Magix City Daily

Magix Governor Vows Omega Will Be Destroyed By Spring

by Rusudan of Tvarr

In a conference today, Governor Symonet declared that plans for the imminent destruction of the Omega Dimension have been finalized and will proceed less than five months from now in March. A team of the foremost experts on translocation magic will be assembled to oversee the process of sealing the Dimension into a closed plane for destruction, although who those experts are has not been revealed at this time. It is speculated the group may include the three headmasters of the schools Redfountain, Alfea, and Cloudtower, as well as the head of the Lighthaven monastic order, Father Tristan of Eirene.

This story will be monitored for updates as they unfold.

magix city

magix

No one had asked Roxy to make tea, but she had volunteered almost immediately after she and Brandon had walked through Timmy's front door and the silence had gone on a beat too long.

She and Brandon and Timmy all knew perfectly well that the reason they had just happened to visit him the day after it was announced that there was a date for the destruction of the Omega Dimension was to check on him and see how he was. She also knew that the only reason Brandon had brought her along was to make it seem as though this was a slightly more social visit than it actually was.

But as they had all walked into the living room, Roxy had felt the tension and unsaid things palpably in the room, and she had leapt up from the sofa almost immediately after sitting down and said that she would make tea if anyone wanted it. Both of the guys had said they did, although she assumed it was more to humor her than anything else, and Timmy had thanked her and told her there was tea in the first drawer.

She could have gone back into the other room while the water boiled, but she leaned against the counter and listened to the two of them talking from there. She couldn't exactly hear what they were saying over the sound of the electric kettle, and she didn't really want to.

Roxy didn't even know if Timmy had thought she had always known about what happened or not. But this was the first time she had seen him since she had become unable to go a day without her mind wandering back to those articles and those photos and how Aisha glanced up at the ceiling before finishing her story. What was that Brandon had said? Part grief and part being used to being the smartest guy in the room. Was that really what it was?

It had been nagging at her for days now and she hadn't even known the girl. And Timmy had been her boyfriend.

His kitchen was very neat. Everything was evenly spaced out, lined up precisely, but not OCD. In all the time she had known him, he had always been rather quiet and terse, but polite. According to Brandon, he had some good job doing some engineering thing in Magix. His life did not seem destroyed or in shambles. He seemed like she was doing better than she was, at least.

But she knew from all that she had read about that it had been almost exactly four years since Tecna of Zenith had disappeared and he had searched for her. She had known about this for a few weeks, but to go on believing and believing in something so unlikely for so long?

Well, maybe four years wasn't actually too long. It was only a year longer than she had been in the Magic Dimension, and the past three years seemed blended together and wasted in her memory. She had been astonished at how fast they had passed. She felt like on Earth, every year had been different, stood out; somehow once she had gotten here everything was a rush, and she just stayed the same around it all. She had just felt lost and helpless and miserable this whole time.

If she hadn't seen her mom die in front of her eyes, if there had been any chance or hope that she could have survived...she probably would be holding onto it to. She would probably be obsessed.

She realized the kettle had stopped boiling and she got mugs from the cabinet. Now that it was quieter she could hear Timmy and Brandon talking in the other room.

"I know," Brandon was saying. There was a short silence.

"Are you here because you feel like you have to be, Brandon?" Timmy spoke in a low tone, but he did not seem angry.

"I'm here because we're friends, and—look, Tim, you can't live like this. You don't have any kind of life! There isn't anything but this...this..." Brandon trailed off for a moment. "It is hard to watch because we are friends, at least I think so, and it sucks to watch you not be able to move forward."

"Move forward like you? You won't talk to Sky, you won't talk to Stella—"

"That's different."

"Is it?"

When neither said anything, Roxy picked up a mug in each hand and headed into the other room. Both Timmy and Brandon turned to look at her as she entered, controlled expressions on their faces. "Here's the tea."

