1. Video   •••

Detective Jamaal Johnson carefully slid his police-issue tablet out of its protective sleeve. “Ready to have your mind blown?” he asked his wife.

Doctor Nina Lopez looked up tiredly. “It better be good. I’m exhausted.” She noticed the paper bags of burgers and fries on the kitchen table and brightened somewhat. “This is exactly what I was in the mood for.” Her act of sitting was more like collapsing.

While Nina sorted the bags’ contents, Jamaal flipped out the tablet’s plastic stand and pushed the device across the table to her, video queued on the screen.

“You said it was at Borking Station, right?” She bit off a chunk of burger.

“That’s right.” He moved his chair next to hers; she tapped the triangular play icon.

“This is around 3 a.m.”, Jamaal said, pointing. “You’re looking at the service cor­ridors under the station.”

They ate in silence while onscreen a young man with two large duffel bags entered the scene. He set down the bags, opened one, pulled out a contraption, and slid it behind a support pillar. The scene skipped to another corridor, and then another, as the man repeated his actions at numerous pillars.

“White male, mid-20s, later identified as Christopher Ludwig Van Scriver”, Jamaal added helpfully.

“Looks like a white supremacist to me”, Nina responded through a mouthful.

Jamaal nodded. “Based on a search of the computer at his home, he radicalized within the past three years. Frequents hard-right message boards. These are all homemade bombs”, he added.

The scene skipped to the giant central room of the station. “This is a little after 08:15 a.m.”, Jamaal narrated. “Middle of rush hour.” Hundreds of travelers milled about, most carrying cups of coffee and briefcases, some trailing children behind them, others clumped in conversational groups. Jamaal pointed. “Here comes Van Scriver again.” The man wore a jacket, still wet from torrential rain outside. He glanced around, apparently getting his bearings, and then made his way to the very center of the cathedral-like chamber.

“This is incredibly high-definition footage”, Nina said quietly. Before Jamaal could respond, she exclaimed, “Oh, damn!”

Van Scriver pulled two handguns from inside his jacket. No audio accompanied the video, but it was clear he had begun to yell as he waved the guns around. The crowd melted away, creating a wide clearance around him. As dozens ran screaming, a lone man approached him.

“Who’s this?” Nina said, crumpling her empty burger wrapper and reaching for her fries. She took over the narration: “Wearing a mask, dark tunic with long sleeves, and I’d guess Asian.” She reached out a pinky — the only finger that wasn’t greasy — and tapped the pause button.

”Is this one of those monks that made the news a few years back? They were in some kind of cult. Verbo Virtutis, a secret society, right?”

“Wow! Good memory”, Jamaal replied. “That’s what it reminded me of too, but I didn’t remember the name. Shaved heads. Little masks. Hands hidden by sleeves. We haven’t been able to ID him yet. Witnesses referred to him as a ‘magician’. Now we’re getting to the good part.” He pointed. “Look at Van Scriver’s jacket. We think that is his phone, because he was live-streaming the whole thing. And this is the detonator.” Then he tapped the play icon.

Van Scriver swung around and aimed his guns at the apparently unarmed Asian man. His arms jerked as if he meant to fire both pistols, but it was clear from the video that his hands were now empty.

“Wha—?” Nina exclaimed, just as Van Scriver reacted the same way. The perp reached for his detonator, held it up — but then it too was gone.

“I must have blinked”, Nina said, scrolling the time-slider back a few seconds.

“Nope”, Jamaal told her. The exact same sequence played again. Guns disap­peared. Detonator disappeared.

Nina was about to say something, her eyes wide, when the Van Scriver on screen clearly lost his temper and charged at the blue-shirted interloper, as if he meant to tackle him. The Asian man didn’t move. But Van Scriver disappeared.

She turned slowly to face her husband, her mouth working slowly.

Jamaal nodded earnestly. “Imagine how I feel”, he told her. “I’m supposed to solve this.” He barked a laugh.

In the video, the “magician” calmly turned and walked away.

Jamaal gathered up the refuse of their quickly gulped meal and disposed of it. He came back with two glasses and a bottle of wine. “Sit with me a few minutes — I know you’re exhausted, babe — but I need your prodigious brainpower on this real quick.” He poured wine in each glass, slid one carefully to Nina.

“So... What happened after?”

Jamaal sipped. “Other footage shows the magician guy going through the service corridors and stopping at each bomb. Doesn’t touch them; just stands nearby for a few seconds. Forensics later determined the explosive material had been removed — though it was clearly visible in the earlier video. Then he disappeared too.

“Uniformed officers showed up, corralled the crowd, detained witnesses, made sure no one was hurt, and set up a cordon. It’s still pouring rain outside. The uniforms have no idea it’s all over inside so they rush in. S.W.A.T. shows up and clears the building. Neither the perp nor the magician is anywhere to be found... Dozens of witness statements basically confirm what we saw on video, with varying degrees of accuracy.”

“So they what? Escaped down the tracks?” Nina sipped at her wine and stared incredulously at her husband.

“We don’t think so”, Jamaal said. “I’ve reviewed an awful lot of security footage this afternoon and there’s no sign of either one of them.”

“How are the news stations handling it?” she wondered.

He winced. “They’re not happy that we’ve told them almost nothing. That’s for sure. But they agreed to sit on the manifesto for 24 hours — Van Scriver emailed all of them this morning. And we’re withholding the security footage for now.”

She shook her head. “That’s public footage, Jamaal.”

