Chapter 13—Snorkackian Code

"You're kidding, right?" said Dean. The other two didn't appear to hear him. Luna was staring at that little kid, the kid was staring at Luna, and at the moment they seemed to forget he was even in the room.

Dean got up from his computer and grabbed a yogurt. When he got back, they still hadn't moved. Dean sighed. Any other day—any other person—and it would be fine, but he didn't want that little kid getting any closer to Luna than he already was.

"Hey."

No response.

"Hey, kid."

Nothing.

"Hey, shortie!"

Ah, dramatic results. Surprisingly dramatic results. Dean would have to remember that the little guy didn't like being called short in the future. Heh.

"Of course!" shouted Luna. She jumped up and slapped her forehead. "CHS! In Sweden! Crumple-horned Snorkacks! It all makes sense!" She turned to Dean, whose heart leaped to his throat seeing her exuberant expression. "Don't you remember? Dad and I went to Sweden a few summers back to look for them!"

Dean nodded. That was before he had…well, back when he thought she was weird.

The kid interrupted. "Did you find any?"

Luna sank back to the couch. "No. Dad said it must have been a false clue or something. We didn't even find a trace of them. They can hide themselves very well, but there are clues that you can find if you know about them."

"What sorts of clues?" asked Shortie.

"They dance," responded Luna, "and leave elaborate designs in muggle corn fields."

"Elaborate designs?"

"Like this," said Dean, eager to get Shortie's attention away from Luna. He quickly clicked on 'image search' and typed in a few keywords into the search box. About 207,000 results, huh?

Shortie looked over his shoulder and gasped. "That one—that one right there! It looks like a transmutation circle!" (a/n static./gif/crop-circle-5.jpg )

Dean clicked on it. "Looks like it's from Wiltshire."

"Maybe it's a message!" gasped Luna. Her eyes widened. "Crumple-Horned Snorkacks are notorious for leaving coded messages!"

The kid squinted at the tiny picture on the screen. "If it really is a transmutation circle I might be able to tell you what its transmutating, but the pictures are too small to tell what the symbols are."

"Well, that's easy to fix," said Dean, glad he could interject his two cents. "I just have to make it bigger."

"Can you do that?" asked Luna, staring at Dean with awe and delight. He felt his stomach twinge and his breath catch in his throat. He nodded.

"See, I click on it like this, go to copy, paste it here, and then I can make it as big as you want. The quality isn't as good, but you should still be able to see what's going on. It's really easy." Dean paused, wondering if he should go for a small (and cheap) jab. Ah, what the heck. "Pity you can't do that with people."

"What did you just say?" growled the little guy.

"I don't know what you're talking about," replied Dean while clicking on a few more boxes. This was fun.

"Look." Shortie pointed at the screen. "There are empty boxes here, where activation symbols would normally be. These…the square spirals. They represent different elements. Usually squares are metals…and those dashed lines. They're for gases, I think. The symbol in the middle, though. I've never seen that before. Normally transmutation circles have stars in the middle."

Dean tilted his head. "They look kind of like wings to me."

"Wings?" Luna leaned forward.

"Yeah, see? These are the feathers right here…" Dean looked at the information on the page. "It says here this circle resembles an Aztec sun stone."

"A sun stone?" asked Shortie.

"Its how an ancient civilization in America told time." The kid still looked confused. "Here, I'll look up a picture." Dean opened a new window and typed in the necessary information.

The kid grabbed his shoulder. Shortie was apparently really strong.

"An eight-pointed star?" whispered the kid. Dean looked over his aching shoulder at the little guy. His face was frightening—wide eyes skimming quickly over a message only he could read.

"I don't see a star," said Luna as she tilted her head to the side.

"Right here. It's only got the points of the star." Shortie pointed at the corresponding place on the sun circle. "Keep this picture up, and the crop circle. I want to copy them down. Do you have paper?"

Dean laughed. "Paper?"

Shortie nodded.

Dean laughed again. He could tell the kid was getting irritated. Dean clicked on a very special button in the upper left corner of his screen. "How about I do something better?"

There was a noise from Dean's room, a thank-zzoop-clunk. The kid's hand tightened on his shoulder, and Luna screeched something incomprehensible, but Dean was pretty sure it was about some sort of lethal creature that only she and her father had ever heard of.

"Relax, guys. It's just my printer."

Luna and Shortie looked at him, confused. Dean beckoned them to come with him. He led them into his room, picked his way through the mess on his floor—thank goodness he always put his boxers in the dirty clothes basket!—and moved some stuff off his desk so they could see the black box on top. "This is my printer. I got it second-hand, and it needs a good kick every now and again to actually work right." Dean banged on the top of it, and with a small grind it started to print.

"That's the picture!" exclaimed Luna.

"That's how printers work, Luna. They don't make the pictures move, though. I don't know the spell to do that yet."

Dean glanced at the kid, who was watching in fascination as more of the transmutation circles were revealed. Looking at them together, Dean had a sudden epiphany.