She sat down on the sofa next to Brandon, who took his mug from her, and handed the other to Timmy, sitting on a chair across from them.

"Thanks," Timmy said with a tight lipped smile.

"You're welcome."

Brandon looked into the mug as if there was something very interesting at the bottom.

"I used to make tea all the time at my dad's cafe—it was called the Fruity Music Bar. I mean, it still is. They served a lot of different drinks and stuff. It was by the beach—it is by the beach, I mean, still—though, so we didn't make hot tea very much." Why was she still talking? Why had she started talking in the first place? What was she even saying?

"Oh that's nice," said Timmy, nodding.

Brandon looked at her. "Where's yours?"

"...oh." She glanced down at her empty hands like they held the answer. "Uh, I guess I forgot to make any for myself."

He stood up. "No problem, I'll get you a cup."

"Thanks," she said lamely, and he stood up and went into the kitchen, and then she was sitting across from Timmy alone and listening to the faint sound of the electric kettle.

He hadn't touched his tea. She wondered if he even liked tea or was just being polite.

Finally she said, "I'm sorry about what happened. And the news and stuff."

He nodded his head. "Thanks."

She pressed her lips together. She knew that it was absolutely a mistake to say the words that were pounding in her head. She knew that Brandon wouldn't love her asking. But she had to know. Something about this whole thing made her have to know.

"Why don't you think she's dead?"

Timmy stared at her, something like surprise in his eyes. Immediately Roxy was backpedaling. "I'm sorry. I'm sorry, I shouldn't have asked. I know it's—I'm sorry. I just—"

But he sprang back to life, maybe more life than before, shaking his head. "No, it's fine. I just didn't realize—" he shook his head again, turning up his hands where they rested on his lap. "I know it. I just do. I know I'm not a wizard or anything, but I think when it's important enough everyone can feel things like that. That's my unscientific answer." He spoke with feeling, but he was calm and almost subdued. There was something tired in his eyes which Roxy found rather reassuring, more so than if he had looked bright and endlessly optimistic after four years. This was wearing on him, but he still wasn't giving up. Did that count for anything?

"Do you have a scientific answer too?" Did she want him to convince her? Why? And why, why, why did she care so much? She was in danger of damaging pretty much every relationship she had over this.

She put the thoughts out of her mind when Timmy answered. "Strictly speaking, it is possible. There are people alive in Omega now, criminals who were sent down there. When Valtor and the Trix broke out and damaged the planet, it became easier for others, and now the place is nearly overrun."

"But I thought they found her blood," Roxy said uncertainly.

"They did, some of it. A lot of people think there was some kind of injury or something, or a beast or a convict attacked her, but I think she did it herself."

"Like, she tried blood magic?"

He nodded eagerly. "It's very possible. We had talked about blood magic before, about how it was illegal but we knew Cloudtower students practiced it, and she wondered if it could have any application in the fairy world. Maybe she was trying to open a portal."

"Hey, guys—" Roxy turned to see Brandon sticking his head into the doorway, and felt almost guilty, but the look on his face didn't indicate he had heard them at all. "Do you mind if I take a call? It's Codatorta and he never calls unless—"

"Yeah, no problem," Timmy said, at the same time Roxy said, "no, go ahead."

He walked back into the kitchen, and Roxy met Timmy's eyes again. "But you went down there seven times, and you never found her."

Timmy shook his head. "The Omega Dimension is a very strange place. Almost impossible to navigate efficiently. Hard to know where you're going or where you've been. And it's a whole planet, full of caves and valleys and who knows what else. I know for a fact we didn't go everywhere. We didn't even cover the majority of the planet. We just couldn't."

"But..." Roxy wasn't sure how to phrase her next question, but Timmy seemed a lot less delicate than everyone seemed to think. Made a lot more sense, too. "Do you think she's just...alive down there? Living for almost four years by herself? I mean...it doesn't really make any sense."

