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27 - Elvira Ernest
🕑 Added 2025-02-14 19:08:52 +0000 UTCLexie's breakthrough came sooner than she had expected. And it began with one special visitor who came to their History and Politics class the next morning.
Elvira Ernest didn't look like she wanted to be there, talking to a bunch of middle schoolers on a Thursday.
In Lexie's opinion, Elvira would rather be getting her eyeballs picked with tweezers.
Not that she looked mad or unpleasant, but she was…fidgety. While Mrs. P. gave her a welcome speech, the tall slender woman adjusted her glasses twice, coughed once, tugged at her sleeves, shifted from one foot the the other and her gaze seemed to skitter around the whole room, actively avoiding eye contact.
And then, when it was finally time to introduce herself, she coughed again and gave a short wave and an unnecessarily detailed speech.
“Hello esteemed children,” she began in a throaty voice. “Or preteens as I suppose some of you might be now. My name is Elvira Ernest, as your teacher mentioned. I’m a scholar-mage at the Arcadia Research College under the Card Magic department, and I’m currently in my third year, which means I’m now working on my focus project. It’s titled, 'Card Mechanics and Interaction with a Mundane system’. Truly a fascinating project, although a little difficult to find volunteers and test subjects for, especially young ones such as yourself.” She paused and frowned as though she sensed she'd said something wrong. “Not that I’m using young people as test subjects. That is highly illegal. While a certain subset of scholars might argue that what we’re doing inevitably involves quite a few children, I would assert that it’s more in the observatory sense. It’s not like we’re cutting open their skull to extract their brains and observe their pathways–”
“Elvira,” Mrs. P’s voice was a little sharp, her smile a little tight as several of the students looked at each other in alarm, especially at the ‘cutting skulls’ comment. “Perhaps you want to get to the point of why you’re here today?"
“Ah yes.” Elvira looked relieved to be given some direction and cleared her throat. “And just to clear up that last point, in case there was any confusion, I would never use young human brains for experimentation. Not just because the college forbids it, and not just because it would be against my personal morals. But also, preteen brains are notoriously difficult to create a baseline or find controls for, so the effort isn’t even worth it. Which is why I've never understood why child sacrifice was such a major feature of some magical cults…but in any case, uh… I’m here to complete my focus project which unfortunately includes speaking to you all today.”
She paused on that, frowned again, and then seemed to notice she’d made another gaff because she hurried to clear it up, gesturing defensively with her hands. “I mean, it’s not unfortunate in the sense that I don't want to speak to you people in particular, but more so that I suppose, I don’t want to be speaking to anyone, not just you. I’m sure you are lovely speech mates but I’m very bad at speaking in large or small groups, and I have no plans on significantly cultivating that skill. So I don’t like to do it often. But I’m here because I have to be.”
One glance at Mrs P.’s unsatisfied look and Elvira seemed to decide that even further explanation was needed. “During our focus year, the college requires a certain number of community service hours, and one's volunteering activity is assigned randomly. Not a very good system I think, because it kind of defeats the purpose of it being volunteer if we're forced to do it, but no one listens to me when making the rules, even when listening to me would make things much easier for them." She sighed. "But, I guess it's fine. As the college’s guidance counselor likes to tell me, ‘Easy isn't always good Elvira. Sometimes doing hard things is better for you, and even if you fail, it’s the effort that counts.’” She shrugs, allowing that sentence to linger before she concludes. “So I suppose that summarizes exactly what I’m doing here. Failing effortfully.”
Elvira ended her speech and the class was silent. Lexie didn't blame them because that was a lot to digest. Plus the question had not been answered at all. Lexie was still somewhat confused as to why the woman was here.
Oblivious to the reaction she elicited, the tall woman nodded her satisfaction and turned to Mrs. P. as though signifying that she’d ended her speech. Mrs. P. gave her a strange look and then sighed in resignation.
“Elvira is here to speak to you about card magic,” she said. “If any of you are considering utilizing card magic in your future careers–”
“We’re not,” Bennie said plainly and she shot him a withering look before continuing.
“–then feel free to ask Elvira any questions you might have.”
“Yes, that’s what I’m here for,” Elvira smiled nervously and bobbed her head. “To answer questions.”
There was a single second of silence, where everyone was kind of confused about what to do next. And then, to no one’s surprise, Bennie stuck his hand in the air first.
Mrs. P. really didn't want to call on him. She glanced at just about everyone else in the class in hope and plea, even as Bennie waved his hand from side to side.
Abernathy finally put a hand up.
“Yes, Abernathy,” she said, relieved.
“I think Bennie has a question, Mrs. P,” Abernathy said, sounding amused.
Mrs. P. gave Abernathy a look and then said in a resigned tone, she finally exhaled. “Yes Bennie.”
