could do about that. They were four regular looking people, all men dressed in modern enough clothes to not be looked at twice. "Get rid of that thing, what are you, nuts?" called one when they saw us. "We're supposed to be keeping a low- hang on. You're humans."

"Can't be humans," said the one next to him. "They've got magic."

"Well they aren't our kind. Hey, humans, come over here!"

"Let's go," I told the others. "Let me do the talking." I have a plan. Michael probably won't like it, but they would probably go along with it. Best if we just keep it simple though and make them deal with me.

"Of course," the others muttered. We stepped closer to them.

"Souls," breathed the third. "Wait, did Good Place send souls back to this plane? Those goody-goodies? I can't believe it. How many forms did they make you fill out for that little privilege?"

"None, we were in a hurry," I told them. "You're the four celestials that came through the unsanctioned door?"

"Obviously," said the first one. "They really just let you come here after us?"

"They seemed to think you could cause some trouble."

They snickered. "Got that much right. So, you're here to take us back then? Think you can manage it?"

"Actually, I've came here to bargain. I want your door." Behind me the other three gasped. Yeah, I figured that would be your reaction. That's why I didn't tell you. "Or at least the plans on how to build our own."

"Wicked little souls, you're worse than us, aren't you? Want to come back to life? Oh, Good Place won't like that. Hell, I'm inclined to say yes just because of how ballsy you demanded it. Really teach those Good Place people a lesson. Maybe Midveil isn't so bad, if it's got people like you in it."

"Never you mind what I want it for," I told them. "The deal is, you go back, we take your door, we tell Good Place the problem is solved and your names stay out of it."

"You don't even know our names!"

"Ah, but I could find out, now that I've seen you. Divination magic."

The one looked back at the others who gave a curt nod. They didn't know I didn't know that spell, and it could probably work any time, asking the magic the identity of each of the celestials I saw on the rooftop one by one.

"Or we could just disintegrate you right now. Wonder what would happen to your essence if we did that!"

"We're not afraid of Good Place anyway," said another. "What are they going to do? Come to our realm and demand we hand ourselves over? Not likely."

I shrugged. "Still, word gets around. You want to be laughed at by your fellow celestials for getting caught in our trap? Forever is a long time to live something down."

"Hummm..."

"Why did you do all this, anyway?"

"We're bored! With so many people off limits there aren't enough souls to torture to go around now. So we figured we would come here, take our frustrations out on the living."

"Of course, I should have guessed." Don't do anything constructive, like clearing areas for them to live while they wait or just torture more one on one instead of in groups like they're used to. Build a portal to the living world and come here. Sure, that's logical. "So, what's it going to be?"

"I like your style, don't get me wrong. But I think we're going to stay here. Get them!"