He paused before he spoke, but then he nodded. "It's not probable, I admit. When you look at just the facts, it's not probable. But it's possible—and—and this sounds silly, but...I know she's alive. I know it. And combined with the facts, I..." he gave a rather humorless laugh. "You know, she would never agree. She would look at the facts and argue against it, say the probability was too low." He glanced down at his hands. "But I can't just...not know it."

"Why doesn't anyone else think so?" Roxy asked. "You don't sound like a basket case. Uh, not that anyone said you were a basket case, I just mean..."

"Eh, that's kinda what they think," Timmy said, but he didn't sound bothered. "They're pretty good friends to keep me around even if they think I'm a basket case. And I understand. They had to live their lives and to do that they had to move on."

"But you haven't."

"But I know for sure," Timmy said. "And they don't. And if you don't, it looks like a no-brainer. I'm not mad at them. Like I said, I can understand them. Sometimes..." he looked away, a darker expression coming over him. "I won't pretend it's always easy." There was a slightly uncomfortable silence. "I'm aware that this upsets them because they're sad, too, and because they care about me and think I'm hurting myself more. But...I just know she's out there. And I can't stand there and not do anything about it while I'm so sure."

"So what are you doing about...the news?" She asked somewhat timidly.

He suddenly looked more tired than he had a moment ago. "I..." he glanced down at his hands. "I haven't been pushing to go back there the past almost three years because I've been trying to fix what went wrong on our last searches. I've been using data from previous trips to map out the entire planet and track my progress as well. With better organization there's a better chance of covering more ground." He seemed about to continue, but then he blinked and looked at Roxy. "Why are you so interested? If you don't mind me asking." Suddenly he looked more tired than he had before.

Roxy felt bad before she even started talking. "I just...when I heard about it, I..." she looked down at her hands in her lap. "It stuck in my mind."

He nodded, but his expression didn't change, and he looked almost unconvinced. She couldn't stand the silence that stretched between them. And Timmy was almost a stranger. Brandon's friend who she saw rarely. Maybe that was why the words started tumbling from her lips.

"I never gave my dad his memories back."

"I'm sorry?" He furrowed his brow.

"After Bloom and the others freed me from the Wizards and...everything happened...well, Morgana and my dad had been married before he lost his memories of her. And with the Wizards dead Bloom said I could remove the enchantment. And I know how. I could restore his memories if I wanted. I could have done it three years ago when I came back to Earth. But instead I just explained to him about being a fairy. And I left for Alfea, and I try not to come back for very long before I'm back here because I...I just can't stand to be around him, knowing what I did.

"But if I gave them back...then I would have to tell him that his wife is dead. That she died fighting against the Wizards for me. Trying to save me. That it's my fault. And..." and it hurts enough to hate myself for it. I can't let my dad hate me for it, too. And why would I let him suffer? He doesn't know now. That's better. I wish I didn't know.

The inside of her throat felt uncomfortably hot as she took a breath and realized she was embarrassingly near tears. They were just behind her eyes. She had been looking at the floor, but now she looked into Timmy's face, and it was solemn and thoughtful. He had been listening to her with consideration but not pity. She had said something she had never said aloud before, the secret shame she had carried with her for years, and she still hadn't explained herself right.

She swallowed. "Being kidnapped by the Wizards, being trapped in the Black Circle...fighting them after Bloom and the others freed me...Mor—Morgana dying, and telling me she was my—" Roxy avoided her voice catching on the word mom by not saying it at all, pressing her lips together. "I don't think my life is ever going to be..." ever going to be good again. How were those things not the defining moment of my life? How can I live at all without being the girl who those things have happened to? I wanted a normal life and now I can never have it because I will always be the girl who's afraid of the dark, who can't use magic or live on Earth. Something of me is still inside that Black Circle even though it's gone. I can't get it back. I can't move on. How am I supposed to move on from that? What am I supposed to do for the rest of my life? The thoughts came fast and painful like ripped off bandaids. When she spoke again it was haltingly. "I want to believe that something that...big, and terrible, and life-ruining can happen and have it not be the end, I guess."

