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Chapter 5 - All Things Seen and Unseen
Mirana hid in a corner and wished she could disappear.
No, she did not want to disappear. Disappearing was what had gotten her into this ungodly mess. Disappearing had been the bane of her existence for all her life, and just now she was thoroughly sick of it. A few hours ago, had one given her the option, she would have gladly seized on a different option: to never disappear again, to live her life among kind people who saw her and listened to her and truly desired her company. She realized now that she would have been perfectly happy if things had gone on that way for the rest of her life. She did not wish to disappear now.
She wished she had never been born.
I'm a failure, she told herself miserably, curling into a ball and sobbing against her knees. I've failed in my duties as an Invisible. I'm not even one of them anymore. I'm nobody now. Nobody! I'm worse off than when I started. I can't even protect Pax and Lux from a distance, anymore...
On and on she berated herself, scolding herself for being selfish enough to actively seek out the companionship of the Seen. No Invisible behaved that way. Why should she think she was special? Now someone else would be assigned to her case, and she wouldn't even be allowed to watch from the sidelines anymore.
She was roused from her miserable musings by the feeling of a wet tongue on her cheek and tiny claws pricking at her shoulders. Critter was doing his best to cheer her up. She tried to brush him away, but he was perched on her back, and she couldn't reach him to dislodge him. He continued his industrious licking of her face and ears until she was forced to laugh in spite of herself at the tickling sensation. It came out as a choke and a hiccup, and she had to stop a moment to catch her breath. By the time she could breathe normally again, she found the krillip sitting in her lap, gazing at her with a baffled expression, as if it couldn't begin to comprehend why its human companion was carrying on this way. She looked into his innocent black eyes and felt the beginnings of a smile tugging at her lips.
"Well, at least you're still here," she said. "Thanks for helping me, Critter. If it weren't for you..."
If it hadn't been for the krillip's timely interference, the Viewer would have taken her memories. Was that really a good thing, though? She wouldn't be feeling this unhappy if she could no longer remember her failure. Maybe that would have been the better path... but in her heart, she didn't believe that. She knew too well what it was like to be forgotten by people she loved and trusted. Pax and Lux trusted her, and she would not forget them, no matter what! She clenched her hands in renewed determination, and felt the solidarity of her magical staff in her hand. She raised it and watched the bright Lumarian sunlight glitter off its jeweled tip.
"And why shouldn't I still watch them?" she wondered. "I'm really independent now. I don't have the Viewer breathing down my neck anymore... not that he did much breathing to begin with... but he can't tell me what to do, now! I can talk to them both if I want to - and I can give Vox a little comeuppance," she added as an afterthought. There had been rules about that sort of thing, but if she was going to become an outcast, she might as well do it with some style.
The krillip barked, prancing around excitedly. Mirana got to her feet.
"Okay," she said. "That's it. Find them for me, Critter. I'm not hiding anymore!"
The krillip yipped again and scampered off. It stopped a moment, sniffing the breeze - and then took off in a direction opposite from the way they should have gone to reach the Cosmic Light headquarters. Mirana felt a pang of concern. Had something happened while she'd been away? Could anything happen in that little time? She answered herself instantly: in the life of a superhero, of course it could.
She rushed up the city streets in no danger of being seen - because there was nobody there. The irony of the situation made her giggle nervously. Now that there were no more consequences for being seen, there was no one to see her! All was ominously quiet. It was only distantly that she heard crashes and crunches that made her think things were not as they should be. The krillip was acting nervous, something she did not ordinarily associate with the placid little creature. A ruff of fur stood up around its back, and it ran back and forth with a speed that surprised her; he was usually such a sleepy little thing. Now he dashed ahead, chattering wildly, and then ran back to Mirana's side, urging her forward.
So intent was she on following the krillip that she was not paying much attention to the road she was walking on - at least, not until she had tripped over something. She fell face forward, grazing her knees on the stone pavement. As she attempted to climb back to her feet, she heard something behind her clatter. Something metallic was lying on the road. Puzzled, she sat up and looked around. It was a gun. The krillip ran over to it, running its wet nose up and down the barrel and whining.
"This is Pax's," she said. "But where is he?"
She looked around. The earth was covered by a black stain like old blood. Something about it made her insides prickle.
In a flash, she was on her feet again, carrying her wand in one hand and Pax's gun in the other. Whatever had hurt her friend was going to catch it from one or the other as soon as she caught up with it.
Mirana raced up the block and rounded a corner, following the trail of black sludge. There it was, at the end of the street - a massive, sluglike form, carrying a limp body in either claw. Mirana recognized Pax and Lux's color-coded uniforms even from a distance.
That's odd. What does it want them for?
The girl shook her head - there was no time to worry about that now. What was important was that they were both still, apparently, in one piece, and perhaps still alive.
"Hey, you!" she shouted at the top of her lungs. Her voice felt creaky; she couldn't recall ever actually yelling like this before. "Put my friends down, or you'll have Mirana Sidestep to answer to!"
There was a moment of silence, and Mirana felt a weird gathering of tension around her, a shifting of powers. Even an Invisible could be seen if she called attention to herself, and right now, Mirana was putting all her strength into being Seen.
She was. The monster turned around slowly, its warped face registering confusion as it searched for the source of the voice.
"That's right, ugly, I'm talking to you!" Mirana shouted. She hefted the gun. "Put them down right now, or you'll feel what this can do!"
The monster hesitated. Apparently, it wasn't particularly worried about what she could do with the gun.
"All right, then - you asked for it!"
Mirana flourished her wand and said the words of invocation. Instantly, Pax and Lux fell out of the monster's hands as they suddenly weighed several hundred pounds more than they had originally. As soon as they were free, they drifted lightly back to earth. Mirana smiled slightly, proud of herself for pulling off a complicated maneuver so well. She had never learned to handle guns, anyway. She hurried to Pax's side and started shaking him. He stirred, coughed, and gasped as he tried to fill his lungs again. Nearby, Lux was starting to come around, moaning slightly.
"Get up, get up, get up!" Mirana urged, tugging at Pax's arm. "You've got to get out of here!"
Pax opened his eyes, and a look of wonder crossed his features as he realized just who had come to his rescue.
"Mirana! So you did come! I was afraid something had happened to you," he babbled.
Lux shoved herself to her feet. "Quit acting like a lovestruck idiot and get moving!"
The two of them staggered to their feet and made a run for it. Mirana tossed the gun to Pax, who grinned his thanks and tossed off a few parting shots at the monster. The others were forced to admit that, for someone who didn't have much real battle experience, he had an excellent running shot. The monster bellowed and clawed at its face as the beams of pure blue light struck its face. Lux just scowled and muttered something about why his attacks had to work and not hers. The three of them found safety of a sort behind the remains of what had once been a general store.
"Are you both all right?" Mirana asked.
"I'll be fine in a minute," said Lux. She held a hand to the back of her head and winced as her healing magic flared up. "I took a bad knock to the head, and a few other bumps and bruises... Are you all right, Pax?"
"I'm a little winded," said Pax. "Don't worry, I feel fine. How about you, Mirana? I was worried when you didn't come..."
"I ran into a spot of trouble," she admitted. "It's all right, though. It's not your problem. What matters is, you're safe now."