He held up his hands placatingly. “Babe — argument for a different day, okay? Focus on the unbelievable stuff we just saw — the whole reason I showed you all this. I want your opinion.” He saw his wife relax subtly. “I mean, I’m used to dealing with the universe as it presents itself. Laws of physics. Gravity, heat, light. Life and death. But in that universe, things don’t just disappear. Especially people. Not while they’re on camera and in front of a bunch of witnesses.”

“No curtain or cape”, Nina mused, staring into the distance. “Performance magicians all depend on distraction or hidden apparatus. This all happened in plain view.”

Jamaal nodded. He watched as she stared toward the blank table top, her eyes focused on nothing. He knew her agile mind was flipping through various scenarios — some of which he’d already considered. He’d scribbled his top four theories into his notebook earlier:

1. Fake video? Either perp or magician (both?) choreograph moves to match?
2. Van Scriver not actually there? Hologram? Magician set it up to be hero?
3. ???
4. Maybe magic is real.

Full disclaimer: he hadn’t actually written down the fourth theory.

He had refuted the first two with a few phone calls, but waited to see what his wife would come up with. He’d recognized within minutes of first meeting her that she was the brains of this operation.

Finally, she looked at him. “If we go with Occam’s Razor, the simplest explanation that fits the known facts is that magic is real.” She laughed.

Okay, so she skipped the first few steps.

“That’s all you got?” he stared imploringly.

“Well, you said you ID’d Van Scriver. That implies you actually checked around and learned he’s a real person. You said witnesses described basically what the videos showed. So that tosses out the theory that one or the other wasn’t actually in the station in the first place. Right?”

Jamaal nodded. “Lots of info on Van Scriver already. And it does look like he’s gone missing. And his live-streaming video cut off in the middle — if you match up his video with the security footage, his cuts off at about the point he disappears.

“Exactly”, Nina said. “That’s why I didn’t mention the possibility that your perp might have simply been faked. Okay, the other weak theory is faked video. Which we know from watching modern movies can be done. But in this case, it’s actually security footage, and all the witnesses corroborate...”

“Yes. And the footage isn’t actually stored on site”, Jamaal noted. “Just like City Hall and the PD, all footage is streamed in real-time to secure off-site storage. We’re fairly certain that nothing suspicious happened over there. But I’m holding onto that idea as a last resort. If so, it would have to be an inside job — and require an incredible amount of skill.”

Nina took a deep breath, held it, then released it — a relaxation technique. “A lot of people are going to have to reconsider their worldviews”, she said. “If it turns out that a secret society of magicians has the ability to make people disappear.”

“I’m not willing to go there just yet”, Jamaal noted. “So far, 100 percent of the cases I’ve solved have been done so without assuming some sort of magic or superpowers.”

She shrugged. “Not to bring up an old argument, but you are the half of us that believes in magic. You do still believe in God, right?”

Jamaal licked his lips, suddenly feeling them drying. They’d agreed to disagree on this. When you already have a tough time maintaining your faith while living in a brutal, evil world, you don’t want to argue with a smarter person about it.

“I don’t think of God as magic”, he noted quietly. “And yes, I still believe.”

“Honey”, she said softy, “you know I won’t demean you or your beliefs. I’m just surprised you’re having trouble accept­ing this guy might have powers. If there’s a God, then at least God is able to bend the laws of physics. So why is it a stretch to believe someone else can? Or maybe this ‘magician’ prayed for God to protect people, and God answered this time.”

She shrugged, as if the conversation was over, and he knew it was. She moved close and kissed him. “I know you’ll figure it out. You always do. But I simply can’t stay awake any longer, okay? Love you.”

He stood in silence as she moved into the bedroom. Momentarily, he heard the shower. It took him a few minutes for him to clean the kitchen. By the time he was done, Nina was fast asleep in their bed.

Jamaal decided to have another glass of wine and watch the footage again.

 

2. Parents   •••

Mr. and Mrs. Van Scriver arrived at the Riverton Police Department the next morn­ing, having driven from their farm outside the city. After Detective Jamaal Johnson ushered them into his small office and offered refreshment, he sat behind his desk and was about to speak when Mr. Van Scriver piped up: “Will the detective be here soon?”

Instead of reminding the late-middle-age couple that he had already introduced himself as a detective, he simply smiled and re-introduced himself.

“Oh, I beg your pardon”, the man said, recovering quickly. “I must have mis­under­stood. Has our son been located yet?”

“I hope he’s okay”, the woman added. She looked as if she hadn’t slept well.

Jamaal shook his head. “No, sir. And there’s no easy way to say this, but all the evidence shows that he simply... disappeared.”

“Oh, he does that from time to time”, Mrs. Van Scriver said knowingly. Before Jamaal could interject, she went on, “Usually after something in his life goes badly. Once he was in the woods for three weeks before he got his head straight.”

“I see, ma’am”, Jamaal responded. “I should have been more clear. I don’t mean he ‘wandered off’ or ‘took a sabbatical’. If it’s okay with both of you, I would like to show you the video of the incident at Borking Station.”

First, he played the 3 a.m. footage. He watched their eyes; it was easy to spot when they recognized their son. Their eyes widened as he planted bombs. Then Jamaal skipped to rush hour, beginning the playback just as Christopher Ludwig Van Scriver stepped out into the crowd.

“Oh no!” Mrs. Van Scriver whispered.

Both Van Scrivers stiffened and leaned forward slightly as they saw the other man come into view. Jamaal watched their eyes widen again as the guns disappeared. And then the detonator. And then their son.