"I didn't know everything was that bad for you," Timmy said quietly, and she could only nod, trying not to look too pitiable.

"Yeah, I...the Wizards snatched me right from Earth before I even knew I was a fairy. Apparently I was only in the Black Circle for a couple months before Bloom and her friends got it away from them and found me. But it felt longer." She shook her head. "It's okay, though. It's fine." She tried to look normal. His girlfriend was gone, after all, and all things considered probably never coming back, which was way worse. "I hope...I don't know. That you get back there before they shut down the planet? Gosh, that's such a dumb thing to say. I'm sorry." There wasn't a phrase you could put on a card for that sentiment. It seemed painfully trite.

He recognized her stumbling and nodded. "Thanks. I hope so too." His eyes were always a little bit faraway. Roxy wondered if he was always thinking about this on some level, always trying to figure out how to get the girl he loved back home. "All I know is that if they destroy the planet, and I haven't found her—I know I'll feel it then. I'll feel her die. And I'll know it was my fault, in a way." He shut his eyes, and when he spoke it was softer. "I can't imagine what my life would look like after that."

While Roxy was thinking of what to say to that, Brandon came back in, and she almost jumped.

"Hey, guys, we actually have to go. I need to be back early for some midterm prep." He didn't go past the doorway, and Roxy guessed he couldn't have heard their conversation, but she figured she'd find out as he drove her back.

Timmy stood up and she did too. "Thanks for coming," he said.

"No problem, man."

"You should talk to Sky, at least." Evidently Timmy didn't want to be the only one in the room getting a lecture.

"Sky and I don't really have anything to talk about," Brandon said with the set-jaw look he always got when he talked about Sky.

"Yeah, you say that." Everyone was heading towards the door at the same time. "Bye, Roxy. It was nice to see you."

She had regarded him differently ever since learning about the whole Tecna thing. He seemed more like a real person now, at least.

"Sorry for leaving you with him when you guys don't really know each other," Brandon said as they drove back. "Was it awkward?"

"No," Roxy said, and then looked out the window for a while. "Timmy really wants you to talk to Sky, huh."

"Yeah. I dunno. We were, uh, best friends at school. I think a part of him wants everyone to be good with each other again. So it feels more like...I don't know."

"Did something bad happen?" She had known that Sky and Brandon were friends, same as everyone else. But she didn't know what had actually happened. That was becoming a recurring theme in her life.

"This isn't one of those things where..." he cut himself off, never taking his eyes from the road. He was conscientious like that. "I don't know if you knew I was once Sky's royal squire. When we were in school. That was fine, but after school he was trying to get me to take another position in the royal guard, and I had always thought that was where I wanted to end up. But by the time we got out of school I kind of wanted an identity outside of Eraklyon and the whole royal family. So I quit and Saladin up on his offer of teaching here. Sky didn't understand."

"That's it?" Roxy couldn't stop herself from sounding incredulous. "I mean, that doesn't sound really bad."

"It isn't. Like I said to Timmy. We just didn't really have anything else to say to each other."

Roxy nodded, and then changed the subject. "I can't believe I have to take a magical reality chamber midterm again this year. I barely scraped by in the group exam freshman year."

"I'm sure you'll do good," he said, which was optimistic, considering she had never done 'good' at Alfea, ever.

"We'll see. I'm already a remedial student. Like, what, will they keep me back again?" She was joking, but it was because she wanted to pretend like that was unlikely, when in reality it was the most probable outcome.

"You've studied, right?"

"Yes." Only it wasn't the knowing, it was the doing.

Roxy returned to an empty room at Alfea and studied for the rest of the evening, but more often she found herself just staring at the wall, her eyes trailing off from the page.