"Vaguely," said Lux.
Pax rolled his eyes. "You're so cynical. Things will be fine, now that Mirana is here to help us."
"I wish I had your faith," said Mirana. "But I guess you're stuck with me until someone better comes along."
"What do you mean, 'someone better'?" Pax asked. "Are you in trouble with your boss?"
Mirana stared at the ground. "Well, I've been dismissed. But I don't guess the Viewer has had time to assign someone else to your case, so until they get here... I'll do what I can. I still have my wand, even if he took my amulet..."
"We'll need all the help we can get," said Lux.
"I can see that," said Mirana, anxiously eyeing the monster, which could still be seen in the distance, searching for them.
Lux shook her head. "Not that. I mean, our powers have fizzled out."
"What? How?" asked Mirana. "That shouldn't happen."
"How do you know?" Pax asked, interested.
"I've studied how these things work. It's part of my training," said Mirana. "Those powers were embedded in you - they're linked to your very life-force now. As long as you're living, they should work, unless someone... removes them... Oh, dear."
"What's wrong?" asked Lux. "What are you thinking? You know something!"
"Well, it's more like a suspicion..."
"Tell," Lux said.
"All right." Mirana took a deep breath. "There are only two ways your powers could be removed. One is if someone physically removed the chip from you. The other is if your powers were drained little by little by a magical object. Of course, for that to work, the object would have to stay near you for an extended period of time. Such a thing would be very awkward to do without being noticed... unless you had an invisible person following you around to keep it close to you."
"Uh-oh," said Pax. "You mean, you think...?"
Mirana flushed. "I just remembered - my locket... it glowed whenever you activated or deactivated your powers. I had wondered about it, but I thought it was... some kind of warning. I never imagined something like this!"
"But now it's gone, and our powers don't work," Lux murmured. "Interesting. A magical object to absorb power, while still allowing us to access it at need, until said item is taken away. Very, very interesting."
"I don't think it's interesting!" said Pax.
"I do," said Lux. "I think it's absolutely fascinating. It means we're not the only ones in danger."
"What do you mean?" Pax asked.
Lux ignored him. "I want to work through this whole thing in more detail later. Right now, we need to deal with that thing."
"But we don't have any powers!" Pax wailed.
"Idiot! What do you think I am?" Lux snapped. "What do you think that thing in your hand is, a slingshot? What do you think of her?" She pointed at Mirana. "Every last one of us has powers, and they can't be taken away by some stupid amulet. We'll fight with what we've got."
Pax looked startled a moment, then nodded. He glanced at Mirana.
"Feel like helping us out?" he asked.
She couldn't stifle a smile. "Why not?"
They ran back out into the street. Pax put his fingers to his lips and gave a shrill whistle that echoed around the empty street. The monster turned to glare at him. Whether he saw three people or two arrayed against him, it was hard to say, but the sight of all of them glaring defiantly up at him sent him into a rage. His face was already scarred from his last encounter with Pax's laser, and now he was out to extract revenge. He lunged at them all with mouth wide open, a row of black teeth gleaming against the deeper darkness of his throat.
"Mirana! Slow him down!" Lux commanded.
The girl nodded and raised her wand, chanting. The monster suddenly stopped moving, as she invoked the power of friction against him. Instead of gliding smoothly up the street, now the very air fought against him, and he moved as if he were buried in thick wet cement.
"That'll hold him for a second, but it won't last forever!" Mirana warned. "Do something fast!"
"Right," said Lux. "Pax, when you see the light, fire!"
"Huh? What light?"
Lux didn't answer. Instead, she passed her hands over her eyes, chanting something in a low voice. Then she moved as if flinging something at the monster, and there was a flash of purple light in about the area a navel would have been if it had been human.
"There! Aim there!" she ordered.
"Right!"
Pax whipped his gun around, without even seeming to aim, but the bolt of blue light flew straight and true. As it struck, beams of light flew in all directions like light refracting through a prism. The monster screamed until Mirana wanted to clap her hands over her ears, but she did not release the spell until the monster had shattered into a burst for fragments that blew away on the wintry wind. She dropped to her knees in exhaustion.
"Whew!" she said.
Pax knelt next to her and flung his arms around her. "Great going, Mirana! You were awesome!"
Lux cleared her throat. Pax looked up, grinning sheepishly.
"Oh, ah..." he said.
"I'll settle for a thank-you," she said.
"Oh! Well, uh... Thanks! Thanks a whole lot! What did you do, anyway?"
"Just highlighted his weak spot," she answered. "I figured you didn't have the time to waste on shooting indiscriminately." The faintest trace of a smile crossed her features. "We do seem to work well as a team."
"Yeah!" Pax cheered. "I knew it would work." He grinned conspirationally at Mirana.
"Yes, yes, let's all pat ourselves on the back," said Lux disdainfully. "We still have a bigger problem - you know, the little matter of where our powers went."
Pax blinked. "We seemed to do well enough without them."
"That's not the point. I have a hunch something bigger is at work here," Lux said, "and I want to know what it is. I don't care about some hyped-up magical superpowers, but I don't approve of people meddling in my life, either. I've been meddled with quite enough as it is. Come on, let's get back to the base before people see us standing around like idiots."
Mirana nodded and followed silently as Lux led them away. Inside, her initial euphoria was starting to wear off. What was going on? Was her locket really at fault here? And why would the Viewer do such a thing? It made no sense, no sense at all...
Lux got them back into the compound with a minimum of difficulty - it was easier for Mirana to get through the front gates when there was an extra person accompanying her. Lux could stroll along confidently in front, while Pax scurried along behind, and Mirana walked invisibly between them. It was rather a strange feeling to know that she was being both seen and not seen at the same time.
"So, where are we going?" asked Pax, once they were inside.
"My room," Lux answered. "It's the one place I know we won't be overheard."
No one bothered to ask her how she was sure no one would overhear them there. Perhaps that was because Pax simply didn't think of it, or had a high enough opinion of Lux's magic to be sure she'd think of something. Mirana, however, didn't have to ask, because she knew. The minute she passed through the door, she felt she'd walked through a wall of some kind of force, as if a tiny rainstorm had passed over her head. Obviously the whole place was sealed with some kind of spell. She glanced at Lux, who seemed to guess her thoughts.
"They didn't like it," she said, "but I told them I'd had trouble with Peeping Toms before, and I wanted my own security measures in place. This is the only room in the whole complex where everything we say and do won't be recorded, scanned, and filed on some computer somewhere to be held against us if anything goes wrong. I don't trust those creeps not to watch me undress."
Pax looked mildly shocked. "They can do that?"
"They've done it before, on my last job," said Lux. "They won't do it again, though."
She didn't say what exactly she'd done to ensure this, but the look on her face as she said it convinced her companions that they didn't really want to know.
Mirana found a place to sit and looked around her new friend's room. There wasn't a lot to see - it was about the most stark place Mirana had ever seen. Lux didn't appear to have added anything that would personalize the place. It was as if Lux had been studiously avoiding letting any of her personality show here, as if she was afraid of anyone finding out anything about her...
"Are you paying attention?" Lux snapped.