"Hey, Shortie." The kid tore his eyes from the pages and looked at him.

"Don't call me short."

"Whatever. You said that this crop circle looked like a transmutation circle, right? Just without the star in the middle."

"That's right."

"And this one looks like a transmutation circle with the star, right?"

"Well, not quite. It's got that funny head in the middle that I don't know what to do with. But the rest of it, yeah. It mostly looks like one."

"Well, I've just had a thought. The ancient Aztecs had this legend about where to make their main city, Tenochtitlan. They were traveling and when they got to the right spot they saw their god—an eagle—sitting on a cactus with his wings stretched toward the sun. That's how they knew to build their city there. So, what if the Crumpled-Horned Snorkacks didn't just make one circle with all the secrets to traveling between universes but made a few that you're supposed to fit together?"

The kid's eyes grew wide and he looked again at the pictures.

Dean continued, "Look here. The crop circle has wings—like an eagle—in the middle that led us to the Aztecs. Their sun stone has the eight-pointed star in the outer edges, which would fit in the spot where the wings are in the other one."

Shortie's hands started to shake as he held the piece of paper. "You're right," he whispered. "That's how it's supposed to be. The crop circle represents the physical aspect—the elements required or something. The sun stone is change—you said they used it to tell time?"

"Mm."

"Then maybe…a change in time? Or something?"

"Yeah—or maybe a change in dimensions. Muggles have this theory made by this scientist…Einstein, I think. He did this thing about space and time and how they're kind of the same thing if you're going fast enough. So eight points is kind of like two squares, exactly the same except one is turned. So if your world is like our world except turned…"

"You're so smart, Dean!" Dean barely had time to look up when Luna jumped toward him and latched herself around his neck. At which point his mind stopped functioning and he could feel his cheeks heating up. Jeez, she was short. Her feet dangled a good foot and a half from the floor.

The kid grinned, but Dean didn't really notice. "Well, Dean, you might be useful to have around after all. If you think of any more clever ideas I'd definitely be willing to hear them." He led the way back to the living room.

Dean regretfully unwound Luna's arms from his neck—leaving her there would be too obvious—and followed.

"Well, what do you think we should do now?"

"I think we should go see this Aztec thing," said Luna. "Right after I see if Rosa has anything else to say." She grabbed her yogurt container and headed to the kitchen. The two boys watched her go.

"She really is something else, isn't she," said Shortie.

Dean scowled and turned back to his computer. "Mmf."

The little guy leaned against the armrest. "So…"

Dean looked at him. "What?"

"How come you believe in all the creatures she talks about? The other wizards seemed to think she made it all up."

Definitely not expecting that question. Dean's hand paused over the keyboard. "I don't really believe in most of them," he murmured.

The kid seemed shocked. "Then why do you make her think that you do?"

Dean glared at the miniscule boy that was asking too personal of questions. "Because I do, okay?"

For some reason Shortie grinned. "I don't know what to think of all of it. Some of the creatures, like Rosa, she's shown me. Others…I don't know."

"Then maybe it's safe to say that we may not believe in all the things she says, but we believe in her, so that's enough."

The kid scratched his head. "You're surprisingly deep, Dean."

"And you're surprisingly short, kiddo."

"Don't call me short!"

"Short, tiny, miniscule, little…"

"Do you want to die?"

"Do you really want to go there, shortie?"

"….don't stand up. You're freakishly tall."

"And you're a midget."

"Don't call me short!"

"I didn't call you short. I called you a midget."

"It's the same thing!"

Dean laughed. "How old are you, anyway?"

"Sixteen."

Dean feigned surprise to cover up his elated feeling. He's too young for her! He's too young for her! Maybe he could get along with this kid. Ed. This kid named Ed. "Really? When I was sixteen I was about that tall." He held his hand a foot over the Ed's head.

"If you don't stop it right now, I'm going to tell Luna!"

Dean raised an eyebrow. "You sure you're sixteen? Not six or seven?"

Ed's reply was lost in a sudden shout from the kitchen.

"Dean! Dean! RUN!!"

But it was too late.

A beam of green light shot through the window, hitting Dean right over his heart. Dean felt a brief sense of astonishment as he looked down at his unmarked chest before collapsing in a heap at the feet of the kid he had been mocking just a moment ago.

I know, cliffhangers suck. But don't worry--if there's a cliffhanger, it means there's more to the story!

This one was all in Dean's point of view. It was kind of fun. This was actually a really fun chapter to write, even if it wasn't fun to read. It was a 'figuring-things-out-somewhat' kind of chapter--kind of boring to everyone except the author. Or at least that's what I think. But it had to be done. I had a blast thinking of different things to make into transmutation circles. I went through kind of the same process Ed and co. did!

So, I watched Ouran High School Host Club during the past two weeks. If you haven't seen it, go watch it. It's flippin hilarious. Seriously has something for everyone. Kyouya is mine, though. And HikaruandKaoru. And Mori. You can have Tamaki and Honey.

Yeah.

churu