“Wha—?” Mr. Van Scriver’s mouth fell open.

“Have either of you ever seen anything like this?” Jamaal asked. Deadpan. Like it was something he asked parents every morning. “Did your son ever express an interest in magic tricks?”

“Not since he was little”, the mother said, her eyes in a faraway place. “When a magician came to his school. But only for a few days.” Her voice was shaking and slow.

“This has obviously been doctored.” The father attempted to sound calm and knowing. It wasn’t working. If anything, his voice was shakier than his wife’s. “Nobody just... vanishes.” Then: “What about this Oriental fellow?” He pointed at the now-paused video, indicating the man in the blue tunic. “What’s he got to say about it?”

Jamaal sighed. Oriental? Really? In this day and age? “I was hoping one of you could identify him. Was he a known associate of your son’s?”

“I don’t know any Orientals”, the father answered almost immediately. “And I don’t think Chris did either. He didn’t have many friends, but there were all American.”

Jamaal ignored the insinuation, which he heard often, that American meant white.

The mother shook her head. “He knew that colored—” she quickly corrected herself “—African-American girl in school.”

“Everyone knew her”, the father corrected. “Because she was the only one. But she wasn’t Oriental.”

Jamaal jumped in quickly. “So neither of you recognize him. Hmm. What about places your son might go when he thinks he’s in trouble? Does he have any regular hangouts? A friend’s house? A particular park or...?”

Both shook their heads. “He doesn’t really tell us much the last couple of years”, the mother said. “We call him, but he says he’s busy. Or he wants to talk politics. We don’t know much about his life — I mean about where he goes or what he does.”

There was an uncomfortable silence while Jamaal tried to think of something comforting to say. Then Mr. Van Scriver began, “He spent a lot of time looking up conspiracy theories lately. I always changed the subject. But...” He looked uneasy. “Do you think he dug too deep into something? Maybe someone came after him for it?”

Jamaal didn’t know how to answer that one. Finally: “We are certainly looking into your son’s online activity, Mr. Van Scriver. If I find something in that vein, you can be sure I’ll pursue it.” Because that was easier than saying “Those websites he was reading are horseshit.”

After another 20 minutes with them, Jamaal thanked them, gave them each his card, and promised he would contact them with any updates. Then he was back at his desk alone, no further along. If nothing else, he had confirmed that the white man in the videos was Christopher Ludwig Van Scriver. His parents had recognized him instantly. They were clearly not very updated on their son’s life (or on many social issues, Jamaal added), and had never seen the other man in the video. He had warned them that tonight’s news might be disturbing, to avoid it if at all possible.

He was reminded of his wife’s words: “If we go with Occam’s Razor, the simplest explanation that fits the known facts is that magic is real.”

And then his desk phone buzzed; it was the duty officer. “Johnson? Um, I think your magician just walked in the front door.”

 

3. Magician   •••

Detective Jamaal Johnson swallowed the last drops of his third coffee of the day. There. I think I’m ready now, he told himself. Ready to question the magician.

He tapped a button on his desk phone. “I’m coming down.”

Soon he was in the basement, standing outside Interview Room Six. Through the glass he could see the young man. Jamaal guessed the guy was about 25, but admitted he could be anywhere from late teens to 40.

The as-of-yet-unidentified “magician” had been searched; he had nothing but his clothes and his mask. Officers had taken the wooden mask before admitting the man beyond the lobby. Someone will probably file a civil rights complaint about that, Jamaal grumbled to himself. Religious freedom and everything. Last year, he’d inter­viewed a witness who insisted on wearing a colander on her head — but it hadn’t covered her face.

The magician wasn’t technically a suspect at this point, but he had to know some­thing. This guy had clearly done something with Van Scriver. And he seemed nervous to Jamaal.

Jamaal grasped the door handle and stepped into the room.

“Good morning”, he said, nodding amicably toward the young man, who looked at him with piercing eyes.

“Let’s make this easy on both of us”, Jamaal said, sitting across from him. “You came in of your own accord, so I think you want to answer my questions, some of which are doozies.”

“Are you a curious man, Detective?” the magician asked.

“This isn’t about me”, Jamaal replied quickly. “This is about how a would-be terrorist disappeared into thin air.”

“I think you’ll find that it is, indeed, about you, Detective”, the young man insisted. “I have already been judged by my own people — or soon will be. My time is limited, so I ask again: Are you a curious man? Your chosen profession implies that you might be.”

“Look, there are several ways this can happen”, Jamaal explained, ignoring the esoteric ramblings. “One is we charge you with obstruction — for refusing to cooperate with this investigation. That means you get held here until you talk.” That wasn’t true, of course. They couldn’t hold him very long. “Two is we charge you with something related to Van Scriver’s fate — a lesser-degree murder charge, perhaps.” Jamaal knew such a charge wouldn’t stick; in this state it helped to have a dead body and some strong evidence pointing to how the body became dead. In this case, he had neither. “Three — you tell me what happened in your own words and we sort this out like rational adults.”

The young man’s face didn’t change. No frown, no smile. He asked: “Is it common to file murder charges when no one has died?”

Jamaal cocked his head slightly to the side. “Are you saying the other man is alive?”

“Killing is forbidden”, came the quick answer.

“Then... Where is he?”

“Somewhere else. I cannot say more.”

“When you produce a living, breathing Christopher Ludwig Van Scriver, then the murder charge is off the table”, Jamaal replied. “And of course I can’t file obstruction charges if you tell me what you know.”