Mirana suddenly sat up straight. She realized belatedly that Lux had been talking to her, and both of the Lights were looking at her expectantly.
"I'm sorry," she said. "What were you saying?"
"I wasn't," said Lux. "I was asking. Don't let your mind wander; this is important, and I don't feel like trying to be the only one in this room who can think clearly."
"Sorry," said Mirana contritely. "I'll listen now. What was the question?"
"I want you to tell me more about these Invisibles of yours," she answered. "Everything you know. Don't leave out anything or worry about boring me - any little detail might be important."
"I'm still not sure I know what's going on," said Mirana.
"That's why I want every last detail," Lux answered. "You won't have any idea what it is I'm listening for."
So Mirana told her, starting from the beginning, with how she had run away from home when she'd realized that she was virtually invisible to all around her, and the Viewer had come to take her away and give her a new life. She told them about her classes with people she could only half-see, about passing her fellow students in the hall without ever knowing they were there. She told them about reciting pledges to the Viewer at the beginning of her classes, and all the rules and regulations they had to follow. The story continued right up to her graduation, her brief stint as an independent Invisible, and the final confrontation with the Viewer. She was not sure she'd ever told anyone so much at once in all her life, and by the time she was finished, she was breathless and hoarse. Her hands shook with nerves, and she cuddled the ever-supportive krillip, who attempted to relax her by purring and licking her fingers. Pax rummaged in his pocket and produced a hard candy in a pink wrapper and offered it to her, and she accepted it with a weak smile. Lux, however, was completely lost in thought. She could have been asleep, for all anyone could tell.
"Interesting," she murmured at last. "We are lucky you came by. A lot of people are lucky."
"What do you mean?" she asked.
"Well, obviously your friend has a very neat system going," said Lux. "Puts what we've got around here to shame. Just think about it. Here's this absolute legion of people who have these powers, really special powers that can be used to do amazing things. Unfortunately, nobody can actually see them doing it. They're lonely, they're neglected, they're just dying for someone to come along and say, 'Hey, I appreciate you!' They would be absolutely loyal to someone like that - willing to do anything for them."
Mirana nodded, thinking of her graduation ceremony, and the uncountable crowds of people chanting their oath of loyalty to the Viewer with such fervor in their eyes. Mirana had felt it herself - that overwhelming desire to please the one being who could actually have an opinion of her.
"I don't suppose any of you actually got around to thinking," said Lux dryly, "that maybe someone with that much power on tap might be just a little tempted to try to use it?"
Mirana blushed. "He always told us we were doing everything for the good of the universe."
"So are we, sweetie," said Lux. "The universe and Master Zariyan's pockets. If anyone tells you they're doing something for the good of all, chances are, they've got an ulterior motive."
"Well, I didn't know that!"
"Of course not," said Lux, "and you'd never get around to working it out on your own, because your precious Viewer has you all isolated. You can't talk to each other, so you never get to compare notes. You can't talk to outsiders because you've got that rule, and anyone who breaks it gets their memory rubbed out and bundled off to somewhere else entirely. And everywhere you go, you carry around those pretty bits of jewelry that light up anytime some nearby hero decides to use your powers..."
"I just got it!" said Pax. "That Viewer's running one massive magical battery operation!"
Lux clapped her hands together. "Well done. You've finally caught on."
Mirana stayed silent. This was a lot to take in at once. The Viewer was using her... using her for what?
"I just can't believe it," she said. "Why would he...? How could he...?"
Lux shrugged. "Who knows?"
"The usual reason is something to do with taking over the universe," said Pax helpfully.
"That may well be it," said Lux. "The fact remains that we seem to have lost our powers at about the same time Mirana here lost her brooch. I don't know about you, but I don't take very kindly to that."
"What do you think we should do about it?" asked Pax.
"I don't know," said Lux. "I was thinking of possibly having a look at this Viewer creature myself."
"You can't do that!" Mirana said.
Lux glared at her. "Why not?"
"Well... people just don't look at the Viewer," said Mirana lamely. "Not if he doesn't want them to. Besides, I have no idea where he is."
"He's in that Hall of Shadows you keep talking about, most likely," said Pax. "That's where he was last time you saw him, right?"
"He was," said Mirana, "but I don't know where the Hall of Shadows is."
"You don't have to," said Lux. "You have on your side a fully qualified sorceress. I do have ways of getting from one place to another, believe it or not. Even if I don't know exactly where I'm going. I can get us all to this Hall of yours, given some time to set things up."
Pax gave her a dirty look. "You never told us that. How come we all had to run wherever the monsters were when you could have just waved your hand - poof - and sent us there?"
"Because I couldn't," Lux snapped back. "Don't you pay attention? I said 'given some time'. It's only in your stupid comic books where people can just wave their hands and go anywhere they want to go."
"So get moving already," said Pax. "I wanna find that Viewer and tell him a thing or three. He can't get away with locking people up and making them do whatever he says, just because they're invisible."
"I had intended to do something like that myself," said Lux. "What about you, Mirana? I intend to confront this Viewer and get some answers, but you're free not to rebel against him if you don't want to."
"You ought to come with us," said Pax. "We're your friends, not him."
"Don't pressure her," Lux said. "We could be jumping to conclusions. It could very well be that I'm completely off base and that this Viewer has been doing the right thing by her all along."
"If that's true, then there's no harm in going back," said Mirana slowly.
"Except that he'll erase your memory if you go back," Lux pointed out. "He wanted to the first time."
"I trust you to protect me," she said, looking at Lux and Pax. "If you're right, I want to help. Pax is right - you two are my friends."
Lux looked away. "Whatever. Anyway, it's good you want to help, because I'm going to need it. I can't get to this Hall of Shadows without getting a hand from you. You're the only one who's ever seen even part of it, and I'll need that if we're going to get there safely."
"What do I do?" asked Mirana, eager to appear helpful.
"Nothing, for the moment. Give me a minute."
Lux walked to her desk, opened it up, and pulled out a folded sheet of some kind of white, pliable plastic, which she spread out on the floor. Then she produced a purple marker and began making marks on it.
"This will take a while. Talk among yourselves," she said.
It did take a few minutes, but Mirana didn't feel like talking, so she resigned herself to stroking Critter's fur and watching Lux work. Pax didn't seem to mind; he, too, seemed fascinated by the patterns the sorceress was laying out on the floor. Doubtless it reminded him of something in his precious comic books, and he was eager for a better look at it. Lux marked out some geometric images, simple at first - a circle, then some rays angling out from it, then adding a succession of curlicues. The image grew more and more complicated, like some kind of crazed spiderweb, or the pattern for an elaborate stained glass window. Mirana thought the whole thing could be hung on the wall as art. She had never realized that magic could be decorative as well as practical.
"There," said Lux, finally capping her pen. "Now all we have to do is-"
There was a knock on the door.
"Go away!" Lux snapped. "I'm busy!"
"Sure you are," said a haughty voice on the other side of the door. "What are you busy with? That's what I'd like to know."
"Oh, for the love of little fishes!" Lux swore. "Why did he have to show up now?"
There was a rattling at the door, and a bit of muffled cursing. Then there was a snap as Vox physically wrenched the doorknob off the door and barged in. He looked around with fire in his eyes, glaring at Lux and Pax both.
