I don't know what I was expecting. What I do know is that I wasn't expecting what really happened. If that makes sense…

"And now just try not to scream too loud…" I hate Vass. Let it be known that I hate Vassili Smith forever, and just because of that line. Well, for many reasons, but I'd hate him even if it were just that line!

I'm stalling. I'm sorry. I don't want to relive what happened next. I'm not the best author, so I don't know how detailed I can get it. How detailed I even want to get it…

I stood in the middle of the circle, just as Vass had told me to. There were eleven men who ranged from somewhere around twenty years old to somewhere around fifty (Mr. Lottsky). Then there was Vass, who, like me, was sixteen.

As I stood there I realized that I felt very out of place. The people around me loomed as if they were going to catch me, not unlock some magical abilities. It was kind of like I was a spy in the girls bathroom, or something of an equal offense. Then they all started to raise both hands.

The sun hadn't set outside of the forest yet, but in the clearing it was late twilight. Shadows lay over everything and cast some faces in partial, harsh shadow, and some in full shadow. Overall, it was very creepy. Vass managed to get at the perfect angle. Half of his face was dark; the other was lit by a malignant orange light.

All twelve men brought their hands together and raised them to a height even with my shoulders. With their elbows slightly bent, they fanned out their fingers and stared at me. They all had blank eyes, almost like they were in another realm.

Four of them chanted one single word, and suddenly webs of light danced between their fingers. Four more brought their hands apart just long enough to select two items from a pouch between their feet before smashing the contents together, causing more light. The remaining four, including Vass, merely stood there for a brief second before the webs of light burst into existence. I assumed that they were, in this order, wizards, warlocks, and sorcerers.

As soon as all hands had spun their web, the clearing suddenly darkened. I'm still not sure if it was from the magic or if the sun chose that precise moment to set, but it added up to a very dramatic, and very daunting, effect.

The light coursed between their spread fingers, flickering from white to electric blue and back. The webs wouldn't stay still for a second and it reminded me of lightening.

Just as I began to feel safe again, all twelve opened their hands until they touched the back of their neighbor's hand. The webs expanded to fill the void between palms and fingers. The light stopped switching colors and flared a bright blue, so bright that I remember thinking no natural power could ever be that hue.

As I had feared, they wanted to get closer to me. All twelve walked inward until, finally, they were only a step away from me and their hands had been pushed back together so that no man's web of light was wider than his shoulders.

"Close your eyes," Vass whispered very, very quietly, and I'm still not sure that I heard his voice. It might very well have been my mind whispering at me in fear, willing it to stop.

Suddenly I felt very warm. Light flared outside of my eyelids, and, a second later, in them. I could feel the webs of light stretching every which way across the circle, from person to person and through me. The lightening stretched from a mere plane to a copy of my body, and any place I turned my attention to I could feel them flickering and moving, I could feel that they were confined in me and no longer flickering between hands.

One thick cord of light struck me inside my torso, somewhere near my heart. Another hit me behind the eyes. I tried to hold it in, but a small moan escaped. It had hurt, and I'm not one to admit pain easily.

"Hold on, almost done."

I don't know who that was. Maybe it was my alternate personality. The one who says everything else.

Finally the lightening ceased. It just disappeared between one moment and the next. It left me feeling empty.

Right before I opened my eyes, something else rushed through me. I screamed. I have never screamed like that at any other moment of my life. Something pseudo-alien came into me and forced itself into every cell of my body.

I don't think I have to say it, but just for emphasis: It was the single most painful thing I have ever experienced. And, when I opened my eyes after a few random groans, I discovered it wasn't supposed to be that way.

"Oops…"

"It wasn't your fault, Vassili. We just didn't have the power needed to do this properly." I didn't know the speaker then. He was short and had sandy-blond hair.

I still don't know him. I think he died in the Incident.

But, for the story, I was on the ground, in grass covered in dew, with the full twelve others clustered around me.

I had to ask it. "What happened? Did I pass out?"

Vass leaned down, and helped me sit up. I tried to stay there, though it was hard. I did not then and still do not like to lie down in front of people, especially people I don't know. Someone handed me a glass of water. Conjured, now that I think of it. I sipped it as an older man answered me.

"We tried to unlock your power, and it was going just fine. Very suddenly, as the natural block was being removed, your power slammed out and escaped. I don't know what you felt, but our magic snapped out of control and struck out at you. Then your magic escaped the entire way."

I stared at them. I was trying to sip the water, trying not to fall back down, and trying to get more information out of them all at once. Vass prompted me to tell them what I felt.

"Carl, they may be able to figure out what happened if you tell them what happened to you."

"But…" Here it was again. I think deep down inside I'm a very shy person. "I don't even know most of these people."

Vass looked around at the other eleven, then back at me. "They all may have different information based off what they felt. No one experiences magic the same. With all thirteen of us chiming in, we may be able to figure out what happened and why, in or near full."

Do any of you hate it when your friends get all smart at you? But he was right. "Fine. First… I felt the lightening going through me, flat, like a plane. Then it changed and raced all through me. I felt like I could step away and it'd be a perfect replica of my body. It didn't feel like it was stretching between your hands anymore, though. Then something hit me here," I placed a finger where it hit… My heart, I realized. It had been a direct hit. "And then another hit me in the head, somewhere behind my eyes." I took a deep breath, a sip of water, and continued with closed eyes. "The lightening disappeared, and I felt empty until something else, I guess it was my magic, rushed into me and forced itself to combine with my body. Then I screamed. And then I opened my eyes."

There was a moment where I just sipped my water.

"Well, I've found some good news amongst the bad," Mr. Lottsky said, rather cheerily. "You were just struck with malignant magic in your heart and your brain, and you didn't die." I suppose the emphasis was to show me that it could very well have happened.

"But, sir… what's the… bad news?" I didn't want to know. What if I was crippled magically, or something equally horrible that I couldn't imagine because I didn't know what magic could or could not do?

"You may not be able to use your full potential. You may be fully handicapped. You may have malignant magic only. There are a number of things. You were simply too powerful. Normally that power is not a factor, but apparently it can be."

I groaned as pain spiked in my head and heart at once. "Well, whatever it is, can I go home now?" The stars were just beginning to appear in the western sky. There was a curfew during the school year that all people under eighteen years old had to be home before full dark. Full dark meaning, it was very clearly defined, that more than twenty stars were visible the whole way from the eastern to the western sky. Don't ask who made the rule. We're still trying to find him and to change it, but nothing ever happens.

"That would be a very good idea, actually," Harold Brown chimed in. "Go home and rest. When you feel better, we should be able to identify what damage was done tonight, if any. Vassili, you help him. Make sure he arrives at his house safely and help come up with an excuse if his mother asks. I can't imagine that he'll be in any condition to answer by then. The rest of you, stay here."

Harold Brown was a great leader. It came naturally to him, he claimed, but his career had nothing to do with leading. Go figure.

By the time we got to my door, I was leaning very heavily on Vass, who had to explain that I was not drunk, high, or in bad favor with anyone else who may have decided to take a bit of anger out on me. I don't know how he did it. I actually don't remember much about that night.

Or the following four days, for that matter.

The last thing I remember is, as Vass was handing me to my mother, he whispered, "You really weren't supposed to scream at all." He may have been crying. I'm not sure.

Ending notes: Sorry it took so long to write this. I've got too many other things and none of them are making progress. For those keeping track, I think I'll stick only to this story and A Bedtime Story for a while. Maybe one or two odd one-shots, but no more multi-chapter stories on Fictionpress until I finish one of these two. I hope you enjoy this chapter! ^_^