The man looked as frustrated as Jamaal felt. “What do you want to know? I will answer what I can. But again, I have little time.”

“You could start with your name.”

“I told them already: Artifex Operarius.”

Jamaal sighed. “And they didn’t believe you because you wouldn’t produce ID. It means ‘Artist Worker’, right? Sure, okay. What name is on your birth certificate? What name would I find on your ID, if you had one?”

Artifex Operarius shook his head, his expression never wavering. “I have no birth certificate, no ID, no address.”

“Where do you live?” Jamaal asked.

“In the hills.”

“Which hills?”

“Any number of them.”

“How long have you been in Riverton?”

“I’ve never been in Riverton”, the young man said.

Jamaal blinked a few times.

“You’re currently in Riverton. When did you arrive?”

“No, I’m in a cell on the other side of the world”, Artifex blurted, but then calmed himself. “And now we’re back to the ‘curious man’ question, Detective”, he said, suddenly leaning forward. “We’ve reached the part I can’t explain until I know more about you. And now I have less time remaining than when we began.”

“Why does it matter whether I’m curious?” Jamaal said, finally taking the bait.

“Because some of my answers will not make sense to you at first”, Artifex replied. “In order for anything I have done to have the intended effect, you must be a curious man, a person willing to re-investigate how the world works.”

Jamaal let out his breath slowly.

“Maybe you can explain some things on this footage”, he said, turning to the tablet.

“Let us assume that I was a participant and do not require video footage”, Artifex responded. “However, again, I insist I cannot answer your questions to your satis­faction without first laying some groundwork.”

“What kind of groundwork?”

“First, I must insist you shut off any recording devices”, Artifex said, pointing with his eyes toward the room’s corners.

“It’s required by city statute”, Jamaal told him. “Any time any person is in any of these rooms, video and audio is recorded.”

“Ah”, Artifex said. “Then we must continue this at another time and place.” And he promptly disappeared.

Jamaal forced himself to remain perfectly still for just a moment. His poker face had been legendary in college. But then he couldn’t help slowly turning his head to visually inspect the entire room. In what would eventually become hilarious lore around the P.D., he even looked under the table.

 

4. Perp   •••

Christopher Ludwig Van Scriver was understandably confused. A second earlier he’d been in a busy commuter station in Riverton. Now he was stumbling in a wooden room on a hillside. Like everything else he’d tried in his life, his big plan to go out in a blaze of glory hadn’t worked out well. This wasn’t even a proper cabin, he thought. Entirely empty. Just a smooth wooden floor — possibly bamboo, he thought — smooth wooden walls, and an open doorway to the outside.

This is impossible, right? he asked himself. Had he dreamt the station? Or was he dreaming this? Had the bombs actually gone off — and now he was in some sort of afterlife? Had the police gunned him down?

No, it was that damn Asian guy.

Somehow it was night here, and balmy. He could see stars merrily twinkling in the clear sky outside. He checked his watch and saw “08:20”. There were still water droplets on his jacket sleeves from the rain outside Borking Station. Christ. His knees felt weak. Christopher Ludwig Van Scriver swayed, reached for the door frame but missed, and fell out onto the soft earth nearby.

“Fuck”, he said, to no one in particular. Was nothing going to work out for him?

Briefly, he mused that his life story — at least until very recently — would make a famously boring and increasingly sad movie. Unremarkable childhood. A few brief-but-failed rela­tion­ships. No progress career-wise. Vague fantasies about someday not being entirely poor. A number of minimum wage jobs that barely paid for tiny, flimsy apartments. He had learned hard work didn’t pay. No, hard work led to a shift supervisor’s position for a few extra cents an hour and twice the stress.

He took several giant breaths, then clambered to his knees. By the light of the Moon, he could see other wooden structures on the hillside. All of them were plain, of varying sizes. None of them had windows or doors. He looked back and saw that the small building he’d exited also had no windows or doors. Not even a doorway. Then how...?

He felt his jacket pockets. His phone was still there. He extracted it and saw the video was paused. No signal. No internet. The time said “8:21 a.m.” He sucked in air. Only six minutes since he had walked into Borking Station. Nothing made sense anymore.

He was also starting to feel a little foolish about the manifesto he’d emailed all over the place. It didn’t have quite the same effect without huge explosions play­ing on the evening news.

He was snapped back into the present by the sight of canisters appearing on the grass nearby. One at a time. He easily recognized them; they were the explosive parts of the bombs he’d painstakingly constructed by following instructions found online. At the moment, he only had two theories to explain what his eyes were telling him. One, he had gone stark, raving mad. Two... Okay, so he only had one theory. Also, he wondered where the guns and detonator had gone.

Van Scriver stood, slowly and carefully. He counted all the canisters; they were all here but one. Then the last one appeared, sitting on the grass as if it had always been there.

He became aware of someone standing nearby. Van Scriver turned his head slowly. It was a monk of some sort, wearing the same garb as the guy in Borking Station. Dark-colored tunic with extra-wide, extra-long sleeves, hands clasped in front but hidden by the sleeves. Vented wooden mask over his mouth and nose. Lightweight and light-colored pantaloons.

Wait. Was it the same guy? Van Scriver realized he couldn’t tell. All these damn guys look alike, he reminded himself. He hadn’t gotten a good look at his nemesis in the station, either.

“What in the fresh fuck is going on?”

“You have been removed”, the monk said.

 

5. Artifex   •••

“What in the fresh fuck is going on?” screeched the panting man.