"What did you two think you were doing?" he snapped. "What the hell did you think you were doing, leaving me to fight that monster on my own?"
There was a pause.
"I think I speak for everyone," said Pax, "when I say, what the hay are you talking about?"
"You two!" said Vox. "You two didn't follow me. You took off on your own and left me, and then you had the nerve to go and try to fight the monster anyway! What were you thinking? What if I'd found it before you did, huh?"
"As I recall," said Lux, "I was the one who told you to hold your horses and wait for me to figure out where the thing was, and you were the one who was so determined to be a hero that you ran off in the wrong direction."
"Humph," said Vox. "A fine thing. You have no idea what kind of trouble you've caused. Look, I'm supposed to be the leader, here! You're supposed to follow me! Not only that, but you're supposed to be using these stupid suits they gave us when you fight monsters! Now you've gone and blown up the most powerful thing ever to attack this city, you did it without your power suits, and you did it without me! It's a fiasco, and it's all your fault!"
Lux regarded him levelly. "Are you quite done?"
"No!" he said. "Don't you understand? You're making it look like your powers aren't important! More importantly, you're making it look like I'm not important!"
"You're not," said Pax. "You're just a big showoff, is what you are. The most important things aren't the things you can see." He winked at Mirana.
"What are you talking about?" asked Vox.
Lux smiled suddenly. "He's trying to tell you that you're not the most important person here. The most important person here is the invisible girl who's saved all our hides, including yours."
Vox snorted. "You're not serious. There's no invisible girl he-"
He stopped talking with a grunt as Mirana suddenly kicked him in the shins. He hopped around with a howl of surprise, and then looked down at the girl who seemed to have miraculously appeared before him.
"Hey, where did you come from?" he demanded. He glared at Lux. "Oh, I get it - this is one of your little magical tricks, isn't it? It's just an illusion, that's what it is!"
"I'm getting tired of this," said Pax. "Haven't we got something better to do?"
"Yes," said Lux. "Mirana, would you like to do the honors, or shall I?"
"Let's do it together," she said.
She flicked her wand at Vox, sending a thread of power through it. She didn't need to even say very much of an incantation; with a wand this powerful, it was easy to take out someone like Vox at point-blank range. He froze up like a statue, as Mirana invoked the power of inertia on him, robbing him of the ability to move.
"He's all yours," said Mirana.
Lux smiled. "This is going to be so liberating..."
A few minutes later, a still-frozen Vox was being thrown unceremoniously out into the hall, still frozen solid from Mirana's spell, by his two comrades and one invisible girl. It took all three of them to pick him up, but all agreed it was worth the effort. Critter made matters worse by taking the opportunity to relieve itself on Vox's highly polished boots. Lux slammed the door and put a spell on it to hold it shut against any more intruders.
"That felt good," she said.
"No kidding," said Pax. "Watch him try to explain his way out of that."
"That would be nice if we could watch," said Mirana, "but we might miss it if we don't get back from where we're going soon."
"She's right. We should get moving," said Lux. "Mirana, take your place in the center of my diagram. Pax, you sit on one of the points. I'm going to sit opposite you."
"I'll get ink on my suit," Pax complained, but he sat down anyway.
Mirana made herself as comfortable as she could in the blank circle in the middle of Lux's chart. Critter the krillip coiled around her shoulders and put his nose in her ear, making her giggle nervously. Lux leveled a glare at the little animal, but seemed to decide it wouldn't do any harm.
"Make yourself comfortable," said Lux. "You might be sitting there a while. Do you know how to meditate?" Her tone suggested she doubted Mirana knew any such thing, but she had to ask anyway.
Mirana nodded. "I learned that. It was the first thing they taught us, to help us channel our powers."
"Oh, good," said Lux, relaxing a fraction. "That will make this much easier. I thought I was in for a job. Okay, then, meditate on this: I want you to think about the Hall of Shadows in as much detail as you can."
Mirana nodded and closed her eyes. Gradually, her breathing slowed, and she seemed to become still as stone - it was hard to believe that her heart was even beating. Lux watched her a moment, then raised her hands, conjuring up a pale purple glow that became tinged with pink as it wreathed around Mirana. The lights wove back and forth between the two young women, becoming brighter and brighter. Then there was a snapping noise, and the entire group was surrounded by a pearly lavender bubble. Mirana came awake with a start, and squeaked as she realized she was sealed inside a glowing sphere.
"What? What happened?" she yelped.
"Cool it," said Lux. "This is our mode of transportation."
"Awesome," said Pax approvingly. He had his nose pressed to the wall, and was peering through whatever semitransparent material the globe was made out of. When Mirana looked closely, she could see scenes whizzing by, brief glimpses of people and places. Everything she looked at seemed to twist and warp, as if she were viewing them through rippling water or on the surface of bubbles, before they disappeared to be replaced by something else. Some of them seemed so close, but she knew they couldn't possibly be, because nobody she passed seemed to notice that there was a purple bubble speeding by them.
"How fast are we going?" she asked.
"We aren't, really," said Lux vaguely. "It's hard to explain. We're currently on the outside of time and space, and we'll slip back into the realms of reality when we get where we're going. We can't measure how far we've moved or how fast we travel because there's nothing for us to be compared to out here."
"That's freaky," said Pax. "Can you get motion sickness even if you're not moving? I don't feel so good."
"We'll be there in a second," Lux snapped. There was a hint of desperation in her voice; Mirana wasn't sure what would happen if someone got motion-sick in an interdimensional bubble, but she doubted it would be good.
A moment later, there was a lurch, as if they'd all been dropped a few inches, and then they landed gently on a carpeted floor. They looked around - Pax with keen interest, Lux warily, and Mirana with recognition.
"Did we make it?" Pax asked.
"We made it somewhere," said Lux. "Mirana, is this the right place?"
"Mm-hm," said Mirana, nodding. "This is the library on the second floor of the House. It's mostly a reference library for senior students, and we're not supposed to come in here without a chaperone. Usually it's empty. I didn't think anyone would like it if Seen people showed up unexpectedly."
"Good thinking," said Lux. "Every little bit of secrecy we can get will help."
She got up from the floor and started looking around. He gaze strayed to the shelves of books all around her. She pulled one from its place and began flipping through it.
"What I wouldn't give to be able to read a few of these," she murmured. "Then maybe I could get my wish..."
"So, which way is this Viewer?" asked Pax, looking around eagerly, as if he expected the Viewer to be hiding behind a bookshelf.
Mirana shrugged. "I don't know."
"You don't?" asked Pax, stunned. "How are we supposed to find him?"
"I don't know," Mirana admitted. "I don't even know how many rooms are in this place, if he even has rooms at all. Even if I knew where he is, I wouldn't know how to get there."
"He'll find us," said Lux. "If he really is like you say he is, he'll know we're here soon enough. We ought to be more worried about what we'll do when he finds us."
"Well, I've got some supplies on me..." said Pax, patting his gun in a meaningful way.
Lux glared at him. "That would be Vox's solution. Please tell me you can do better than that."
Pax grinned sheepishly. "Sorry. Anyone got any ideas?"