Indigo returned to the dorm before dark and they exchanged a few words. Roxy thought about calling Brandon, but she didn't, and instead she got ready for bed. Indigo did, too, and spent some time on the computer in her pajamas. Roxy flipped through a magazine but couldn't bring herself to care about any of the stories. She heard the television in the other room; it was either Nephele or Dolley, their suitemates who had the room opposite theirs. Their fifth suitemate, Princess Aspicia of Clystra, was very social and it was not unusual for her to come in after curfew. Like Indigo, Roxy wasn't really friends with any of them, though they were all nice to each other. She was aware it was weird to have her as a roommate.

Indigo went to bed early; eventually the television quieted and she was pretty sure Nephele and Dolley had gone to bed, too. Roxy climbed into bed herself and pulled the covers up to her chin, and shut her eyes very tightly. She didn't go to sleep, though. She just let her thoughts weigh on her.

As a remedial student who had not yet gotten her Enchantix, she was going to have to take a midterm exam in the magical reality chamber—alone, this time, and not in a group like she had freshman year.

She knew she was going to choke. In situations like that, her magic came in frightened, imprecise starts; she couldn't control it or summon it like the other girls could. Maybe it was because she had been raised on Earth—but so had Bloom, and Roxy had seen books fly into her hands and doors swing open behind her like it was the most casual thing in the world.

Roxy knew the words, the actions. She had memorized them weeks ago. And she was going to choke. She knew it. Probably Professor Palladium and Headmistress Faragonda and everyone else knew it, too.

The lights in the hall, visible from the windows she could see from their room's own, flickered out to indicate that all students were meant to be in bed. She waited to be absolutely sure that a Indigo was asleep.

After a while she heard the main door open and jumped, but quickly recognized the voice of Princess Aspicia, presumably on the phone. Then she heard the sound of Aspicia tripping over something, as she always did when she came in way past curfew, and a quieter, "dammit! No. I've got to go. My roommates are all asleep. I'll call you back tomorrow." She heard the door to Aspicia's room open and then shut again.

Roxy lay in the dark, her eyes wide open, pressing her back deep into the mattress and generally trying to alleviate the unsafe feeling she always got in the dark. It made her feel claustrophobic. Like she was back in that horrible place—

No. She wasn't going to think about that. She grabbed her phone, which was under her pillow, and turned on the flashlight. Just the mild illumination of her surroundings made her feel infinitely better. She breathed a sigh of relief, knowing she didn't have to be too secretive. Indigo always was asleep by ten thirty, and it was midnight. Propping the phone up to see what she was doing, Roxy leaned over to take her box off of her beside table. It had used to hold a pair of shoes, but now it held several crystals and stones and a couple of charms, accumulated over the years. She been doing this so long it only took her a few minutes to set the stones where they needed to be. There were two on her nightstand—one to ward off danger, and one to ward off nightmares—and three under her pillow—two against nightmares and one for sweet dreams. She set two under her bed, both for peaceful sleep. She hung her four protection charms on each bedpost, and one in the center of her headboard. Also in the box was a piece of notebook paper on which she had written several different protection spells she had found, and now she whispered them as though they were bedtime stories, having committed them to memory.

It was not exactly the most calming nighttime ritual, but she always felt significantly less jittery after all her protection spells and wards and charms were in place. She knew not everyone agreed on how much they worked, if at all, but it was better than nothing. No one had ever attacked her here, and regardless of whether that was the charms or just luck, or Alfea security, she wanted to keep it like that. Likewise, she wasn't sure if it was psychosomatic, but she felt like her dreams were worse when she didn't have her crystals.

With everything in place, she carefully lay back down in bed, the flashlight still glowing in her eyes. In all honestly, she wished she could just keep the lights on at night. But that would make her an even crappier roommate. She also knew that if she had insinuated she wanted one, Alfea would have given her a private room. It made sense, not to subject anyone else to living with a crazy girl. But she doubted being alone would be less scary than being in the dark, and it was sort of comforting to have another person in the room, even someone she didn't know too well like Indigo. At the same time, though, it meant she had to do her protection spells much more secretly. They would look at her like she was a freak if they knew all the stupid crap she had to position exactly right in order to get at least some sleep.