“You have been removed”, replied Artifex Operarius.

Artifex watched calmly as the criminal’s beady eyes darted around the hillside. The eyes settled on Artifex again. “You!” he shrieked. “It was you, wasn’t it?”

Artifex didn’t answer. He didn’t owe anything, especially explanations, to this... he hesitated to use the word human to describe Van Scriver, but then chided himself for the thought. Of course the man is human. But not all humans have equal opportunities, he reminded himself. This human has been broken. Artifex didn’t know if Van Scriver could be fixed.

Van Scriver huffed and puffed a few times and then charged at Artifex. Artifex was prepared for such an animal-like act. He quickly muttered a few syllables inside his wooden mask and twitched a few fingers within the oversized sleeves, and Van Scriver was suddenly forty feet away from him. Foiled, the flustered terrorist tripped on a root and skidded into the gravel. He clambered up, wild-eyed.

Artifex muttered again, and Van Scriver was back in front of him. “Are you injured?” he asked the criminal.

Seething, Van Scriver checked his knees and elbows, but didn’t answer.

Artifex became aware of a woman standing next to him who hadn’t been there before. She was wearing garb identical to his.

“Teacher”, he said, without turning toward her.

Van Scriver noticed her too, and sputtered, “Where do you people keep coming from? Are you wizards?” He glanced about frantically, then suddenly became calm. “Oh! Okay, I’m just insane. This only makes sense if I’m insane.” He pointed back at the wooden cabin and shouted, “I just walked through a fucking wall! And I’ll do it again to prove that I’m insane.”

Artifex Operarius muttered softly to himself. He watched the American hesitate but then walk straight through the wood. Artifex muttered again, and heard muffled sounds from inside.

“Hey! Why can’t I get back out? Where’s the doorway. What happened? I’m going to kill you mother—”

This time it was Teacher who said a few short syllables and suddenly the sound cut off. No one outside Van Scriver’s wooden cell would be able to hear him.

She turned to Artifex, a questioning expression on her face. “This was not part of our plan”, she noted, gesturing toward Van Scriver’s cell. “Can I assume you have an explanation?” Then she looked around at the canisters scattered on the grass. “You have been busy.”

Artifex felt himself sweating. He had always known this would be the most difficult part. “Yes, Teacher. I have an explanation.”

“I would very much like to hear it”, she said. “However, it is late. This man is safe for now. You have ensured no others are in danger?”

“I have.”

“Then we will sleep. Tomorrow we will talk.”

His expression did change then, but only a bit. He was worried. But he would answer for himself.

 

6. Soup   •••

Christopher Ludwig Van Scriver carefully shifted his eyes from one side to the other, then whipped his head around quickly enough to hurt his neck. No matter how quickly he spun, turned, or darted, all four walls of his cabin remained solid. There were no windows and no doors. The only light flickered from a thick candle on a metal holder above the center of the room, suspended by delicate chains. The air wasn’t stale, so there must be vents in the roof somewhere. He checked for loose floorboards or secret levers in the walls. To no avail.

He had been in the room for several hours, talking aloud to himself about his current insanity, but then regularly convincing himself that something more sinister was afoot. His watch said it was afternoon in Riverton. He didn’t know what time it was here.

Then he spun at a slight sound. He saw an old man standing next to a small wooden table. On the table was a wooden bowl filled with steaming soup. Next to the bowl was a wooden spoon. The old man wore a blue tunic and flimsy pants like everyone else he’d seen on this hillside. And that infernal wooden mask.

The man said, “Good morning.” And then, “I apologize.”

After a moment’s shock, Van Scriver asked: “For what?”

“Because you can never leave.”

“Of course I can leave”, Van Scriver said firmly. “I’m an American citizen. They’re looking for me right now. All of you are going to regret this.”

The old man shook his head. “Please eat to maintain your health”, he said. “Then you will begin to learn.”

“Learn what?”

“Everything.”

Then the old man said something Van Scriver couldn’t understand. The man ceased to be there.

His stomach growling, Van Scriver convinced himself the soup wasn’t an illusion and wasn’t poisoned, and began to eat. In his hungered state, it was delicious. Then he grew sleepy. It had been a long day, what with waking up early to plant the bombs, storming the station, and then... Whatever it was that happened after that.

He stretched out on the floor and slept.

 

7. Trial   •••

As evening approached, Artifex Operarius entered the largest structure on the hillside, the gathering hall. Others were already there, seated around the sides of the chamber. Teacher was at the far end of the room.

Teacher stood as he came in, and his trial began.

“Artifex Operarius is hereby charged with revealing himself to the world”, Teacher told the Council and high-ranking onlookers. She didn’t appear happy about it; she had been his mentor. “An American, Christopher Ludwig Van Scriver, entered a crowded public place with the intent to kill hundreds. He live-streamed video via his phone. His video is our primary evidence, for it clearly shows Artifex Operarius exhibiting his skills in front of hundreds of witnesses. While this Council recognizes the intent to save innocent lives, our internal rules are well known to Artifex. The punishment for this infraction is banishment — and permanent prevention of the future exercise of his powers.”

She turned to Artifex. “As required, you may now give account of yourself. You are allowed one hour.”

Artifex Operarius closed his eyes. He hoped what he had to say would be enough. He didn’t expect exoneration; he only wanted the Council to be divided, forcing them to confer. A few extra hours might be enough. Then he began to speak.

“For 500 years, through twenty Teachers, we have meticulous records of our secret history. Before that point, everything is uncertain — nothing was written and old legends are unreliable. So we guess. We conjecture.”