"We'd better not rush into anything," said Lux. "I would personally love to ask a few questions before we start shooting at each other, but there's no telling what this thing can do, or will, do. I can try to put a protective shield around us..."
"That won't be necessary, dear lady," said a voice. It was a strange voice, musical and asexual, like the playing of a far-off horn. Everyone turned to face it.
There was no one there. The krillip began to growl softly, its fur bristling.
"That's him!" Mirana hissed. "He's in here somewhere."
"I'm very disappointed in you, Mirana," said the Viewer's voice. "I never imagined you'd turn out to be such a troublemaker. What did you think you were doing, bringing people of the Seen world in here?"
"Looking for you." Mirana couldn't keep a quiver out of her voice; years of training were screaming at her that she could never defy this creature who had given her everything she had... but her heart said he would take it away just as quickly if she gave him a chance. "You can't talk down to me anymore! We know what you're up to, and I want my brooch back."
"Is that a fact?" answered the Viewer boredly. "Well, I can't say I'm inclined to give it back. I need it more than you do."
"And what about us?" Lux spat. "I suppose I'm supposed to just sit here like always, and let someone like you take whatever they want from me?"
"We need our powers back," Pax said. "How are we supposed to defend Lumaria without them? You wouldn't let Nox take over our world, would you?"
"Would I?" There was a strange ringing sound, and Mirana realized that until now, she'd never heard the Viewer laugh before. It was an eerie, discordant sound, like untuned bells ringing. "You have no idea what I'm doing, do you? No, of course you don't. Well, perhaps I should inform you. You seem to think you slipped by my security by dropping in between dimensions, but I see everything that moves in all worlds seen and unseen. If I haven't appeared before now, it's because I was inviting a friend of mine over to visit. She should be here shortly. Ah, here she comes now."
The air in the room seemed to thicken, and there was a smell of oily smoke that made Mirana's eyes water. A moment later, there was a flash of purple lightning, and everyone cringed.
A woman had appeared in the center of the room, looking quite at home there. She was dressed all in black - a simple, loose-fitting gown that didn't quite manage to disguise what was obviously a flawless figure. Only her hands and face were bared by the concealing dark fabric. Her hair was as black as her clothing, falling freely down her back. Her eyes glittered an eerie shade of violet. There was something faraway about them, as if they didn't quite exist in the real world.
"That's weird," Pax muttered. "There's something familiar about her..."
The Viewer was addressing the newcomer.
"You see?" he was saying. "I told you all you had to do was wait a little while longer. I've been telling you all along to be patient, and you wouldn't listen to me."
"Yeah, well, that's just great for you," she snapped. "I'm not interested in hearing you gloat."
"Fine," said the Viewer. "I've fulfilled my part of the bargain. They've been drained of their superpowers by now. I was going to let you pick them off at your leisure, but now they're intruding in my own personal space, and I don't particularly want them here. Make them go away."
"I'm not here to take your orders," Nox said. "Lucky for you, I feel like getting rid of these clowns anyway. What about the girl? Does she matter to you?"
There was a considering pause.
"No, not particularly," came the answer. "She's been entirely too much trouble lately. For all I know, she's been telling the entire Seen world about my little operation, and she's proven resistant to having her memory erased. If you can eliminate her, it's one less problem for me to handle. Just try not to damage my books, if you would be so kind."
"I don't give a flying flip about your bookcases," said Nox. "I'll finish them off however I feel like it."
"Not while I'm here!" Pax interjected.
He whipped his gun into place and fired off a number of rapid fire shots, directly at the sorceress. One went to her chest, another right between the eyes. Several more went into the wall behind her and caused a spray of rock chips as the bricks disintegrated.
Nox's hair wasn't even ruffled.
"Idiot," she said. "Your weapons are useless against me."
"Oops," said Pax. Nox flourished one hand, sending a blot of black energy at him, which struck him and sent him slamming against a bookcase. A rain of books fell down on him as the shelving shook, but Pax didn't seem to be badly harmed. Mirana scrambled to help him to his feet. Lux rattled off a spell and flung a number of white energy spheres back at the dark sorceress, but all of them fizzled out and disappeared before ever touching her. Nox buffed her nails against her dress and looked bored. She made a gesture as if flicking water at her enemies, and black darts shot from her fingertips. Everyone had to dive to get out of the way; one of the darts tore Pax's sleeve, and another struck Lux in the thigh.
"Mirana, can you do something?" Lux shouted, as she hurriedly tried to heal her leg.
"I can try!"
Mirana raised her wand and chanted the incantation she had used so effectively against the shadow-monster they had fought earlier, the inertia spell that should have made every move the sorceress made like trying to move a massive weight. Mirana felt the power surge through her magic wand and go winging towards Nox, but nothing happened.
"That was interesting," Nox said. "Pointless, but interesting."
"This isn't good," Pax said, tugging woefully at his torn costume. "Guns don't work, and neither do spells. Even with our full powers, we'd be in a fix. What do we do?"
"I'll tell you what we do," said Lux. "We get the hell out of here!"
She sprinted to the nearest exit, still favoring one leg. Mirana hurried to catch up to her.
"Here!" she said, grabbing onto one of Lux's hands. With her free hand, she reached for one of Pax's as he hurried to catch up. "We've got to hold on to each other or we'll be separated!"
Lux nodded and slowed up a fraction so that Pax could catch up and join the chain. Running blindly, they disappeared into the darkness of the Hall of Shadows.
"They got away," Nox muttered.
"They won't go far," said the Viewer. "Not here. They'll be lost within minutes, in this place. Not even the girl knows her way around like I do. We'll find them."
"We'd better," said Nox.
She vanished. It was impossible to tell if the Viewer disappeared, but the room became still and silent whether he was there or not.
Meanwhile, Mirana and her friends were rushing down the hallways with no other plan than to get as far away as possible. The path twisted and looped ahead of them, branching into strange configurations, as if it were growing like some kind of plant, unfolding just ahead of them, out of their sight. Shadows fell in odd places and lights shone from nowhere, confusing their senses, and Lux and Pax often stumbled. Mirana helped to brace them, urging them onwards. They descended a twisting staircase and staggered dizzily down a short hallway, finally taking refuge in what appeared to be a storage closet. Pax collapsed on a wooden crate, while Lux dropped to the floor and struggled to catch her breath. Mirana shut the door behind them and leaned on it.
"Well, this was a bright idea," Lux muttered. "Really brilliant. I'm glad I thought of it."
"We would have wound up in this fix eventually, anyway," said Pax. "I mean, it was our mission to defeat Nox sooner or later."
"That's a very cheering thought," Lux snapped. "I'm not sure I like knowing defeat was inevitable. It would have been nice to think we could win for a little while longer, anyway..."
"You can't give up now!" said Mirana. "There's got to be some way out. There's got to."
"That's right!" Pax agreed. "It always happens that way in the comic books. The badguy always has a weakness, or does something stupid at the wrong moment, or gets all caught up in monologue-ing so the hero can sneak up behind them and defuse the megadeath cannon, or whatever."
Lux shot him a venomous look; for a moment, it looked like she was as fully capable of killing him as Nox was.