As she lay there, a wave of fatigue swept over her, as though the crystals and charms signaled to her subconscious that it was time to sleep. She yawned and reached out for her phone, trying to close her eyes at the same time she turned off the light, hoping to miss the worst part of being in the dark, and that was being plunged into blind blackness.

Eventually she fell asleep and didn't dream at all.

It had taken Timmy approximately three and a half years to access Tecna's personal data centers and computer files. He had been working on it for exactly that long—Zenin tech was the best, and she had personally made it better. There weren't any open ports or obvious weaknesses he had been able to exploit to get access. Even worse, her system was one that heuristically evolved with each attempt to attack it—learning from every attempt and more aggressively shutting him out. It had taken much trial and error and careful planning before his program had been able to overcome hers, especially since hacking was something she had always been more interested in than he was. Engineering was more his strong suit.

But now he could see all of them, and ever since then he had periodically combed through hours and hours of projects, programs, and plans searching for something that could help him.

In the back of his mind he wondered if it wasn't just something else he could focus on to feel as though he was doing something when in reality he was doing nothing—nothing that worked, anyway.

One document was titled Friday 18:00.

He opened it, scanning the words.

Place: Downtown Magix [wide array of activities, able to have private conversations]

Time: Friday 18:00 [neither of us will have to be back early, in time for curfew]

• optimal length: 2.5 hrs

Wearing: dress with cutout, green jacket, sneakers with white laces

If conversation stops—

new Blasterplan levels — what does he think?

ask about family

plans for summer

tell funny story [when Musa knocked that plant off the terrace last week?]

Topics to avoid—

too much about computers — will lose track of time and then he won't want to go out like this again

did he ever date anyone before this? — awkward question. do not ask. find out another way.

Variables—

weather; if it rains we'll have to stay in one building, might cut time short

will we kiss? ; if he does not try I shouldn't either (Stella says)

he is late/he does not come [very unlikely]

This wasn't a program or a spell she had been working on. She had made a plan for their first date.

He remembered, of course. He had a very, very good memory, and even if he didn't, the evening had been important enough he wouldn't have forgotten. It was shortly after the (not particularly relaxing) vacation that had earned her her Charmix. He had been super nervous, made more so by his conviction that she wasn't nervous at all—but she had practically written code for the ideal date. He knew the more she cared about things, the more she planned them.

She hadn't really needed the lists, anyway, because the conversation never stalled. He had kissed her before he dropped her off at Alfea on his bike. He kept smiling like an idiot underneath his helmet the whole drive back to school.

Now he realized he had been biting the inside of his lip hard enough that his jaw hurt a bit. He took a breath.

He really missed her.

But he couldn't just miss her without also being very, very aware of just how...absurd—in a sad way, but still—it was that he was still doing this. Sometimes he would get into his head too much and forget that everyone who knew he hadn't yet just accepted what the rest of them had thought he was insane. And it wasn't that he doubted it. It was that he didn't doubt and he knew he should.

Recently there had been a moment of grim realization as he had written the date on something—that with the fourth anniversary of her disappearance, he had searched for Tecna longer than he had known her.

But he had meant what he had said to Roxy today. He knew she was alive. He knew it as soundly as he knew any truth; he knew it in his bones and in the bottom of his soul. And knowing that, he couldn't just live his life and not do anything about it.

And that made him a failure, because he wasn't smart enough to do anything about it, and he had been trying for nearly four years now.

He didn't really waste time trying to imagine what her current situation was. He didn't have a good answer, he only knew that she was alive still. But the fact remained that even if he found her tomorrow, he had no idea what that meant for the future. What she had been through. What she would do.