Teacher interrupted. “Be reminded that you are allowed only an hour for defense. Do you wish to waste it on recounting history?”

He didn’t reply, but continued speaking.

“Prior to the regular use of verbo virtutis — the Energetic Words — there existed only one widespread way to understand the Universe — it had been created or formed, and was ruled by gods. But the viewpoints diverged into three strands: the scientific, the religious, and of course us — Verbo Virtutis. We few thousand, sprinkled around the Earth, unlike either of the other strands, know differently — because we practice the evidence of Verbo Virtutis, the words of power that when used appear as ‘magic’ to the uninformed.

“We don’t know why or how the reality of our Universe includes these exceptions to the otherwise dependable scientific reality. Some of us—” he gestured to the handful of ochre-colored tunics “—assert that a God gave out the original knowledge. Others—” and here he acknowledged those in gray tunics “—assert that the Universe came about on its own, with the Energetic Words being simply an accident awaiting discovery. The rest of us admit we cannot know either way how the Words came to exist, but we know the Words actually do exist and have the power we ascribe to them.”

He took a breath, noted that the audience was still curious as to what direction he was headed with this defense.

“Therefore a majority among us suppose that some human must have discovered the Energetic Words, likely entirely by accident. Perhaps, we surmise, it was in a moment of frustration that someone — now lost to history — sputtered syllables they believed to be nonsense, and at the same time their hands moved in exactly the correct fashion of a Finger Key. And that person saw the result of that combination, a result we now take to be obvious. Maybe that first word/key combination defied gravity, or perhaps the person slid forward through time or caused an object to disappear.”

He shrugged. “To us, all of these actions are commonplace, learned when we were children. But to that first person, it must have been remarkable.”

He looked around again, earnestness showing on his face, knowing his hour of defense was slipping away.

“I recount history to arrive at an important point. Try to imagine knowing none of the Energetic Words and none of the Finger Keys. Knowing only what had been said of the Universe up to that time. Try to imagine the excitement, the thrill experienced by that person. And perhaps fear. Think of how he or she must have strained, trying to remember and repeat exactly the right combination.

“We cannot know what that person thought, that first one who was able to repeat the feat and develop a theory of it, eventually discovering other Energetic Words and Finger Keys. We can assume that person practiced in private for fear of being labeled a witch or devil-worshipper. But they must have realized how powerful such knowledge could be, both for good and for evil. Even an uneducated peasant, as most people were at the time, would realize the implications. A despot could crush his opposition. A clergyman could conjure tricks to ‘prove’ his religion. But also: a caring person could feed the starving, heal the sick, avert disasters.”

He saw expressions shift minutely around the hall. Some had guessed what he was about to get at, and which stance he was going to take on it. Most couldn’t help but prejudge his conclusion.

“That person, or someone who learned under them, decided to keep it all a secret. The fear, fear of evil people in the world, is written into our doctrine — which was fully formed by the time our records began 500 years ago. Someone invented the Larva — the mask — to hide our lips. Sleeves were lengthened to hide the Finger Keys. We are told since childhood that if anyone outside our group learns the secret, then the worst people will turn it against us. Further, that the very existence of our society must be hidden. All to keep our wonderful knowledge secret.”

Some faces hardened. He plunged on.

“This secrecy assumes most people are evil, and that evil will overcome good. But in traveling this world, I have learned that most people are good. Most people will do the right thing even if they don’t have to, even if no one is watching. I have come to believe that Verborum Industria was correct.”

A gasp went up around the room. Teacher’s eyes widened. Artifex Operarius felt beads of sweat break out on his back. He had just committed blasphemy.

“It is still my hour”, he declared, before anyone could interrupt.

“Verborum Industria, our greatest historical enemy, arose 200 years ago from among our own ranks. They decided, as I now have, to make greater public use of the Words and Keys, to save those in need of saving, to improve our world. But our Teacher of that time judged Verborum Industria to be as evil as the men we hide our powers from — merely because they risked the secret getting out. For forty years we hunted them, banished them, wiped their minds or removed their hands. For nearly a century we searched out any mention of them in documents, news­papers, journals, and letters. We ensured nothing of them exists in history today — only the repeated warnings within our circles. Our secret was safe once again.

“Since then, a few individuals have tried it, most recently four years ago. We all remember how that ended.”

He watched them glance at one another.

“All while our powers go mostly unused.”

Another gasp.

Artifex quickened his pace, worrying he wouldn’t be allowed to finish.

“We have the power to cleanse the Earth of pollution, but instead we heal one child with asthma. We can stop tsunamis, but we rescue one poor family. We can end all war, but we provide food to a handful of refugees.”

Horrified expressions.

He looked for sympathy, but saw none. He accepted that he would likely lose his hands at the end of this. He would spend the rest of his life begging for loose change on muddy street corners. Or, if he was lucky, he would get hit by a bus and go into a blessed coma. He reminded himself that his only goal now was to gain a few extra hours.

“We need to reveal ourselves to the world, offer our power for the greater good.

“We were all taught the argument: Evil men will steal our knowledge to gain more wealth and power. But remember how easily we defeated Verborum Industria? All of them were well-learned in our arts. One by one we caught them and removed their hands or blanked their minds. We can do the same with any evil man. We know in which boardrooms they sit and in which mansions they live. Any one of them who learns a single Energetic Word along with its Finger Key would be caught the next day.”

His voice was rising now; he fought to get it under control.