"For the last time, this isn't a comic book!" she barked. "This is real life, and that is a real person in there with real magic than can fry you to dust in the time it takes you to say 'When's the next issue coming out?', okay? If you think we're going to win out just because we're the heroes and the good guys always win, forget it! It's not that simple. You don't get spared problems just because you're a nice person at heart."
"I know that," said Pax. "I was just trying to be optimistic. If I'm going to die, I'm going to die trying, not hiding in a broom closet waiting for the end to come."
Lux sighed. "Maybe you're right. I seriously doubt it, but maybe you're right. It won't hurt to try to think of something."
The three lapsed into silence as they pondered their options. Mirana wracked her brain, but all she could come up with was confusion. How could this person resist her spells? It was conceivable that a dark sorceress might be immune to white magic, but how could any living being overcome having the very forces of nature turned against her?
"You know, I wish I'd asked her," said Pax vaguely.
"Asked her what?" asked Mirana.
"Why she's doing this. You know, trying to take over the world and all. I've always wondered why bad guys in stories want to do stuff like that. I wouldn't want to rule the world. Everyone would blame all the bad stuff that happened on me. And why would anybody want to make it eternally night? Plunging the world into never-ending darkness just seems kind of dumb."
"You're right. I wondered that same thing, myself," said Mirana.
There was another thoughtful pause. Suddenly, Pax sat up straight, his eyes lighting up.
"I've got it!" he exclaimed. "I just figured it out!"
"What?" asked Lux anxiously.
"I thought Nox looked familiar," he said. "She looks just like you, Lux. That was really bugging me."
Lux slumped over with a groan. "You idiot. I ought to finish you off myself!"
"Wait a minute," said Mirana slowly. "Wait just one minute - I think he's on to something!"
"What could he possibly be on to?" asked Lux.
"Hang on a sec," said Mirana. "Some things are starting to make sense. I think I've figured some things out that nobody has figured out before."
"What kind of things?" asked Pax eagerly.
"Things they would have found out a long time ago if people spent more time talking to sorceresses," said Mirana. She sounded more like she was talking to herself than anyone else. "But they couldn't, could they? Of course not..."
"You're not making any sense," said Lux, but she sounded intrigued nevertheless. "What are you talking about?"
"Sorceresses," Mirana said. "Sorcerers, too, I guess, but there aren't as many of those, are there? They're usually women."
"That's true," Lux allowed, "but what has that got to do with anything?"
Mirana's face lit up with a look of discovery. She smiled.
"Lux, I think I just found the answer to all your troubles," she said. "Your Seen magic, my Unseen magic, Nox's Shadow magic - it's all the same stuff. It's just being used in different ways. Lux, answer a question for me. If you could have anything in the world - anything you wanted - what would you ask for?"
There was a heavy silence.
"Well," she said at last, "if you had asked me a few days ago, I would have said that what I wanted more than anything else in the world would be just what I asked you for when we first met - to be invisible, so no one would ever look at me again."
"What?" asked Pax. "You can't really want that! You'd get lonely."
"Being lonely would be better than being treated like a tool, or worse," said Lux.
"I understand why you'd want that," said Mirana. "I was wrong, Lux. You do have the power. You're like me - an Invisible."
She couldn't have shocked the sorceress more if she'd hit her.
"I am?" she asked. "But that doesn't make any sense. All my life, I've had to put up with being stared at by idiots. How can I be an Invisible if I'm so... visible?"
"It's not just you," said Mirana. "Lux, you told me once that most sorceresses are beautiful, and everyone says that in the end, they all either go over to the dark side or go insane. But that is why, isn't it? They're just the Invisibles who got seen. They're beautiful and talented - people want them around, but they can't see beyond their surfaces because of their Unseen magic. So they spend their whole lives being ignored until someone wants to use them for someone. They're stuck being Seen and Unseen at the same time, and it tears them in half. That's why they all go insane."
"Yes," said Lux softly. "That is how it feels. Torn in half..."
"You know it's true," said Mirana. "I saw it myself. When nobody needs you for anything, they look around you like you're not there - even nice people like Pax. They don't hear a word you say, even if you're standing right next to them. You can't even get out the way I did, by joining the Viewer, because you'd been Seen by enough people that he never guessed you were Invisible."
"It's a wonder she didn't go crazy," said Pax, "when you put it like that."
"No, she didn't," Mirana replied. "She took the other option."
"What?" Lux yelped. "What do you mean?"
"There are two options," Mirana repeated. "Go insane - or go to the Shadows. Admit it, Lux - there have been lots of times, haven't there, when you wished the whole world would sink into darkness? When you wished everyone would just go away, so you could disappear at last - and everyone else around you would finally know what you were going through, because they'd be lost in the darkness, too."
"Yes," said Lux softly, and then, "No! No. Maybe I would have liked to see the rest of the world get their comeuppance, but that doesn't mean I'd actually do anything like that."
"Not on purpose," said Mirana. "The Viewer told me, when I first met him, that if an Invisible goes too long without proper training for their talents, their powers take them over and make strange things happen to them. You couldn't bring yourself to take revenge on the world yourself, I think, so you created something else that could."
"Nox," said Pax.
"Exactly," said Mirana. "She doesn't look just like you, she is just like you - your Shadow side."
"Torn in two..." Lux murmured again.
Mirana looked at her friend's stricken expression and softened her tone.
"I don't believe you meant to do any harm," she said. "You didn't know it was happening, probably. But you have to admit, it explains a lot - like why your spells didn't work very well on the Shadowtypes. It was a struggle with yourself, trying to create and destroy them at the same time."
"And that's why my gun wouldn't work on Nox!" said Pax. "She's just a stray piece of magic - not really real."
"And why my inertia spell wouldn't work, either," Mirana added. "It would only work on a physical object, and she's just an illusion."
"An illusion with my own powers," said Lux. "But that brings us back to the original question: now that we know - or guess - what she is, how do we get rid of her?"
"We don't," said Pax. "You do."
"If you want to," added Mirana quietly.
"What do you mean?" Lux asked.
"If you created Nox out of your desire to see the world suffering the way you do," said Mirana, "you might not be able to destroy her if you don't really want to. It's possible that it might work the other way around - that your dark side might be able to take you over completely."
"You could be right," said Lux. "I'll try it anyway. I never was one for sitting around playing the fainting princess. We can't be any worse off than we are now."
Pax grimaced. "You shouldn't have said that."
"Why not?" asked Mirana.
"Because according to everything I've ever read," said Pax, "that would be the cue for someone to come along and say, 'Oh, yes, you can!'"
"You stole my line," said a voice.
Pax shrugged resignedly. "See what I mean?"
Standing in the doorway was the sorceress Nox, wearing an irritated scowl that was, now that Mirana was getting a close-up look, disturbingly familiar. Other than the pale skin and glowing eyes, Nox and Lux were perfectly identical down to the length of their fingernails.
"That was really intelligent of you," she said, "hiding yourself in a room with no exit. Finishing you off is going to be too easy."
She raised one hand and pointed it at Pax, who grabbed for his pistol out of reflex, though he knew it would do no good. Lights crackled at the tips of Nox's fingers.
"Stop," said Lux. "He's not the one you want to take on first. Challenge me, if you've got the nerve. Or don't you know who I am?"