“Why is her hair white?” he asked. “Is she old or sick?”
“You don't ask people those kinds of questions, Bennie.” She looked to Elvira. “You don’t have to answer that.”
“Ah, not it’s fine.” Elvira met Bennie’s gaze steadily. “My hair is white because I have Fae ancestry. Small and fairly distant, but there."
That suddenly got a lot of attention in class. Murmurs broke out and some of the kids sat up a little straighter.
“For real?” Veronica asked, her eyes glittering.
“Yes, for real,” Elvira said. “I’m told it’s my great-great-grandfather but I never met him. I do sometimes visit his temple when my family travels to Planet Fae.”
Lexie was also amazed by what she was hearing but for a different reason. She didn't know Fae and humans could have kids. Were the species reproductively compatible?
That was...interesting, although mildly disturbing.
“You go to Planet Fae a lot, huh?" Veronica continued, finally giving the woman her complete attention. "So do my parents. I’ve been there a few times too on vacation.”
“Oh, that’s…nice. I’m there fairly regularly but it’s mostly been for work. You see, with card magic, the Fae have a way of–”
“Which one do you think you'd rather marry,” Diane cut in. “A fae or a human.”
Elvira blinked in shock. “Erm…I suppose I haven’t thought that far ahead–”
"Obviously, she’s going to marry a Fae.” Veronica gave Diane one of her eye rolls. “Fae boys are better than human boys.”
“Hey.” Bennie spun around in his seat, looking incensed. “That’s rude. You’re not allowed to say that. Right, Mrs. P.?”
“But it’s the truth. Fae boys have long hair and pointed ears. Human boys look like boogers.”
“No, we do not! That's de-gog-atory, Mrs P! She’s not allowed to say that.”
“Okay enough!” Mrs P. finally reached the end of the rope. “No more questions about Fae or boogers or anything else that isn't the point of Elvira’s visit. She’s here to talk about card magic. Does anyone have any questions about cards?”
“Who would have questions about cards?” Bennie looked genuinely perplexed by the question. “No one wants to be a card user. It’s like the lamest form of magic.”
"Bennie, just be quiet." Mrs. P. sighed. "Please."
Elvira looked a tad offended at Bennie's statement. Lexie was also offended so much that she stuck her hand up instantly.
“I have a question,” she asked.
Elvira’s pale-purplish gaze traveled to her. "Yes, tiny one.”
“Lexie,” Lexie corrected, not liking the nickname one bit. “Yeah, I was just curious about if you've had any findings so far.”
Elvira cocked her head. “In what sense?”
“Um…” Lexie was aware of all the eyes on her and it made her uncomfortable but she kept talking. "I mean you said that you were researching whether or not mundanes can use card magic, right?”
“Oh no!” Elvira adjusted her glasses. “Although I can see why there would be confusion there, my research is not that controversial. It’s pretty definitive that mundanes can’t use any magic, including card magic.”
"But cards are artifacts. Like potions. Mundanes can use potions to heal themselves. Why can't they use cards?"
"Well potions and cards are fundamentally different things. Potions aren't a form of magic, at least not in the way we consider magic in more recent times. They're medicine made with magic, but they themselves cannot imbue magic on another being, and their mechanism of action isn't magic-based. Cards, on the other hand, are purely magic. Their mechanism is based on magic. Without any internal mana, they simply wouldn't work."
"But the cards contain mana themselves. Would it be possible to make a card with enough mana that they can be used by a non-magical person? At least one with some affinity for magic?"
Elvira thought about it. "I suppose you have a point there. After all, there have been mentions of one or two people who made such a card, but that was a long time ago just after the war with the Guardians. It was a time of turbulence before the system had established the rules of play."
"What do you mean?" Lexie leaned forward in her desk, suddenly very interested in this thread of conversation. "You're saying the system is the reason why cards can’t be used by mundanes?"
"Well yes," she said. "You have to understand that even mundanes with relatively high affinity don't have the pathway components necessary to handle and control mana."
"What does that mean?"
"Well, not to get too deep into pathway anatomy, but there are different nodes and valves in a typical pathway that push mana forward and protect the pathways from rupturing due to mana pressure. Without these, you're at best ineffective at using the mana, and at worst you're risking your pathways and sometimes your life just to use magic. Many a mundane died like that in the past until the system stepped in and reassessed the way card magic worked. So now, they're unusable by mundanes."
"Oh." She'd never heard of that story. Interesting. "And there's no way to add those components to a mundane pathway? How did they even make the mundane-usable cards back in the day?"
Elvira shrugged. "I’m not sure. That knowledge was system-wiped some time ago, so probably only a few history experts know about it. And to answer your first question, the answer is most likely no. Barring some very unethical experimentation, there is no way to change someone's pathway."