“Being seen is only radical relative to our intense secrecy. Yet it is the best way to better our world. Relax our secrecy rules. Allow us — those who wish it — to operate in public. Instead of helping only a few in the shadows, we could stand in the light.

“As to the charge against me, no, I have not shared our secrets.” He stared at Teacher. “Read my thoughts and know I speak the Truth. Did I show my power? Yes, to avert certain death for a small number of people. No one saw my Finger Keys. The only person who could have heard my Words has been removed to this hillside. He will become one of us, if you allow it.”

He sighed. “I offer myself to your judgment.” Then he sat on the bamboo floor.

Teacher rose and returned to her place. “Very well.” She looked around the room. No good Teacher — and all of them had been good — would pronounce judgment over the doubts of trusted councilors. All must be convinced. She saw that some were unsure.

“We must confer”, she said. “Artifex Operarius, join your prisoner in his cabin until we call for you.”

He nodded mutely. Inwardly, he relaxed. Even if the Council reached a decision tonight, the sentence would not be carried out until morning. He would have time. Just enough.

 

8. Curious   •••

Detective Jamaal Johnson arrived home about the same time as his wife.

“So...? What did you learn?” she asked him, even before they’d hung up their coats.

“I think it’s real”, he said.

“Magic?”

“Yes.” He held his hands in a gesture of surrender. “Somehow, some way, some kind of magic exists in our world — some secret way of subverting the laws of physics.”

“Again, you already believe in God”, she pointed out.

“Somehow, this is different. It feels more real to me because I’ve watched that security footage fifty times. I’ve never seen a video of God or been in the presence of a miracle. All that feels more like old stories. But this is some real shit. Today I saw a man disappear right in front of me.”

Nina’s eyes went wide. “The magician?”

“Yes.”

“At the P.D.?”

“Also yes.”

“So that’s on tape too?”

“Yes. No, I didn’t bring a video of that.” He laughed, weakly. “I know you want to see my expression on that video, and maybe you will someday when this all comes out.”

She nodded fiercely. “You bet your ass I want to see that.” Then she laughed at the thought of it. “Did you learn anything before he... left?”

“A little. He seemed intent on telling me something, but was trying to gauge what kind of man I am.” He looked introspective for a moment. “Maybe I scared him off. But now I’m the one who’s scared.”

“What are you scared of?”

“Nina, honey, I’ve just become convinced that the world as I know it is a sham. Almost all of us walk around every day, assuming one thing, but it turns out a select few people know something we don’t.”

“So what are you going to do?”

“Well, what I did was spend a lot of the afternoon searching the internet. I found that a lot of those old stories and videos we remembered have been scrubbed — they’re gone. The people who made them were fired and disgraced. Several media sites published retractions.”

She raised her eyebrows.

“Yeah. I found a couple of blog entries by one writer. She made sense. She went offline three years ago, but maybe I can track her down, find out what she knows... I don’t think she would have thrown away a promising career for some made-up fiction about magic monks in a secret society. She wouldn’t have sent that to press unless she was convinced it was true.”

Nina looked at him steadily. “Is this a personal quest, or part of your official investigation?”

“I don’t know, honey. I just know I’m curious about...” Jamaal looked off into space.

“What is it?” Nina put a hand on his shoulder.

“Curious. That’s what he asked me. Am I a curious man? I’m sure as shit curious now. For example, when this guy disappears, where does he go?”

Nina didn’t respond right away. But when she did, the tone of her voice scared Jamaal further. “I think I might know where he is”, she said.

Jamaal looked up, then followed her eyes toward the living room. Artifex Operarius was standing there, his face expressionless behind the wooden mask, his dark blue tunic dry as a summer day.

“I will tell you more now”, he said. “But I must hurry.”

 

9. Choice   •••

Artifex Operarius appeared beside Christopher Ludwig Van Scriver. The sleeping man awoke.

“It’s you again.” Van Scriver was gentler now, hadn’t had time to work up the rage.

“Yes”, Artifex said. This time he smiled. “You should know I will almost certainly be punished for revealing myself, which I did only to stop you. You, on the other hand, will be offered choices.”

Van Scriver sat up. “What choices?”

“Once I am gone, the Council will give you two choices. You can learn our ways. Learn the Energetic Words and Finger Keys that unlock powers you can’t imagine. At your age, it will take some time. But you will be fed and housed. It will not be easy. But it will make you a better person.”

“I’d rather not”, Christopher retorted. He glanced around the bare walls again, in case a magic doorway had appeared. It hadn’t. ‘What’s the other choice?”

“Less pleasant”, Artifex assured him. “You will stay in this room for the rest of your life. You will be fed and sheltered, but that is all. You can never leave, never see the world again.”

“I’ll get out”, Christopher sneered. “Even if I have to claw my way out. I will chew through these walls if that’s what it takes.”

Artifex tilted his head. “You aren’t interested in the power at all?”

“You mean your sleight-of-hand magic tricks?”

“Like this”, Artifex said. He whispered syllables inside his mask, flicking his fingers inside his sleeves, and a giant snake appeared on the floor several feet away from Van Scriver. The white man yelped and began scrambling backward from the slowly undulating python. But then it was a small pony. It snorted and glanced around, curious about its new wooden shed. Then an ostrich. Then nothing.

“Simple illusions”, Christopher gasped, not believing his own words. “You should watch more television; they explain tricks like this all the time.”

“Like this?” Artifex asked.