It had been implied and then strongly suggested that out of grief and a lack of closure he was perhaps holding onto an obsession more conceptual than personal; he was holding onto the idea of Tecna. But he didn't think that was true, because he knew, just as sure as he was about everything else, that he wasn't looking to pick up where they had left off. He loved her. He kind of doubted he would ever stop. But it wasn't like things were just going to go back to normal, he understood that very well—and he didn't care. He wanted to find her because he didn't want her to be lost anymore.

He put a lot of effort into appearing well-adjusted. His friends didn't appreciate all the trouble he went to, but then they were the only ones he continued to discuss this with, even though their discussions had become more like arguments in the last year and a half or so. He had intimated to his parents that he had just about moved on. They had been worried about him when he had barely made it out of school—but he had graduated and gotten a good job, as a weapons engineer in Magix. He kept to himself the fact that he could have advanced long ago, or even quit and gotten a contract with a military like he had meant to when he went to Redfountain, but it was easier to stay where he was so people didn't worry about him and spend most of his time working on this.

With a sigh he leaned back in his chair and tried to decide how much later he planned to stay up. He didn't sleep very much at the moment.

At least a bit longer, it was only a bit after midnight. But he was getting distracted. He didn't need to be thinking about everything just now—it had been Roxy's questions, probably, that were making him so contemplative.

He hadn't known everything that had happened to her when she was kidnapped by the Wizards of the Black Circle—he hadn't known very much about the whole thing, really, only that once they had started trying to take over the Magical Dimension, having conquered the Earth fairies, they had made the mistake of attacking Eraklyon, and from there Bloom and Sky and then some of the others were on their case. (It wasn't the Winx Club, though. After Tecna was gone, it wasn't the Winx Club ever again.)

He couldn't recall having talked to Roxy for more than a few words ever before. She had always been the girls' friend, and then Brandon's girlfriend (he couldn't help but find it a little weird, but maybe that was because he had been used to seeing Stella and Brandon together since their freshman year.) But her eyes had been almost pleading today, like she was searching for a reason to believe him.

It was almost novel to imagine that someone might believe him.

But he was still wasting time. He straightened in his chair and exited out of the document which had been softly glowing on his screen the whole time. He figured the topography of the newest section of Omega he had pieced together through location trackers and data from guard ships was finished rendering, but he clicked aimlessly through the next few files anyway. There were a few notes for school, the prototype of a spell to clear out a digital imp virus the Cloudtower students had cooked up as a prank that had been passing through Alfea computers sometime sophomore year...

He was about to give up on the notes for the night when the title of the next file caught his eye.

Upgrade: Magic Signature Tracker (Trix?)

Objective: to increase range/specificity of current magic signature trackers by widening scope and increasing power/accuracy. If Trix are hiding on a planet should be able to find specifically them

incorporate spell into planetary scanning tech (issues: not specific enough?)

From there the notes spiraled into increasingly experimental ideas, with arrows arcing neatly from point to point. Occasionally something had been crossed out. Diagrams had been sketched.

He had abandoned his own signature tracker pretty early on in the search because it hadn't been helping. He suspected Omega was messing with it, plus the difficult surface of the planet was an issue, too—but he had been working on something he felt might stabilize the tech on the surface. And her ideas for the sensory system were different—and good. Workable, even. Especially when combined with his mapping out of the whole planet beforehand...

He felt a rush of inspiration, of understanding, that he hadn't felt in a long time. He pulled up his own work to compare it alongside. Maybe Tecna was rescuing herself after all, from years and planets away. If anyone could do that, it would be her.

The next day was a reading day. Roxy had discussed maybe getting lunch with Musa, who only taught music classes and thus did not have to do too much in the way of midterm prep, but they hadn't agreed on anything concrete, and now Roxy wasn't really sure what to say to her. They hadn't really talked since Aisha's party, and Musa acted totally normal, but Roxy wasn't sure if she could.

She had kind of sworn to herself that she wasn't going to think about the Omega Dimension thing anymore. She only had a couple of friends, and if they stopped liking her she didn't know what she was going to do.

