Myst and the Magic Shop Part 12 (Patreon)

Myst glanced in the mirror on the table in the room he'd rented for the night, trying to make sure that every hint of her hair and face were covered by the ski mask and hoodie, on the off chance that her invisibility didn't extend to the cameras or failed. She checked her gloves and the rest of her outfit then cast her invisibility spell and checked the mirror. 'Okay, even if one of the cameras catches you, you're just a random thief and you can leave through the skylight.'

She opened a portal to the storage closet's door that she'd cased earlier, slightly annoyed that it wasn't closer to her target, but it was the closest door that was recessed enough that the camera wouldn't catch the portal. 'In and out,' she told herself as she stepped through the portal and into the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York. She closed the portal to the Waterdeep inn behind her then headed down the hallway, not seeing a point in flying as she'd already scanned the hallway for pressure sensors.

'You'd think the insurance company would insist on better security,' she mused as she hugged a wall to avoid one of the museum's only infrared cameras in his path. She kept part of her attention on the security guards in the gate station that were talking about baseball rather than paying attention to the monitors as he headed towards the section of the museum that held his target.

Myst was a little disappointed that the rooms weren't wired to detect sounds or heat or anything that would make her excursion into burglary a challenge before pushing the thought aside. She slipped behind a pillar where none of the cameras could see then used her X-ray vision to examine a sword they had on display. 'Metal and flesh,' she mused as she pulled a rusty short sword out of his bag along with a bit of hair from one of the serving girls that she'd wrapped around a jagged piece of bone from last night’s dinner.

Myst focused on the magical stone she'd picked up that gave her the polymorph any object spell while it was on her person and polymorphed the sword, chunk of bone and hair into a copy of the Sword of Beowulf, complete with its cursed sheath. She frowned at the copy that looked like something that came out of a high school shop class. 'Could be better, could be worse.'

She checked the original again, looking through the case and the sheath with her X-ray vision then tried her polymorph spell again. 'Okay, that should actually pass inspection unless they compare it with the detailed photos.'

Myst scanned the room and the cameras then examined the case and the wires that connected to an audible alarm system built into the case. 'I know it's 2010 but if you're not going to integrate everything to a security system, shouldn't you have wifi? Or maybe they just figured anyone that got to this point would hack it?'

She knelt down and poked her head around the pillar so she could get line of sight on the display case without getting caught on the cameras on the off chance that her invisibility dropped. She cast silence on the case then cast blind on the camera.

"Jeff, check out camera nine, it's dark," Derek complained.

'Huh, that worked and Kryptonian hearing is bullshit,' Myst thought when she heard the security people talking in the security station. 'I knew it worked on golems in the game, it's nice to see it works on cameras,' she mused as she cast unlock on the case, causing the case to open and the silenced alarm to blare… without making a sound.

Jeff glanced over the various security monitors that he was responsible for. "Anything from eleven?"

Derek checked the other monitor that could see the malfunctioning camera. "It doesn't look like someone tampered with it, it just looks like it's on the fritz."

"Weird," Jeff muttered, wondering if it was worth checking out and how long he could delay in case a homicidal villain had decided to rob the place rather than Catwoman or one of the other costumed thieves that didn't leave bodies everywhere.

"Are you going to check it out?" Derek asked in concern.

Myst checked her arm to make sure she was still visible then walked over to the case, doing her best to avoid the still working cameras. She quickly swapped the swords then cast unlock on the alarm in the case and shut it. She frowned slightly when she didn't feel the spell have any effect. 'So much for completely bullshit conceptual magic, Harry Potter lied. Best case, they'll just think it's a glitch and get a tech to check it out in the morning.'

"It's probably just a glitch," Jeff assured him, not seeing a point in risking his life for the little they paid them.

"Shouldn't we check it out anyway?" Derek reluctantly asked.

Myst examined the wires with her X-ray vision then focused, recalling the feeling of making a stone dance in her hand while experimenting with her powers earlier. The wire was a small lightweight thing, probably as thick as a couple dozen strands of hair though much more dense. Her eyes narrowed and her brow furrowed in concentration as the wire trembled and then pulled itself loose, just enough that it didn't work, but not enough that it would be so obvious that there was no way a tech would leave it like that. She sighed and rubbed the bridge of her nose, wishing she had some aspirin with her. ‘I need a lot more practice with telekinesis,’ she mentally complained with a wince as her pulse throbbed in her temples even if the pain was slowly fading away.

"I swear these things were built by Russians," Jeff grumbled as he reached out and hit the monitor.

'Perfect.' A relieved Myst dashed back to the pillar and dispelled the blind on the camera.

'Huh, maybe it was just a glitch.' Jeff glanced over the rest of the cameras, relieved that everything was working. "I need to take a leak, I'll swing by and check everything," he offered, figuring it would be better than listening to the rookie complain for the rest of their shift or write something up which would cause management to look into things and no one wanted that.