"But healers can repair damaged pathways and fortify them for healing too." Lexie had read up a little on healing magic recently. "Does that not mean that mundanes, in theory, can get stronger pathways with some kind of magic?”
“In theory. But in practice, it’s more difficult. You’re right that healers can fortify pathways but they can't put in components that aren't there, and as such, they can't imbue fundamental safety systems that enable card magic to work. The nodes, the feedback protocol, the fundamental connections...you probably have no clue what I'm talking about but all these are important for mana pathways to have. And most mundanes either have incomplete or faulty mana pathways. That makes it more dangerous for them to use mana even if they could, because none of the fail-safes that the cards implement would work."
"Oh." Now, Lexie couldn't help but think about Aiden's card, <Out of Sight, Out of Mind>. It worked on mundanes and he'd never warned her not to let a mundane person use it (even though he didn't want her to necessarily spread the word that she had such a card). So it figured that it was safe for them, if not he would have told her.
This, of course, begged the question: what made the <Out of Mind> card different from all the others? How exactly did Aiden make the card in the first place? How did he ensure its safety? Why did it work better than the other cards that had been made in the past?
Lexie had a feeling that Aiden had created an ingenious, non-typical way of making cards that he'd fashioned after the ancient methods.
But also, she knew that he wouldn't tell her anything about it, at least not anytime soon. He was already resisting giving her more information about pathway structure and was still encouraging her to make slow, measured progress that would have her doing this for at least another year. He was probably concerned that, if he told her too much, she would go off the deep end and become a [Villain] like him.
He didn’t seem to understand that Lexie was a good girl. There was no way she would turn into a [Villain].
But she was also impatient and she wanted to know what she didn't know, now.
“So what is your research about?" Lexie finally asked, because Elvira was still looking at her in a curious, measured way and no one else was speaking up.
"It's about how to design cards in a way for card users to serve a larger mundane population," she said. "As we all know, card magic has rapidly fallen in popularity in the last decade, and developers are concerned that it will eventually become obsolete."
"For good reason," Bennie cut in despite Mrs. P.'s sudden glare.
Elvira ignored him and continued, "But I think that if we can prove more ways in which cards can help users to better serve their mundane friends and family, then it will grow in popularity by at least 23%."
"Great,” Abernathy said drily. "Just what the world needs. 23% more party planners.”
Doyle and Chris snickered and Bennie asked Elvira again about her hair, and the conversation soon returned to Fae Planet. Elvira looked relieved to be leaving at the end of the fifteen-minute session, but even after she was gone, what she’d said still hung in Lexie’s mind.
I should have taken her number, Lexie thought, but she figured she would take it next time. According to Mrs. P., Elvira would be back in a few weeks.
Lexie often thought that there was something familiarly methodical about card magic, almost like it was a computer program or some engineering software.
The way it activated and could be turned off by a feedback loop was the first thing that gave her that notion. There had to be some kind of sensor at both the start and the end of the pathway to be able to shut down the mechanism when it detected something was wrong.
All the things Elvira had mentioned, about nodes and valves and feedback protocols, strengthened this idea in Lexie’s head. Given that card magic restricted the malleability of pathways, it would also seem that these feedback sensors and nodes were baked into the very structure of the pathway and could detect too much deviation which would lead to the mechanism shutting down as well.
So the question now was, “how much was too much?”
And how did the nodes work? What did they detect and how did they do it?
What amount of stimulus would be enough to shut down the entire mechanism and how much could she get away with?
And was there a way to preemptively turn off the feedback loop? Or at the very least use it to her advantage?
All these questions continued to rattle in her mind as the rest of the class droned on. She opened up her notes and penned down, Feedback loop manipulation? Is it possible?
***
Lexie couldn’t attempt it after school, because Aiden unexpectedly came early to pick her up that day.
Recently, her dad had been pretty busy with work so she usually had to wait about an hour or two before he came to get her. She would either spend that hour studying and practicing card magic in class or, if she felt she could get away with it, she would visit a deadroom.
Today she was planning on doing the latter when she got a text from Aiden telling her that he was downstairs.
She quickly packed up her bag and went down to find him at the entrance waving at her.
“Hey.” She smiled even though she was somewhat disappointed that she wouldn’t get to go to the deadroom that day. “What are you doing here?”
"Taking you home, of course,” he said, wrapping his arm around her shoulder when she reached him. He wanted to carry her but she was too old to be carried in public so she shook her head firmly. “I worked like a dog the entire morning so I could finish my quota early. My workmate Eddie is punching me out later. I’ll be covering for him next week as a result. He has a wedding.”
“Why did you leave early? What’s special about today?”
He shrugged and took her hand. “Nothing special. I just figured I haven’t spent much time with you lately, because I’ve been so busy, and I don’t want to fall into old habits.”