"That's what I told him last night! I literally said—" Aspicia was coming down the hall, speaking animatedly into her phone. She was pretty and bright-looking: terra cotta skin, bright blue eyeshadow almost to her brows, gold tinsel extensions in her long dark hair. She was the fairy of serpents and had always been friendly to Roxy when they happened to see each other. "Yeah, I know. I'll talk to you later, girl. Love you." She finished her conversation and started lifting up books and sweaters around the sofa. "Roxy, you haven't seen my purse anywhere, have you?"

"No. Sorry." Roxy stood up because she felt awkward sitting and watching Aspicia search. "What does it look like?"

"Mmm...black. And green."

Roxy glanced under the coffee table and spied a handle. "Is this it?"

"Holy Dragon, you're a lifesaver." Aspicia took the little bag from her, opened it, and then looked back at Roxy, eyebrows raised. "Oh my gosh, I totally forgot. I have something for you."

Roxy stood bewildered as she dug in her purse. They were friendly but not friends, same as Roxy was with her other suitemates. But when Aspicia glanced at her, her golden eyes were serious and a little conspiratorial. "Here you go." She handed her a package loosely wrapped in pink tissue paper with the logo of some store. A present? Roxy frowned slightly, glancing at Aspicia as she opened it.

It wasn't a present, it was a canned charm in a plastic package. It looked a bit like a shiny plastic coin. The writing on the package said, Holds up to three spells! Easy, convenient, and fast! Just snap it in half to release YOUR magic!

Her expression must've shown her confusion because Aspicia quickly said, "it's for your midterm. You said you were worried about the practical portion in the virtual reality chamber. I know a girl last year who passed all her exams, even though she was absolutely terrible at any attack spells, because she used this and so she did like six perfectly, and she got full marks." She gave a half smile. "And no offense, but you look like you've been having a hard time recently. I thought you could use it."

Roxy felt herself smile and wished she was alone right now. "Thanks, Aspicia."

"Anytime, girl."

Roxy walked to her room, thankful Indigo was out right now and hoping that would continue for a while. She wanted to have a good nervous breakdown without having to explain, or worse, just have her roommate come in and have to find her freaking out. It wasn't Indie's fault she was stuck with the crazy girl from Earth this year.

She had never been the type to cheat on a test, but now she was strongly considering it.

Why not? She was literally failing most of her important classes. She kind of needed to do okay on the midterm or she didn't know what was going to happen. And she couldn't fail Alfea. She was twenty years old. On Earth she was a high school dropout; the week before her sophomore year was when she was taken, and she had never returned to school and enrolled in Alfea a few months later. What was she supposed to do with that? This was the only option.

But she sucked at it. She just sucked.

Taking a deep breath she turned the charm over in her hands. If she put her own spells on this, it wouldn't really be cheating. Well, it would in the sense that the test was supposed to measure decision making under pressure and how well you could do magic in weird situations, but...with enough practice she could do a decent spell, she just needed more chances than the midterm provided.

That was justification. What was the point of that? It was cheating. She was a cheater.

Roxy blinked as she continued to stare at the little heart shaped chip. She hadn't realized that she had already made her decision, already resigned herself to this thing that she would've found quite morally repugnant a few years ago, but she supposed she just had. And she didn't even really feel bad? She felt a bit sad that she didn't care, but other than that she felt pure utility. She didn't really have any other option. It wasn't like she had forgotten to study or was doing other things. She just really really sucked at magic and the only way for her to have any kind of future was to suck less.

She took the charm out of its packaging and started reading the instructions.

a/n: hmm two updates in the same year seems pretty good to me lol

seriously though, thank you all so much for all the love you have given a thousand winters so far. seeing your thoughts always reminds me to keep updating, and to be honest this is one of my favorite things I've ever written, so I really want to finish this story out. please do keep letting me know what you think! i just finished my senior college thesis and i plan on getting a lot of this story done over break. :)