Myst stuck the sword in her satchel then headed back down the hallway, towards the exit. 'If this was a show, Catwoman or a team of ninjas would burst in to cause pointless drama.' She paused and quickly scanned the rest of the building and the roof with his X-ray vision then silently chuckled and continued when she didn't find anything out of place… other than a certain woman in a black leather catsuit that was currently climbing through a skylight. 'Not my monkey, not my problem.'

0o0o0

Myst froze when he woke up in an unfamiliar place to the sound of voices.

"Do you think he found any buried treasure?" Alura asked as she scanned the ship with her X-ray vision.

Myst relaxed when he recognized the voice and where he was. "So much for having a lazy morning," he muttered as he rolled off the mattress he'd stuck on the captain's bed and floated towards the door to the room as he used his X-ray vision to look through the ship at where Alura, Clark and Lena were standing outside of the ship looking around. He glanced at the heavy looking plastic case next to Lena then focused on the Burger King bag that Alura was carrying, looking through the bag. 'Two burgers and fries, hopefully she's going to share.'

Luna pulled her attention off the glass dome that was barely illuminated by a patch of glass that wasn't covered by sand and looked at her daughter. "You'll have to ask him."

"I would if he was here," Alura replied as her attention jumped to the captain's door that had been open the last time she checked. "Do you think the ship is haunted?"

"What makes you think that?" Clark asked as he finished scanning the dome for structural issues.

"The captain's door was closed the first time I scanned the ship, now it's open," Alura replied, thinking about some of Zatanna's ghost stories from the party.

Clark turned and scanned the ship. "I'm guessing Myst heard us."

Alura shook her head. "I didn't see him."

"Batman mentioned him picking up anti-scrying gear," Clark replied as he watched the handle on the airlock spin. "Our hearing is partially psychic."

"How often do you and Mom run into wards?" Alura asked.

"Now and then," Clark replied, thinking about the magic users they'd run into over the years. "We mostly just have to deal with bits of alien tech."

Myst opened the airlock and stepped out. "It makes it easier to avoid running into crazy magic users."

"Cool," Alura replied as she held the bag up. "Breakfast? I'll share one of the burgers."

"That would be great," Myst replied, figuring that would keep him from having to scrounge up something for breakfast. "To answer your earlier question, I didn't end up going treasure hunting."

"Why not?" Alura asked as she pulled one of the burgers out of the bag and tossed it to Myst.

Myst caught the burger, being careful not to crush it. "I didn't have my head on straight and I didn't want to deal with giant monsters while I was distracted and tired."

"Problems?" Clark asked.

"I went to New York to pick up a magical sword before a bunch of crazy people stole it and used it to kill people," Myst replied as he partially unwrapped the burger.

"Is that the sword with the yellow sticker on the shelf?" Alura asked.

"Yellow sticker?" Lena asked as Myst bit into his burger.

"It says 'Cursed sword, don't touch!' on it," Alura replied as she grabbed her burger and handed her father the bag with the fries so she could unwrap her burger.

"Thanks," Clark replied with a grin as he grabbed a couple of fries.

"I'm going to want some of those," Alura replied as she finished unwrapping the burger then quickly stole the bag back from her cousin.

Myst swallowed his bite. "Yeah, it's basically enchanted to only work for the pure of heart. I'm not sure if the enchanter was a," he glanced at Alura, "a sadistic genius or an idiot because the sword only works for the pure of heart, good or evil doesn't really matter as long as they are pure."

"In other words, the Joker could use it?" Alura asked.

Myst shook his head. "Considering Harley, probably not. He's a bit too chaotic to be considered pure anything."

"Does that mean it's useless?" Lena asked.

"Some of the League of Shadows would probably count and a couple of the heroes," Myst mused.

"Could you use it?" Alura asked.

"Not a chance," Myst admitted, knowing he wasn't even close to pure of heart. "You need a level of intensity that borders on the insane to be pure," he explained as he turned to look at Clark. "Speaking of pure, do you want to try it?"

"Pure?!" Alura blurted. "You should hear the things him and my Moms get up to."

"We're not that bad," Clark lied, blushing at having his sex life exposed.

"Wrong type of purity," Myst replied with amusement then went back to eating his burger.

"What can I say, he's a beast and flight opens up so many options," Lena replied with a grin then stood up on her toes and kissed Clark, enjoying his embarrassment which he couldn’t seem to shake even after all these years.

Alura glanced at the gem stuck to Myst's forehead. "I'd ask for extra gems cause they're loud enough that we're lucky we live on the edge of the city and in a soundproofed house."

"By design, Kara can shake the walls with her moaning if we don’t take precautions," Lena said cheerfully.

"Mother," Alura groaned, "I don't need to know the details!"