"I know you. You're the enemy, just like everyone else," Nox snapped. "You're not special just because you're a sorceress."
"I'm not just any sorceress," said Lux. "Look me in the eye, if you've got the nerve. See me for who I really am."
Lux stood up and brushed her hair back from her face so that she could stare her dark counterpart in the eye, and Nox looked back. Her face went from coldly annoyed to completely shocked.
"You! You are..." she stammered.
"It's true," said Lux. "I can't look at you and say it isn't, and you can't deny it to me, either. You and I are one being. You can't destroy me without destroying yourself, because I created you."
Nox's beautiful face twisted into a mask of fury. "I can too! I can get by without you. I don't need anyone..."
"That's not true," said Lux. "That's yesterday's thinking. We do need other people. If it weren't for these two here with me, neither of us would be here today."
Nox scowled. "You should have let me destroy them both. You should have joined me a long time ago. If you hadn't resisted me, we could have destroyed everyone you hate. We would have been alone in the world, and safe. We can still do it. Join with me. We'll become one, as we were meant to, and you can finally have your wish."
Lux hesitated a moment. Then she sighed and shook her head.
"No. I don't want that anymore. Maybe I'm just being stupid, but I trust Mirana and Pax. There are at least two people in the universe I know won't hurt me, and that's something I won't give up. I don't want to disappear anymore. What I really want is to finally be seen."
Nox stood a moment in shock. Then, with a shriek of fury, she dove at Lux as if to tear her apart with her bare hands. Lux held up her hands, and light shone briefly. The two collided, and there was a flash and a sound like something snapping. Pax and Mirana shielded their eyes as the room was filled with dazzling light. When the afterimages cleared from their vision, they looked down to see a single dark-haired woman lying sprawled on the floor.
"Lux! Are you all right?" called Mirana, dropping to her knees next to her.
"Who won?" asked Pax, gingerly trying to help the woman up.
Lux's eyes flickered open. "Idiot! Who do you think?"
Mirana laughed.
"I knew you could do it!" she said. She flung her arms around Lux and hugged her. Lux looked startled for a moment, then relaxed. She gently set one of her hands on Mirana's shoulder for a moment before pulling away.
"Enough of that," she said. "You don't have to get all mushy about it."
Pax grinned. "You rock, Lux. Way to go!"
Lux almost smiled.
The celebration was interrupted by a growl: Critter was staring at the ceiling, fur bristling. The group suddenly realized that they had forgotten about someone. Tinny laughter echoed through the room.
"Well, I never expected that," said the Viewer's voice. "You've presented me with some interesting food for thought, and for that, I thank you. However, I think you three are a bit too clever for your own good. At this rate, you'll have all my secrets worked out, and I'll never have any peace. It's time I separated you. It will be easier to relieve you all of these troublesome memories that way. Say goodbye to your friends."
The world - or at least the room around them - shifted. Lux gave a shriek as the floor tipped over and dumped her through a wall, where she disappeared down a long corridor that appeared from nowhere. The floor opened up and sent Pax plummeting to whatever was below him, and a flight of stairs evolved to catch him, sending him bumping off into the shadows. Mirana was thrown off her feet by something she couldn't see, and she shot backwards out the door and down the hallway they had come through, tumbling end over end until she couldn't see what was happening to her anymore. The krillip clung to her neck, keening in fear.
Then, as suddenly as it had started, it was all over. Mirana sat up and shook herself, wondering what was coming next. She shakily climbed to her feet, using a nearby statue for support. Looking around, she realized she was surrounded by statues of various things - people, objects, abstract forms, all made of different materials. The effect would have been beautiful if she'd been seeing it in full daylight, but in the darkness of the Hall of Shadows, it was eerie. She realized she had never been to this part of the building before. Even if, for once, the Hall decided not to rearrange itself, she still wouldn't have had any idea which way to go to find her way out.
But I don't want out, she told herself. I want to find Pax and Lux. Then I want to find the Viewer and give him what-for!
Vain hope! The Viewer had taught her everything she knew about magic. There was no chance that she'd ever have the power to take him on in one-on-one combat. It would take the three of them together to fight him, and possibly more than all their power combined. The best she could hope for was to find her friends and get out of here before the Viewer found them. Maybe once they were together, they could go back to Lumaria and get help from someone...
Who's going to believe that we're being menaced by an invisible talking one-eyed star?
She shook her head. They could worry about that later. The first thing she had to do was find Pax and Lux, before it was too late. She had no doubt that if the Viewer got to them first, he would erase all their memories of her and send them back to Lumaria thinking nothing had ever happened. Without them, Mirana would be alone and friendless again, with no refuge even among the Invisibles - she doubted the Viewer would ever trust her again, even with her memories modified. Mirana wondered how long Lux would be able to get by without the support of her friends, now that her dark side had been destroyed. She imagined trying to get through life without Pax's eternal optimism and welcoming smile. She felt tears pricking at her eyes.
"Oh, come now," said a voice above her head. "You don't think I would hurt your companions, do you?"
Mirana jumped. Critter yapped as fiercely as a small furry creature could, baring its tiny teeth at the glittering being that had appeared above it.
"You stop that," the Viewer scolded. "I knew it was a mistake to allow animals in here. They are entirely too knowing. I think I will have to find a new home for that one, after I'm done with you."
"I won't let you hurt any of my friends," said Mirana, "not even Critter."
"Hurt them? Who said I wanted to hurt them? I'm offended by the very idea," said the Viewer. "I'm not in this business to hurt anyone."
"Then what are you in it for? And why do you have to take away the powers of the heroes to do it? Weren't you helping Nox to take over Lumaria?"
"Of course. I've helped quite a few of these super-villains take over a few planets, over the years," said the Viewer. "You just don't understand. It's a temporary loan. I intend to take them all back eventually, when I've collected a sufficient amount of power."
"So you can rule the universe yourself?" asked Mirana.
"Absolutely not," said the Viewer, sounding offended. "You've been spending too much time with that Pax character. I'm not a villain in a comic book; my intentions are honorable."
"Then what are you planning on doing with all the power you've stolen?" Mirana demanded.
"I am transforming it," he said. "I am turning it all from Seen to Unseen magic. When the time is right, I will feed it all back into the places it came from, and draw the entire universe into the Unseen realms. The curse of the Unseen will be lifted at last; the lines between Seen and Unseen will be destroyed."
Mirana scowled. "That's just another version of Nox's plans. What good will it do if we're all Unseen?"
"It will end our suffering. There will be no more reason to long to rejoin the Seen world, because it will no longer exist."
"That's crazy talk," said Mirana. "I won't stand for it!"
"You have no choice," the Viewer replied. "I am going to erase your memory now. Hold still."
"No!"
Mirana held up her wand, trying desperately to fend off what she knew was coming. It was no use. In the next instant, her world was engulfed in blurry green lights. She felt her mind reel as the light invaded her thoughts, pushing everything away.
No! I won't forget. I can't forget... there's got to be some way to stop it...
She scrambled to collect her thoughts, but it was like trying to catch one particular butterfly in a swarm. Finally, a thought came to her: memory was one of the invisible powers, and it was hers to command as much as the Viewer's. She gripped her wand tightly and began murmuring the incantation.
