Improvised Spellcasting

[madimpossibledreamer]

We get to see the inner workings of how the three cast spells.  It's very individual but not entirely unique, because there's only so many ways to do things in your brain.  Galen did math, for instance, and I think Isabelle did weaving but, again, it's been forever.  I thought about their strong suits, and Buffy's, well, she kind of has Kiryu & Majima's ability to pick up choreography just from seeing it once.  Willow legit hacked the government back before she kind of gave up computers for magic.  And as a carpenter-slash-builder, a strong 3-D mental map is a definite plus.

Main Points:
Buffy/Babylon 5 AU (same as The Ushari): Agents of Chaos AU
Chapter Summary: Angel's rescue turns a little complicated.
Word Count: 880
Rating: Teen

 

        Angel looks almost grateful for the rescue, but then, he often does, the shy introvert.  It’s not like he’s reading everyone’s minds, when they’re around, because that would be highly illegal and he doesn’t have the psi rating to pick up on thoughts like that, and he’s a good boy and always wears his gloves, but he still gets nervous in a crowd or with new people, particularly ‘normals’.  Tsandar’s still slightly confused as to how he’d even met Buffy in the first place, given how shy he is, but at least they’re rescuing him now.
        And he sees who they’re rescuing him from and barely contains the hiss—a woman whose ‘cat’ costume is cringeworthy, to say the least.  If the foreign memories Willow had found was correct, his was equally terrible, before the change, but he didn’t have to stare at that.  At least hers has a tail, as floppy and ridiculous as it looks, and for a moment he feels envious.  Just a moment, though.
        He looks ridiculously relieved at the rescue.  “Buffy, do you know what’s going on?”  Probably getting slightly desperate and wondering if he should risk breaking the rules with an unauthorized scan.
        “Something about implanted memories,” she responds, putting a hand on her hip, in total business mode.
        “You’re almost making more sense than usual.  Maybe you should stay that way.”  He narrows his eyes.  Ah.  This must be what the ancient human phrase of ‘catty’ comes from.  Did cat costumes draw such people?  Was he, gasp, like that before the change?  If so, he’s not altogether sure he wants to come back.  That’s when she notices him and gets ready to lecture him.  “Don’t think I didn’t notice the outfit.  You know, dressing like me won’t make you any cooler.”
        He rolls his eyes, but before he can respond one of his ears flicks as he picks up a sound.  A bad sound.  Coming in their direction.
        “Incoming,” he states quickly, and almost immediately Willow and Buffy are joining him in formation.  They’ve been training well.  Angel pulls the “cat-girl” off to the side to a somewhat defensible location even as she complains.
        “Godzilla?” Buffy asks quietly, fireball appearing in her hand as she concentrates on her fireball spell.  It’s a good question whether or not it would actually work on a radioactive creature, but it’s worth a try.  He is certainly grateful that each Technomage has a different mental casting method, because while he’s decent enough with a staff in a fight, choreography is not his strongest suit.
        “Yeah.  I think I saw some of one of the old films, so I should be able to make a hologram that will distract him, though it’s going to be a little tricky.”  If he remembers correctly, Gojira’s biggest foe was a three-headed dragon named Ghidorah, though remembering all of its powers and keeping that all in mind as he constructs the three-dimensional model of the spell in his head is going to be by far and away the most complicated spell he’s ever cast.
        “Buffy, if I know our furry friend well, he’s trying to recreate a situation where a different monster is attacking Earth and Godzilla defends us.  I’m not sure attacking it in the meantime will help the situation.”  He smiles, as odd as it probably looks to most humans.  Willow is such a good friend.  “You’ve got a decent shield, right?”
        She grumbles a bit, letting the fireball wink into nothing, reminding him briefly of the ‘no, seriously, she’s not a pyro’ conversations he’d had before he reigns back in his mind to concentrate on the task at hand.
        “I’m going to try to use an electron incantation to tell Godzilla of our plight, and how the terrible—”
        “Three-headed dragon,” he supplies, faint and far away.
        “How the terrible three-headed dragon is killing people and terrorizing the countryside.”  He doesn’t have to have his eyes open to hear the verbal wink in her voice.  She’d mastered the code for the electron incantation as almost her first spell.
        Then it’s quiet, all but the ominous roaring and crashing coming in their direction.
        “Hey, you trust me, right?”  His ears flatten a little, and he hopes Buffy isn’t paying attention, even though that’s probably a foolish hope because she tends to be fairly observant.  It’s not that he doesn’t, mind, only that those words never lead places that are of the good.
        “Absolutely, even though you’re probably going to suggest something a little, uh…unconventional.”  He hasn’t gotten anywhere too strenuous with building the illusion, yet, just gotten the blocking sketched out in his head, so he can still afford an interruption, if not for much longer.
        “I have absolutely no idea if another Technomage can control another’s hologram, but see if you can’t inject a password and send the password along.  If we really want to make this realistic enough to fool a giant monster, it had better actually fight like it knows what it’s doing.”  And she complains about Galen pushing the envelope.  He’s a smart enough Ushari not to say that out loud, though.
        “Sounds like a plan,” he murmurs and fully dives into the spell, knowing that soon enough it’ll look all too flashy from the outside.