"Do you need to wear them on your forehead?" Clark asked, hoping he could get something less visible.

"I could probably put them on rings or anklets or something, it might take me a couple of days," Myst said thoughtfully.

"Cool, that should save my sanity," Alura grumbled.

Lena grinned at her daughter. "Sanity is overrated."

"Says the mad scientist," Alura replied sarcastically.

"Yes, which means I should know," Lena replied innocently.

"I'm not touching that one," Clark offered.

"This means Clark can sneak up on you, Robin, and Zatanna," Lena pointed out.

"We're not," Alura replied, then shook her head and turned to look at Myst, deciding that arguing about her flirting with Robin and Zatanna wasn't productive. "So, what else went weird last night?" she asked, trying to change the subject.

"I heard a scream for help, I went and helped a demigod kid against a chaotic magic user that I'd rather not name in case he shows up," Myst replied, trying not to think about burning Kadabra's body to ash after tossing it through a portal to a random D&D world.

"Demigod?" Clark asked.

"Yeah, probably a future hero, I'll tell Diana the details. I'm sort of hoping I can deal with the chaos monkey this weekend, but I'd rather not name him because I don't want you saying it and causing him to appear," Myst explained.

"One of those. Don't worry, we're familiar with the practice," Clark assured him, thinking about a certain imp and some of Diana's family.

"Let's see the ship," Alura suggested, recognizing a subject people wanted to avoid.

"Mad scientists or alien meatshields first?" Myst asked as he gestured towards the ship.

"Split the difference," Clark said as he gestured for Alura to go first, not particularly worried about the ship as Kara had already checked it.

"Yes!" Alura squealed as she flew towards the ship.

0o0o0

"We're going to have to bring the alien hamsters back to life," Alura mused as she lightly tapped one of the glasslike tubes that ran through the ship with her finger. “I’m not sure if it was for temperature control or lighting or both, but alien hamsters were definitely involved.”

Myst pulled his attention away from the section of the wall he was cleaning with prestidigitation and looked at Alura. "Alien hamsters?"

"I can see the organic residue and traces of what may be fur in the tubes, which means there was something alive and furry in the tubes, thus alien hamsters," Alura replied with a grin.

"Or they used an organic compound," Myst pointed out.

Alura snickered. "Alien hamsters sound more fun."

"Your mind is a scary place, you know that, right?" Myst asked, doing his best not to laugh at the mental image of creepy alien hamsters running around the tubes.

"So I've been told," Alura replied with amusement as they started walking down the passageway, ducking beneath a few pipes that had been jarred loose during the crash or sometime in the decades since. "Any idea who we should set Aqualad up with?"

"Not my monkey, not my circus. I'd rather avoid any and all teenage drama," Myst replied, not particularly interested in dealing with teenage emotional issues.

"Does that mean you're not interested in watching Kid Flash crash and burn?" Alura asked as they reached the captain's room.

"Aqualad's love life is his business, Kid Flash crashing and burning is comedy for the public at large," Myst replied with a grin as he walked over to the enchanting altar set up in the corner.

Alura laughed. "Are you still annoyed about the magic thing?"

"I'm not sure annoyed is the right word," Myst replied as he grabbed a cardboard box of rings and bits of jewelry off the shelf and handed it to Alura. "Disappointed? Confused? He's smart enough to reconstruct a viable elixir that gave him superpowers from stories and partial notes but he can't seem to understand that insulting his teammates is a bad idea, especially since they can turn him into a toad."

"Zatanna would be too worried about turning him back and getting in trouble," Alura replied as she looked through the box.

"Fair point," Myst admitted. "Pick something out and I'll turn it into a magic item."

"Aren't you supposed to buy a girl dinner before you get her a ring?" Alura teased as she glanced over the rings, trying to find something that wouldn't get in the way while she was fighting villains.

"Probably," Myst replied as he grabbed one of the filled soul gems out of the box he'd set next to the enchanting altar, “but then you did buy me a burger, so I figure it counts.”

"Can I use an earring?" Alura asked as she pulled her clip-on earring off her ear and handed it to him.

"Sure," Myst replied as he took the ruby earring and set it on the altar. “Anything you want on it besides scrying protection? I can slot two spells on without much effort."

"Sex changing," Alura replied, bouncing excitedly on her heels.

"Disguise?" Myst asked as he focused on the enchanting altar, bringing up the floating menu.

"That and Zatanna swings both ways… as do I,” she replied, taking a moment to obviously check him out.

"Good to know," Myst teased as he enchanted her earring, hands and magic operating on automatic as he thought about what Zatanna looked like as an adult in some of the comics he’d read.

Alura grinned as she shook her finger at Myst. "No stealing my witch."

Myst grinned as he handed her the earring. "That should let you change back and forth and let you avoid being scryed on, just be careful not to rip your clothes when you change."

