“You’re running from the law
Now you’re a wanted man
That bitch can rot in hell
But she was the best you ever had
Your house, your car, your job
She took all your cash
That’s not the worst of it
She took all your stash
And I said
You got them fucked up blues oh yeah.”
– The Snowdroppers, “Fucked Up Blues”
Welcome to Shreveport, Louisiana. Or, welcome to Bossier-City, also Louisiana. Really, take your pick — There’s nothin’ but water and magic between ‘em. And like some are thirsty for water, you’re thirsty for the magic.
Oh yeah, no question. Magic’s real. I mean, it’s hidden; magicians call the magic subculture ‘the esoteric’ because it’s weird and you don’t talk about it. But it’s real, no question about that — You’ve seen it, touched it, and can do it. You’re not great at it, mind you, but you’ve got the knack, and understand the limits. It starts small. Here’s a few examples:
Laurie figured out that dreamcatchers really work, if you make them with old videotape instead of thread, and a small bit of ‘kick’ in the middle. She wears one around her neck, and she picks up on surface thoughts around her.
Michael gets it: ‘Skill’ and ‘talent’ is bullshit. Everything is luck, and once you ditch your pride and admit this, luck gets a lot kinder. The kind of bad shit that happens to other people just doesn’t seem to touch him. And there’s always a cab waiting for him when he needs one. So long as he keeps his kick in his pocket.
Jackie is a punk, and frankly most everyone in town can’t stand them, but they get the idea: The body is an illusion. Every morning, they clutch their kick and repeat the mantra — I am energy. This shell only contains me, it is not me. Jackie can fucking breath fire. Oh, not out at people. Just in. But fire and smoke don’t hurt ‘em, and they don’t really feel the weather.
That’s small time stuff though. Let’s timeskip five years, and see how they’re doing.
Laurie has really gone to town on her usual tricks. After binge watching most of the last VHS tapes the local rental place sold to her for nickles, she worked out that by ripping out bits of her dreamcatchers, she can slip the ragged bits of videotapes into people’s pockets and then can send her thoughts into other people’s heads. She can’t mind control, but she can think thoughts for other people, who will think of them just as their own. It’s about to get her in a lot of trouble.
Michael’s gone down a similar path. He used to think luck was just an impartial force, now he thinks ‘Lady Luck’ might be real, and he can ask her for favours. Put another way, he can hex people now. Mind you, karma’s a bitch: Any bad luck he puts on someone else, comes back to him eventually.
Jackie got dead. Like I said, they were a punk. But before they went down, they’d learned to set their goddamned fists on fire and turn their skin to ice.
All of them think there’s another step. (Well, except for Jackie. Dead’s dead.) A way up to ‘archmage’ status. But if so, none of them found it.
OK, but what’s this kick bullshit, right? Well, magic ain’t free. You need a power source. Hard to say why certain objects start humming with power, but they do. Religious artifacts are classics — Especially sentimental old ones. The cross bought off ChurchSupplies.com (Yes, that’s real) ain’t gonna have kick… but the one handmade by the first reverend of the church would. That chintzy Mother Mary plastic figurine has none… but this one that’s been handed down three generations now does.
The logic most mages tend to ascribe is this: Kick is human emotion, thought and need accumulating into physical objects over the decades, residing there and able to be drawn on. Which means sometimes you really don’t wanna know how, say, the sex toy on auction today has kick. You just don’t wanna know.
What you do wanna know is this: To do magic, you need kick. The more powerful the magic, the more kick you need. Worse, doing magic will, slowly but surely, wear out the kick on an object.
Hence, the need. Kick runs out. Finding more kick is essential. And for kick, you will bluff, steal, cheat, lie and smuggle.
Welcome to Shreveport. We got kick.
Hosted and narrated by:
Sean Riley (JackSlack)
Completed 03/14/16.
Scenes played: 11
License: Community License
18+
