Chapter 3: Cereal Edgelord Strikes Again

The old man caught the rising lid with his gloved palm and forced it shut, dragging one foot across the floor as the box lifted his arm. Dante stumbled against a rack of shirts while Martin pulled the metal case open beneath it.

"Bring the case up to it," he told Martin, bracing his other arm against the counter. "Don’t wait for me to get it down."

Martin lifted the open case around the box while the old man held the lid. Something struck the wood from inside, making Dante reach for a coat hanger before he saw what he had picked up. He put it back and held the rack steady instead, giving Martin room to turn.

The old man pulled his hand clear as Martin shut the case. Four locks snapped into place, and the weight landed on the counter hard enough to rattle the till. Dante waited for the voice to start again, watching the locks while both men kept their hands on the metal.

"Is it staying in there this time?" he asked. "Because I put a bowl over it, and I’m beginning to see where that fell short."

"This case is made for it," Martin said, checking each lock before releasing his grip. "Keep your hands clear while we make sure it’s secure."

The old man checked a small window beside the handle. Only after the light behind it settled did he reset the warning above the doorway and reach for the receipt printer.

"It’s equipment for testing magic," the cleaner said, reading the label on his screen. "An assessment unit, according to this. It should have arrived in a safety case like this one, not loose in a box. I’m recording the fault, and we’re keeping it here."

"Could I get that part in writing?" Dante asked. "Someone told me they’d come back if I missed the appointment, and I want proof I brought it here."

The man wrote ACTIVE ON RETURN beneath the case number and printed a second slip for Mom’s jacket. Dante checked that both had the shop’s details, then took them outside to call her. Through the window, he could still see Martin beside the locked case and students passing beyond the blue door.

Mom asked whether he was hurt before she asked about the receipt. Dante sent her a photograph and explained the hallway, turning his phone toward the shop until she reminded him they were on an ordinary call.

"Then come home, and we can work out who to report this to," she said. "You returned what they sent you."

Through the shop, Dante watched a student lift a dropped notebook without bending down. This was no longer just a strange interview on a screen. People here could move things without touching them, and he had done that with the box. Going home would be safer, but it would leave him scared of his own hands and no closer to knowing whether he could learn to use them.

"There’s a reception desk right there," he said. "I want to ask whether the offer actually came from them, and whether they can stop another visit. I’m not agreeing to a test."

Mom made him repeat that last part before she agreed to wait for his call. Dante put the receipts in his pocket and went back inside, asking Martin who he should speak to. Martin pointed out the welcome desk through the open doorway, where a woman in a university sweatshirt was sorting campus maps.

Dante started another recording before crossing, keeping the cleaner’s counter in view behind him. As he stepped through, his phone stopped recording and displayed a visitor registration notice. He checked that the old videos remained, then looked up as a man at reception retrieved his wallet from empty air. Dante turned to follow the wallet while still walking toward the desk.

A woman caught Dante’s forearm before he walked into the welcome desk. Copper-red hair fell over her university sweatshirt, and small silver rings lined one pointed ear. Her badge read ANIKA, STUDENT WELCOME TEAM. She looked more amused than worried about nearly having to explain a desk-related injury.

"You’ll get used to it, but the desks don’t move for you," she said, guiding him toward a table covered in maps. "Sit down before you find something else worth watching."

Dante pulled out the chair nearest the blue door and sat, laying his invitation beside the maps. On the nearest map, a tiny blue arrow followed a path between buildings, stopped at a printed staircase, and climbed it. He tilted the paper to see whether there was a screen underneath, but the arrow carried on across a fold.

Anika passed him a bottle of water while he studied the moving arrow. She explained that she was twenty-three and helped new arrivals find their way around campus. She was another student, not the person who had run his interview, which made it a little easier to ask her what was happening.

"My mom thought this was a school for party magicians," he said, indicating the hall with his bottle. "I’m starting to worry about the birthday expectations she’s setting."

"It’s a university for real magic," Anika said. "Classes, exams, homework, and people complaining about all three. The party tricks are usually what students do instead of studying."

"So I could learn to do what happened to the window?" Dante asked. He had meant to start with the box complaint, but the question came out before he could stop it.

"That’s what we can ask Admissions," she said, picking up her tablet from the maps. A man carrying printer paper closed the blue door, and Dante turned toward it at the sound.

Dante set the bottle down and stood so quickly that his chair scraped across the floor. He crossed back to the blue door and pulled it open, expecting to see the cleaner’s counter.

The door now opened into a supply closet. The cleaner’s counter and the street beyond it had vanished, leaving a mop and shelves of toner where his way home should have been.

He shut it and opened it once more. The mop remained, which felt insulting from an object that had never had a job interview go wrong.

"Anika, I’m going to need the exit back before I get attached to anything." He held the door open while she brought her tablet over, unwilling to give the cupboard another opportunity.

"That door was linked to the shop for a delivery," Anika said. "The link has closed, so it’s a closet again. You aren’t trapped here. I can have someone take you back to the street." She showed him the escort request on her tablet and waited for him to choose.

Dante looked from the request button to the closet. A magic doorway was not something he understood, but someone taking him home was. He asked her to keep that option open while he showed her what had happened at his house.

"I’d like an answer about the interview first," he said, letting the door close and following her back to the table. He sat in the same chair and pulled his phone from his pocket. "I opened their box, and a woman I couldn’t see decided we had a home appointment."

"Show me the ad." Anika put the maps aside.

"It’s gone. I saved the offer, and I’ve got this." Dante played the chair recording at a volume that might preserve his reputation.

Anika replayed his threat. Dante resisted asking whether the bass had sounded better in person and told her what had happened before he started recording.

"I waved at my mom to leave the room, and the window flew open behind me. My hand got hot just before it happened." He turned his palm up over the table. "Later I tried to open the box. I pictured the catch moving, felt the same heat, and it actually moved."

"When you waved at your mom, were you angry with her, frightened, or something else?" Anika picked up the invitation he had left beside the maps. "I’m asking because a strong feeling can set off magic before someone knows how to use it."

"Someone opened private files on my computer during the call, and then my mom walked in," he said. "I was embarrassed and trying to get her away from the camera. Then my hand got hot, and the window flew open." ℴ

Anika asked for the company name and sent it to the staff handling new students. She did not laugh at his hand or tell him he had imagined the window, and he realized how much he had expected her to do both.

"So you’re saying I did magic because I was embarrassed?"

"Possibly, but I’d want someone to check before I told you for certain."

Dante stared at his bottle. "I’ve been embarrassed for eighteen years. The furniture’s been very patient."

"Let’s keep it patient while I check this." She moved the bottle away from the tablet.

A group in long black coats crossed the hall, looking so comfortable here that Dante wished he could borrow some of it. "People reveal a great deal when they think you haven’t noticed their plans," he said, using his practiced villain voice because sounding lost had started to hurt.

"Who else contacted you?" Anika stopped typing.

He could have admitted that he did not know any more than she did. Instead, he enjoyed being taken seriously for a second too long and let her think he had a reason for the warning.

"I should speak to whoever’s in charge."

Her tablet chimed as she reached for her phone. Dante saw the reply: his appointment was real, but Blackwell had never placed the job ad or authorized the home assessor.

Another message appeared. Keep him talking until the escort arrives.

Then, as Anika’s hand slid over the screen: "Do not tell him any of this yet."