"Thanks," Alura replied as she put the earring on then started taking her clothes off so she could test her new earring.

"Ah…" Myst trailed off.

Alura snorted. "Like you haven't peeked."

"I haven't," Myst replied.

Alura dropped her shirt on the table and stared at Myst. "Why not?" she demanded, sounding half offended.

Myst tried to keep his gaze on her face rather than her breasts, which was hard to do as he was a good foot taller than her so the angle seemed designed to insure he got a good view with how close she was. "Because, it's not polite. If someone goes to all the trouble of putting on pants I assume they don’t want me peeking on them."

"I only put on pants because moms insist," Alura replied as she went back to stripping so she could test her earring. “I think I’m developing quite well and wouldn’t mind second and even third opinions from people I like.”

"Good to know," he said as he watched her drop her shorts to the ground along with her panties.

"That reminds me, mom mentioned something about you having a magic razor, can I talk you into enchanting me a razor?" Alura asked hopefully.

"You’re a bit of an exhibitionist aren’t you?" Myst asked.

Alura grinned as she slowly spun around. "A bit, besides you're supposed to tip your enchanter, it's a good rule of thumb."

Myst watched the transformation with amusement as Alura activated her earring and changed into a rather tall dark haired young man that could have been on the cover of a teen heartthrob magazine.

"I'm going to need a mirror," Alura said as he checked out his new package, humming slightly to test his slightly deeper vocal range.

Myst laughed as he watched Alura twist so he could check his own butt out. "You'd make a decent leading man if you want to go to Hollywood."

"Thanks," Alura replied as he flexed his muscles. "I need a camera and Zatanna," he mused as he glanced around the room. "Can you use a camera?"

"Depends on the type," Myst replied with a shrug, not sure how his ability or lack of ability to use a camera came into things.

Alura focused on his earring and shifted back to her normal form. "Do you think Zatanna and I could borrow your ship to make a video so we can show off some of our cosplay costumes?"

"Before or after I clean everything up?" Myst asked as he pictured her dressed up like various alien characters from popular media, using the interior of the ship for a backdrop.

"After," Alura replied as she started putting her clothes back on, having seen her mother heading their way.

"Sounds like fun," Myst replied, figuring it would be good to spend time with his… half niece/daughter? Whatever they were. It would be good to get to know one of the few other kryptonians while geeking out a bit.

0o0o0

'Kryptonians are bullshit,' Myst thought as he hovered over the ocean invisible and scanned the ruins under the ocean floor in a massive cavern miles below him, looking for one particular relic that might not even exist in this version of the world. "Relax, the cavern exists, the crown probably…" he trailed off as he caught sight of a suspiciously preserved skeleton wearing a golden crown. "Bingo!"

He took a deep breath then dove into the water and headed for the ocean floor, curious what type of magical defenses the place had. Thankfully, it didn't take all that long to get down to the entrance of the small partially collapsed tunnel that connected the ocean with the large cave under the ocean. 'You'll be fine, just don't get hit by the obviously magical seafood.'

Myst took a moment to steady his nerves then pushed his way through the partially collapsed tunnel, the stones blocking his way breaking and crumbling under his kryptonian strength. He wiggled out of the tunnel into the surprisingly well lit cavern filled with various bioluminescent plants and giant marine creatures. He smiled slightly when he saw a massive crab that reminded him of the crab from Moana. 'Shiny!'

Myst pulled his attention away from the shiny crab and headed towards the section of the ruins that contained the crown he wanted. He spent a couple of minutes taking pictures with the nearly indestructible camera that Clark had loaned him and collecting the various magical items that hadn't succumbed to the water or the pressure in the ten thousand years they'd been sitting in salt water on the way to the crown.

He spent a couple minutes taking pictures of the giant marine life then swam over and carefully lifted the crown off the skeleton of the ancient atlantean king who’s lower body was crushed by rock, half expecting to get a vision or to have a Lord of Order show up. 'Huh, that was easier than I was expecting.'

He glanced around suspiciously then turned around and headed back towards the tunnel, wishing there was a convenient door that he could use to portal to D&D so he could portal back but wasn't sure that removing the crown from the world wouldn't trigger something and he wanted to take the crown apart on the enchanting altar before the Lords of Order noticed that someone had swiped the crown.

Myst frowned when he saw a massive shiny crab blocking the tunnel entrance, looking almost like it knew exactly what it was doing. It dashed at him, moving suspiciously fast for something the size of a house. He waved then zoomed past at speeds too fast for it to perceive, pausing and turning to watch as it attacked the water where he'd been standing. 'Yeah, kryptonians are bullshit,' he mused as he flew down the tunnel, rather happy with his haul and the stories he'd get to share and seeing no reason to fight the giant monster… not unless he managed to find some pokeballs anyway. ‘I always did want a shiny Krabby.’