Christopher floated into the air, midway between floor and ceiling. He gurgled and flailed his limbs. “Put me down!”

“What can I do to convince you?” Artifex asked, allowing Van Scriver to stay in the air. “Are you hungry? Thirsty?” Platters of food and beverage appeared all around the still-floating and flailing Van Scriver.

“I can actually smell that”, he said, finally accepting — if only a little bit.

“Or, since I am to be punished anyway, and will certainly soon be stripped of my abilities, I offer you a third choice”, Artifex told him. “I could break one more rule and put you out of your misery. You would never feel a thing; only cease to exist. You would no longer have to live with being a failed human.”

“Failed? I was thwarted”, Christopher insisted.

“You failed to be kind at almost every turn”, Artifex pointed out. “You even failed to avoid extreme and wanton unkindness — something almost everyone succeeds at daily. You failed to empathize with your fellow citizens. You failed to differentiate between fact and fiction on your conspiracy theory websites. And so much more. I can put an end to that.”

The food and drink disappeared; the room was empty again.

“Or I can simply wipe your mind. Do you want to forget your lackluster jobs, your poor attempts to know women? What about your parents? You almost never talk to them; I can make you forget it all.”

Christopher was shaking now.

“Please set me down”, he asked quietly. And he floated slowly to the floor. All resistance had faded.

“You said you were going to be punished for stopping me. What are they going to do to you?”

“Most likely remove my memories and set me down in a city street somewhere”, Artifex said. “Sometimes, to be sure, they also remove an offender’s hands.”

“That seems pretty harsh. Why don’t you use your magic to escape? Disappear.”

Artifex shook his head sadly. “I will face the judgment of the Council”, he said. “I have hidden all my life — from the world — I won’t hide from the very ones who taught me these secrets.”

Van Scriver looked thoughtful. “Most people probably think you’re a hero. Even I might have when I was younger.”

“What changed since then?” Artifex asked. “What happened to you that made you want to kill hundreds of people?”

Christopher Ludwig Van Scriver shook his head. “I don’t... I didn’t want to kill anyone. I wanted to wake them up. Because no one will listen to manifestos, blogs, online screeds... No one will listen unless you do something.”

“Answer the question.”

“What changed? Oh, I learned a lot. I found out about the globalist elites that control our world. Their social engineering plans.”

Artifex allowed an expression to change his face. It was confusion. “And you think people aren’t aware? It’s in the news every day.”

“No”, Christopher insisted. “When I talk to people about it — even my own parents — they look at me like I’m crazy. Or like they’re in on it and have something to gain.”

“But almost everyone’s aware”, Artifex pointed out. “The corporate masters fund­ing political campaigns. CEOs writing the very laws that give them loopholes and tax cuts. Bought-off politicians fighting against wage increases or worker protec­tions. Fossil fuel corporations pushing climate change...”

Christopher shook his head. “What? That’s not what I’m talking about at all, man.”

“These are established facts”, Artifex said grimly. “Arms dealers profiting from war. Systematic efforts to trap people in poverty.”

“You don’t get it. You couldn’t. This is about leftist agendas and their secret goals to eradicate white people and feminize men.”

Artifex gaped at him, confounded. “Foolish drivel.” Then his expression grew stern. “We’re running out of time. I have a detective to visit. Your choices are simple. I have offered to end you while I still can; no one else here will make that offer. They will offer only two choices. Exist forever in this cabin or learn their ways.”

“I guess I’ll learn then”, Christopher sighed.

 

10. Avatar   •••

“How did you get in my house?”, Detective Jamaal Johnson said to the magician. His right arm had drawn his gun without conscious thought.

Artifex Operarius waved a hand, unconcerned. “I’m not even here”, he said. To emphasize that, he blinked out of existence, and then reappeared a few feet away a second later. “See? I was never in your police station. Never in this country.”

“I was there, man”, Jamaal said. “I saw you come into the station. Get searched. Sit across from me.”

Artifex passed one of his arms through the other. “Check your footage of my arrival”, he said. “It was raining. Note that everyone around me was soaking wet but that I was dry. This is a mirage.”

Then he looked very tired. “I can’t keep this up much longer. You talked about tracking down a writer. Why not speak with me?”

Jamaal stood slowly and walked across the room to Artifex Operarius. The man looked real. Jamaal put out a hand and touched the shoulder. It felt solid. But when he suddenly flexed his fingers to grasp the man, his fingers clasped through the appearance of a shoulder. Jamaal yelped and leapt back.

“Are you okay?” Nina squeaked. She hadn’t moved from the edge of the kitchen.

“Fine”. Jamaal walked around the projection. “How do you do it? Where are you, really?”

“I am on the other side of the world”, Artifex Operarius said. “This is just a... an avatar if you will. A placeholder. The how is more complex. Please check your coat pockets for a piece of paper. Any moment now, my sentence will be carried out.”

Jamaal walked sideways to the coat rack, keeping an eye on Artifex.

“Hurry, please”, Artifex Operarius pleaded.

Jamaal pulled a slip of paper from his coat pocket. It hadn’t been there this morning, he knew. It had a string of numbers neatly written across it: 38383838 121212121.

Artifex said hurriedly: “I have written all I know — a great crime against my Council. They will look for you. Practice privately. It is crucial that you spread the—”

He disappeared.

Jamaal looked at Nina. Nina looked at Jamaal.

“Well, that was unexpected”, Nina finally said.

Jamaal looked at the paper again, and back to the empty spot where Artifex had been. “Weirdly, I think I know where this is.”