“Oh.” Lexie peered at her father as they walked. “You know that I get it, right? I get that you’re busy and stuff.”
“You shouldn’t get it,” he said firmly. “I hate that you have to be so mature and understanding all the time. I’d rather you acted like a kid and yelled at me for being a bad dad.”
“You’re not a bad dad,” Lexie assured him. Aiden might be a lot of things, including a [Villain], but he was also better than most of the dads she knew, including her own.
Lexie felt guilty thinking about her real father like that, but it was the truth. She barely thought about her real parents anymore and she wondered if it made her a bad daughter because, with each passing day, she missed them less and less. Or did she ever even miss them at all? Most of her thoughts regarding her home dimension revolved around her brother and how he was doing. And even with that, she didn't feel the same urgency to return as she'd felt when she got here.
Yeah, I’m definitely a bad daughter. And sister.
Perhaps she would have missed her parents more if she hadn’t had Aiden. If he wasn’t such a solid parental figure in her life.
But he was. So right now, she only missed her brother and Mickie.
She’d stopped reading Logan's texts. The battery percentage of her phone remained the same and there was still no service. But it was sometimes too painful to read her brother's words knowing she wouldn't see him for at least a while.
Maybe forever.
The thought brought a pang to her chest, and she squeezed Aiden’s hand a little tighter. She wondered why the ISTS had given her the phone. To torture her, or as just as a memento from the past? Was that also why they left only Logan's texts behind? Because they knew he was likely the only one she would miss so badly?
Didn’t leaving his texts increase the risk of her true identity being discovered?
“Speaking of special days,” Aiden said, interrupting her thoughts. “Your birthday is coming up, isn’t it?”
She stared at him blankly. "It is?"
“Yes. It’s in a few months,” he said. “Didn’t you wonder why I’ve been working so hard, lately?"
She shook her head.
"I’ve been pulling double shifts because I wanted to get you something nice for your birthday. Or even maybe just take you somewhere, wherever you want. We can go to the antique shop your mother and I used to go to. Or the consignment store you loved in Alberton. Where she bought you that phone from."
"My phone?"
“Yes." He glanced at her and Lexie suddenly realized that the reason Aiden hadn't brought up the phone was because he thought her mother had given it to her.
How convenient.
But was it true? Was that how the ISTS had baked in the phone element? Was she living in a storyline that they could just add to and remove from at will?
This whole thing was giving her a headache.
She needed to find out more about the ISTS along with her card lessons, but she didn't even know where to start.
Start with Aiden.
She glanced up at him, and he smiled down at her. She decided to trust him, but wondered how to start.
"We got a lady at school to talk to us today," Lexie said. "She mentioned something about an ISTS?"
Aiden’s eyebrows furrowed and Lexie's heart skipped a beat. She was suddenly afraid she’d said the wrong thing.
But Aiden only continued by saying, "The Interdimensional Soul Travel System? Like the one in Alberton?"
"It's in Alberton?"
"Yes. Your mother had a friend that used to work there. But she passed away some time ago.”
Lexie’s heart began racing. The plot thickened.
"What do you want to know?" Aiden asked.
"What is it? The ISTS?"
"It's a huge enigma to me, to be honest," he said. "And most of their research is largely experimental but I believe you're supposed to be able to travel to different dimensions with it."
"How?"
"It's hard to explain. Maybe we can check it out when we go to the consignment store."
"Okay," she said quickly with a smile.
Wow. She felt a little stupid for not asking earlier. That was so easy. And no soul termination. Hurray.
But she had to be careful. She couldn't ask too much.
Better she see it for herself.
He gave her a tender, sad look in return.
"We can do anything you want on your birthday," he said. "I have enough money saved up to ensure you have a good time. I know you probably miss your mom...she used to throw the best parties. But since it’s going to be the two of us, I’ll make that day as special as possible."
Lexie's smile turned softer and she wrapped her arm around him, leaning her head at his side. He really was a sweet dad. And he still smelled a little like cinnamon even though he'd been working outside all day.
As they hugged, a stocky, hairy man bumped into them hard enough that Aiden was turned around.
The man snarled first. "Hey, watch where you’re–"
He took one look at Aiden and his face paled. His mouth dropped open and it was like a full-body shudder went through him.
“You,” he whispered.
Aiden raised an eyebrow. “Do I know you?”
The man didn't say anything else. He turned on his heels and ran.
“What was that about?” Lexie wondered aloud as she watched him retreat.
Aiden shrugged. “Who knows? So many interesting personalities in this city. Anyway, we should get going. I’m thinking of roasting up lamb tonight. Would you like that?”
Lexie put the strange man out of her mind for now and smiled at her father. “Yeah. I’d like that.”