"Invisible powers that live in all things, heed the words of your child in her moment of need. Loan your strength to me, who am hidden from all eyes. I call on the unseen power of memory!"
A tension sprang up between herself and the Viewer, as the two powers vied for supremacy. Mirana felt sweat beading on her face, and her head began to ache with the strain; it was obvious that the Viewer was more powerful than she was. She couldn't fight him like this forever.
But some memories were still left to her. One of them swam before her mind's eye: the day she had first met the Viewer, and he had set her on this path.
"Think of the things that really matter in life: love, hope, kindness. These things are invisible to the eye. Often they are not noticed at all. They are the background music of the universe - never seen, seldom appreciated, yet they enhance everything they are a part of."
There! That was the key - the powers she had never known she could use, but had always been waiting for her, just beyond her reach. She reached for them now with the last of her strength. Suddenly, it was as if her friends were standing there with her, calling out encouragement.
"Don't let this creep beat you down," Lux was saying. "People like us can't go all our lives letting scum like him take advantage of us. Beat him for me."
"Hang in there, Mirana!" Pax cheered. "You know the good guys always win!"
"I'll do my best," she told them. "Stay with me, guys. Don't let me forget you."
"I won't," said Lux. "I need a friend like you. You're the one I trust."
"I won't," Pax promised. "No matter what, I'll always want to see you again."
"Thanks, guys! I know I can win, as long as you're with me," said Mirana.
The light level in the room increased. Mirana found her headache was easing. Now it was the Viewer who was backing away, a panicked expression in his single eye.
"What - what is this?" he exclaimed. "What is this power I feel?"
"Invisible powers - the strongest of them all," said Mirana. "You told me about them yourself. Trust, friendship, love... I can't see them, but I know they're there, and I'll use them to stop you!"
The light around her intensified. She thought she could see three distinct colors in it - pink, green, and purple. She gathered it all together and launched it, letting it fly directly at the Viewer. There was a noise like the scream of twisting metal, and then there was silence. Mirana dropped to her knees with a sigh, and quietly passed out.
She came around a while later to find Critter licking frantically at her face. She brushed him away.
"Let me sleep. I'm tired."
"She's alive!" said a voice above her head.
"Idiot. Of course she's alive. I told you that already. She's just worn herself out."
Mirana slowly opened her eyes. "Pax? Lux? Is that you?"
"Of course it's us. Who else is there?" Lux retorted.
"We were worried about you!" said Pax. "Critter just about threw a fit trying to get us here, and Lux was worried sick. I've never seen her looking so grumpy."
"Humph," said Lux. "It would be pointless to go through all this bother just to lose now. But I'm glad you're all right, anyway."
"What happened to the Viewer?" asked Pax. "We haven't seen any sign of him anywhere."
"He's gone," said Mirana. "I fought him down. I don't know what exactly I did to him, but I don't think he'll be coming back anytime soon. I couldn't have done it without your support."
"Any time!" Pax said. "You know you can count on us, Mirana. We're your friends."
"Yes," she said, smiling. "I know. Thank you both. You guys... you're really the best thing that ever happened to me."
"Humph," said Lux again. "You're still half-unconscious, to be talking like that. Come on. Let's go home."
"Home?" Mirana repeated.
"Sure," said Pax. "You don't think we're going to leave you to rot in this gloomy place, do you? Nah, your place is with us. You're going back to Lumaria."
"Don't pressure the poor girl," said Lux. "She might not want to stay with us forever. She's free to do whatever she wants, now that the Viewer is out of her life."
"No!" said Mirana. "I want to stay with you. I really do. If you want me to. I'd like that a lot."
Lux smiled. "Well, in that case, let's get going."
Some hours later, a report came back that Nox's fortress seemed to have vanished without a trace, and no sign of any of her monsters remained. When Lux and Pax reappeared, with a fantastic story about being kidnaped by one of Nox's warriors and dragged to her castle, where they had engaged in a dramatic and ultimately successful battle, they were greeted with a certain amount of dismay. The fact that they had apparently done all this without the use of their powers annoyed the people who built them in the first place. The project was declared a failure, and Pax and Lux were both given nice bonuses and orders to keep their mouths shut, and were quietly dismissed from the force.
"Well, how do you like that!" said Lux that evening. She, Pax, and Mirana were sitting on the roof of a building - a nice spot for stargazing, if you had magic enough to get up there without attracting attention. "All that work, and we don't even get any credit for it! Just like always."
"Oh, I don't really mind," said Pax, looking idly up at the sky. "It was kind of fun. And we know we're really the heroes. Besides, if we'd never taken this job, we'd never have met each other."
"So, what are you going to do now?" asked Mirana.
"Probably same thing I used to do," said Pax. "Go back to building weapons systems for people. It pays the bills. It won't be as much fun as this, though."
"I was thinking," said Lux slowly, "of going back to the Hall of Shadows."
Her friends stared at her.
"Well, look at it this way," said Lux. "You two... you have what it takes to fit back in with the rest of the world. Yes, even you, Mirana. But not me. I'm not even sure I want to. I don't mind you two, but I don't think I want to be friends with the rest of the world. I'd like to go somewhere out of sight for a while. Besides, there are still a lot of Invisibles left. They need someone to look after them, now that the Viewer is gone. I can keep an eye on them, and maybe teach them a little about Seen magic."
"What do you think will happen to them all?" Mirana asked. "Do you think they'll be able to manage, now that they're free to do whatever they want?"
"They'll be fine," said Pax. "Maybe someday, they'll be able to come out and join us. In the Seen world, I mean."
"You think?" Mirana asked.
"Sure," he replied. "We saw you. Who's to say someone else can't see them?"
"That makes me wonder," said Mirana. "Why is it that you two could see me? I mean, even my own parents..."
"You have to care, to see someone," said Lux. "It's not about seeing with your eyes. To really see someone as they are, you have to look with your heart."
"That's right," said Pax. "You saw us, too. Saw us as something more than a kid and a crazy sorceress."
"And that brings us to a question," said Lux. "What are you going to do with your freedom?"
"I - I hadn't really thought," said Mirana.
She gazed off into the starry sky. What could she do now? She was free, and she knew the full extent of her powers. It was possible that she could go back home, that she could use her memory-magic to make her family remember her again. The idea seemed a strange and distant one. She shook her head. She had chosen to make them forget her, back when she didn't know any better, and it was beyond her power to change that choice now.
"I'll stay with you," she said. "Both of you. I'll help Lux teach the other Invisibles... and I'll look after Pax and make sure no one shoots him by accident," she added, smiling a little. "And I'll keep looking. Maybe there are other people who could use an invisible friend."
"I was hoping you'd stay," said Pax. "You're my friend. I'll always want to see you again."
Lux's lips twitched a little. "I guess I could stand a little help, now that you mention it. You won't get on my nerves too much."
"What about me? Do I get on your nerves?" asked Pax. "I want to help out, too!"
"You don't know the first thing about magic. What can you do?"
"I don't know. I'll think of something!"
Mirana laughed. To any others, their bickering was just another argument, but to her, it was clear and perfect music, the triumphant background music to the rest of her life.
The End
